Search Results for Environment

At UC Berkeley, scientists studying how to feed our growing need for energy have turned to a surprising source. As Lauren Sommer reports, researchers there are trying to produce the next generation of green power by mimicking something every weekend gardener works to clean up.

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Nov 23, 2009

If you have solar panels on your house, you can count on reducing your electricity bill. Maybe you'll pay nothing at all. But what if you produce more than you use? Well, until recently in California, you could consider it a gift to the local utility. But now, thanks to a new law, that will soon change. Amy Standen reports.

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Nov 9, 2009

It may seem that California's parks dodged a bullet recently when the Governor announced that all of the state's financially strapped parks will remain open, but state parks still have to cut $14 million in spending this year. This may lead to rolling closures, maintenance cuts and layoffs. Hoping to solve a chronic funding problem, environmentalists are considering a ballot proposal that would place a fee on car registrations to help fund parks.

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Nov 2, 2009

Conflicts over pesticide use have increased as new suburbs push up against farming areas in California. In the second part of our series, Sasha Khokha looks at how community residents are looking to document the impact of pesticides on their own health when those chemicals drift off the farm.

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Oct 26, 2009

Every year California farmers spray more than 150 million pounds of pesticides to keep insects from ravaging crops like almonds, oranges, and grapes. But when those toxins drift onto nearby farmworkers and communities, they sicken hundreds of people each year. California legislators tried to fix the problem five years ago, but new laws don't appear to have made much of a difference.

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Oct 19, 2009

Lying 28 miles off the coast of San Francisco, the Farallon Islands sit amid one of the most productive marine food webs on the planet and host the largest seabird breeding colony in the continental United States. QUEST ventures out for a rare visit to learn what life is like on the islands and meet the scientists who call this incredibly wild place home.

Play this TV Story Air Date: Oct 13, 2009

San José photographer Doug Nomura has learned just how to track his subjects to create arresting photos of birds in flight. He focuses his work on the Bay Trail, a 300-mile trail around the Bay. QUEST joins Nomura on the bayfront in Sunnyvale as he works to photograph the many bird species that call the South Bay's mudflats home, or stop here as part of their migration.

Play this TV Story Air Date: Oct 13, 2009

It's been twenty years since the Loma Prieta Earthquake ravaged downtown Santa Cruz and damaged San Francisco's Marina District and the Bay Bridge. QUEST looks at the dramatic improvements in earthquake prediction technology since 1989. But what can be done with ten seconds of warning?

Play this Radio Report Air Date: Oct 12, 2009

There's a hidden danger in San Francisco Bay: mercury. A potent neurotoxin that can cause serious illness, mercury has been flowing into the Bay since the mining days of the Gold Rush Era. It has settled in the Bay's mud and made its way up the food chain, endangering wildlife and making many fish unsafe to eat. Now a multi-billion-dollar plan aims to clean it up. But will it work?

Play this TV Story Air Date: Oct 6, 2009

QUEST examines how the Golden Gate National Recreation Area was saved from development, the rise of non-profit land trusts in protecting and restoring Northern California's open spaces, and how these vital places are used and maintained by the communities served by them.

Play this TV Story Air Date: Sep 29, 2009