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"content": "\u003cp>https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/qbl-int-usw2/QUEST+Nebraska/Radio/Stream/PrescribedBurnQuest.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71048\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 639px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/QUEST-jose-luis.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71048 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/QUEST-jose-luis.jpg\" alt=\"QUEST jose luis\" width=\"639\" height=\"360\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/QUEST-jose-luis.jpg 639w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/QUEST-jose-luis-400x225.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 639px) 100vw, 639px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jose Luis Duce, from Spain's Ministry of the Environment, is training to do a prescribed burn with firefighters from Spain, Colorado, Wyoming, California, and Nebraska. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71043\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 168px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Phil-Dye.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71043 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Phil-Dye-168x253.jpg\" alt=\"Phil Dye\" width=\"168\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Firefighter Phil Dye uses a flapper tool to put out any remaining flames on the black line. (Photo credit: Ben Wheeler, Pheasants Forever)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>If you’re working on a prescribed burn, you need to have a few things with you. “This tool here is called a thaw claw or a hoe… This is called a fire swatter or flapper,” said Phil Dye, a firefighter from the San Francisco Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The flapper looks exactly like a giant flyswatter. But that’s not how it’s used. Right now Dye and a few dozen firefighters are doing what’s called “black lining” just outside Elba, a small town on the Loup River in north central Nebraska. The crew is split into igniters and holders, and they’re walking along a 15-foot-wide line of grass that’s been mowed around the perimeter of a burn unit. The igniters pour gasoline on the short grass and then light the fire.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once the grass has burned black, the holders drag their flappers on the ground to smother any remaining flames. Tomorrow, if the weather, wind, and humidity are just right, the firefighters will set fire to the 700 acres inside the black line. That line keeps the fire from spreading outside the burn unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Basically, it’s a buffer, because fire’s not going to burn in an area that’s already been burned,” Dye said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71052\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 379px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Small-Cedars.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-71052\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Small-Cedars-379x253.jpg\" alt=\"Young eastern redcedars killed during the burn. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\" width=\"379\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Young eastern redcedars killed during the burn. (Photo credit: Ben Wheeler, Pheasants Forever)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Why burn?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The firefighters are participating in a 10-day-long training exchange hosted by \u003ca href=\"http://www.nature.org/\">The Nature Conservancy\u003c/a> and the nonprofit \u003ca href=\"http://nebraskapf.com/\">Pheasants Forever\u003c/a>. The exchange has two goals: one is for firefighters to train on a prescribed burn and the other is to actually burn 4,000 acres of land to control the eastern redcedar population on the prairie.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Redcedars are native to Nebraska, but they’re starting to take over grassland areas -- partly because of us. Ben Wheeler, the wildlife ecologist with the conservation group Pheasants Forever, said, “When white settlers moved in, we began some pretty aggressive fire-suppression campaigns, you know, because people were worried about fire going through their homesteads and being destructive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today the redcedar population has grown so much that parts of the prairie look more like forest than grassland. Wheeler says that eastern redcedars used to only grow where natural wildfire couldn’t reach them, like steep, northern-facing slopes. Without fire, Wheeler said, “Those refuge areas for trees expanded exponentially -- basically across the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71053\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 168px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Ashley.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71053 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Ashley-168x253.jpg\" alt=\"Ashley\" width=\"168\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Firefighter Ashley Whitworth sprays water along the edges of the black line that will end up being about 15 feet wide and encompass 700 acres. (Photo credit: Ben Wheeler, Pheasants Forever)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Don Westover, fire program leader with the \u003ca href=\"http://nfs.unl.edu/\">Nebraska Forest Service\u003c/a>, said recently that land management organizations like the U.S. Forest Service went from seeing fire as a threat to an integral force in prairie ecology. Westover said, “The U.S. Forest Service had a policy for a number of years that they called the \u003ca href=\"http://www.foresthistory.org/ASPNET/Policy/Fire/Suppression/Suppression.aspx\">10 am policy\u003c/a>, and that policy stated that all wildfires will be suppressed by 10 am the morning following the fire started.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That all changed for the Forest Service and other federal agencies about 25 years ago. Instead of putting every fire out, the current policy is to let wildfires happen under very controlled circumstances, like at the training exchange near Elba, Nebraska.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Keeping control\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Safety is every firefighter’s concern on the training exchange, especially for Dye, who is the burn’s plan chief. Every night he writes the \u003ca href=\"http://gpfirescience.missouristate.edu/assets/gpfirescience/NE_NRCSexampleBurnPlanFillable.pdf\">incident action plan\u003c/a>, or IAP, for the next day’s work. It’s a thick document that lists things like the burn’s objectives, weather forecast, each crew member’s assignment, and a go/no go checklist. Everything on the checklist has to be “yes before we can light fire,” Dye said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71041\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.33.52.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71041 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.33.52-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After spraying water on the borders of the black line, firefighters pour gas, ignite the grass, and wait for the fire to burn out. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The IAP is handbook, schedule, and manual all in one for the firefighters to refer to throughout the day. It cuts down on the chances that someone will accidentally start a fire. Dye has worked on grassland burns before, but not all the firefighters here have, like Ashley Whitworth, a firefighter in the Colorado Springs Fire Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve only done ditch burning and a few prescribed fires, but not 700 acres,” Whitworth said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71039\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.36.37.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71039 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.36.37-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Once the grass has burnt, the crew follows with flappers to make sure the fire is out. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There are also firefighters from Nebraska, Idaho, Minnesota, Utah, California, and even Spain. Jose Luis Duce works for the Ministry of Environment in Spain and is one of 12 visiting firefighters. He’s also never worked on a prescribed fire, but he says that Spain’s grasslands evolved with fire, similar to Nebraska’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This kind of fuel, we have this fuel in Spain,” Duce said, “but we don’t burn that much in Spain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fuel, to firefighters, means anything that will burn. In this case, Duce means grass. Like Nebraska, wildfire spreads easily in Spain because of that grass, and especially on dry, windy days. In July 2009, those factors led to \u003ca href=\"http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8167101.stm#map\">wildfires across Europe, from Spain to Turkey\u003c/a>, resulting in hundreds of people evacuating their homes and eight deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Duce thinks that’s why people are so reluctant to use fire as a management tool. “People only see the bad side of fire. It’s a part of the ecosystem. People don’t consider using fire as a natural tool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71042\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-15.17.31.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-71042\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-15.17.31-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"The blackline acts as a buffer to keep fire from spreading beyond what's planned. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The black line acts as a buffer to keep fire from spreading beyond the intended unit. It took the burn crew a few hours to complete this section of the line. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once the crew finishes black lining, the firefighters will head back to the command post to get some sleep. Except for Dye. He’ll be working late into the night on the burn plan for tomorrow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dye spends so much time on the IAP because it’s the only way to make sure the burn stays safe for everyone involved, from the firefighters to the landowners. And it’s those procedures that drew so many firefighters to Nebraska for the training.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch \u003ca href=\"http://netnebraska.org/media/media.php?bin=NET&vidgroup=40164419\">a timelapse video of the prescribed burn on the Loup River\u003c/a> from QUEST Nebraska.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe src=\"http://netnebraska.org/media/iframe.php?vidgroup=40164419&w=600&h=385&bin=NET\" width=\"100%\" height=\"385\" frameborder=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Redcedars are native to Nebraska, but they’re starting to take over grassland areas -- partly because of us. Ben Wheeler, the wildlife ecologist with the conservation group Pheasants Forever, said, “When white settlers moved in, we began some pretty aggressive fire-suppression campaigns, you know, because people were worried about fire going through their homesteads and being destructive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today the redcedar population has grown so much that parts of the prairie look more like forest than grassland. Wheeler says that eastern redcedars used to only grow where natural wildfire couldn’t reach them, like steep, northern-facing slopes. Without fire, Wheeler said, “Those refuge areas for trees expanded exponentially -- basically across the state.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71053\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 168px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Ashley.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71053 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Ashley-168x253.jpg\" alt=\"Ashley\" width=\"168\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Firefighter Ashley Whitworth sprays water along the edges of the black line that will end up being about 15 feet wide and encompass 700 acres. (Photo credit: Ben Wheeler, Pheasants Forever)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Don Westover, fire program leader with the \u003ca href=\"http://nfs.unl.edu/\">Nebraska Forest Service\u003c/a>, said recently that land management organizations like the U.S. Forest Service went from seeing fire as a threat to an integral force in prairie ecology. Westover said, “The U.S. Forest Service had a policy for a number of years that they called the \u003ca href=\"http://www.foresthistory.org/ASPNET/Policy/Fire/Suppression/Suppression.aspx\">10 am policy\u003c/a>, and that policy stated that all wildfires will be suppressed by 10 am the morning following the fire started.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That all changed for the Forest Service and other federal agencies about 25 years ago. Instead of putting every fire out, the current policy is to let wildfires happen under very controlled circumstances, like at the training exchange near Elba, Nebraska.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Keeping control\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Safety is every firefighter’s concern on the training exchange, especially for Dye, who is the burn’s plan chief. Every night he writes the \u003ca href=\"http://gpfirescience.missouristate.edu/assets/gpfirescience/NE_NRCSexampleBurnPlanFillable.pdf\">incident action plan\u003c/a>, or IAP, for the next day’s work. It’s a thick document that lists things like the burn’s objectives, weather forecast, each crew member’s assignment, and a go/no go checklist. Everything on the checklist has to be “yes before we can light fire,” Dye said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71041\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.33.52.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71041 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.33.52-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After spraying water on the borders of the black line, firefighters pour gas, ignite the grass, and wait for the fire to burn out. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The IAP is handbook, schedule, and manual all in one for the firefighters to refer to throughout the day. It cuts down on the chances that someone will accidentally start a fire. Dye has worked on grassland burns before, but not all the firefighters here have, like Ashley Whitworth, a firefighter in the Colorado Springs Fire Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve only done ditch burning and a few prescribed fires, but not 700 acres,” Whitworth said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71039\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.36.37.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71039 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-14.36.37-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Once the grass has burnt, the crew follows with flappers to make sure the fire is out. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>There are also firefighters from Nebraska, Idaho, Minnesota, Utah, California, and even Spain. Jose Luis Duce works for the Ministry of Environment in Spain and is one of 12 visiting firefighters. He’s also never worked on a prescribed fire, but he says that Spain’s grasslands evolved with fire, similar to Nebraska’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This kind of fuel, we have this fuel in Spain,” Duce said, “but we don’t burn that much in Spain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fuel, to firefighters, means anything that will burn. In this case, Duce means grass. Like Nebraska, wildfire spreads easily in Spain because of that grass, and especially on dry, windy days. In July 2009, those factors led to \u003ca href=\"http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8167101.stm#map\">wildfires across Europe, from Spain to Turkey\u003c/a>, resulting in hundreds of people evacuating their homes and eight deaths.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Duce thinks that’s why people are so reluctant to use fire as a management tool. “People only see the bad side of fire. It’s a part of the ecosystem. People don’t consider using fire as a natural tool.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71042\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-15.17.31.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-71042\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/2014-03-28-15.17.31-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"The blackline acts as a buffer to keep fire from spreading beyond what's planned. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The black line acts as a buffer to keep fire from spreading beyond the intended unit. It took the burn crew a few hours to complete this section of the line. (Photo credit: Jackie Sojico, QUEST Nebraska)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Once the crew finishes black lining, the firefighters will head back to the command post to get some sleep. Except for Dye. He’ll be working late into the night on the burn plan for tomorrow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dye spends so much time on the IAP because it’s the only way to make sure the burn stays safe for everyone involved, from the firefighters to the landowners. And it’s those procedures that drew so many firefighters to Nebraska for the training.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch \u003ca href=\"http://netnebraska.org/media/media.php?bin=NET&vidgroup=40164419\">a timelapse video of the prescribed burn on the Loup River\u003c/a> from QUEST Nebraska.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>It’s not your fault, gardeners. Strawberries are not very well suited to this \u003ca href=\"http://www.plantmaps.com/interactive-north-carolina-usda-plant-zone-hardiness-map.php\" target=\"_blank\">hot, dry climate\u003c/a>. That’s why your garden-variety strawberries probably don’t look -- or taste -- much like the plump varieties found at farm stands or grocery stores. But help is on the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The fact is, the North Carolina climate is hostile to the so-called “love fruit.” These delicate seed receptacles are more suited to temperate climates, \u003ca href=\"http://www.fred.ifas.ufl.edu/pdf/webinar/Strawberry.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">like coastal California\u003c/a>, where cool, moist nights help the plant thrive. But strawberries \u003cstrong>can\u003c/strong> flourish in more extreme climates, thanks to science and “North Carolina is able to grow strawberries because of all the science and technology that is devoted to the crop,” said Debby Wechsler, executive secretary of the North Carolina Strawberry Association. “It’s really what is known as intense management. It takes a lot of care. It’s not like you just throw them out and let them grow.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A good example of that intense management can be seen on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.wallerfamilyfarm.com/Site/Welcome.html\" target=\"_blank\">Waller Family Farm\u003c/a> in Durham, NC. Mark Waller farms 40 acres of strawberries on what used to be a tobacco farm. Customers can pick their own strawberries or visit the market he runs during the strawberry season, which lasts anywhere from April through June.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once we see about eight to ten blooms per plant, we really pick up the intensity around the farm,” said Waller. “Not only are we fertilizing but we are also really watching for frost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s where North Carolina State University Professor Emeritus Barclay Poling’s research comes in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it’s real humid, with ‘lots of moisture in the air’ type of night, we can get frost or ice crystals on the bloom and we’ve killed blossoms as high as 31 degrees, which is really interesting,” explained Poling. “If it’s a dry night, with a low dew point, in those conditions the flowers can super cool to as low as 27, so that’s quite a range.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcV_jYeHGQ0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Watch this video to learn how farmers and scientists use digital thermometers to help strawberries thrive in North Carolina.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Poling has found the average critical temperature for strawberry blooms in the state is 28 degrees. If the blooms get much colder than that, they will either stay dormant and wait for warmer weather or possibly die if the cold persists. Because the blooms are the most vulnerable tissue for the strawberry plant, and the most critical to a successful harvest, Poling compiles a wealth of weather information into an alert system to warn farmers of significant weather events during the all-important spring growing season.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a key tool in this “nurture versus nature” battle is a new type of handheld digital thermometer, which Poling helped develop. Electrodes at one end of a wire are inserted into the strawberry blossoms while the other end of the wire is connected to a digital thermometer. The device reads the temperature of the strawberry blossom. Farmers use those readings together with the weather forecast to decide whether to cover the crops or irrigate them to protect from frost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s not just protection from the cold: the handheld thermometer is also helpful as the weather gets warm. If the strawberry blossom temperature gets too high, the farmer needs to increase irrigation to cool the plants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71007\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 450px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/IMG_8109_640x360.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71007\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/IMG_8109_640x360-450x253.jpg\" alt=\"IMG_8109_640x360\" width=\"450\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The United States is the world's leading strawberry producer, accounting for \u003ca href=\"http://www.fred.ifas.ufl.edu/pdf/webinar/Strawberry.pdf\">over 25 percent of global production\u003c/a>.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The reality is that for all of the help science has provided to strawberry farmers, Mother Nature is still full of surprises and challenges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sort of like going out on a hike and seeing a sign that says ‘unmarked trail,’” said Poling as he smiled and plucked a berry from a plant to examine it. “For all we can monitor and plan for, every strawberry season is an unmarked trail, and so you go out and anticipate what might be happening, but you are never sure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So where does that leave you, the intrepid gardener, trying to grow strawberries in this hostile North Carolina environment? Well, you can either invest in one of Poling’s $1,000 thermometers, or you can head to your closest \u003ca href=\"http://www.pickyourown.org/NC.htm\" target=\"_blank\">“U-pick” farm\u003c/a>, walk the rows, and pick your own perfectly plump strawberries for under $2 a pound.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>It’s not your fault, gardeners. Strawberries are not very well suited to this \u003ca href=\"http://www.plantmaps.com/interactive-north-carolina-usda-plant-zone-hardiness-map.php\" target=\"_blank\">hot, dry climate\u003c/a>. That’s why your garden-variety strawberries probably don’t look -- or taste -- much like the plump varieties found at farm stands or grocery stores. But help is on the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The fact is, the North Carolina climate is hostile to the so-called “love fruit.” These delicate seed receptacles are more suited to temperate climates, \u003ca href=\"http://www.fred.ifas.ufl.edu/pdf/webinar/Strawberry.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">like coastal California\u003c/a>, where cool, moist nights help the plant thrive. But strawberries \u003cstrong>can\u003c/strong> flourish in more extreme climates, thanks to science and “North Carolina is able to grow strawberries because of all the science and technology that is devoted to the crop,” said Debby Wechsler, executive secretary of the North Carolina Strawberry Association. “It’s really what is known as intense management. It takes a lot of care. It’s not like you just throw them out and let them grow.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A good example of that intense management can be seen on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.wallerfamilyfarm.com/Site/Welcome.html\" target=\"_blank\">Waller Family Farm\u003c/a> in Durham, NC. Mark Waller farms 40 acres of strawberries on what used to be a tobacco farm. Customers can pick their own strawberries or visit the market he runs during the strawberry season, which lasts anywhere from April through June.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once we see about eight to ten blooms per plant, we really pick up the intensity around the farm,” said Waller. “Not only are we fertilizing but we are also really watching for frost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And that’s where North Carolina State University Professor Emeritus Barclay Poling’s research comes in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it’s real humid, with ‘lots of moisture in the air’ type of night, we can get frost or ice crystals on the bloom and we’ve killed blossoms as high as 31 degrees, which is really interesting,” explained Poling. “If it’s a dry night, with a low dew point, in those conditions the flowers can super cool to as low as 27, so that’s quite a range.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/BcV_jYeHGQ0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/BcV_jYeHGQ0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Watch this video to learn how farmers and scientists use digital thermometers to help strawberries thrive in North Carolina.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Poling has found the average critical temperature for strawberry blooms in the state is 28 degrees. If the blooms get much colder than that, they will either stay dormant and wait for warmer weather or possibly die if the cold persists. Because the blooms are the most vulnerable tissue for the strawberry plant, and the most critical to a successful harvest, Poling compiles a wealth of weather information into an alert system to warn farmers of significant weather events during the all-important spring growing season.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a key tool in this “nurture versus nature” battle is a new type of handheld digital thermometer, which Poling helped develop. Electrodes at one end of a wire are inserted into the strawberry blossoms while the other end of the wire is connected to a digital thermometer. The device reads the temperature of the strawberry blossom. Farmers use those readings together with the weather forecast to decide whether to cover the crops or irrigate them to protect from frost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s not just protection from the cold: the handheld thermometer is also helpful as the weather gets warm. If the strawberry blossom temperature gets too high, the farmer needs to increase irrigation to cool the plants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71007\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 450px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/IMG_8109_640x360.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71007\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/IMG_8109_640x360-450x253.jpg\" alt=\"IMG_8109_640x360\" width=\"450\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The United States is the world's leading strawberry producer, accounting for \u003ca href=\"http://www.fred.ifas.ufl.edu/pdf/webinar/Strawberry.pdf\">over 25 percent of global production\u003c/a>.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The reality is that for all of the help science has provided to strawberry farmers, Mother Nature is still full of surprises and challenges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sort of like going out on a hike and seeing a sign that says ‘unmarked trail,’” said Poling as he smiled and plucked a berry from a plant to examine it. “For all we can monitor and plan for, every strawberry season is an unmarked trail, and so you go out and anticipate what might be happening, but you are never sure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So where does that leave you, the intrepid gardener, trying to grow strawberries in this hostile North Carolina environment? Well, you can either invest in one of Poling’s $1,000 thermometers, or you can head to your closest \u003ca href=\"http://www.pickyourown.org/NC.htm\" target=\"_blank\">“U-pick” farm\u003c/a>, walk the rows, and pick your own perfectly plump strawberries for under $2 a pound.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "As Tropics Expand, Tropical Storms Follow",
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"content": "\u003cp>He discovered the trend by accident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jim Kossin, a NOAA scientist stationed in Madison, Wisconsin, started tracking tropical cyclones to settle a disagreement about the temperature at the bottom of the stratosphere. When he looked at all the data he’d gotten about cylcones’ positions, it was clear: they’ve been \u003ca href=\"http://www.news.wisc.edu/22857\">wandering\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tropical cyclones, a category that includes \u003cstrong>hurricanes\u003c/strong> and \u003cstrong>typhoons\u003c/strong>, are rotating storms hundreds of miles wide. Once one forms, it gathers strength as water evaporates from the ocean’s surface; it hits a maximum intensity and then wanes and finally dissipates. What Kossin noticed was that over the last 30 years, even though there hasn’t been a change in the frequency or the peak strength of cyclones, they’ve been hitting that peak farther and farther from the equator. His research, \u003ca href=\"http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v509/n7500/full/nature13278.html\">published\u003c/a> in \u003cstrong>Nature\u003c/strong>, showed that those points of maximum intensity are inching toward the poles at more than 30 miles per decade, putting communities at higher latitudes at greater risk of damage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71149\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/cyclones.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-71149\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/cyclones-640x277.jpg\" alt=\"Data from the National Climatic Data Center show where tropical cyclones have reached their maximum intensity between 1982 and 2012. Over time, these points are creeping away from the Equator. Image by Hamish Ramsay. \" width=\"640\" height=\"277\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Data from the National Climatic Data Center show where tropical cyclones have reached their maximum intensity between 1982 and 2012. Over time, these points are creeping away from the Equator. Image by Hamish Ramsay.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This slow exodus out of the tropics reflects changes in the climatic conditions that nurture these storms. Factors like water temperature, humidity, and the temperature difference between the bottom and the top of the lowest layer of the atmosphere combine to determine a cyclone’s maximum possible strength. Whether or not a storm ever reaches that theoretical ferocity, though, depends on the winds it encounters along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Think of them like a cylinder,” Kossin said. “They like to be vertical.” If there’s a lot of “wind shear,” meaning the wind’s speed or direction changes dramatically as you move upward, that cylinder gets disrupted. Kossin likens the effect of wind shear on cyclones to trying to move a phone book by pushing only on the top few pages. “You can push the phone book as a whole across the table and it's fine,” he explains, “but if you just push on the top and hold the bottom steady, it will shear.” That kind of shear will sap a cyclone’s strength.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the deep tropics -- places like the southern Philippines -- the temperature and humidity are changing to discourage strong cyclones. Meanwhile, the wind shear is strengthening, weakening cyclones when they form. On the other hand, said Kossin, “if you move away from the equator towards higher latitudes, the opposite is true: the potential intensity is getting relatively stronger, and the shear is getting relatively weaker. The deep tropics are becoming less hospitable, and the higher latitudes are becoming less hostile to tropical cyclones.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What’s really compelling to Kossin is that the cyclones’ shift seems to mirror another trend: the \u003ca href=\"http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071203-AP-expanding-tropics.html\">expansion\u003c/a> of the tropics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71150\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-71150\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg\" alt=\"The incredible damage inflicted on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 may become more commonplace at higher latitudes. Image by Eoghan Rice - Trócaire / Caritas.\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg 640w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591-400x267.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The incredible damage inflicted on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 may become more commonplace at higher latitudes. Image by Eoghan Rice - Trócaire / Caritas.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On a map, the tropics are defined by latitude lines. But their characteristic weather patterns are determined far above ground, by a tunnel of air called the Hadley circulation. Warm air rises at the equator and is propelled toward the poles before falling and curling back on itself at a northerly latitude near the Texas-Mexico border and a southerly latitude bisecting South Africa. Where this warm, dry air descends, deserts form, and the tropics end.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the late 1970s, though, the Hadley winds have been traveling a few degrees of latitude farther from the equator before dropping back to Earth. Explanations for this tropical expansion vary -- too much ozone pollution in the lower atmosphere, too little protective ozone in the upper atmosphere, greenhouse gases that heat up the air and allow it to travel farther -- but they’re all related to human activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s too early to conclusively demonstrate that this human-fueled expansion of the tropics is what’s propelling cyclones into new latitudes, but the two trends are strikingly similar. Cyclones are moving north and south at about the same rate as the tropics. When the tropical expansion temporarily sped up in the 1990s, cyclones hustled poleward more quickly, too. Expanding tropics will create more deserts, and the cyclones traveling with them will put new communities in harm’s way while depriving others of seasonal downpours. Together, these two trends mean that the lives of people living anywhere near the equator could look very different just a few decades from now.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>He discovered the trend by accident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Jim Kossin, a NOAA scientist stationed in Madison, Wisconsin, started tracking tropical cyclones to settle a disagreement about the temperature at the bottom of the stratosphere. When he looked at all the data he’d gotten about cylcones’ positions, it was clear: they’ve been \u003ca href=\"http://www.news.wisc.edu/22857\">wandering\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tropical cyclones, a category that includes \u003cstrong>hurricanes\u003c/strong> and \u003cstrong>typhoons\u003c/strong>, are rotating storms hundreds of miles wide. Once one forms, it gathers strength as water evaporates from the ocean’s surface; it hits a maximum intensity and then wanes and finally dissipates. What Kossin noticed was that over the last 30 years, even though there hasn’t been a change in the frequency or the peak strength of cyclones, they’ve been hitting that peak farther and farther from the equator. His research, \u003ca href=\"http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v509/n7500/full/nature13278.html\">published\u003c/a> in \u003cstrong>Nature\u003c/strong>, showed that those points of maximum intensity are inching toward the poles at more than 30 miles per decade, putting communities at higher latitudes at greater risk of damage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71149\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/cyclones.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-71149\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/cyclones-640x277.jpg\" alt=\"Data from the National Climatic Data Center show where tropical cyclones have reached their maximum intensity between 1982 and 2012. Over time, these points are creeping away from the Equator. Image by Hamish Ramsay. \" width=\"640\" height=\"277\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Data from the National Climatic Data Center show where tropical cyclones have reached their maximum intensity between 1982 and 2012. Over time, these points are creeping away from the Equator. Image by Hamish Ramsay.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This slow exodus out of the tropics reflects changes in the climatic conditions that nurture these storms. Factors like water temperature, humidity, and the temperature difference between the bottom and the top of the lowest layer of the atmosphere combine to determine a cyclone’s maximum possible strength. Whether or not a storm ever reaches that theoretical ferocity, though, depends on the winds it encounters along the way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Think of them like a cylinder,” Kossin said. “They like to be vertical.” If there’s a lot of “wind shear,” meaning the wind’s speed or direction changes dramatically as you move upward, that cylinder gets disrupted. Kossin likens the effect of wind shear on cyclones to trying to move a phone book by pushing only on the top few pages. “You can push the phone book as a whole across the table and it's fine,” he explains, “but if you just push on the top and hold the bottom steady, it will shear.” That kind of shear will sap a cyclone’s strength.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the deep tropics -- places like the southern Philippines -- the temperature and humidity are changing to discourage strong cyclones. Meanwhile, the wind shear is strengthening, weakening cyclones when they form. On the other hand, said Kossin, “if you move away from the equator towards higher latitudes, the opposite is true: the potential intensity is getting relatively stronger, and the shear is getting relatively weaker. The deep tropics are becoming less hospitable, and the higher latitudes are becoming less hostile to tropical cyclones.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What’s really compelling to Kossin is that the cyclones’ shift seems to mirror another trend: the \u003ca href=\"http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071203-AP-expanding-tropics.html\">expansion\u003c/a> of the tropics.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71150\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-71150\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg\" alt=\"The incredible damage inflicted on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 may become more commonplace at higher latitudes. Image by Eoghan Rice - Trócaire / Caritas.\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591.jpg 640w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2014/05/Tacloban_Typhoon_Haiyan_2013-11-14-e1403295113591-400x267.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The incredible damage inflicted on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 may become more commonplace at higher latitudes. Image by Eoghan Rice - Trócaire / Caritas.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On a map, the tropics are defined by latitude lines. But their characteristic weather patterns are determined far above ground, by a tunnel of air called the Hadley circulation. Warm air rises at the equator and is propelled toward the poles before falling and curling back on itself at a northerly latitude near the Texas-Mexico border and a southerly latitude bisecting South Africa. Where this warm, dry air descends, deserts form, and the tropics end.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since the late 1970s, though, the Hadley winds have been traveling a few degrees of latitude farther from the equator before dropping back to Earth. Explanations for this tropical expansion vary -- too much ozone pollution in the lower atmosphere, too little protective ozone in the upper atmosphere, greenhouse gases that heat up the air and allow it to travel farther -- but they’re all related to human activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s too early to conclusively demonstrate that this human-fueled expansion of the tropics is what’s propelling cyclones into new latitudes, but the two trends are strikingly similar. Cyclones are moving north and south at about the same rate as the tropics. When the tropical expansion temporarily sped up in the 1990s, cyclones hustled poleward more quickly, too. Expanding tropics will create more deserts, and the cyclones traveling with them will put new communities in harm’s way while depriving others of seasonal downpours. Together, these two trends mean that the lives of people living anywhere near the equator could look very different just a few decades from now.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>\"\u003c/em>\u003cstrong>From the ashes of catastrophe, life somehow manages to rise again. This thought hung on Daisy’s mind, sweat pouring down her face, as she uttered a reassuring click to Bud and Betsy, the pair of Belgian draft horses drawing the plow\u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>.”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71097\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 489px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-71097\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy-548x360.jpg\" alt=\"Daisy plowing\" width=\"489\" height=\"321\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Illustration by John Miller\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>You wouldn’t expect those opening words from a story set six decades from today. But those kinds of surprises abound in the tales told in “\u003ca title=\"Yahara 2070 home page\" href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070\">Yahara 2070\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project is part of an intensive study of the land, lakes, and rivers incorporating and surrounding Madison, Wisconsin, a thousand-square-kilometer area known as the Yahara Watershed. To engage community thought and discussion, “Yahara 2070” uses illustrated stories set in the year 2070 to explore four distinct imagined futures for the region’s environment and society, each with its own descriptive title and logo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I\u003cimg class=\"alignleft wp-image-71098 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy_Icon-153x169.jpg\" alt=\"Daisy_Icon\" width=\"83\" height=\"91\">n “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/abandonment\">Abandonment and Renewal\u003c/a>,” from which the lines above are taken, the population is unprepared for a dramatic rise in temperature. Government is unable to manage ecological disaster and the area begins to return to the wild, including animals, like elephants, who have escaped the local zoo. Brave settlers have returned to the area, joining those who were unable to evacuate, and together they work to carve out a new way of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In another scenario, “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/innovation\">Accelerated Innovation\u003c/a>,” technology provides the path away from\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Accelerated_Icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignright wp-image-71095\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Accelerated_Icon-149x169.jpg\" alt=\"Accelerated_Icon\" width=\"89\" height=\"101\">\u003c/a> environmental ruin. Agricultural automation optimizes water use, reducing runoff, and ecologically destructive cattle raising has been replaced by genetically engineered, “motherless” meat created in laboratories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/CC_Icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignleft wp-image-71096\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/CC_Icon-157x169.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"83\" height=\"89\">\u003c/a>While the Robert Frost line may read that good fences make good neighbors, in “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/connected\">Connected Communities\u003c/a>,” neighbors have removed fences, creating space for community gardens and parks. This symbolizes a societal shift in values toward cooperation, community and sustainability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/nested\">Nested Watersheds\u003c/a>” takes an idea first proposed by 19th century explorer John Wesley Powell that our largely arbitrary state boundaries be redrawn\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Nested_icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignright wp-image-71100\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Nested_icon-169x169.jpg\" alt=\"Nested_icon\" width=\"88\" height=\"88\">\u003c/a> around watersheds. More water-centric forms of governance are adopted after years of drought and water scarcity, placing a premium on conservation, and rewarding farmers for practices that regenerate groundwater while preventing runoff and erosion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-71105\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg\" alt=\"Land cover map for abandonment scenario\" width=\"605\" height=\"372\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg 605w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps-400x246.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 605px) 100vw, 605px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\nBased on extensive data\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the stories are futuristic science fiction, they are grounded in present-day scientific fact. Background for the scenarios comes from extensive data collection on land use in the Yahara watershed. Modeling how present trends could play out over the coming decades informs the conditions that become the setting for each story. The projection seen above shows the abandonment scenario, with a large swath of green representing a return to forest and grassland after depopulation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Hearing hopes and fears\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The quantitative approach of data and projection is combined with qualitative methods of interview and discussion. “We began this project by interviewing a large number of people and conducting workshops with about a hundred people in the watershed to hear what they think about the future. What are the stories in their head about the future? What are their fears, their hopes for the future?” explained Steve Carpenter, “Yahara 2070” leader and director of the University of Wisconsin Center for Limnology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Putting thought to paper\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Synthesizing those hopes and fears with the background of a changing environment into narratives fell to project writer Jenny Seifert. Unlike producers of all too many high-concept Hollywood science fiction films, Seifert didn’t forget to create stories on a human scale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I created characters for each story,” she said. “So I really think about these moments in time for these characters. Focusing on these moments really was my way of trying to help people connect with the stories and kind of see themselves and see what their life could be like.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71099\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 385px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Felix.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71099\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Felix-464x360.jpg\" alt=\"Felix swimming in lake with elephant in backdrop\" width=\"385\" height=\"299\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Illustration by John Miller\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“Felix heard a loud rustle on the shoreline that startled him into alertness. Cougars are known to stalk these shores, and even though he knew the odds that one would bother to jump in after him were miniscule, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of dread as he eyed the distance between himself and the pier, where his machete lay. Then, a trumpet-like noise bellowed from the trees, and the mammoth head of an elephant emerged. Phew, thought Felix. Just an elephant.”\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>- Excerpt from “Abandonment and Renewal”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Imagining and imaging \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Deciding what life could be like, or look like, was a special challenge for the project’s illustrator, John Miller, particularly with the technology involved in some of the scenarios. Contemplating his iPhone, Miller said, “You take a look at something like this and it’s just so different from the original phone that if I were to create something, to invent something, nobody would know what I’m showing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asking “What if…”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The team makes clear they are not trying to invent the future, or even predict it. Rather, the use of scenarios is a tool to help prepare for what the future may bring.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The idea of the scenarios is to develop stories about the future that organize our thinking. Carpenter explained, “and also provide guidance to us as scientists about what we should be learning to simulate in order to understand the future.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which of these scenarios seems most likely? Will pachyderms prowl the prairie? Will Wisconsin’s beloved bratwurst be petri-dish-processed before hitting the grill? Both the good and bad parts of each scenario are worth contemplating as we all collectively create the future.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>\"\u003c/em>\u003cstrong>From the ashes of catastrophe, life somehow manages to rise again. This thought hung on Daisy’s mind, sweat pouring down her face, as she uttered a reassuring click to Bud and Betsy, the pair of Belgian draft horses drawing the plow\u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>.”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71097\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 489px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-71097\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy-548x360.jpg\" alt=\"Daisy plowing\" width=\"489\" height=\"321\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Illustration by John Miller\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>You wouldn’t expect those opening words from a story set six decades from today. But those kinds of surprises abound in the tales told in “\u003ca title=\"Yahara 2070 home page\" href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070\">Yahara 2070\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project is part of an intensive study of the land, lakes, and rivers incorporating and surrounding Madison, Wisconsin, a thousand-square-kilometer area known as the Yahara Watershed. To engage community thought and discussion, “Yahara 2070” uses illustrated stories set in the year 2070 to explore four distinct imagined futures for the region’s environment and society, each with its own descriptive title and logo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I\u003cimg class=\"alignleft wp-image-71098 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Daisy_Icon-153x169.jpg\" alt=\"Daisy_Icon\" width=\"83\" height=\"91\">n “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/abandonment\">Abandonment and Renewal\u003c/a>,” from which the lines above are taken, the population is unprepared for a dramatic rise in temperature. Government is unable to manage ecological disaster and the area begins to return to the wild, including animals, like elephants, who have escaped the local zoo. Brave settlers have returned to the area, joining those who were unable to evacuate, and together they work to carve out a new way of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In another scenario, “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/innovation\">Accelerated Innovation\u003c/a>,” technology provides the path away from\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Accelerated_Icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignright wp-image-71095\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Accelerated_Icon-149x169.jpg\" alt=\"Accelerated_Icon\" width=\"89\" height=\"101\">\u003c/a> environmental ruin. Agricultural automation optimizes water use, reducing runoff, and ecologically destructive cattle raising has been replaced by genetically engineered, “motherless” meat created in laboratories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/CC_Icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignleft wp-image-71096\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/CC_Icon-157x169.jpg\" alt=\"Print\" width=\"83\" height=\"89\">\u003c/a>While the Robert Frost line may read that good fences make good neighbors, in “\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/connected\">Connected Communities\u003c/a>,” neighbors have removed fences, creating space for community gardens and parks. This symbolizes a societal shift in values toward cooperation, community and sustainability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“\u003ca href=\"https://wsc.limnology.wisc.edu/yahara2070/nested\">Nested Watersheds\u003c/a>” takes an idea first proposed by 19th century explorer John Wesley Powell that our largely arbitrary state boundaries be redrawn\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Nested_icon.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"alignright wp-image-71100\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Nested_icon-169x169.jpg\" alt=\"Nested_icon\" width=\"88\" height=\"88\">\u003c/a> around watersheds. More water-centric forms of governance are adopted after years of drought and water scarcity, placing a premium on conservation, and rewarding farmers for practices that regenerate groundwater while preventing runoff and erosion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-71105\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg\" alt=\"Land cover map for abandonment scenario\" width=\"605\" height=\"372\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps.jpg 605w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/AR_landcover_maps-400x246.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 605px) 100vw, 605px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\nBased on extensive data\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the stories are futuristic science fiction, they are grounded in present-day scientific fact. Background for the scenarios comes from extensive data collection on land use in the Yahara watershed. Modeling how present trends could play out over the coming decades informs the conditions that become the setting for each story. The projection seen above shows the abandonment scenario, with a large swath of green representing a return to forest and grassland after depopulation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Hearing hopes and fears\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The quantitative approach of data and projection is combined with qualitative methods of interview and discussion. “We began this project by interviewing a large number of people and conducting workshops with about a hundred people in the watershed to hear what they think about the future. What are the stories in their head about the future? What are their fears, their hopes for the future?” explained Steve Carpenter, “Yahara 2070” leader and director of the University of Wisconsin Center for Limnology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Putting thought to paper\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Synthesizing those hopes and fears with the background of a changing environment into narratives fell to project writer Jenny Seifert. Unlike producers of all too many high-concept Hollywood science fiction films, Seifert didn’t forget to create stories on a human scale.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I created characters for each story,” she said. “So I really think about these moments in time for these characters. Focusing on these moments really was my way of trying to help people connect with the stories and kind of see themselves and see what their life could be like.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_71099\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 385px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Felix.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-71099\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/09/Felix-464x360.jpg\" alt=\"Felix swimming in lake with elephant in backdrop\" width=\"385\" height=\"299\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Illustration by John Miller\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“Felix heard a loud rustle on the shoreline that startled him into alertness. Cougars are known to stalk these shores, and even though he knew the odds that one would bother to jump in after him were miniscule, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of dread as he eyed the distance between himself and the pier, where his machete lay. Then, a trumpet-like noise bellowed from the trees, and the mammoth head of an elephant emerged. Phew, thought Felix. Just an elephant.”\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>- Excerpt from “Abandonment and Renewal”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Imagining and imaging \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Deciding what life could be like, or look like, was a special challenge for the project’s illustrator, John Miller, particularly with the technology involved in some of the scenarios. Contemplating his iPhone, Miller said, “You take a look at something like this and it’s just so different from the original phone that if I were to create something, to invent something, nobody would know what I’m showing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Asking “What if…”\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The team makes clear they are not trying to invent the future, or even predict it. Rather, the use of scenarios is a tool to help prepare for what the future may bring.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The idea of the scenarios is to develop stories about the future that organize our thinking. Carpenter explained, “and also provide guidance to us as scientists about what we should be learning to simulate in order to understand the future.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Which of these scenarios seems most likely? Will pachyderms prowl the prairie? Will Wisconsin’s beloved bratwurst be petri-dish-processed before hitting the grill? Both the good and bad parts of each scenario are worth contemplating as we all collectively create the future.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>The next time you drop a bottle marketed as biodegradable into your reusable grocery bag, pause. \u003ca href=\"http://cfaes.osu.edu/news/articles/bio-plastics-not-so-good-biodegrading-ohio-state-study\" target=\"_blank\">New research\u003c/a> shows that not all of these plastics are made equal: some don’t actually biodegrade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plastic pollution is a global issue. Long-lasting plastics \u003ca href=\"http://www.theoec.org/campaign/recycling-landfills\" target=\"_blank\">cramp landfills\u003c/a>, pile up in city streets, and create toxic problems in rivers, oceans, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.ohio.gov/Portals/34/document/newspdfs/n_cdd_leachate_evaluation.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">drinking water\u003c/a>. Americans generate over 30 million tons of plastic waste each year, and only 8 percent of that is recycled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Ohio, plastics are the largest component going into the waste stream, according to recycling expert \u003ca href=\"http://epa.ohio.gov/dmwm/home/recycle.aspx\" target=\"_blank\">Terrie Termeer with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. \u003c/a>Concerns about this influx throughout the U.S. have given rise to a new kind of “biodegradable” plastic, which Termeer says is gaining in popularity. Companies are actively designing products that degrade quickly and that are sometimes made from plant feedstocks, appealing to consumers who don’t want to leave behind piles of waste or use materials that are “bad” for the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers picked up on the trend, too, some of whom felt it was cause for concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was always curious about, you know, do they actually biodegrade?” said \u003ca href=\"http://fabe.osu.edu/our-people/frederick-michel-jr\" target=\"_blank\">Fred Michel\u003c/a>, a waste-management expert and professor at Ohio State University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Biodegradability, a measure of how well something breaks down in compost, soil, or landfills, is an ambiguous term at best. Everything biodegrades completely over time, but your car might take a few thousand years longer to fall apart than, say, a tissue. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has attempted to clarify the term to prevent misleading advertising, but the definition is complex. According to the FTC, a product is biodegradable if it breaks down in certain environments, like compost bins, within a \"reasonable\" amount of time. But each environment dictates different interpretations of “reasonable.” Ultimately, the FTC notes that no matter where something breaks down, it needs to be completely returned to nature within a one-year timeframe in order to be marketed as “degradable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70919\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 364px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/examples-of-exp.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-70919\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/examples-of-exp-431x360.jpg\" alt=\"Michel and his team tested materials like coconut hull, asphalt-covered plastic, and additive-boosted polypropylene.\" width=\"364\" height=\"304\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michel and his team tested materials like coconut hull, asphalt-covered plastic, and additive-boosted polypropylene. Photo courtesy of Fred Michel.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To make a plastic biodegradable, manufacturers have started putting in additives that supposedly allow even the sturdiest plastics to degrade in a backyard compost pile. To Michel, this seemed like an example of \u003ca href=\"http://hbr.org/product/the-drivers-of-greenwashing/an/CMR494-PDF-ENG?N=4294958507&Ntt=+&Nao=1540\" target=\"_blank\">greenwashing\u003c/a>-- a term that refers to misleading marketing tactics that appeal to the Captain Planet in each of us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was skeptical about it from the beginning because those materials don’t usually biodegrade,” Michel said. “It’s difficult to imagine a material you could add to them that would magically make them biodegradable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In theory, biodegradable additives work by \u003ca href=\"http://www.goecopure.com/technology/\" target=\"_blank\">attracting microbes that in turn attract more microbes\u003c/a>, increasing the rate of degradation. Some manufacturers also claim the additives are organic and nontoxic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michel reviewed the research but was unable to find evidence to support manufacturers’ claims, so he ran his own experiment. Michel and his team rounded up all sorts of plastics to test their biodegradability: a motley collection of natural fibers, petroleum-based materials with the biodegradability additives, and plastics that shouldn’t biodegrade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0141391013003066\" target=\"_blank\">results of the research\u003c/a>, published in December 2013, were disconcerting. Traditional plastics with the “biodegradable” additives didn’t break down any more quickly than those without.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wasn’t surprised,” Michel said, “but it’s just interesting that there are materials in the market like that, that have claims that don’t seem to be justified in our testing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The FTC soon caught wind of the results and began investigating ECM BioFilms, an Ohio-based manufacturer that makes a plastic additive analyzed in Michel’s experiment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ECM investigation, which remains tied up in court, represents the first time the FTC has ever pursued plastic biodegradability claims. Meanwhile, the FTC has also begun a closed \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2014/05/ftc-approves-final-order-settling-charges-company-made-misleading\" target=\"_blank\">investigation into plastic bag manufacturer American Plastic Manufacturing, Inc.\u003c/a> for misleading claims, which might set precedent for future interactions with plastic manufacturers. Manufacturers of other materials have been charged \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2013/10/ftc-cracks-down-misleading-unsubstantiated-environmental\" target=\"_blank\">hundreds of thousands of dollars in civil penalties\u003c/a> for misleading marketing, but as a first-time offender, \u003ca href=\"http://www.science20.com/advertising_science/blog/plastic_companys_unscientific_biodegradability_claims_barred_by_ftc-135566\" target=\"_blank\">APM was not fined but simply ordered to stop making false claims. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unfortunately, the marketplace is full of these misleading claims,” said \u003ca href=\"https://www.msu.edu/user/narayan/\" target=\"_blank\">Ramani Narayan\u003c/a>, a biochemical engineering professor at Michigan State University and chairman of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.astm.org/\" target=\"_blank\">ASTM Subcommittee\u003c/a> at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.bpiworld.org/BPI-Public\" target=\"_blank\">Biodegradable Products Institute\u003c/a>, a nonprofit that helped develop international biodegradability standards. He says it’s often difficult to come across strong research about plastics, but he is pleased with Michel’s paper.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It has given very clear scientific data,” he said. “It’s shown that nothing happens [when these additives are used].”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But greenwashing isn’t always deliberate. The language surrounding “bio-friendliness” is so complex that many are just plain confused, said Michel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In addition to there being confusion among consumers about how these materials may be recycled or composted -- or where they end up -- there's also a certain amount of confusion among industries that are trying to become more sustainable and develop more sustainable products, about the end of life of these materials and products, and how they can best address their sustainability goals with these materials,” Michel said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some companies have their products tested and certified by the Biodegradability Products Institute. Those confused about particulars can look to the FTC’s \u003cstrong>Green Guides\u003c/strong>, documents that outline what the agency might perceive as deceptive practices. \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2012/10/ftc-issues-revised-green-guides\" target=\"_blank\">The FTC revised the guides in 2012\u003c/a> based on input from consumers who wanted to buy “green” products more intelligently, and enhanced its investigations accordingly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70923\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 414px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/plastic-graph.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-70923\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/plastic-graph-508x360.jpg\" alt=\"The results of the soil experiment. See how poorly the additive-amended materials did?\" width=\"414\" height=\"293\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The results of the soil experiment. See how poorly the additive-amended materials did? Photo courtesy of Fred Michel.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Being certified by the Institute isn’t mandated, and the \u003cstrong>Green Guides\u003c/strong> aren’t rules. You can market any product as biodegradable even if it’s not. There is, however, risk of civil lawsuits. If your product seems fishy, the FTC will investigate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Michel isn’t content to simply police eco-friendly claims. He hopes his team’s work gets consumers to consider whether they know how to use plastics correctly, or what these “green” terms even mean. Words like “bioplastic” and “biodegradable” are often used interchangeably, when in fact each implies a very specific method of creation or disposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you know that something is a bioplastic, all you really know is that it is something made from plant feedstocks. On the other hand, if you know that something is biodegradable, you may not know what it’s made from, but you do have insight into what might happen to it in certain environments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We don’t have much information about the lifecycles of new biodegradable plastics, and what we do know isn’t widely understood by the public. For instance, not all bioplastics are biodegradable, and leaving one in your compost pile would be a bad move. Worse, if people think biodegradable products can biodegrade anywhere, they might send them to landfills. Biodegradable products usually release carbon dioxide, but if they land in an anaerobic landfill environment, they release methane as they very slowly break down -- a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide. The bottom line is that you can’t count on something breaking down in your compost bin just because it’s made of coconut fiber, for example. Plastics don’t break down quickly because of what they’re made of but because of how engineers structure the molecules within them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I were to draw the chemical structure of polyethylene (PET), derived from plants…or derived from petroleum fossils, [they’d be] identical,” said Narayan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One way to handle this might be to change package labeling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A way to improve things would be to have some sort of lifecycle information on the container rather than just the word 'biodegradable,'” Michel said. “How much carbon went into making that material? What are the other impacts? And then, what should be done with it to have the least environmental impact?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mean that's a lot for a label,” he added, “but those are the things you really need to think about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Deciphering Plastic Labels\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Plant-based\u003c/strong> or \u003cstrong>Bio-based\u003c/strong> or \u003cstrong>Bioplastic\u003c/strong>: Plastics that are made from one or more plant starches, including feedstocks like corn, coconut, sugarcane, and wood cellulose. Not to be confused with biodegradable. This term describes the content of the material, not how it operates. Many bioplastics biodegrade in a timely way, but not all.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Biodegradable\u003c/strong>: This term does not indicate source material. Rather, it implies that the plastic can be broken down and eaten by microbes in environments like compost piles. All things biodegrade, but some things biodegrade more quickly than others. Biodegradable materials are those that break down in certain environments like compost bins within a reasonable amount of time, as determined by the FTC.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Compostable\u003c/strong>: \u003ca href=\"http://worldcentric.org/biocompostables/bioplastics\" target=\"_blank\">Compostable products\u003c/a> are biodegradable, but even more so. When compostable products biodegrade, they often do so at a quicker pace and leave behind only \u003ca href=\"http://education.nationalgeographic.com/education/encyclopedia/humus/?ar_a=1\" target=\"_blank\">humus -- the essential component of soil\u003c/a>.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Recyclable\u003c/strong>: As with biodegradable and compostable products, recyclable products can come from any number of feedstocks, but the term refers to their end-of-life situation. Recyclable products are those whose materials can be reused, either in a similar form or as part of another product. Plastics are recycled \u003ca href=\"http://www.nationofchange.org/numbers-plastic-bottles-what-do-plastic-recycling-symbols-mean-1360168347\" target=\"_blank\">according to their recycling symbol\u003c/a> -- a number 1 through 7 surrounded by three arrows in the shape of a triangle. These symbols correspond with types and structures of plastic, like vinyl (3) or polypropylene (PP).\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For more information about green vocabulary, \u003ca href=\"http://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0226-shopping-green#recyclable\" target=\"_blank\">visit the FTC\u003cstrong> Green Guides\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Products advertised as “green” aren't always what they appear to be. New research from Ohio State University adds supposedly biodegradable plastics to that list.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The next time you drop a bottle marketed as biodegradable into your reusable grocery bag, pause. \u003ca href=\"http://cfaes.osu.edu/news/articles/bio-plastics-not-so-good-biodegrading-ohio-state-study\" target=\"_blank\">New research\u003c/a> shows that not all of these plastics are made equal: some don’t actually biodegrade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Plastic pollution is a global issue. Long-lasting plastics \u003ca href=\"http://www.theoec.org/campaign/recycling-landfills\" target=\"_blank\">cramp landfills\u003c/a>, pile up in city streets, and create toxic problems in rivers, oceans, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.ohio.gov/Portals/34/document/newspdfs/n_cdd_leachate_evaluation.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">drinking water\u003c/a>. Americans generate over 30 million tons of plastic waste each year, and only 8 percent of that is recycled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Ohio, plastics are the largest component going into the waste stream, according to recycling expert \u003ca href=\"http://epa.ohio.gov/dmwm/home/recycle.aspx\" target=\"_blank\">Terrie Termeer with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. \u003c/a>Concerns about this influx throughout the U.S. have given rise to a new kind of “biodegradable” plastic, which Termeer says is gaining in popularity. Companies are actively designing products that degrade quickly and that are sometimes made from plant feedstocks, appealing to consumers who don’t want to leave behind piles of waste or use materials that are “bad” for the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers picked up on the trend, too, some of whom felt it was cause for concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was always curious about, you know, do they actually biodegrade?” said \u003ca href=\"http://fabe.osu.edu/our-people/frederick-michel-jr\" target=\"_blank\">Fred Michel\u003c/a>, a waste-management expert and professor at Ohio State University.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Biodegradability, a measure of how well something breaks down in compost, soil, or landfills, is an ambiguous term at best. Everything biodegrades completely over time, but your car might take a few thousand years longer to fall apart than, say, a tissue. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has attempted to clarify the term to prevent misleading advertising, but the definition is complex. According to the FTC, a product is biodegradable if it breaks down in certain environments, like compost bins, within a \"reasonable\" amount of time. But each environment dictates different interpretations of “reasonable.” Ultimately, the FTC notes that no matter where something breaks down, it needs to be completely returned to nature within a one-year timeframe in order to be marketed as “degradable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70919\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 364px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/examples-of-exp.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-70919\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/examples-of-exp-431x360.jpg\" alt=\"Michel and his team tested materials like coconut hull, asphalt-covered plastic, and additive-boosted polypropylene.\" width=\"364\" height=\"304\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michel and his team tested materials like coconut hull, asphalt-covered plastic, and additive-boosted polypropylene. Photo courtesy of Fred Michel.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>To make a plastic biodegradable, manufacturers have started putting in additives that supposedly allow even the sturdiest plastics to degrade in a backyard compost pile. To Michel, this seemed like an example of \u003ca href=\"http://hbr.org/product/the-drivers-of-greenwashing/an/CMR494-PDF-ENG?N=4294958507&Ntt=+&Nao=1540\" target=\"_blank\">greenwashing\u003c/a>-- a term that refers to misleading marketing tactics that appeal to the Captain Planet in each of us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was skeptical about it from the beginning because those materials don’t usually biodegrade,” Michel said. “It’s difficult to imagine a material you could add to them that would magically make them biodegradable.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In theory, biodegradable additives work by \u003ca href=\"http://www.goecopure.com/technology/\" target=\"_blank\">attracting microbes that in turn attract more microbes\u003c/a>, increasing the rate of degradation. Some manufacturers also claim the additives are organic and nontoxic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michel reviewed the research but was unable to find evidence to support manufacturers’ claims, so he ran his own experiment. Michel and his team rounded up all sorts of plastics to test their biodegradability: a motley collection of natural fibers, petroleum-based materials with the biodegradability additives, and plastics that shouldn’t biodegrade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0141391013003066\" target=\"_blank\">results of the research\u003c/a>, published in December 2013, were disconcerting. Traditional plastics with the “biodegradable” additives didn’t break down any more quickly than those without.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wasn’t surprised,” Michel said, “but it’s just interesting that there are materials in the market like that, that have claims that don’t seem to be justified in our testing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The FTC soon caught wind of the results and began investigating ECM BioFilms, an Ohio-based manufacturer that makes a plastic additive analyzed in Michel’s experiment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ECM investigation, which remains tied up in court, represents the first time the FTC has ever pursued plastic biodegradability claims. Meanwhile, the FTC has also begun a closed \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2014/05/ftc-approves-final-order-settling-charges-company-made-misleading\" target=\"_blank\">investigation into plastic bag manufacturer American Plastic Manufacturing, Inc.\u003c/a> for misleading claims, which might set precedent for future interactions with plastic manufacturers. Manufacturers of other materials have been charged \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2013/10/ftc-cracks-down-misleading-unsubstantiated-environmental\" target=\"_blank\">hundreds of thousands of dollars in civil penalties\u003c/a> for misleading marketing, but as a first-time offender, \u003ca href=\"http://www.science20.com/advertising_science/blog/plastic_companys_unscientific_biodegradability_claims_barred_by_ftc-135566\" target=\"_blank\">APM was not fined but simply ordered to stop making false claims. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unfortunately, the marketplace is full of these misleading claims,” said \u003ca href=\"https://www.msu.edu/user/narayan/\" target=\"_blank\">Ramani Narayan\u003c/a>, a biochemical engineering professor at Michigan State University and chairman of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.astm.org/\" target=\"_blank\">ASTM Subcommittee\u003c/a> at the \u003ca href=\"http://www.bpiworld.org/BPI-Public\" target=\"_blank\">Biodegradable Products Institute\u003c/a>, a nonprofit that helped develop international biodegradability standards. He says it’s often difficult to come across strong research about plastics, but he is pleased with Michel’s paper.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It has given very clear scientific data,” he said. “It’s shown that nothing happens [when these additives are used].”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But greenwashing isn’t always deliberate. The language surrounding “bio-friendliness” is so complex that many are just plain confused, said Michel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In addition to there being confusion among consumers about how these materials may be recycled or composted -- or where they end up -- there's also a certain amount of confusion among industries that are trying to become more sustainable and develop more sustainable products, about the end of life of these materials and products, and how they can best address their sustainability goals with these materials,” Michel said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some companies have their products tested and certified by the Biodegradability Products Institute. Those confused about particulars can look to the FTC’s \u003cstrong>Green Guides\u003c/strong>, documents that outline what the agency might perceive as deceptive practices. \u003ca href=\"http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2012/10/ftc-issues-revised-green-guides\" target=\"_blank\">The FTC revised the guides in 2012\u003c/a> based on input from consumers who wanted to buy “green” products more intelligently, and enhanced its investigations accordingly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70923\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 414px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/plastic-graph.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-70923\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/plastic-graph-508x360.jpg\" alt=\"The results of the soil experiment. See how poorly the additive-amended materials did?\" width=\"414\" height=\"293\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The results of the soil experiment. See how poorly the additive-amended materials did? Photo courtesy of Fred Michel.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Being certified by the Institute isn’t mandated, and the \u003cstrong>Green Guides\u003c/strong> aren’t rules. You can market any product as biodegradable even if it’s not. There is, however, risk of civil lawsuits. If your product seems fishy, the FTC will investigate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Michel isn’t content to simply police eco-friendly claims. He hopes his team’s work gets consumers to consider whether they know how to use plastics correctly, or what these “green” terms even mean. Words like “bioplastic” and “biodegradable” are often used interchangeably, when in fact each implies a very specific method of creation or disposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you know that something is a bioplastic, all you really know is that it is something made from plant feedstocks. On the other hand, if you know that something is biodegradable, you may not know what it’s made from, but you do have insight into what might happen to it in certain environments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We don’t have much information about the lifecycles of new biodegradable plastics, and what we do know isn’t widely understood by the public. For instance, not all bioplastics are biodegradable, and leaving one in your compost pile would be a bad move. Worse, if people think biodegradable products can biodegrade anywhere, they might send them to landfills. Biodegradable products usually release carbon dioxide, but if they land in an anaerobic landfill environment, they release methane as they very slowly break down -- a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide. The bottom line is that you can’t count on something breaking down in your compost bin just because it’s made of coconut fiber, for example. Plastics don’t break down quickly because of what they’re made of but because of how engineers structure the molecules within them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I were to draw the chemical structure of polyethylene (PET), derived from plants…or derived from petroleum fossils, [they’d be] identical,” said Narayan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One way to handle this might be to change package labeling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A way to improve things would be to have some sort of lifecycle information on the container rather than just the word 'biodegradable,'” Michel said. “How much carbon went into making that material? What are the other impacts? And then, what should be done with it to have the least environmental impact?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mean that's a lot for a label,” he added, “but those are the things you really need to think about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Deciphering Plastic Labels\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Plant-based\u003c/strong> or \u003cstrong>Bio-based\u003c/strong> or \u003cstrong>Bioplastic\u003c/strong>: Plastics that are made from one or more plant starches, including feedstocks like corn, coconut, sugarcane, and wood cellulose. Not to be confused with biodegradable. This term describes the content of the material, not how it operates. Many bioplastics biodegrade in a timely way, but not all.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Biodegradable\u003c/strong>: This term does not indicate source material. Rather, it implies that the plastic can be broken down and eaten by microbes in environments like compost piles. All things biodegrade, but some things biodegrade more quickly than others. Biodegradable materials are those that break down in certain environments like compost bins within a reasonable amount of time, as determined by the FTC.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Compostable\u003c/strong>: \u003ca href=\"http://worldcentric.org/biocompostables/bioplastics\" target=\"_blank\">Compostable products\u003c/a> are biodegradable, but even more so. When compostable products biodegrade, they often do so at a quicker pace and leave behind only \u003ca href=\"http://education.nationalgeographic.com/education/encyclopedia/humus/?ar_a=1\" target=\"_blank\">humus -- the essential component of soil\u003c/a>.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Recyclable\u003c/strong>: As with biodegradable and compostable products, recyclable products can come from any number of feedstocks, but the term refers to their end-of-life situation. Recyclable products are those whose materials can be reused, either in a similar form or as part of another product. Plastics are recycled \u003ca href=\"http://www.nationofchange.org/numbers-plastic-bottles-what-do-plastic-recycling-symbols-mean-1360168347\" target=\"_blank\">according to their recycling symbol\u003c/a> -- a number 1 through 7 surrounded by three arrows in the shape of a triangle. These symbols correspond with types and structures of plastic, like vinyl (3) or polypropylene (PP).\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For more information about green vocabulary, \u003ca href=\"http://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0226-shopping-green#recyclable\" target=\"_blank\">visit the FTC\u003cstrong> Green Guides\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>When it comes to extracting riches from the southern forest there’s a new game in town. Over the past few years a new cottage industry has emerged focused on milling wood pellets and shipping them to Europe to be fired with coal for electricity production.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it turns out the forests in eastern North Carolina are ripe for the picking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/specialcollections/forestry/background.html\" target=\"_blank\">woods of North Carolina\u003c/a> have long been a rich provider of resources. Hardwood trees are harvested for pallets and furniture and softwoods for pulp and paper. North Carolina’s southern yellow pine is more commonly known to consumers as a “two-by-four” and is a ubiquitous part of the building industry nationwide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not breaking news that forest resources are renewable. Those of us who live or spend time in the woods can’t help but be in awe of the rapid rejuvenation that occurs naturally after a field is cleared. In an era when renewability is seen as “green,” it’s logical that we turn to our forests. To some, it makes sense that we would harvest and burn biomass to reduce our coal consumption. But does it make sense to pelletize wood in the U.S. only to ship it overseas?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70459\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 307px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/IMG_7153.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70459\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/IMG_7153-379x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"307\" height=\"205\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">63% of U.S. wood pellet exports come from the South, according to \u003ca href=\"http://www.wri-ltd.com/pdfs/GTWMU%20North%20America%20wood%20pellet%20exports%202013.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Wood Resources International\u003c/a>.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Enterprising foresters in North Carolina are figuring out how to pelletize waste wood, which consists mostly of tree crowns and weed species that are the byproduct of the forest harvest. The pellets are then shipped to markets where they are valued as a renewable source of energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The markets for these wood products are increasingly found across the Atlantic. The European Union has decreed that \u003ca href=\"http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/index_en.htm\" target=\"_blank\">20 percent of energy in EU countries must come from renewable sources by 2020\u003c/a>. Europe’s carbon market (unlike America’s) puts a high value on burning “green” energy sources, and wood pellets from North Carolina are fueling this mandate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One argument in favor of pelletizing leftover crowns is that it’s better than letting them rot on the forest floor. After all, rotting wood releases stored carbon and contributes to the very greenhouse gases we’re trying to avoid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70468\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 345px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-Enviva__Ahoskie-NC__2012__credit-Dogwood-Alliance-Southwings-c.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70468\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-Enviva__Ahoskie-NC__2012__credit-Dogwood-Alliance-Southwings-c-349x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"345\" height=\"250\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Enviva wood pellet plant in Ahoskie, NC operates 24/7. Most of their products are shipped to Europe where it is valued as a renewable energy source. Photo courtesy Dogwood Alliance & SouthWings\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>However, many environmentalists oppose the idea of pelletizing or burning biomass of any kind. They see a denuding of the landscape, where we take everything we can get our hands on -- from wooded wetlands to trees from pristine swamps to stands of old growth forest. They are also concerned with the loss of biodiversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"//www.nrdc.org/energy/forestnotfuel/enviva-wood-pellets.asp\" target=\"_blank\">According to the Natural Resources Defense Council\u003c/a>, the source for much of these wood pellets -- the southeastern mixed forest and the middle Atlantic coastal forest ecoregions -- “have been designated by the World Wildlife Fund as Critical/Endangered, because of their high biodiversity and the combination of habitat fragmentation, conversion, and other threats.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While our forests are able to yield plenty of lumber, furniture, and toilet paper, they have no hope of keeping up with our insatiable desire for energy. Conservationists are concerned that the unchecked use of woody biomass for energy could have a devastating impact on our forests. Organizations like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.dogwoodalliance.org/2014/03/monster-enviva-wood-pellet-plants-invade-northeast-nc-communities/\" target=\"_blank\">Dogwood Alliance\u003c/a>, based in Asheville, North Carolina, advocate for keeping our forests out of the energy equation altogether.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Dogwood Alliance considers the shipping of this resource to Europe to be a travesty. For Europe to reduce its emissions and claim a “green-energy credit” by burning pellets from southern forests is seen by many as absurd. Among other things, fossil energy is required to ship the wood pellets to Europe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This isn’t the first time one culture has stripped another of its resources. Japan’s civilization was built on trees imported from Australia, and the Turkish Empire stripped the Middle East of trees almost entirely. It’s hard to imagine North Carolina as a desert, but human endeavor has done this before all over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70467\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 378px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-clearcuts-credit-Southwings.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70467 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-clearcuts-credit-Southwings-378x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"378\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">According to wood pellet manufacturer Enviva, clear-cutting forests is often the most sustainable approach to forest management. Photo credit SouthWings\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>These days it’s fashionable for scholars to argue about when one resource or another has “peaked.” Peak oil, peak coal, even peak uranium has made it into today’s energy debate, and the notion of “peak forest” is no exception. When a resource peaks, it doesn’t mean that it ceases to exist: it implies that it will get progressively more expensive as more and more of it consumed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Anyone who has tried to buy land in the woods of North Carolina knows that the southern forest has peaked. Property in areas populated with hardwoods is way more expensive than pine woodlands. Cleared land is even cheaper. Whether for wildlife habitat or shading homes, hardwood lots are prized -- this is something both conservationists and realtors can agree on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The question that North Carolina and other wooded states need to consider is, how much of our natural capital are we interested in converting into financial capital by shipping our forest resources to Europe? Perhaps it’s time to put a value on the ecological services our woods provide in the U.S. so that our forests are not destroyed in the process of keeping Europe “green.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>When it comes to extracting riches from the southern forest there’s a new game in town. Over the past few years a new cottage industry has emerged focused on milling wood pellets and shipping them to Europe to be fired with coal for electricity production.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it turns out the forests in eastern North Carolina are ripe for the picking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/specialcollections/forestry/background.html\" target=\"_blank\">woods of North Carolina\u003c/a> have long been a rich provider of resources. Hardwood trees are harvested for pallets and furniture and softwoods for pulp and paper. North Carolina’s southern yellow pine is more commonly known to consumers as a “two-by-four” and is a ubiquitous part of the building industry nationwide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not breaking news that forest resources are renewable. Those of us who live or spend time in the woods can’t help but be in awe of the rapid rejuvenation that occurs naturally after a field is cleared. In an era when renewability is seen as “green,” it’s logical that we turn to our forests. To some, it makes sense that we would harvest and burn biomass to reduce our coal consumption. But does it make sense to pelletize wood in the U.S. only to ship it overseas?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70459\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 307px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/IMG_7153.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70459\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/IMG_7153-379x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"307\" height=\"205\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">63% of U.S. wood pellet exports come from the South, according to \u003ca href=\"http://www.wri-ltd.com/pdfs/GTWMU%20North%20America%20wood%20pellet%20exports%202013.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Wood Resources International\u003c/a>.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Enterprising foresters in North Carolina are figuring out how to pelletize waste wood, which consists mostly of tree crowns and weed species that are the byproduct of the forest harvest. The pellets are then shipped to markets where they are valued as a renewable source of energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The markets for these wood products are increasingly found across the Atlantic. The European Union has decreed that \u003ca href=\"http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/index_en.htm\" target=\"_blank\">20 percent of energy in EU countries must come from renewable sources by 2020\u003c/a>. Europe’s carbon market (unlike America’s) puts a high value on burning “green” energy sources, and wood pellets from North Carolina are fueling this mandate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One argument in favor of pelletizing leftover crowns is that it’s better than letting them rot on the forest floor. After all, rotting wood releases stored carbon and contributes to the very greenhouse gases we’re trying to avoid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70468\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 345px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-Enviva__Ahoskie-NC__2012__credit-Dogwood-Alliance-Southwings-c.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70468\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-Enviva__Ahoskie-NC__2012__credit-Dogwood-Alliance-Southwings-c-349x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"345\" height=\"250\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Enviva wood pellet plant in Ahoskie, NC operates 24/7. Most of their products are shipped to Europe where it is valued as a renewable energy source. Photo courtesy Dogwood Alliance & SouthWings\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>However, many environmentalists oppose the idea of pelletizing or burning biomass of any kind. They see a denuding of the landscape, where we take everything we can get our hands on -- from wooded wetlands to trees from pristine swamps to stands of old growth forest. They are also concerned with the loss of biodiversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"//www.nrdc.org/energy/forestnotfuel/enviva-wood-pellets.asp\" target=\"_blank\">According to the Natural Resources Defense Council\u003c/a>, the source for much of these wood pellets -- the southeastern mixed forest and the middle Atlantic coastal forest ecoregions -- “have been designated by the World Wildlife Fund as Critical/Endangered, because of their high biodiversity and the combination of habitat fragmentation, conversion, and other threats.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While our forests are able to yield plenty of lumber, furniture, and toilet paper, they have no hope of keeping up with our insatiable desire for energy. Conservationists are concerned that the unchecked use of woody biomass for energy could have a devastating impact on our forests. Organizations like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.dogwoodalliance.org/2014/03/monster-enviva-wood-pellet-plants-invade-northeast-nc-communities/\" target=\"_blank\">Dogwood Alliance\u003c/a>, based in Asheville, North Carolina, advocate for keeping our forests out of the energy equation altogether.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Dogwood Alliance considers the shipping of this resource to Europe to be a travesty. For Europe to reduce its emissions and claim a “green-energy credit” by burning pellets from southern forests is seen by many as absurd. Among other things, fossil energy is required to ship the wood pellets to Europe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This isn’t the first time one culture has stripped another of its resources. Japan’s civilization was built on trees imported from Australia, and the Turkish Empire stripped the Middle East of trees almost entirely. It’s hard to imagine North Carolina as a desert, but human endeavor has done this before all over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70467\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 378px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-clearcuts-credit-Southwings.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70467 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/02/0000034594-clearcuts-credit-Southwings-378x253.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"378\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">According to wood pellet manufacturer Enviva, clear-cutting forests is often the most sustainable approach to forest management. Photo credit SouthWings\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>These days it’s fashionable for scholars to argue about when one resource or another has “peaked.” Peak oil, peak coal, even peak uranium has made it into today’s energy debate, and the notion of “peak forest” is no exception. When a resource peaks, it doesn’t mean that it ceases to exist: it implies that it will get progressively more expensive as more and more of it consumed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Anyone who has tried to buy land in the woods of North Carolina knows that the southern forest has peaked. Property in areas populated with hardwoods is way more expensive than pine woodlands. Cleared land is even cheaper. Whether for wildlife habitat or shading homes, hardwood lots are prized -- this is something both conservationists and realtors can agree on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The question that North Carolina and other wooded states need to consider is, how much of our natural capital are we interested in converting into financial capital by shipping our forest resources to Europe? Perhaps it’s time to put a value on the ecological services our woods provide in the U.S. so that our forests are not destroyed in the process of keeping Europe “green.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "Drought Risk Atlas Uses Past to Predict Future: A Q&A with Climatologist Mark Svoboda",
"title": "Drought Risk Atlas Uses Past to Predict Future: A Q&A with Climatologist Mark Svoboda",
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"content": "\u003cp>https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/qbl-int-usw2/QUEST+Nebraska/Radio/Stream/MarkSvoboda_web.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 540px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70443 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/LiedBridge_20120807_Forsberg_491-540x360.jpg\" alt=\"The Platte River in Nebraska in 2012, one of the hottest and driest years on record. (Photo credit Michael Forsberg, Platte Basin Timelapse)\" width=\"540\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Platte River in Nebraska in 2012, one of the hottest and driest years on record. (Photo credit Michael Forsberg, Platte Basin Timelapse)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A new tool called the Drought Risk Atlas promises to help decision-makers and the public better understand and prepare for future drought. The Atlas was developed and launched by the \u003ca href=\"http://drought.unl.edu/\">National Drought Mitigation Center \u003c/a>at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, which offers a variety of tools and data related to drought, including reports on precipitation, water supply, vegetation, climate, and drought indices. A climatologist with the Center, Mark Svoboda, explained how their latest innovation will help inform our understanding of drought.\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70340\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70340 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtriskatlas-e1399334774136-640x360.jpg\" alt=\"droughtriskatlas\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Drought Risk Atlas\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Can you explain the Drought Risk Atlas and what it’s going to be used for?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the questions we always get from the newspapers and radio and TV and people in general is, how does this drought compare to the Dust Bowl years or the ’70s or '88? Everyone seems to have a drought they remember. The\u003ca href=\"http://droughtatlas.unl.edu/\"> Drought Risk Atlas\u003c/a> was built with the idea that for the best climate stations out there that have really nice, long-term histories and not a lot of missing data, we can go back and look at the drought history. We’ve built a nice visual interface for that. People that want to download the raw data can get it, but it’s also a nice way to come in and look at the spatial behavior of drought, the intensity of drought. How large of an area, how long did it last, how often does that sort of drought come around? That was the motivation in building this tool, to help decision makers, citizens, and the media. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">We’re going to generate more than 500,000 maps of drought for each week of every year back to the early 1900s.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\">For a citizen, what can they expect to see and draw from this?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can search and hopefully find your station in the town you live in. If that doesn't exist or doesn't have a long history, there will be a station close to you. We've clumped these stations into clusters that have similar drought behavior. You can find your location, then look at drought and how it's behaved over time in your region with a variety of maps, time series, and all sorts of neat visualization tools on the interface. And that's all free and available to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70354\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 224px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtmonitor.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtmonitor.jpg\" alt=\"droughtmonitor\" width=\"224\" height=\"136\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The U.S. Drought Monitor releases weekly reports on drought conditions across the country. You can find more at droughtmonitor.unl.edu\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\">Why is this needed or useful?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s to give people a better sense of how they might need to adapt, preparing to get a different mindset about droughts, that they’re a normal part of our climate. We’ve seen [droughts] in the past and we’ll see them in the future with a changing climate. Are these droughts changing in their frequency? Are we seeing them become more intense but more short-lived, are they long-lived but of just a moderate intensity? Knowing how that impacts you and your operation, whether you’re a farmer or rancher or whoever it might be, may help us look to what we should expect from droughts in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70340 size-thumbnail\">Do you think our ability to predict and prepare for drought is improving or has improved during the last few decades?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">This can help folks better hedge their bets... What sort of operational decisions they'll make could be driven by knowing something a few months to half a year in advance.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>I think it's improved, but it has an awful long way to go. Especially in this part of the country, we're sort of landlocked. When you hear about El Niño and La Niña, things that are in the news quite often, they have a much stronger relationship to driving weather along the coastal areas of the country, or the Gulf Coast region, for example. In Nebraska it's not quite as strong, but there are indicators out there that if the ocean's in a certain state, whether abnormally warm or cold, you might expect to have a better chance of seeing drought. This can help folks better hedge their bets. Maybe what sort of operational decisions they'll make, depending on their business, could be driven by knowing something a few months to half a year in advance. But the forecast skill depends on a strong oceanic state, and the problem we've had the last two winters -- it's been neutral, not abnormally warm or cool in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/teleconnections/enso/enso-tech.php\">ENSO \u003c/a>(El Niño-Southern Oscillation) region of the equatorial Pacific. So the forecast hasn't been very skillful. So, in those times you want to always be prepared for drought as if it will occur any year, not just when there's a forecast to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70437\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 179px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/022806_svoboda037a-179x253.jpg\" alt=\"022806_svoboda037a\" width=\"179\" height=\"253\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mark Svoboda has been with the National Drought Mitigation Center since it formed in 1995. As the NDMC’s Monitoring Program Area Leader, his duties include overseeing the center’s operational drought monitoring activities and providing expertise on climate and water management issues. (Courtesy photo)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\">Will the Drought Risk Atlas help predict drought and prepare for drought in the future, knowing the historical record?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where I think this tool will be useful is if you see a forecast for drought, or if you’re in a certain stage of drought, you can go back in the Atlas and look at other periods of drought that behaved the same way and maybe you’ll have a better anticipation of what impacts might be coming if this drought continues, if it gets more intense. If it covers a larger area, will this affect my water supply? Everyone will have a different question they want answered, but our goal was to provide some of the visualization tools that can answer several questions, and most questions we've anticipated. And if it doesn't, we've encouraged people to contact us and let us know what they'd like to see in the Atlas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Some irrigators in Nebraska have talked about the “new normal” -- meaning they’re getting used to operating with less water year after year. Do you think the same concept applies to drought, in the sense that we’re in these longer phases of drought or maybe we’re entering a longer dry period?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\">That’s the kicker question. The million-dollar question is, is this an interlude? We may go back into wetter times. The models that the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) released in \u003ca href=\"http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/\">its report\u003c/a> still show the continuing trend of a hotter atmosphere, which exacerbates drought, but also a moister atmosphere. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">It’s not as easy as it was to look at the past and say, the climate of the past is going to equal the climate of the future. The bars have changed.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp> So it depends on the timing of these rains, how many days in between these rains. But in general, it’s not as easy as it was to look at the past and say the climate of the past is going to equal the climate of the future. The bars have changed. And if that shift continues long enough -- say, a couple decades -- that would mean more of a climate shift to the climate regime of a region. We would call that more arid, or aridity, which is a permanent feature of the climate, versus drought, which is a temporary departure from the normal of a region’s climate. So, droughts are going to then be the departure from that new, drier regime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\">This interview has been condensed and edited. \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/qbl-int-usw2/QUEST+Nebraska/Radio/Stream/MarkSvoboda_web.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70443\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 540px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70443 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/LiedBridge_20120807_Forsberg_491-540x360.jpg\" alt=\"The Platte River in Nebraska in 2012, one of the hottest and driest years on record. (Photo credit Michael Forsberg, Platte Basin Timelapse)\" width=\"540\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Platte River in Nebraska in 2012, one of the hottest and driest years on record. (Photo credit Michael Forsberg, Platte Basin Timelapse)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A new tool called the Drought Risk Atlas promises to help decision-makers and the public better understand and prepare for future drought. The Atlas was developed and launched by the \u003ca href=\"http://drought.unl.edu/\">National Drought Mitigation Center \u003c/a>at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, which offers a variety of tools and data related to drought, including reports on precipitation, water supply, vegetation, climate, and drought indices. A climatologist with the Center, Mark Svoboda, explained how their latest innovation will help inform our understanding of drought.\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70340\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70340 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtriskatlas-e1399334774136-640x360.jpg\" alt=\"droughtriskatlas\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Drought Risk Atlas\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Can you explain the Drought Risk Atlas and what it’s going to be used for?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the questions we always get from the newspapers and radio and TV and people in general is, how does this drought compare to the Dust Bowl years or the ’70s or '88? Everyone seems to have a drought they remember. The\u003ca href=\"http://droughtatlas.unl.edu/\"> Drought Risk Atlas\u003c/a> was built with the idea that for the best climate stations out there that have really nice, long-term histories and not a lot of missing data, we can go back and look at the drought history. We’ve built a nice visual interface for that. People that want to download the raw data can get it, but it’s also a nice way to come in and look at the spatial behavior of drought, the intensity of drought. How large of an area, how long did it last, how often does that sort of drought come around? That was the motivation in building this tool, to help decision makers, citizens, and the media. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">We’re going to generate more than 500,000 maps of drought for each week of every year back to the early 1900s.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\">For a citizen, what can they expect to see and draw from this?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can search and hopefully find your station in the town you live in. If that doesn't exist or doesn't have a long history, there will be a station close to you. We've clumped these stations into clusters that have similar drought behavior. You can find your location, then look at drought and how it's behaved over time in your region with a variety of maps, time series, and all sorts of neat visualization tools on the interface. And that's all free and available to the public.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70354\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 224px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtmonitor.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/droughtmonitor.jpg\" alt=\"droughtmonitor\" width=\"224\" height=\"136\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The U.S. Drought Monitor releases weekly reports on drought conditions across the country. You can find more at droughtmonitor.unl.edu\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70354 size-full\">Why is this needed or useful?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s to give people a better sense of how they might need to adapt, preparing to get a different mindset about droughts, that they’re a normal part of our climate. We’ve seen [droughts] in the past and we’ll see them in the future with a changing climate. Are these droughts changing in their frequency? Are we seeing them become more intense but more short-lived, are they long-lived but of just a moderate intensity? Knowing how that impacts you and your operation, whether you’re a farmer or rancher or whoever it might be, may help us look to what we should expect from droughts in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70340 size-thumbnail\">Do you think our ability to predict and prepare for drought is improving or has improved during the last few decades?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">This can help folks better hedge their bets... What sort of operational decisions they'll make could be driven by knowing something a few months to half a year in advance.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>I think it's improved, but it has an awful long way to go. Especially in this part of the country, we're sort of landlocked. When you hear about El Niño and La Niña, things that are in the news quite often, they have a much stronger relationship to driving weather along the coastal areas of the country, or the Gulf Coast region, for example. In Nebraska it's not quite as strong, but there are indicators out there that if the ocean's in a certain state, whether abnormally warm or cold, you might expect to have a better chance of seeing drought. This can help folks better hedge their bets. Maybe what sort of operational decisions they'll make, depending on their business, could be driven by knowing something a few months to half a year in advance. But the forecast skill depends on a strong oceanic state, and the problem we've had the last two winters -- it's been neutral, not abnormally warm or cool in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/teleconnections/enso/enso-tech.php\">ENSO \u003c/a>(El Niño-Southern Oscillation) region of the equatorial Pacific. So the forecast hasn't been very skillful. So, in those times you want to always be prepared for drought as if it will occur any year, not just when there's a forecast to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70437\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 179px\">\u003cimg class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/04/022806_svoboda037a-179x253.jpg\" alt=\"022806_svoboda037a\" width=\"179\" height=\"253\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mark Svoboda has been with the National Drought Mitigation Center since it formed in 1995. As the NDMC’s Monitoring Program Area Leader, his duties include overseeing the center’s operational drought monitoring activities and providing expertise on climate and water management issues. (Courtesy photo)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\">Will the Drought Risk Atlas help predict drought and prepare for drought in the future, knowing the historical record?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Where I think this tool will be useful is if you see a forecast for drought, or if you’re in a certain stage of drought, you can go back in the Atlas and look at other periods of drought that behaved the same way and maybe you’ll have a better anticipation of what impacts might be coming if this drought continues, if it gets more intense. If it covers a larger area, will this affect my water supply? Everyone will have a different question they want answered, but our goal was to provide some of the visualization tools that can answer several questions, and most questions we've anticipated. And if it doesn't, we've encouraged people to contact us and let us know what they'd like to see in the Atlas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Some irrigators in Nebraska have talked about the “new normal” -- meaning they’re getting used to operating with less water year after year. Do you think the same concept applies to drought, in the sense that we’re in these longer phases of drought or maybe we’re entering a longer dry period?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"wp-image-70437 size-medium\">That’s the kicker question. The million-dollar question is, is this an interlude? We may go back into wetter times. The models that the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) released in \u003ca href=\"http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/\">its report\u003c/a> still show the continuing trend of a hotter atmosphere, which exacerbates drought, but also a moister atmosphere. \u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">It’s not as easy as it was to look at the past and say, the climate of the past is going to equal the climate of the future. The bars have changed.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp> So it depends on the timing of these rains, how many days in between these rains. But in general, it’s not as easy as it was to look at the past and say the climate of the past is going to equal the climate of the future. The bars have changed. And if that shift continues long enough -- say, a couple decades -- that would mean more of a climate shift to the climate regime of a region. We would call that more arid, or aridity, which is a permanent feature of the climate, versus drought, which is a temporary departure from the normal of a region’s climate. So, droughts are going to then be the departure from that new, drier regime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Back in college I went to visit my older sister in Austin, Texas, and she laughed when I asked about a compost bin. She grabbed my sleeve and led me out to the tiny balcony of her second-story apartment, then plucked the apple core from my palm and chucked it off the side of the building. “That’s my compost,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That scene has stayed with me. Over the years I’ve come to a greater appreciation for my sister’s reluctance to take on proper backyard composting while she juggled work and city life. Nowadays, I’m just not that motivated to compost. I know I should. But the reality is I don’t. And I am not alone in composting resistance: in 2012, only \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/foodrecovery/\">5 percent\u003c/a> of the nearly 40 million tons of food waste generated in the United States was composted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70366\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/garbage-disposal-flickr.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70366\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/garbage-disposal-flickr-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"Whether or not it makes sense to send food scraps down the garbage disposal really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal than to put it in the trash. Photo Credit: capl@washjeff.edu / Flickr\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Whether or not it makes sense to send food scraps down the garbage disposal really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal than to put them in the trash.\u003cbr>Photo Credit: capl@washjeff.edu / Flickr\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>So what I wanted to figure out on behalf of all compost-challenged urbanites is what the next best option is for disposing of food scraps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I called up Martin Heller, a researcher at the University of Michigan’s Center for Sustainable Systems, who specializes in life cycle analysis of food, to help me sort this out. If I’m standing at my kitchen sink with a handful of kale stems, I asked, should I toss them in the trash or grind them down the garbage disposal?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First, he reaffirmed that I should in fact be composting them for the most environmentally friendly disposal (yeah, yeah). Composting is best because it breaks down food scraps and returns their nutrients to the soil, which improves soil health. When those scraps are instead left to rot in the landfill (through anaerobic decomposition, which occurs in the absence of oxygen), they release methane, a potent greenhouse gas. According to Heller’s calculations, which will appear in a forthcoming publication, U.S. food waste in 2010 contributed roughly the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere as 33 million cars on the road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if I’m not going to compost, should I bother with the disposal or just throw my food waste in the trash?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s the short answer according to Heller: \u003ca href=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22922048\">It’s probably a wash\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The long answer is that it really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70364\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 338px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Cooking-with-food-scraps-my-shot-wasnt-tasty.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70364\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Cooking-with-food-scraps-my-shot-wasnt-tasty-338x253.jpg\" alt=\"Some people advocate for cooking with food scraps, like onion skins. This is a shot of the author's attempt at making a stock from food scraps. It wasn't tasty.\" width=\"338\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Some people advocate for cooking with food scraps, like onion skins. This is a shot of the author's attempt at making a stock from food scraps. It wasn't tasty.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Here’s why: When you grind your carrot peels down the disposal, this carrot mash ends up in the same waste stream as city sewage. “Your food waste goes to the same place as the water you flush down your toilet,” said Michael Keleman, manager of environmental engineering at the garbage disposal company \u003ca href=\"http://www.insinkerator.com/en-us/Pages/default.aspx\">InSinkErator.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The wastewater treatment plant will separate out the solids, and this sludge, once treated and stabilized, is known as “\u003ca href=\"http://www.biosolids.com/faq.html\">biosolids.” \u003c/a>Biosolids are handled differently in different locales, but about \u003ca href=\"http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS04-14.pdf\">60 percent\u003c/a> of biosolids are put to beneficial use; the rest are either landfilled or incinerated. Beneficial use largely means that the biosolids are applied to agricultural land, forests, or urban parks. In this way the nutrients from the organic matter are returned to the soil, albeit with significant water and energy requirements to make that journey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as greenhouse gas emissions, some wastewater treatment plants \u003cstrong>capture \u003c/strong>the gases released from the sludge as it is anaerobically digested. The methane from this “\u003ca href=\"http://www.afdc.energy.gov/fuels/emerging_biogas.html\">biogas\u003c/a>” mixture can be used to produce heat and electricity. There are about 1,240 U.S. wastewater treatment plants that produce biogas, and about 270 of them provide electricity to the grid, according to data from the website \u003ca href=\"http://biogasdata.org/\">biogasdata.org. \u003c/a> This is out of a total of about \u003ca href=\"http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS04-14.pdf\">21,594\u003c/a> publicly owned U.S. wastewater treatment facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you want to find out whether your wastewater treatment plant produces biogas, check the searchable biogasdata.org \u003ca href=\"http://biogasdata.org/facilities/search\">database. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70363\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 270px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Compost_bin_cutaway_by_Bruce_McAdam-via-flickr.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70363\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Compost_bin_cutaway_by_Bruce_McAdam-via-flickr-270x360.jpg\" alt=\"A cutaway view of an outdoor compost bin. Photo Credit: Bruce McAdam / Flickr\" width=\"270\" height=\"360\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A cutaway view of an outdoor compost bin. Photo Credit: Bruce McAdam / Flickr\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Some cities offer a middle ground in this dilemma: curbside composting. About \u003ca href=\"http://www.governing.com/topics/energy-env/gov-curbside-composting-added-to-major-city.html\">100 cities\u003c/a> have compost collection programs, including San Francisco, Boulder, and Seattle. Data from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/waste/nonhaz/municipal/pubs/2012_msw_fs.pdf\">2012 survey of municipal waste\u003c/a> indicate there are more than 3,000 community composting programs in place across the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It’s a doable thing,\" said Heller, comparing it to citywide recycling, which wasn't the norm during his childhood but is now standard in cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s not just municipalities that are offering the service; entrepreneurs are, too. \"We have a 12-year-old kid in Traverse City, Michigan, who has started up quite a little business collecting food scraps from folks on his bike,” he said. Even Cleveland will soon be home to a start-up \u003ca href=\"http://www.crowdrise.com/ClevelandBikeComposting/fundraiser/RBGCleveland\">composting company\u003c/a> that will gladly cycle over to pick up your food scraps, for a fee.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Heller, taking a more upstream approach to food-waste reduction is fundamental to this discussion about consumer actions around food waste. That is, we need to get consumers to buy only the food they will actually eat. “From the cradle-to-grave perspective, the biggest impacts are on the food\u003cstrong> production\u003c/strong> side,” said Heller, so reducing consumer demand would help reduce the amount of food produced and thus the amount of environmental impacts all around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Heller’s advice? Don’t “binge-shop.” Instead, go to the store more frequently so you don’t have food spoiling in your fridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So the next time that giant vat of raspberries calls to me from the produce aisle of Costco, perhaps I’ll think twice about whether I can really eat my way through all those berries without tuckering out. Either that or I suppose I’ll have to suck it up and compost.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Back in college I went to visit my older sister in Austin, Texas, and she laughed when I asked about a compost bin. She grabbed my sleeve and led me out to the tiny balcony of her second-story apartment, then plucked the apple core from my palm and chucked it off the side of the building. “That’s my compost,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That scene has stayed with me. Over the years I’ve come to a greater appreciation for my sister’s reluctance to take on proper backyard composting while she juggled work and city life. Nowadays, I’m just not that motivated to compost. I know I should. But the reality is I don’t. And I am not alone in composting resistance: in 2012, only \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/foodrecovery/\">5 percent\u003c/a> of the nearly 40 million tons of food waste generated in the United States was composted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70366\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/garbage-disposal-flickr.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70366\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/garbage-disposal-flickr-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"Whether or not it makes sense to send food scraps down the garbage disposal really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal than to put it in the trash. Photo Credit: capl@washjeff.edu / Flickr\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Whether or not it makes sense to send food scraps down the garbage disposal really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal than to put them in the trash.\u003cbr>Photo Credit: capl@washjeff.edu / Flickr\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>So what I wanted to figure out on behalf of all compost-challenged urbanites is what the next best option is for disposing of food scraps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I called up Martin Heller, a researcher at the University of Michigan’s Center for Sustainable Systems, who specializes in life cycle analysis of food, to help me sort this out. If I’m standing at my kitchen sink with a handful of kale stems, I asked, should I toss them in the trash or grind them down the garbage disposal?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First, he reaffirmed that I should in fact be composting them for the most environmentally friendly disposal (yeah, yeah). Composting is best because it breaks down food scraps and returns their nutrients to the soil, which improves soil health. When those scraps are instead left to rot in the landfill (through anaerobic decomposition, which occurs in the absence of oxygen), they release methane, a potent greenhouse gas. According to Heller’s calculations, which will appear in a forthcoming publication, U.S. food waste in 2010 contributed roughly the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere as 33 million cars on the road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if I’m not going to compost, should I bother with the disposal or just throw my food waste in the trash?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s the short answer according to Heller: \u003ca href=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22922048\">It’s probably a wash\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The long answer is that it really depends on your city’s infrastructure. If your city puts that organic waste to good use, then it may be better to send the scraps down the garbage disposal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70364\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 338px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Cooking-with-food-scraps-my-shot-wasnt-tasty.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70364\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Cooking-with-food-scraps-my-shot-wasnt-tasty-338x253.jpg\" alt=\"Some people advocate for cooking with food scraps, like onion skins. This is a shot of the author's attempt at making a stock from food scraps. It wasn't tasty.\" width=\"338\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Some people advocate for cooking with food scraps, like onion skins. This is a shot of the author's attempt at making a stock from food scraps. It wasn't tasty.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Here’s why: When you grind your carrot peels down the disposal, this carrot mash ends up in the same waste stream as city sewage. “Your food waste goes to the same place as the water you flush down your toilet,” said Michael Keleman, manager of environmental engineering at the garbage disposal company \u003ca href=\"http://www.insinkerator.com/en-us/Pages/default.aspx\">InSinkErator.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The wastewater treatment plant will separate out the solids, and this sludge, once treated and stabilized, is known as “\u003ca href=\"http://www.biosolids.com/faq.html\">biosolids.” \u003c/a>Biosolids are handled differently in different locales, but about \u003ca href=\"http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS04-14.pdf\">60 percent\u003c/a> of biosolids are put to beneficial use; the rest are either landfilled or incinerated. Beneficial use largely means that the biosolids are applied to agricultural land, forests, or urban parks. In this way the nutrients from the organic matter are returned to the soil, albeit with significant water and energy requirements to make that journey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As far as greenhouse gas emissions, some wastewater treatment plants \u003cstrong>capture \u003c/strong>the gases released from the sludge as it is anaerobically digested. The methane from this “\u003ca href=\"http://www.afdc.energy.gov/fuels/emerging_biogas.html\">biogas\u003c/a>” mixture can be used to produce heat and electricity. There are about 1,240 U.S. wastewater treatment plants that produce biogas, and about 270 of them provide electricity to the grid, according to data from the website \u003ca href=\"http://biogasdata.org/\">biogasdata.org. \u003c/a> This is out of a total of about \u003ca href=\"http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS04-14.pdf\">21,594\u003c/a> publicly owned U.S. wastewater treatment facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you want to find out whether your wastewater treatment plant produces biogas, check the searchable biogasdata.org \u003ca href=\"http://biogasdata.org/facilities/search\">database. \u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70363\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 270px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Compost_bin_cutaway_by_Bruce_McAdam-via-flickr.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70363\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2013/08/Compost_bin_cutaway_by_Bruce_McAdam-via-flickr-270x360.jpg\" alt=\"A cutaway view of an outdoor compost bin. Photo Credit: Bruce McAdam / Flickr\" width=\"270\" height=\"360\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A cutaway view of an outdoor compost bin. Photo Credit: Bruce McAdam / Flickr\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Some cities offer a middle ground in this dilemma: curbside composting. About \u003ca href=\"http://www.governing.com/topics/energy-env/gov-curbside-composting-added-to-major-city.html\">100 cities\u003c/a> have compost collection programs, including San Francisco, Boulder, and Seattle. Data from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.epa.gov/waste/nonhaz/municipal/pubs/2012_msw_fs.pdf\">2012 survey of municipal waste\u003c/a> indicate there are more than 3,000 community composting programs in place across the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"It’s a doable thing,\" said Heller, comparing it to citywide recycling, which wasn't the norm during his childhood but is now standard in cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And it’s not just municipalities that are offering the service; entrepreneurs are, too. \"We have a 12-year-old kid in Traverse City, Michigan, who has started up quite a little business collecting food scraps from folks on his bike,” he said. Even Cleveland will soon be home to a start-up \u003ca href=\"http://www.crowdrise.com/ClevelandBikeComposting/fundraiser/RBGCleveland\">composting company\u003c/a> that will gladly cycle over to pick up your food scraps, for a fee.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Heller, taking a more upstream approach to food-waste reduction is fundamental to this discussion about consumer actions around food waste. That is, we need to get consumers to buy only the food they will actually eat. “From the cradle-to-grave perspective, the biggest impacts are on the food\u003cstrong> production\u003c/strong> side,” said Heller, so reducing consumer demand would help reduce the amount of food produced and thus the amount of environmental impacts all around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Heller’s advice? Don’t “binge-shop.” Instead, go to the store more frequently so you don’t have food spoiling in your fridge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So the next time that giant vat of raspberries calls to me from the produce aisle of Costco, perhaps I’ll think twice about whether I can really eat my way through all those berries without tuckering out. Either that or I suppose I’ll have to suck it up and compost.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70203\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 480px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70203\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/movingcows-480x360.jpg\" alt=\"Cows grazing in the field on a summer day. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"480\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cows grazing in the field on a summer day. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On a warm summer day the lines for ice cream at the Daily Scoop on the University of Wisconsin- Madison campus are frustratingly long. Everyone is herded together, waiting their turn to order a cone filled with creamy, cold ice cream -- anything to take the edge off that overheated feeling. But securing a steady supply of this refreshing treat depends on keeping cows cool, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70200\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 334px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/jerseyface.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70200\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/jerseyface-334x253.jpg\" alt=\"Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"334\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cows create a lot of body heat and use a large amount of energy in the process of producing milk. “When you are comfortable, a cow is warm; when you are hot, a cow is miserable; and when you are cold, a cow is probably fine,” explained Dr. Lou Armentano, a professor in the Department of Dairy Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. On those hot summer days, cows immediately respond to the high temperature with decreased milk production.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cows produce the most milk and are \u003ca title=\"Mesonet Cattle Comfort Index\" href=\"http://www.mesonet.org/images/site/Mesonet%20Cattle%20Comfort%20Advisor%20Description.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">most comfortable \u003c/a>when the temperature is between 15 and 85 degrees Fahrenheit. When the temperature increases to the 85- to 105-degree range, milk production is decreased by 20 percent, or more. Once it gets above 105 degrees it can be fatal. At that point, up to 5 percent of the herd can be expected to die.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The big issue for all the farmers we work with is risk. Extreme weather is adding uncertainty to this already uncertain profession,” according to Michelle Miller, associate director of the UW-Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an average year Madison would expect 13 days above 90 degrees, but in the summer of 2012 there were 39 days when the temperature surpassed that mark. And scientists expect more hot summers like that in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70188\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 425px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Midwest_DaysGT90F_sresa1b_2046_2065.png\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70188\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Midwest_DaysGT90F_sresa1b_2046_2065-425x360.png\" alt=\"The projected change in number of days above 90° is based on the 2000 greenhouse gas emissions study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Emissions Scenario (SRES). Source: Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison.\" width=\"425\" height=\"360\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The projected change in number of days above 90° is based on the 2000 greenhouse gas emissions study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Emissions Scenario (SRES). Source: Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca title=\"Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts\" href=\"http://www.wicci.wisc.edu/climate-change.phphttp://\" target=\"_blank\">Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts \u003c/a>(WICCI) predicts that summer days and nights in Wisconsin will become increasingly warmer. Climate models point toward an average temperature increase of as much as 3 to 9 degrees Fahrenheit in Wisconsin by mid-century. By 2055 Madison may be seeing an average of 37 days above 90 degrees and 4 above 100 degrees. Many cows are confined to barns with some measure of temperature control, so for them, extreme weather is not a major concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70205\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 379px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Marshfield_heifer_facility.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70205\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Marshfield_heifer_facility-379x253.jpg\" alt=\"Barn with side curtains open for ventilation at the Marshfield Agricultural Research Station. Photo courtesy: UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences\" width=\"379\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Barn with side curtains open for ventilation at the Marshfield Agricultural Research Station. Photo courtesy: UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Various techniques are used in the barns to keep the cows cool. Open-stall barns have curtains that can be opened in the summer to allow natural breezes to blow through. Temperatures can also be held at bay by building the barn so that it’s in the shade during the hottest part of the day. And some farms have installed evaporating systems that mist and fan the cows on hot days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Dr. Victor Cabrera, UW-Madison dairy science professor and extension specialist, “The trend is that milk production increases year to year because of genetics and/or better management practices, regardless of climate changes” for the cows that are kept indoors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But not all cows spend their time in the barn. The cows at Rick Adamski’s Full Circle Farm, in Seymour, graze outdoors in the pastures. Shade trees are scattered throughout the pasture and provide shelter from the heat of the summer at this organic farm. Still, Adamski finds that his cows are vulnerable to heat stress once the temperature gets above 90 degrees. When it gets that hot, the cows wait to eat until the temperatures have cooled down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When they’re ready to graze, “A good permanent pasture shades the soil to keep the soils cooler during the heat of summer,” according to\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70207\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/holsteinsonpasture.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70207\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/holsteinsonpasture-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"Grazing in the pasture. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Grazing in the pasture. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Adamski. He maintains permanent pastures consisting of dense grasses and clovers in about 85 percent of his 220-acre farm. The thick ground covering of these perennial plants retains moisture and provides additional hydration for the cows. And the diversity of the plants creates a natural insurance for the fluctuations in weather patterns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adamski believes that grazing is integral in maintaining this perennial system. “If we manage for both production of the pasture and the livestock, both can be productive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For organic operations committed to an outdoor grazing regimen, perennial agricultural systems with soil and herd management may help to meet milk production demands even if hotter summers become the norm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Organic or not, all dairy farmers and ice cream lovers stand to reap the benefits of farming practices that help cows stay cool.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "If you’re looking for relief on an unusually hot summer day, so are the cows grazing in the pastures. When temperatures climb, milk production drops.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70203\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 480px\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70203\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/movingcows-480x360.jpg\" alt=\"Cows grazing in the field on a summer day. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"480\" height=\"360\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cows grazing in the field on a summer day. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>On a warm summer day the lines for ice cream at the Daily Scoop on the University of Wisconsin- Madison campus are frustratingly long. Everyone is herded together, waiting their turn to order a cone filled with creamy, cold ice cream -- anything to take the edge off that overheated feeling. But securing a steady supply of this refreshing treat depends on keeping cows cool, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70200\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 334px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/jerseyface.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70200\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/jerseyface-334x253.jpg\" alt=\"Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"334\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Cows create a lot of body heat and use a large amount of energy in the process of producing milk. “When you are comfortable, a cow is warm; when you are hot, a cow is miserable; and when you are cold, a cow is probably fine,” explained Dr. Lou Armentano, a professor in the Department of Dairy Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. On those hot summer days, cows immediately respond to the high temperature with decreased milk production.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cows produce the most milk and are \u003ca title=\"Mesonet Cattle Comfort Index\" href=\"http://www.mesonet.org/images/site/Mesonet%20Cattle%20Comfort%20Advisor%20Description.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">most comfortable \u003c/a>when the temperature is between 15 and 85 degrees Fahrenheit. When the temperature increases to the 85- to 105-degree range, milk production is decreased by 20 percent, or more. Once it gets above 105 degrees it can be fatal. At that point, up to 5 percent of the herd can be expected to die.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The big issue for all the farmers we work with is risk. Extreme weather is adding uncertainty to this already uncertain profession,” according to Michelle Miller, associate director of the UW-Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an average year Madison would expect 13 days above 90 degrees, but in the summer of 2012 there were 39 days when the temperature surpassed that mark. And scientists expect more hot summers like that in the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70188\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 425px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Midwest_DaysGT90F_sresa1b_2046_2065.png\">\u003cimg class=\"size-large wp-image-70188\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Midwest_DaysGT90F_sresa1b_2046_2065-425x360.png\" alt=\"The projected change in number of days above 90° is based on the 2000 greenhouse gas emissions study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Emissions Scenario (SRES). Source: Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison.\" width=\"425\" height=\"360\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The projected change in number of days above 90° is based on the 2000 greenhouse gas emissions study by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Emissions Scenario (SRES). Source: Center for Climatic Research, Nelson Institute, University of Wisconsin-Madison.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca title=\"Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts\" href=\"http://www.wicci.wisc.edu/climate-change.phphttp://\" target=\"_blank\">Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts \u003c/a>(WICCI) predicts that summer days and nights in Wisconsin will become increasingly warmer. Climate models point toward an average temperature increase of as much as 3 to 9 degrees Fahrenheit in Wisconsin by mid-century. By 2055 Madison may be seeing an average of 37 days above 90 degrees and 4 above 100 degrees. Many cows are confined to barns with some measure of temperature control, so for them, extreme weather is not a major concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70205\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 379px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Marshfield_heifer_facility.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70205\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/Marshfield_heifer_facility-379x253.jpg\" alt=\"Barn with side curtains open for ventilation at the Marshfield Agricultural Research Station. Photo courtesy: UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences\" width=\"379\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Barn with side curtains open for ventilation at the Marshfield Agricultural Research Station. Photo courtesy: UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Various techniques are used in the barns to keep the cows cool. Open-stall barns have curtains that can be opened in the summer to allow natural breezes to blow through. Temperatures can also be held at bay by building the barn so that it’s in the shade during the hottest part of the day. And some farms have installed evaporating systems that mist and fan the cows on hot days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Dr. Victor Cabrera, UW-Madison dairy science professor and extension specialist, “The trend is that milk production increases year to year because of genetics and/or better management practices, regardless of climate changes” for the cows that are kept indoors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But not all cows spend their time in the barn. The cows at Rick Adamski’s Full Circle Farm, in Seymour, graze outdoors in the pastures. Shade trees are scattered throughout the pasture and provide shelter from the heat of the summer at this organic farm. Still, Adamski finds that his cows are vulnerable to heat stress once the temperature gets above 90 degrees. When it gets that hot, the cows wait to eat until the temperatures have cooled down.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When they’re ready to graze, “A good permanent pasture shades the soil to keep the soils cooler during the heat of summer,” according to\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_70207\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 337px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/holsteinsonpasture.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-70207\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/01/holsteinsonpasture-337x253.jpg\" alt=\"Grazing in the pasture. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\" width=\"337\" height=\"253\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Grazing in the pasture. Photo courtesy of UW-Madison Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems. Photographer: Ruth McNair\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Adamski. He maintains permanent pastures consisting of dense grasses and clovers in about 85 percent of his 220-acre farm. The thick ground covering of these perennial plants retains moisture and provides additional hydration for the cows. And the diversity of the plants creates a natural insurance for the fluctuations in weather patterns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adamski believes that grazing is integral in maintaining this perennial system. “If we manage for both production of the pasture and the livestock, both can be productive.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For organic operations committed to an outdoor grazing regimen, perennial agricultural systems with soil and herd management may help to meet milk production demands even if hotter summers become the norm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Organic or not, all dairy farmers and ice cream lovers stand to reap the benefits of farming practices that help cows stay cool.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"disqusTitle": "The Roots of the Carbon Cycle",
"title": "The Roots of the Carbon Cycle",
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"content": "\u003cp style=\"text-align: center\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe src=\"http://wimedialab.org/questsoil/\" width=\"820\" height=\"620\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"yes\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Play this interactive to learn how changes to soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Land, then, is not merely soil; it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals. Food chains are the living channels that conduct energy upward; death and decay return it to the soil. The circuit is not closed; some energy is dissipated in decay, some is added by absorption from the air, some is stored in soils, peats and long-lived forests.” Aldo Leopold, 1948\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like all aspects of our environment, soil is part of our planet’s complex and dynamic energy cycles, including the carbon cycle. Carbon is one of the most prevalent and important elements on our planet. Its movement through the environment modifies the temperature of our atmosphere and oceans, provides the structure and fuel for all living organisms, and contributes significantly to the living skin of our earth. As we learn more about how carbon moves through the environment, we discover how changes in one part of the carbon cycle can affect the earth as a whole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This investigation of soil’s role in the carbon cycle illustrates the importance of soil to our ecosystems, and demonstrates how human interactions with soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003cbr>\n“Land, then, is not merely soil; it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals. Food chains are the living channels that conduct energy upward; death and decay return it to the soil. The circuit is not closed; some energy is dissipated in decay, some is added by absorption from the air, some is stored in soils, peats and long-lived forests.” Aldo Leopold, 1948\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like all aspects of our environment, soil is part of our planet’s complex and dynamic energy cycles, including the carbon cycle. Carbon is one of the most prevalent and important elements on our planet. Its movement through the environment modifies the temperature of our atmosphere and oceans, provides the structure and fuel for all living organisms, and contributes significantly to the living skin of our earth. As we learn more about how carbon moves through the environment, we discover how changes in one part of the carbon cycle can affect the earth as a whole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This investigation of soil’s role in the carbon cycle illustrates the importance of soil to our ecosystems, and demonstrates how human interactions with soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This interactive is part of a three-part educational series on \u003ca title=\"QUEST Special Series - Soil\" href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/quest/collections/soil-sustainability/\" target=\"_blank\">soil\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Pre-activity Questions\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>What does soil have to do with climate change?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do human actions affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Focus Questions during Activity\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>How is carbon transferred into and out of soil?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>What is the importance of soil structure and how does it affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do changing temperatures in soil affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do changing moisture levels in soil affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Post-activity Questions\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>What conditions tend to cause soil to accumulate lots of carbon? What conditions tend to cause soil to emit carbon to the atmosphere?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>What might happen if more permafrost starts to thaw?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Extension Activity\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Describe how human interactions with soil could affect the carbon cycle. Then describe how your actions as an individual affect soil and the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Links to Learn More\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"Youtube - Crash Course Ecology\" href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2D7hZpIYlCA&index=9&list=PL8dPuuaLjXtNdTKZkV_GiIYXpV9w4WxbX\" target=\"_blank\">Energy Cycles and Ecology\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Crash Course Ecology - \u003c/strong>Learn about the role of the hydrologic and carbon cycles on the ecosystem.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"www.carboncyclescience.gov\" href=\"http://www.carboncyclescience.gov/\" target=\"_blank\">Federal Carbon Cycle Research\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>United States Science Carbon Cycle Program - \u003c/strong>Learn about the role of the hydrologic and carbon cycles on the ecosystem.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"www.ciesin.columbia.edu\" href=\"http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/docs/002-193/002-193.html\" target=\"_blank\">Desertification\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Physics of Desertification - \u003c/strong>Learn about desertification and what is being done to slow it across the planet.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"http://e360.yale.edu\" href=\"http://e360.yale.edu/feature/as_uses_of_biochar_expand_climate_benefits_still_uncertain/2730/\" target=\"_blank\">Biochar\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Yale Environment 360 - \u003c/strong>Biochar removes carbon from the atmosphere and stores it underground, where it does not contribute to global warming. It may play an important role in regulating atmospheric carbon levels.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/\" href=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12057679\" target=\"_blank\">Bioreporters\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>US National Library of Medicine, NIH - \u003c/strong>Bioreporters are microbial cells that have been genetically modified to recognize chemicals. Scientists are using them to test for pollutants in soil without disrupting the surrounding environment.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>NGSS Correlations\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Performance Expectation:\u003c/strong> Develop a model to illustrate the role of photosynthesis and cellular respiration in the cycling of carbon among the biosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere.HS-LS2-5\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Disciplinary Core Idea:\u003c/strong> Photosynthesis and cellular respiration are important components of the carbon cycle, in which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, atmosphere, oceans and geosphere through chemical, physical, geological and biological processes. LS2.B Cycles of Matter and Energy Transfer in Ecosystems\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Crosscutting Concept:\u003c/strong> Energy and Matter - Energy drives the cycling of matter within and between systems. Systems and System Models - Models (e.g. Physical, mathematical, computer models) can be used to simulate systems and interactions - including energy, matter, and information flows - within and between systems.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Science and Engineering Practices:\u003c/strong>Developing and Using Models\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Project Partners\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nick Balster\u003c/strong> is an Associate Professor in the Department of Soil Science and Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His lab, “Collaborations in Ecosystem Science and Environmental Education,” is constantly seeking innovative ways to combine research, teaching, and outreach both in education and the physical sciences. A longtime advocate of teaching and learning, Dr. Balster collaborates with many, including QUEST since 2013.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Craig Kohn\u003c/strong> teaches Agriscience at Waterford Union High School. Kohn has degrees from UW-Madison in Agriscience and Education and is licensed to teach Biology, Agriculture, and Environmental Science. Kohn has developed a nationally-recognized agricultural education program that seeks to maximize student preparation through rigorous and relevant education and meaningful inquiry-based learning.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp style=\"text-align: center\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe src=\"http://wimedialab.org/questsoil/\" width=\"820\" height=\"620\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"yes\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Play this interactive to learn how changes to soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Land, then, is not merely soil; it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals. Food chains are the living channels that conduct energy upward; death and decay return it to the soil. The circuit is not closed; some energy is dissipated in decay, some is added by absorption from the air, some is stored in soils, peats and long-lived forests.” Aldo Leopold, 1948\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like all aspects of our environment, soil is part of our planet’s complex and dynamic energy cycles, including the carbon cycle. Carbon is one of the most prevalent and important elements on our planet. Its movement through the environment modifies the temperature of our atmosphere and oceans, provides the structure and fuel for all living organisms, and contributes significantly to the living skin of our earth. As we learn more about how carbon moves through the environment, we discover how changes in one part of the carbon cycle can affect the earth as a whole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This investigation of soil’s role in the carbon cycle illustrates the importance of soil to our ecosystems, and demonstrates how human interactions with soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003cbr>\n“Land, then, is not merely soil; it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals. Food chains are the living channels that conduct energy upward; death and decay return it to the soil. The circuit is not closed; some energy is dissipated in decay, some is added by absorption from the air, some is stored in soils, peats and long-lived forests.” Aldo Leopold, 1948\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Like all aspects of our environment, soil is part of our planet’s complex and dynamic energy cycles, including the carbon cycle. Carbon is one of the most prevalent and important elements on our planet. Its movement through the environment modifies the temperature of our atmosphere and oceans, provides the structure and fuel for all living organisms, and contributes significantly to the living skin of our earth. As we learn more about how carbon moves through the environment, we discover how changes in one part of the carbon cycle can affect the earth as a whole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This investigation of soil’s role in the carbon cycle illustrates the importance of soil to our ecosystems, and demonstrates how human interactions with soil may affect the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This interactive is part of a three-part educational series on \u003ca title=\"QUEST Special Series - Soil\" href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/quest/collections/soil-sustainability/\" target=\"_blank\">soil\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Pre-activity Questions\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>What does soil have to do with climate change?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do human actions affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Focus Questions during Activity\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>How is carbon transferred into and out of soil?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>What is the importance of soil structure and how does it affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do changing temperatures in soil affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>How do changing moisture levels in soil affect the carbon cycle?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Post-activity Questions\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>What conditions tend to cause soil to accumulate lots of carbon? What conditions tend to cause soil to emit carbon to the atmosphere?\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>What might happen if more permafrost starts to thaw?\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Extension Activity\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Describe how human interactions with soil could affect the carbon cycle. Then describe how your actions as an individual affect soil and the carbon cycle.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Links to Learn More\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"Youtube - Crash Course Ecology\" href=\"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2D7hZpIYlCA&index=9&list=PL8dPuuaLjXtNdTKZkV_GiIYXpV9w4WxbX\" target=\"_blank\">Energy Cycles and Ecology\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Crash Course Ecology - \u003c/strong>Learn about the role of the hydrologic and carbon cycles on the ecosystem.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"www.carboncyclescience.gov\" href=\"http://www.carboncyclescience.gov/\" target=\"_blank\">Federal Carbon Cycle Research\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>United States Science Carbon Cycle Program - \u003c/strong>Learn about the role of the hydrologic and carbon cycles on the ecosystem.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"www.ciesin.columbia.edu\" href=\"http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/docs/002-193/002-193.html\" target=\"_blank\">Desertification\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Physics of Desertification - \u003c/strong>Learn about desertification and what is being done to slow it across the planet.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"http://e360.yale.edu\" href=\"http://e360.yale.edu/feature/as_uses_of_biochar_expand_climate_benefits_still_uncertain/2730/\" target=\"_blank\">Biochar\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>Yale Environment 360 - \u003c/strong>Biochar removes carbon from the atmosphere and stores it underground, where it does not contribute to global warming. It may play an important role in regulating atmospheric carbon levels.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca title=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/\" href=\"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12057679\" target=\"_blank\">Bioreporters\u003c/a>, \u003cstrong>US National Library of Medicine, NIH - \u003c/strong>Bioreporters are microbial cells that have been genetically modified to recognize chemicals. Scientists are using them to test for pollutants in soil without disrupting the surrounding environment.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>NGSS Correlations\u003c/h2>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Performance Expectation:\u003c/strong> Develop a model to illustrate the role of photosynthesis and cellular respiration in the cycling of carbon among the biosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere.HS-LS2-5\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Disciplinary Core Idea:\u003c/strong> Photosynthesis and cellular respiration are important components of the carbon cycle, in which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, atmosphere, oceans and geosphere through chemical, physical, geological and biological processes. LS2.B Cycles of Matter and Energy Transfer in Ecosystems\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Crosscutting Concept:\u003c/strong> Energy and Matter - Energy drives the cycling of matter within and between systems. Systems and System Models - Models (e.g. Physical, mathematical, computer models) can be used to simulate systems and interactions - including energy, matter, and information flows - within and between systems.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>Science and Engineering Practices:\u003c/strong>Developing and Using Models\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>Project Partners\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Nick Balster\u003c/strong> is an Associate Professor in the Department of Soil Science and Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His lab, “Collaborations in Ecosystem Science and Environmental Education,” is constantly seeking innovative ways to combine research, teaching, and outreach both in education and the physical sciences. A longtime advocate of teaching and learning, Dr. Balster collaborates with many, including QUEST since 2013.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Craig Kohn\u003c/strong> teaches Agriscience at Waterford Union High School. Kohn has degrees from UW-Madison in Agriscience and Education and is licensed to teach Biology, Agriculture, and Environmental Science. Kohn has developed a nationally-recognized agricultural education program that seeks to maximize student preparation through rigorous and relevant education and meaningful inquiry-based learning.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>On a remote island near the North Pole, a disaster-proof underground vault holds millions of frozen seeds. Like something out of a James Bond movie, this high-security seed bank in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago was built to help ensure the survival of something incredibly precious: food diversity. If this seems extreme, consider that the U.S. has likely lost over \u003ca href=\"http://www.ecobooks.com/books/shatter.htm\">90 percent of fruit tree and vegetable varieties\u003c/a> since 1900 and India has lost an estimated 90 percent of its \u003ca href=\"http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://agro.biodiver.se/2009/11/tracking-down-rice-genetic-erosion-numbers/\">rice varieties\u003c/a>, largely as a result of industrialization. If the trend continues and climate change compounds the toll, some of our favorite foods could disappear, and important staples like rice, wheat, and corn may become endangered.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">This stuff is precious and unique, and you don’t want to take any risks with it. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever... [Luigi Guarino]\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>To understand why this loss of crop diversity matters and explore the inner workings of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.croptrust.org/content/svalbard-global-seed-vault\">Global Seed Vault\u003c/a>, QUEST TV host \u003ca href=\"http://simransethi.com\">Simran Sethi\u003c/a> talks to \u003ca href=\"https://www.croptrust.org/content/technical-team\">Luigi Guarino\u003c/a>, a scientist with the\u003ca href=\"http://www.croptrust.org/\"> Global Crop Diversity Trust\u003c/a>, an organization that helped establish this Arctic seed bank. During the interview Guarino answers questions about how seeds are acquired and stored, whether the vault accepts genetically modified seeds, and who owns and manages the collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sethi herself has a particular interest and growing expertise in the subject of seeds, which was the focus of her \u003ca href=\"http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/Seeds-The-Buried-Beginnings-of\">TEDx talk\u003c/a> in 2013. Sethi first met Guarino while conducting research for a book she is writing about the loss of biodiversity. She credits Guarino for reminding her -- and her book editor -- that seeds are not only sexy; they \u003cstrong>are\u003c/strong> sex. Watch their long-distance Google Hangout below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nmn8fQKg1YE\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>*See some footage of the Global Seed Vault \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/video/saving-our-seeds/\">in this QUEST television segment\u003c/a> about efforts to preserve seed diversity in America’s Midwest.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>On a remote island near the North Pole, a disaster-proof underground vault holds millions of frozen seeds. Like something out of a James Bond movie, this high-security seed bank in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago was built to help ensure the survival of something incredibly precious: food diversity. If this seems extreme, consider that the U.S. has likely lost over \u003ca href=\"http://www.ecobooks.com/books/shatter.htm\">90 percent of fruit tree and vegetable varieties\u003c/a> since 1900 and India has lost an estimated 90 percent of its \u003ca href=\"http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://agro.biodiver.se/2009/11/tracking-down-rice-genetic-erosion-numbers/\">rice varieties\u003c/a>, largely as a result of industrialization. If the trend continues and climate change compounds the toll, some of our favorite foods could disappear, and important staples like rice, wheat, and corn may become endangered.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">This stuff is precious and unique, and you don’t want to take any risks with it. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever... [Luigi Guarino]\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>To understand why this loss of crop diversity matters and explore the inner workings of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.croptrust.org/content/svalbard-global-seed-vault\">Global Seed Vault\u003c/a>, QUEST TV host \u003ca href=\"http://simransethi.com\">Simran Sethi\u003c/a> talks to \u003ca href=\"https://www.croptrust.org/content/technical-team\">Luigi Guarino\u003c/a>, a scientist with the\u003ca href=\"http://www.croptrust.org/\"> Global Crop Diversity Trust\u003c/a>, an organization that helped establish this Arctic seed bank. During the interview Guarino answers questions about how seeds are acquired and stored, whether the vault accepts genetically modified seeds, and who owns and manages the collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sethi herself has a particular interest and growing expertise in the subject of seeds, which was the focus of her \u003ca href=\"http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/Seeds-The-Buried-Beginnings-of\">TEDx talk\u003c/a> in 2013. Sethi first met Guarino while conducting research for a book she is writing about the loss of biodiversity. She credits Guarino for reminding her -- and her book editor -- that seeds are not only sexy; they \u003cstrong>are\u003c/strong> sex. Watch their long-distance Google Hangout below.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nmn8fQKg1YE\u003cbr>\n\u003cem>*See some footage of the Global Seed Vault \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/video/saving-our-seeds/\">in this QUEST television segment\u003c/a> about efforts to preserve seed diversity in America’s Midwest.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>\"Saving Our Seeds\" was produced by Quest Wisconsin's \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/author/andysoth/\">Andy Soth.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cicero believed that all you really need in life is a garden and a library. He would have really liked a new \u003ca href=\"http://www.lacrosselibrary.org/seed-library\">program\u003c/a> at the public library in La Crosse, Wisconsin: heirloom seeds available for checkout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The La Crosse Public Library has joined a handful of \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/garden/07seed.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0\">libraries\u003c/a> around the country in a quiet rebellion against a rising tide of genetic homogeneity in our food. Instead of grabbing an anonymous green pepper in the grocery store, the library’s members borrow seeds of old, storied varieties to plant in their own gardens. After the harvest, they save some of those plants’ seeds and return them to the library, perpetuating the seed collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>La Crosse librarian Cindy Mischnick, who began the program with her colleague Kelly Becker, was motivated to start it when she grew concerned that “people have gone away from having small gardens or thinking about where their seeds come from.” As a librarian, she thought she might be able to do something about it. “We’re the kind of people that collect things, catalog things, have things available to check out,” she said. “Seeds are just another kind of item for us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The startup capital for this venture was genetic: boxes of seeds from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.seedsavers.org\">Seed Savers Exchange\u003c/a>, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving heirloom varieties and promoting their cultivation. Their 890-acre farm in eastern Iowa, seen in the video above, is like a living library of heirloom plants -- old varieties that have been passed down through generations of gardeners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_69343\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 360px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/Tomato-seeding.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-69343 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/Tomato-seeding-450x253.jpg\" alt=\"Tomato seeding\" width=\"360\" height=\"202\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A horticulturalist at the Seed Savers Exchange harvests tomato seeds to plant for next year's crop. Saving seeds this way helps ensure that heirloom varieties will still be around in case we need them.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Experts from Seed Savers drove the hour northeast to La Crosse to teach aspiring seed library users \u003ca href=\"http://www.seedsavers.org/Education/Seed-Saving-Resources/\">how to harvest their seeds\u003c/a>. Picking tiny seeds out of pods, cleaning them off, drying them, painstakingly packaging them up -- it all sounds absurdly tedious to people used to just buying a few cheap packets of tomato and pepper seeds every year at the local home-and-garden warehouse. But saving seeds this way used to be routine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past, the process of carefully saving seeds from their best-performing plants allowed farmers to select for the traits they wanted. Everyone developed their own varieties, guided by their own preferences and the local growing conditions. Biodiversity expanded as a result. Historical seed company records show that in \u003ca href=\"http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/07/food-ark/food-variety-graphic\">1903 there were 544 varieties of cabbage\u003c/a> alone. Today you’d be lucky to find anything more exotic than “red” and “green.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What happened to all that diversity?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seed saving and the multiplicity of varieties it produces don’t fit into the prevailing model of industrial-scale agriculture. As farming has become increasingly mechanized, farmers operating on an ever-larger scale have increasingly relied on large, predictable, homogeneous yields of a single crop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This trend toward uniformity was made possible by progress in genetic technology. Reliable, uniform, hybrid varieties and, most recently, genetically modified commodity crops make farming more profitable for big operations. But these changes in economics and advances in science combined to spell the death of the local seed company and the farmer’s box of family varieties stored each winter in the root cellar. Thousands of these species have already disappeared. Some estimates say that we’ve lost 90 percent of our agricultural biodiversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But is losing biodiversity necessarily a bad thing? \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/24/garden/24seeds.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0\">Modern hybrid\u003c/a> and genetically modified varieties have been bred to resist diseases and herbicides, stay fresh in stores, and are sometimes even beefed up with extra nutrients, a benefit that’s especially important in developing countries with rampant malnutrition. If we have these exquisitely designed species, why worry if thousands of less perfect ones go extinct?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_69345\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 302px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/1280px-GEM_corn.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-69345 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/1280px-GEM_corn-378x253.jpg\" alt=\"1280px-GEM_corn\" width=\"302\" height=\"202\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ninety-six percent of the corn varieties in the United States have disappeared in the last century.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>We should worry because \u003ca href=\"http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=36564#.U0LNChYhuUQ\">without genetic diversity\u003c/a>, an unexpected disease, tough growing season, or invasive pest can easily devastate a whole species. If that happens to be one of the handful of species on which our national food supply currently depends, the results could be disastrous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Irish potato famine, which killed one million people between 1845 and 1852, is a grim demonstration of the risk caused by leaning too heavily on a single variety of a staple crop. Grant Olson, Seed Savers’ education coordinator, explained that “one of the main contributors to that famine was that everyone in Ireland was growing one variety of potato. Potato blight found a niche in those plants, and because each plant was genetically identical, blight had a whole country's worth of plants that it could devastate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And according to a recent study, a homogeneous agricultural landscape \u003ca href=\"http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/low-crop-diversity/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter\">isn’t so good for our health\u003c/a> either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Imagine, by contrast, if every farm grew a different variety of potato or corn or sugar beets. Even if one of those varieties got wiped out, thousands of others would remain, short-circuiting a crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The recognition that tough growing seasons will become more common as the climate changes has prompted the establishment of seed banks all over the world, storing the genetic material from thousands of plant varieties in case we need them again one day. In \u003ca href=\"https://www.croptrust.org/content/svalbard-global-seed-vault\">one seed bank\u003c/a> on a remote island in the Arctic Circle, more than two thousand seed varieties slumber peacefully in cold storage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More and more communities, including La Crosse, have found a local solution. “Seed libraries have really been taking off,” said Olson. “They're great places to teach people how to save their own seeds and also a place to build this network of people in a community that can be a little bit independent with their seed source and with their food access.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Food security and biodiversity are \u003ca href=\"http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/07/food-ark/siebert-text\">global problems\u003c/a>, but if you live in La Crosse, all you need is a sunny spot, a green thumb, and a library card.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>To find out if there is a seed lending library near you, check out this growing \u003ca href=\"http://www.richmondgrowsseeds.org/sister-libraries.html\">list of national locations\u003c/a>.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "In this video, a public library in Wisconsin joins the global movement to help secure the future of our food supply.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>\"Saving Our Seeds\" was produced by Quest Wisconsin's \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/author/andysoth/\">Andy Soth.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cicero believed that all you really need in life is a garden and a library. He would have really liked a new \u003ca href=\"http://www.lacrosselibrary.org/seed-library\">program\u003c/a> at the public library in La Crosse, Wisconsin: heirloom seeds available for checkout.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The La Crosse Public Library has joined a handful of \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/garden/07seed.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0\">libraries\u003c/a> around the country in a quiet rebellion against a rising tide of genetic homogeneity in our food. Instead of grabbing an anonymous green pepper in the grocery store, the library’s members borrow seeds of old, storied varieties to plant in their own gardens. After the harvest, they save some of those plants’ seeds and return them to the library, perpetuating the seed collection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>La Crosse librarian Cindy Mischnick, who began the program with her colleague Kelly Becker, was motivated to start it when she grew concerned that “people have gone away from having small gardens or thinking about where their seeds come from.” As a librarian, she thought she might be able to do something about it. “We’re the kind of people that collect things, catalog things, have things available to check out,” she said. “Seeds are just another kind of item for us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The startup capital for this venture was genetic: boxes of seeds from the \u003ca href=\"http://www.seedsavers.org\">Seed Savers Exchange\u003c/a>, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving heirloom varieties and promoting their cultivation. Their 890-acre farm in eastern Iowa, seen in the video above, is like a living library of heirloom plants -- old varieties that have been passed down through generations of gardeners.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_69343\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 360px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/Tomato-seeding.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-69343 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/Tomato-seeding-450x253.jpg\" alt=\"Tomato seeding\" width=\"360\" height=\"202\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A horticulturalist at the Seed Savers Exchange harvests tomato seeds to plant for next year's crop. Saving seeds this way helps ensure that heirloom varieties will still be around in case we need them.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Experts from Seed Savers drove the hour northeast to La Crosse to teach aspiring seed library users \u003ca href=\"http://www.seedsavers.org/Education/Seed-Saving-Resources/\">how to harvest their seeds\u003c/a>. Picking tiny seeds out of pods, cleaning them off, drying them, painstakingly packaging them up -- it all sounds absurdly tedious to people used to just buying a few cheap packets of tomato and pepper seeds every year at the local home-and-garden warehouse. But saving seeds this way used to be routine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past, the process of carefully saving seeds from their best-performing plants allowed farmers to select for the traits they wanted. Everyone developed their own varieties, guided by their own preferences and the local growing conditions. Biodiversity expanded as a result. Historical seed company records show that in \u003ca href=\"http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/07/food-ark/food-variety-graphic\">1903 there were 544 varieties of cabbage\u003c/a> alone. Today you’d be lucky to find anything more exotic than “red” and “green.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What happened to all that diversity?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seed saving and the multiplicity of varieties it produces don’t fit into the prevailing model of industrial-scale agriculture. As farming has become increasingly mechanized, farmers operating on an ever-larger scale have increasingly relied on large, predictable, homogeneous yields of a single crop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This trend toward uniformity was made possible by progress in genetic technology. Reliable, uniform, hybrid varieties and, most recently, genetically modified commodity crops make farming more profitable for big operations. But these changes in economics and advances in science combined to spell the death of the local seed company and the farmer’s box of family varieties stored each winter in the root cellar. Thousands of these species have already disappeared. Some estimates say that we’ve lost 90 percent of our agricultural biodiversity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But is losing biodiversity necessarily a bad thing? \u003ca href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/24/garden/24seeds.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0\">Modern hybrid\u003c/a> and genetically modified varieties have been bred to resist diseases and herbicides, stay fresh in stores, and are sometimes even beefed up with extra nutrients, a benefit that’s especially important in developing countries with rampant malnutrition. If we have these exquisitely designed species, why worry if thousands of less perfect ones go extinct?\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_69345\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 302px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/1280px-GEM_corn.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\" wp-image-69345 \" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/quest/wp-content/uploads/sites/39/2014/03/1280px-GEM_corn-378x253.jpg\" alt=\"1280px-GEM_corn\" width=\"302\" height=\"202\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ninety-six percent of the corn varieties in the United States have disappeared in the last century.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>We should worry because \u003ca href=\"http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=36564#.U0LNChYhuUQ\">without genetic diversity\u003c/a>, an unexpected disease, tough growing season, or invasive pest can easily devastate a whole species. If that happens to be one of the handful of species on which our national food supply currently depends, the results could be disastrous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Irish potato famine, which killed one million people between 1845 and 1852, is a grim demonstration of the risk caused by leaning too heavily on a single variety of a staple crop. Grant Olson, Seed Savers’ education coordinator, explained that “one of the main contributors to that famine was that everyone in Ireland was growing one variety of potato. Potato blight found a niche in those plants, and because each plant was genetically identical, blight had a whole country's worth of plants that it could devastate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And according to a recent study, a homogeneous agricultural landscape \u003ca href=\"http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/low-crop-diversity/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter\">isn’t so good for our health\u003c/a> either.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Imagine, by contrast, if every farm grew a different variety of potato or corn or sugar beets. Even if one of those varieties got wiped out, thousands of others would remain, short-circuiting a crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The recognition that tough growing seasons will become more common as the climate changes has prompted the establishment of seed banks all over the world, storing the genetic material from thousands of plant varieties in case we need them again one day. In \u003ca href=\"https://www.croptrust.org/content/svalbard-global-seed-vault\">one seed bank\u003c/a> on a remote island in the Arctic Circle, more than two thousand seed varieties slumber peacefully in cold storage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More and more communities, including La Crosse, have found a local solution. “Seed libraries have really been taking off,” said Olson. “They're great places to teach people how to save their own seeds and also a place to build this network of people in a community that can be a little bit independent with their seed source and with their food access.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Food security and biodiversity are \u003ca href=\"http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/07/food-ark/siebert-text\">global problems\u003c/a>, but if you live in La Crosse, all you need is a sunny spot, a green thumb, and a library card.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"id": "code-switch-life-kit",
"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
"airtime": "THU 10pm, FRI 1am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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"id": "forum",
"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Forum with Mina Kim and Alexis Madrigal",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5NTU3MzgxNjMz",
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"id": "freakonomics-radio",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "http://freakonomics.com/",
"airtime": "SUN 1am-2am, SAT 3pm-4pm",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
"subscribe": {
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
"rss": "https://feeds.feedburner.com/freakonomicsradio"
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},
"fresh-air": {
"id": "fresh-air",
"title": "Fresh Air",
"info": "Hosted by Terry Gross, \u003cem>Fresh Air from WHYY\u003c/em> is the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues. One of public radio's most popular programs, Fresh Air features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.",
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"link": "/radio/program/fresh-air",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=214089682&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510051/podcast.xml"
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},
"hidden-brain": {
"id": "hidden-brain",
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "NPR"
},
"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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},
"how-i-built-this": {
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"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/howIBuiltThis.png",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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},
"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/how-i-built-this-with-guy-raz/id1150510297?mt=2",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
"title": "Hyphenación",
"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
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"order": 15
},
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/2p3Fifq96nw9BPcmFdIq0o?si=39209f7b25774f38",
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
"meta": {
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"order": 18
},
"link": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
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}
},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
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},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "On Our Watch from NPR and KQED",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1567098962",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ucHIub3JnLzUxMDM2MC9wb2RjYXN0LnhtbD9zYz1nb29nbGVwb2RjYXN0cw",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/show/on-our-watch",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510360/podcast.xml"
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},
"on-the-media": {
"id": "on-the-media",
"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm-3pm, MON 12am-1am",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/onTheMedia.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.wnycstudios.org/shows/otm",
"meta": {
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"source": "wnyc"
},
"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-media/id73330715?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/On-the-Media-p69/",
"rss": "http://feeds.wnyc.org/onthemedia"
}
},
"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
"title": "PBS NewsHour",
"info": "Analysis, background reports and updates from the PBS NewsHour putting today's news in context.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PBS-News-Hour-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/",
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"source": "pbs"
},
"link": "/radio/program/pbs-newshour",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pbs-newshour-full-show/id394432287?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
}
},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
"title": "Perspectives",
"tagline": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991",
"info": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991.",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Perspectives_Tile_Final.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Perspectives",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/perspectives/",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 14
},
"link": "/perspectives",
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"npr": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/432309616/perspectives",
"rss": "https://ww2.kqed.org/perspectives/category/perspectives/feed/",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93dzIua3FlZC5vcmcvcGVyc3BlY3RpdmVzL2NhdGVnb3J5L3BlcnNwZWN0aXZlcy9mZWVkLw"
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},
"planet-money": {
"id": "planet-money",
"title": "Planet Money",
"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
"airtime": "SUN 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/sections/money/",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/planet-money",
"subscribe": {
"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/M4f5",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/planet-money/id290783428?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/Business--Economics-Podcasts/Planet-Money-p164680/",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510289/podcast.xml"
}
},
"politicalbreakdown": {
"id": "politicalbreakdown",
"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Political Breakdown",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 5
},
"link": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
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