Bloomberg: “The cement, glass and steel that give shape to urban life have also turned modern cities into dangerous heat sinks. Scorching sunlight gets absorbed, stored and slowly emitted in a bubble of warmth that can push city temperatures as much as 3°C (5.4°F) above the surrounding countryside. This dynamic, combined with the increasingly extreme… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Environmental Law
Can electric car batteries be recycled
Auto Blog: “Here’s what happens at the end of an EV battery’s life in an electric car. Electric vehicles are quickly becoming the go-to for many car buyers. Gas prices and environmental concerns are strong motivators for people to give up gas and go electric, but the segment is so new that there are still… Continue Reading
Open-source flight trackers have been repeatedly used to break news over the last few weeks
Vice: “More than 700,000 people were tracking the flight path of the U.S. military plane believed to be carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi this morning. She touched down in Taiwan at 10:50 pm local time, making Pelosi the first high-ranking American official to visit the self-governing island in 25 years, amid threats of a military… Continue Reading
The consciousness of bees
The Washington Post – “Experiments indicate that bees have surprisingly rich inner worlds…And now we are learning just how smart insects can be. As I show in my new book, “The Mind of a Bee,” the latest research indicates that even tiny-brained bees are profoundly intelligent creatures that can memorize not only flowers but also… Continue Reading
How flood maps can illuminate the risk from toxic waste sites
Fast Company: Climate science is clear: “Floodwaters are a growing risk for many American cities, threatening to displace not only people and housing but also the land-based pollution left behind by earlier industrial activities. In 2019, researchers at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigated climate-related risks at the 1,571 most polluted properties in the… Continue Reading
Cars Are Going Electric. What Happens to the Used Batteries?
Wired – “Used electric vehicle batteries could be the Achilles’ heel of the transportation revolution—or the gold mine that makes it real…Extracting the valuable materials from an EV battery is difficult and expensive. The recycling process typically involves shredding batteries, then breaking them down further with heat or chemicals at dedicated facilities. That part is… Continue Reading
Your gadgets die quickly by design. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Washington Post – “Our analysis of 14 popular consumer devices found most could stop working in 3 to 4 years because of irreplaceable batteries. Here’s how we get the tech industry to design products that last longer — and do less damage to the environment…We the users want electronics that are easy to use, beautiful… Continue Reading
The uneven energy costs of working from home
The Verge: “The COVID-19 pandemic has given us a sneak peek into how working from home changes electricity demand and what that might mean for Americans’ utility bills. The picture it’s painted so far isn’t very pretty, particularly for anyone who’s already struggling to meet their needs. The transition to remote work is changing our… Continue Reading
EPA 2021 TRI Preliminary Dataset
“The 2021 Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) preliminary dataset contains data about chemical releases, waste management and pollution prevention activities that took place during 2021 at more than 20,000 federal and industrial facilities across the country. The TRI preliminary dataset is available each July through September, giving the public access to the most recent TRI information,… Continue Reading
U.S. Will Plant One Billion Trees to Combat Climate Change
Smithsonian Magazine: “To help revitalize millions of acres of burned and damaged forests across the American West, the U.S. Department of Agriculture aims to plant more than one billion trees over the next decade. Wildfires and other issues have devastated U.S. woodlands in recent years, and Forest Service arborists can’t keep up with replanting lost… Continue Reading
Seven Key Provisions in the Climate Deal
Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 Summaries Inflation Reduction Act – One Page Summary Tax Summary Prescription Drugs Summary Energy Security and Climate Change Investments Summary Summary from the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Summary from the Committee on Environment and Public Works The National Law Review – Summary of the Inflation Reduction Act of… Continue Reading
NOAA tool now brings disaster risk, vulnerability down to community level
NOAA – “A comprehensive update to NOAA’s Billion Dollar Disasters mapping tool now includes U.S. census tract data – providing many users with local community-level awareness of hazard risk, exposure and vulnerability across more than 100 combinations of weather and climate hazards. The enhanced interactive maps from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) cover… Continue Reading
