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"content": "\u003cp class=\"p1\">The man who presided over one of the most ambitious climate change agendas in the world has some advice for Joe Biden, who in a matter of weeks will become president of the only nation in the world to have signed and then left the Paris climate agreement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an interview with KQED, former Gov. Jerry Brown said Biden will need to rebuild U.S. credibility on the issue, focussing on the United Nations climate change \u003ca href=\"https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/conferences/glasgow-climate-change-conference\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">conference\u003c/span>\u003c/a> in Glasgow in November 2021.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote]‘This is complicated stuff. What do we do and in what order? The advocates will be marching around for whatever they want, but the leader has to set in motion a process that can be managed sequentially, not all at once.’[/pullquote]Meanwhile, Brown advised, don’t pay too much attention to the “folks that have a banner” or “some great environmental writer who writes columns and gets in all the important publications.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown, who said he was part of “the most successful climate fighting government in the Western Hemisphere,” said some environmentalists will “have their slogans and their framing.” But he said Biden should ignore them and tackle the issue “carefully, engaging different stakeholders,” unfolding policies in a logical sequence rather than all at once.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That is not satisfying to the advocates,” he said. “It’s delayed gratification. But that’s how you have to do it.\u003ci>”\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown suggested the new president create strong international partnerships “so that the work becomes a planetary imperative.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">He called the Glasgow conference “the next pivot point,” saying, “Everything ought to be focused on that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Biden’s first order of business should be to immediately talk to President Xi Jinping of China in order to\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>reestablish a “partnership” that “led to the Paris agreement,” Brown said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“Now, can that be done with all the China bashing? Only with great aplomb and skill by President Biden. Anything less would shortchange this problem.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown’s focus on China is not surprising. Last September, the former governor announced a climate-focused think tank at UC Berkeley, a partnership with China’s top climate official.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mission of the \u003ca href=\"https://ccci.berkeley.edu/about\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">California-China Climate Institute\u003c/span>\u003c/a> is to spur action through \u003cspan class=\"s2\">joint research, training and dialogue, according to the organization’s website. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p4\">The collaboration is also an end-run around the Trump administration, first announced when the U.S. was in the process of withdrawing from the 2015 Paris Agreement and embarking on a trade war with China.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown says another environmental priority for Biden should be the reversal of all the regulatory rollbacks initiated under President Trump.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The administration’s deregulation of environmental rules spurred dozens of lawsuits by California, including a challenge to\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>the science that the Environmental Protection Agency used to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1923269/california-sues-over-plan-to-scrap-car-emission-standards\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">roll back emission standards\u003c/span>\u003c/a>, its \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1956060/epa-rolls-back-obama-era-rules-protecting-rivers-and-wetlands\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">justification for new water rules\u003c/span>\u003c/a>, and its plan to ease methane restrictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">During his first tour as governor, from 1975 to 1983, Brown promoted solar and wind power, then fledgling technologies. Chicago columnist Mike Royko saddled him with the nickname “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/weekinreview/07mckinley.html\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">Governor Moonbeam\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” due to Brown’s popularity with young, idealistic voters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">In his second gubernatorial stint, from 2011 to 2019, renewable energy gained significant ground and carbon emissions declined, both while the California economy boomed. But Brown left office two years ago without ever convincing some environmentalists on the left to embrace California’s cap-and-trade program, one of his signature climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many environmental justice groups in California still see the program, which allows industry to offset their carbon emissions by buying and trading credits to emit the gases that drive global warming, as a kind of Rube Goldberg mechanism that has allowed companies to pollute in some of the state’s poorest neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown now says that directly taxing companies that emit carbon “obviously makes sense at some point,” but he’s dismissive of environmentalists who call for an immediate end to domestic oil production and other more sweeping climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003ci>“\u003c/i>This is complicated stuff,” Brown said. “What do we do and in what order? The advocates will be marching around for whatever they want, but the leader has to set in motion a process that can be managed sequentially, not all at once.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You don’t just spill your guts out,” he said, followed by the sound of “Blargh.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown ran through a litany of what he considers to be reductionist slogans. “‘’Carbon price,’ ‘’stop fracking,’ ‘stop the pipeline,’ ‘stop buying fossil fuel cars,’” he recited. “No. When they ask: ‘Why don’t you say something that will make everybody mad and go to the barricades and make sure we are totally ineffective in fighting climate change?’ I would say, ‘That is dumb.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown did say he’s heartened by news reports that Biden is assembling a “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/17/climate/biden-climate-change.html\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">climate administration\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” that might include Mary Nichols, chair of the California Air Resources Board, who worked with him to implement cap-and-trade and other climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown suggested the new president create strong international partnerships “so that the work becomes a planetary imperative.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">He called the Glasgow conference “the next pivot point,” saying, “Everything ought to be focused on that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Biden’s first order of business should be to immediately talk to President Xi Jinping of China in order to\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>reestablish a “partnership” that “led to the Paris agreement,” Brown said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“Now, can that be done with all the China bashing? Only with great aplomb and skill by President Biden. Anything less would shortchange this problem.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown’s focus on China is not surprising. Last September, the former governor announced a climate-focused think tank at UC Berkeley, a partnership with China’s top climate official.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mission of the \u003ca href=\"https://ccci.berkeley.edu/about\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">California-China Climate Institute\u003c/span>\u003c/a> is to spur action through \u003cspan class=\"s2\">joint research, training and dialogue, according to the organization’s website. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p4\">The collaboration is also an end-run around the Trump administration, first announced when the U.S. was in the process of withdrawing from the 2015 Paris Agreement and embarking on a trade war with China.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown says another environmental priority for Biden should be the reversal of all the regulatory rollbacks initiated under President Trump.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The administration’s deregulation of environmental rules spurred dozens of lawsuits by California, including a challenge to\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>the science that the Environmental Protection Agency used to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1923269/california-sues-over-plan-to-scrap-car-emission-standards\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">roll back emission standards\u003c/span>\u003c/a>, its \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1956060/epa-rolls-back-obama-era-rules-protecting-rivers-and-wetlands\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">justification for new water rules\u003c/span>\u003c/a>, and its plan to ease methane restrictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">During his first tour as governor, from 1975 to 1983, Brown promoted solar and wind power, then fledgling technologies. Chicago columnist Mike Royko saddled him with the nickname “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/weekinreview/07mckinley.html\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">Governor Moonbeam\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” due to Brown’s popularity with young, idealistic voters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">In his second gubernatorial stint, from 2011 to 2019, renewable energy gained significant ground and carbon emissions declined, both while the California economy boomed. But Brown left office two years ago without ever convincing some environmentalists on the left to embrace California’s cap-and-trade program, one of his signature climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many environmental justice groups in California still see the program, which allows industry to offset their carbon emissions by buying and trading credits to emit the gases that drive global warming, as a kind of Rube Goldberg mechanism that has allowed companies to pollute in some of the state’s poorest neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown now says that directly taxing companies that emit carbon “obviously makes sense at some point,” but he’s dismissive of environmentalists who call for an immediate end to domestic oil production and other more sweeping climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003ci>“\u003c/i>This is complicated stuff,” Brown said. “What do we do and in what order? The advocates will be marching around for whatever they want, but the leader has to set in motion a process that can be managed sequentially, not all at once.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You don’t just spill your guts out,” he said, followed by the sound of “Blargh.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Brown ran through a litany of what he considers to be reductionist slogans. “‘’Carbon price,’ ‘’stop fracking,’ ‘stop the pipeline,’ ‘stop buying fossil fuel cars,’” he recited. “No. When they ask: ‘Why don’t you say something that will make everybody mad and go to the barricades and make sure we are totally ineffective in fighting climate change?’ I would say, ‘That is dumb.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Brown did say he’s heartened by news reports that Biden is assembling a “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/17/climate/biden-climate-change.html\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">climate administration\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” that might include Mary Nichols, chair of the California Air Resources Board, who worked with him to implement cap-and-trade and other climate policies.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Now that the autumn rains have begun, the devastating 2020 wildfire season is winding down. This year, smoke from the fires resulted in a record number of days in which the Bay Area experienced poor to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1968573/unhealthy-air-expected-to-continue-as-wildfires-winds-persist\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">awful\u003c/a> air quality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the weather turning colder, more people will stay inside, and while we’re used to thinking about the air quality outdoors, polluted indoor air can also have negative health impacts. So, for some \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1969474/the-air-qualitys-terrible-out-there-so-how-can-you-keep-it-clean-indoors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tips\u003c/a> on how to keep your air clean during a smoke emergency or just in general, watch the video below …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jK18jPVrD8c&w=560&h=315]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Now that the autumn rains have begun, the devastating 2020 wildfire season is winding down. This year, smoke from the fires resulted in a record number of days in which the Bay Area experienced poor to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1968573/unhealthy-air-expected-to-continue-as-wildfires-winds-persist\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">awful\u003c/a> air quality.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the weather turning colder, more people will stay inside, and while we’re used to thinking about the air quality outdoors, polluted indoor air can also have negative health impacts. So, for some \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1969474/the-air-qualitys-terrible-out-there-so-how-can-you-keep-it-clean-indoors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">tips\u003c/a> on how to keep your air clean during a smoke emergency or just in general, watch the video below …\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\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/jK18jPVrD8c'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/jK18jPVrD8c'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">General Motors says it will no longer support the Trump administration in legal efforts to end California’s right to set its own clean-air standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">CEO Mary Barra said in a letter Monday to environmental groups that GM will pull out of the lawsuit, urging other automakers to do the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">She said the company agrees with President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to expand electric vehicle use. Last week, GM said it is testing a new battery chemistry that will bring electric-vehicle costs down to those of gas-powered vehicles within five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Barra sent the letter after a Monday morning conversation with Mary Nichols, head of California’s Air Resources Board, the company said. The board is the state’s air pollution regulator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“We believe the ambitious electrification goals of the President-elect, California, and General Motors are aligned, to address climate change by drastically reducing automobile emissions,” Barra said in the letter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Nichols called GM’s announcement good news. “I was pleased to be in communication with Mary Barra again,” she said. “It’s been a while since we had talked.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Dan Becker of the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the environmental groups Barra wrote to, said GM was wrong in trying to stop California from protecting its people from auto pollution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“Now the other automakers must follow GM and withdraw support for (President Donald) Trump’s attack on clean cars,” he said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The White House had no immediate comment Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Ron Klain, Biden’s incoming chief of staff, wrote on Twitter that he is glad to see the president-elect’s leadership “is already encouraging progress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Last year General Motors, Fiat Chrysler, Toyota and 10 smaller automakers sided with the Trump administration in a lawsuit over whether California has the right to set its own standards for greenhouse gas emissions and fuel economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The companies said they would intervene in a lawsuit filed by the Environmental Defense Fund against the Trump administration, which has rolled back national pollution and gas mileage standards enacted while Barack Obama was president.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The group called itself the “Coalition or Sustainable Automotive Regulation” and also included Nissan, Hyundai, Kia, Subaru, Isuzu, Suzuki, Maserati, McLaren, Aston-Martin and Ferrari.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“With our industry facing the possibility of multiple, overlapping and inconsistent standards that drive up costs and penalize consumers, we had an obligation to intervene,” John Bozzella, CEO of Global Automakers and spokesman for the coalition, said at the time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Toyota, one of the big automakers in the coalition favoring the Trump standards, said Monday it is reconsidering its position.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">In a statement, the company said it has supported year-over-year increases in fuel economy standards, and it joined the coalition because most other automakers agreed there should be a single U.S. standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“Given the changing circumstances, we are assessing the situation, but remain committed to our goal of a consistent, unitary set of fuel economy standards applicable in all 50 states,” Toyota said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The initial move put the coalition automakers at odds with five other companies — BMW, Ford, Volkswagen, Volvo and Honda — that backed California and endorsed stricter emissions and fuel economy standards than proposed by the Trump administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">But the coalition’s stance was not so straightforward. For instance, although it opposed California, it still wanted Trump and the state to compromise on one national regulation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">In September of 2019, Trump announced his administration would seek to revoke California’s congressionally granted authority to set standards that are stricter than those issued by federal regulators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The move came after Ford, BMW, Honda and Volkswagen signed a deal with the California Air Resources Board, which had been at odds with the Trump administration for months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Many automakers have said in the past that they support increasing the standards, but not as much as those affirmed in the waning days of the Obama administration in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Under the Obama administration requirements, the fleet of new vehicles would have to average 30 mpg in real-world driving by 2021, rising to 36 mpg in 2025. Those increases would be about 5% per year. The Trump administration’s plan increased fuel economy by 1.5% per year, backing off an earlier proposal to freeze the requirements at 2021 levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Automakers say that because buyers are switching to larger trucks and SUVs, many companies would not be able to meet the stricter standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Shares of GM rose nearly 5% to $45.11 in Monday afternoon trading.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Kathleen Ronayne in Sacramento, California, and Aamer Madhani in Washington, D.C., contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">General Motors says it will no longer support the Trump administration in legal efforts to end California’s right to set its own clean-air standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">CEO Mary Barra said in a letter Monday to environmental groups that GM will pull out of the lawsuit, urging other automakers to do the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">She said the company agrees with President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to expand electric vehicle use. Last week, GM said it is testing a new battery chemistry that will bring electric-vehicle costs down to those of gas-powered vehicles within five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Barra sent the letter after a Monday morning conversation with Mary Nichols, head of California’s Air Resources Board, the company said. The board is the state’s air pollution regulator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“We believe the ambitious electrification goals of the President-elect, California, and General Motors are aligned, to address climate change by drastically reducing automobile emissions,” Barra said in the letter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Nichols called GM’s announcement good news. “I was pleased to be in communication with Mary Barra again,” she said. “It’s been a while since we had talked.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Dan Becker of the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the environmental groups Barra wrote to, said GM was wrong in trying to stop California from protecting its people from auto pollution.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“Now the other automakers must follow GM and withdraw support for (President Donald) Trump’s attack on clean cars,” he said in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The White House had no immediate comment Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Ron Klain, Biden’s incoming chief of staff, wrote on Twitter that he is glad to see the president-elect’s leadership “is already encouraging progress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Last year General Motors, Fiat Chrysler, Toyota and 10 smaller automakers sided with the Trump administration in a lawsuit over whether California has the right to set its own standards for greenhouse gas emissions and fuel economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The companies said they would intervene in a lawsuit filed by the Environmental Defense Fund against the Trump administration, which has rolled back national pollution and gas mileage standards enacted while Barack Obama was president.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The group called itself the “Coalition or Sustainable Automotive Regulation” and also included Nissan, Hyundai, Kia, Subaru, Isuzu, Suzuki, Maserati, McLaren, Aston-Martin and Ferrari.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“With our industry facing the possibility of multiple, overlapping and inconsistent standards that drive up costs and penalize consumers, we had an obligation to intervene,” John Bozzella, CEO of Global Automakers and spokesman for the coalition, said at the time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Toyota, one of the big automakers in the coalition favoring the Trump standards, said Monday it is reconsidering its position.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">In a statement, the company said it has supported year-over-year increases in fuel economy standards, and it joined the coalition because most other automakers agreed there should be a single U.S. standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">“Given the changing circumstances, we are assessing the situation, but remain committed to our goal of a consistent, unitary set of fuel economy standards applicable in all 50 states,” Toyota said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The initial move put the coalition automakers at odds with five other companies — BMW, Ford, Volkswagen, Volvo and Honda — that backed California and endorsed stricter emissions and fuel economy standards than proposed by the Trump administration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">But the coalition’s stance was not so straightforward. For instance, although it opposed California, it still wanted Trump and the state to compromise on one national regulation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">In September of 2019, Trump announced his administration would seek to revoke California’s congressionally granted authority to set standards that are stricter than those issued by federal regulators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">The move came after Ford, BMW, Honda and Volkswagen signed a deal with the California Air Resources Board, which had been at odds with the Trump administration for months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Many automakers have said in the past that they support increasing the standards, but not as much as those affirmed in the waning days of the Obama administration in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Under the Obama administration requirements, the fleet of new vehicles would have to average 30 mpg in real-world driving by 2021, rising to 36 mpg in 2025. Those increases would be about 5% per year. The Trump administration’s plan increased fuel economy by 1.5% per year, backing off an earlier proposal to freeze the requirements at 2021 levels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Automakers say that because buyers are switching to larger trucks and SUVs, many companies would not be able to meet the stricter standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"Component-root-0-2-62 Component-p-0-2-53\">Shares of GM rose nearly 5% to $45.11 in Monday afternoon trading.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Kathleen Ronayne in Sacramento, California, and Aamer Madhani in Washington, D.C., contributed to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"headTitle": "New Whale Entanglement Rules Delay Crab Season, and the Industry Isn’t Happy | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>California has issued \u003ca href=\"https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=184189&inline\">new regulations\u003c/a> designed to protect endangered humpback whales against potentially fatal entanglements in commercial fishing lines, and the Dungeness crab industry is not happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife on Nov. 1 released rules that allow officials to shut down crabbing in areas where whales are spotted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new regulations, whale activity has already triggered the\u003ca href=\"https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=184556&inline\"> delay of the 2020 crab season\u003c/a> on the Central Coast after aerial and boat surveys spotted an estimated 400 whales. The season was set to open Nov. 15, in time to put crab on Thanksgiving tables. The crab boats will not get the go-ahead until the department makes its next assessment, which is expected to occur before Dec. 1. The area subject to the delay runs from the Sonoma-Mendocino County line to the Mexico border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Dungeness crab fishery brings in on average about \u003ca href=\"https://opc.ca.gov/webmaster/ftp/project_pages/Rapid%20Assessments/Dungeness%20Crab.pdf\">$30 million \u003c/a>each year for California fishermen. But the vertical ropes that connect crab traps on the ocean floor to buoys at the surface can ensnare humpback and blue whales, as well as leatherback sea turtles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s been a major increase in the number of entanglements just in the last five years,” said Geoff Shester, a senior scientist for the environmental nonprofit Oceana.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2016 alone, more than 50 confirmed humpback whale entanglements occurred off the West Coast. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/webdam/download/97733256\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">report\u003c/a> from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration listed California’s Dungeness crab fishery as the largest contributor. Data from the agency projects that roughly three-quarters of whales that get tangled in the lines may eventually die as a result.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What these regulations do is they create a new system for determining when certain areas might be closed to crab fishing if there’s a lot of whales or turtles around,” Shester said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new rules, crabbing can be halted in regions where 20 or more whales are spotted. Toward the end of the season, in the spring, 10 or more whales can trigger a shutdown, and confirmed entanglements have the potential to end the season altogether.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Thresholds Too Low, Says Industry\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ben Platt, president of the \u003ca href=\"https://cacoastcrabassociation.org/\">California Coast Crab Association\u003c/a> and owner of a fishing boat based out of Crescent City, says the number of whales that can trigger a closure is too small.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The bottom line is that the thresholds are so low that it’s unrealistic to expect that this fishery could continue in any meaningful way,” Platt said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The crabbing community has worked with the state in recent years to reduce the number of entanglements by putting less gear in the water and supporting closures when necessary, Platt says. In his view, the typical seven-month Dungeness crab season is now in danger of being reduced to three or four months and potentially even fewer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>“\u003c/i>Nowadays, the crab fishery is really the most widely shared and economically important fishery to the coastal communities in California,” Platt said. “We’re potentially looking at the devastation of a whole commercial fishing industry, because if we lose Dungeness crab, most of us are going to have to quit, because it’s our most important and our most dependable fishery.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ryan Bartling, a senior environmental scientist for the state Fish and Wildlife Department’s Marine Region, says commercial crab fishermen, along with environmental groups and state and federal agencies, were part of the state’s \u003ca href=\"https://opc.ca.gov/whale-entanglement-working-group/\">Dungeness Crab Fishing Gear Working Group\u003c/a>, which helped craft the new rules.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re trying to balance the need to protect an endangered species and allow for the crabbing fishery to continue and be viable for the state of California and all the fishing communities that depend on it,” Bartling said. “It’s a dual-goal regulation\u003ci>.\u003c/i>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bartling adds that closing down fishing regions isn’t the only way the new rules allow his agency to respond to whale activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can be a depth restriction, can be a gear reduction, or another management action based on the best available science,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The regulations also provide a potential avenue for crab fisherman to avoid the closures by using \u003ca href=\"https://usa.oceana.org/sites/default/files/2020/10/26/oceana_whale_safe_oceans_report.pdf\">alternative gear\u003c/a> that won’t pose a threat to whales and sea turtles. One option, which doesn’t rely on leaving lines in the water for long periods, utilizes crab traps that deploy buoys to the surface when triggered by a timer or signal. This “pop-up” gear, Bartling and many crab fishermen agree, is still a work in progress — expensive and possible to lose on the ocean floor, with more testing needed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Given the state of technology, I think we can figure this out,” Bartling said of the different gear, “I just don’t know the time frame\u003ci>.\u003c/i>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "California's new regulations designed to protect endangered humpback whales against potentially fatal entanglements in crab fishing lines have put the season on hold.",
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"description": "California's new regulations designed to protect endangered humpback whales against potentially fatal entanglements in crab fishing lines have put the season on hold.",
"title": "New Whale Entanglement Rules Delay Crab Season, and the Industry Isn't Happy | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>California has issued \u003ca href=\"https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=184189&inline\">new regulations\u003c/a> designed to protect endangered humpback whales against potentially fatal entanglements in commercial fishing lines, and the Dungeness crab industry is not happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife on Nov. 1 released rules that allow officials to shut down crabbing in areas where whales are spotted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new regulations, whale activity has already triggered the\u003ca href=\"https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=184556&inline\"> delay of the 2020 crab season\u003c/a> on the Central Coast after aerial and boat surveys spotted an estimated 400 whales. The season was set to open Nov. 15, in time to put crab on Thanksgiving tables. The crab boats will not get the go-ahead until the department makes its next assessment, which is expected to occur before Dec. 1. The area subject to the delay runs from the Sonoma-Mendocino County line to the Mexico border.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Dungeness crab fishery brings in on average about \u003ca href=\"https://opc.ca.gov/webmaster/ftp/project_pages/Rapid%20Assessments/Dungeness%20Crab.pdf\">$30 million \u003c/a>each year for California fishermen. But the vertical ropes that connect crab traps on the ocean floor to buoys at the surface can ensnare humpback and blue whales, as well as leatherback sea turtles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s been a major increase in the number of entanglements just in the last five years,” said Geoff Shester, a senior scientist for the environmental nonprofit Oceana.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2016 alone, more than 50 confirmed humpback whale entanglements occurred off the West Coast. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/webdam/download/97733256\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">report\u003c/a> from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration listed California’s Dungeness crab fishery as the largest contributor. Data from the agency projects that roughly three-quarters of whales that get tangled in the lines may eventually die as a result.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What these regulations do is they create a new system for determining when certain areas might be closed to crab fishing if there’s a lot of whales or turtles around,” Shester said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new rules, crabbing can be halted in regions where 20 or more whales are spotted. Toward the end of the season, in the spring, 10 or more whales can trigger a shutdown, and confirmed entanglements have the potential to end the season altogether.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Thresholds Too Low, Says Industry\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ben Platt, president of the \u003ca href=\"https://cacoastcrabassociation.org/\">California Coast Crab Association\u003c/a> and owner of a fishing boat based out of Crescent City, says the number of whales that can trigger a closure is too small.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The bottom line is that the thresholds are so low that it’s unrealistic to expect that this fishery could continue in any meaningful way,” Platt said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The crabbing community has worked with the state in recent years to reduce the number of entanglements by putting less gear in the water and supporting closures when necessary, Platt says. In his view, the typical seven-month Dungeness crab season is now in danger of being reduced to three or four months and potentially even fewer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>“\u003c/i>Nowadays, the crab fishery is really the most widely shared and economically important fishery to the coastal communities in California,” Platt said. “We’re potentially looking at the devastation of a whole commercial fishing industry, because if we lose Dungeness crab, most of us are going to have to quit, because it’s our most important and our most dependable fishery.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ryan Bartling, a senior environmental scientist for the state Fish and Wildlife Department’s Marine Region, says commercial crab fishermen, along with environmental groups and state and federal agencies, were part of the state’s \u003ca href=\"https://opc.ca.gov/whale-entanglement-working-group/\">Dungeness Crab Fishing Gear Working Group\u003c/a>, which helped craft the new rules.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re trying to balance the need to protect an endangered species and allow for the crabbing fishery to continue and be viable for the state of California and all the fishing communities that depend on it,” Bartling said. “It’s a dual-goal regulation\u003ci>.\u003c/i>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bartling adds that closing down fishing regions isn’t the only way the new rules allow his agency to respond to whale activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can be a depth restriction, can be a gear reduction, or another management action based on the best available science,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The regulations also provide a potential avenue for crab fisherman to avoid the closures by using \u003ca href=\"https://usa.oceana.org/sites/default/files/2020/10/26/oceana_whale_safe_oceans_report.pdf\">alternative gear\u003c/a> that won’t pose a threat to whales and sea turtles. One option, which doesn’t rely on leaving lines in the water for long periods, utilizes crab traps that deploy buoys to the surface when triggered by a timer or signal. This “pop-up” gear, Bartling and many crab fishermen agree, is still a work in progress — expensive and possible to lose on the ocean floor, with more testing needed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Given the state of technology, I think we can figure this out,” Bartling said of the different gear, “I just don’t know the time frame\u003ci>.\u003c/i>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dl_subscribe]\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“They’re so majestic,” ecologist Brent Hughes says as he looks out across Elkhorn Slough, a large winding estuary off the Monterey Bay coastline. He’s not talking about whales or pelicans. He’s talking about a tiny, slimy, aquatic slug — the eelgrass sea hare. Donning his wetsuit, Hughes hops into his kayak and paddles off toward a section of water where the sea hares live, in an underwater meadow of seagrass.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also known as the Taylor’s sea hare, these humble, zebra-striped slices of green jello are actually crucial to the health of their eelgrass meadow ecosystem.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eelgrass sea hares — named for the bunny-like tentacles on top of their heads — can be found munching on the microscopic algae that grow on the surface of eelgrass, a type of marine seagrass. They don’t eat the grass itself; instead they help the meadows grow by clearing the way for sunlight to reach the plants, scraping the blades of grass clean with their rows of tiny teeth. The seagrass, in turn, serves as a safe haven to lay their eggs, and protection from predators like crabs and fish.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970800\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1970800 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_slide.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"590\" height=\"331\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares symbiotically co-evolved with eelgrass, a type of seagrass found near coastlines worldwide. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy /KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The blades of grass also protect more than just these voracious little cleaners. At Elkhorn Slough off of the Monterey Bay, the eelgrass beds form a habitat for a diverse community of animals and plant life, which includes sea otters, Dungeness crabs, clams, skeleton shrimp and various fish.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Eelgrass is like the ugly duckling of the charismatic habitat world,” says biologist Grace Ha of UC Davis, who studied the camouflage of the Taylor’s sea hare. “Seagrasses are among the most productive habitats in the world, if you compare them to rainforest or coral reefs, but most people don’t even know what eelgrass is.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eelgrass forms submarine meadows in shallow seawater, estuaries and salt marshes across the Northern Hemisphere. Seagrasses absorb carbon from the atmosphere and prevent coastal erosion, but climate change, and human activities like large-scale agriculture threaten their existence worldwide. Biologists compare the steady decline of seagrass beds to the global crises of disappearing rainforests and coral reefs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For decades, the eelgrass meadows of Elkhorn Slough were also disappearing. Since the 1950s nitrogen-based fertilizers from farms in the Salinas Valley have drained into the estuary, overloading the water with nutrients, causing massive algae blooms. Too much algae living on the surface of the water blocks the sunlight necessary for eelgrass meadows to grow, and the grasses begin to die out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970796\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1970796 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1920x1080.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares clean the eelgrass of the microscopic algae that coats it. Seagrass meadows help absorb carbon from the atmosphere and control erosion. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2013, Hughes, now at Sonoma State University, published the results of a surprising discovery. He noticed that the eelgrass in Elkhorn Slough was actually rebounding, despite the extreme algal blooms. Strangely, his data showed, this was happening right around the time sea otters were reintroduced to the area.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sea otters had been totally missing from the estuary ecosystem since the early 20\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">th\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> century. By that time, fur traders had hunted otters almost to extinction along the California coast. But in the late 1980s, the Monterey Bay Aquarium rereleased a small population of sea otters back into the slough, and their numbers have steadily increased.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hughes’ research established that the hungry otters were eating copious amounts of local crabs, a natural predator of Taylor’s sea hares. “The otters recovering allowed for an explosion of sea hares that really kind of facilitated the resilience of that seagrass.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970797\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970797\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When sea otters were reintroduced to Elkhorn Slough, they started eating the crabs that eat the sea hares. This meant the sea hares could get back to work cleaning the eelgrass of excessive algae, enabling the eelgrass to grow again. Researchers call this a trophic cascade, when a top predator, like a sea otter, has a balancing effect on the ecosystem. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hughes and his colleagues had uncovered a trophic cascade in which the reintroduction of a top predator (in this case the sea otter) results in a balancing effect on the food web.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In an eelgrass ecosystem like Elkhorn Slough, where nutrient-polluted waters cause regular extreme algal blooms, the “grazers just become really, really important for controlling that algal overgrowth.” When otters were missing and not eating crabs, the crab population grew and ate too many sea hares, so the eelgrass had less help dealing with the suffocating algae growth.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The remarkable thing is that the nutrients are still climbing,” Hughes said. “It’s insane how high the nutrients are in that system.” Despite this continued stress on the ecosystem, the eelgrass meadows in Elkhorn Slough have in fact steadily expanded over the past three decades. Hughes credits the otters and their trophic cascade relationship with the sea hares. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970798\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970798\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Runoff from farms carries excessive nutrients into Elkhorn Slough, which spurs the growth of thick mats of algae. Left unchecked, these algal blooms block sunlight from reaching the eelgrass, and cause them to die. The eelgrass sea hare’s constant appetite for algae helps to counterbalance these harmful effects. \u003ccite>(Brent Hughes/Sonoma State University)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“These grazers are so abundant in Elkhorn Slough, you just have to reach over and grab some seagrass and you’ll end up grabbing a few sea hares too.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Further north, in the San Francisco Bay, Kathy Boyer has been working for years to restore native eelgrass ecosystems. Eelgrass sea hares had also been easy to find in the meadows she was restoring, until recently.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">2017 was an extremely wet winter and spring for the San Francisco Bay Area. Storm after storm brought so much fresh water to the bay that salinity dropped well below the usual level (below ten parts per thousand). Very soon after this dramatic drop in salinity, Boyer and her colleagues noticed that the Taylor’s sea hare (and another symbiotic grazer called the eelgrass isopod) had disappeared from the meadows in the bay. The sea hares had simply vanished from the eight eelgrass restoration sites she and her team had been monitoring.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It was shocking,” she says. “We’ve definitely seen fluctuations in invertebrate populations, but we’ve never seen the complete loss of species.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970799\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 700px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970799\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_bunny_edit.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"393\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sea hares get their name from the bunny-ear-like tentacles on top of their heads called rhinophores, which they use to sense temperature, water movement and smell. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boyer and her team realized at that moment that the only places in the San Francisco Bay with living Taylor’s sea hares were the experimental holding tanks where she does most of her eelgrass restoration studies, at San Francisco State University’s Estuary and Ocean Science Center in Tiburon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boyer immediately recognized the importance of the animals in her tanks. “We’ve got to try to keep these guys alive, because it’s all that’s left of this population.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She hopes to grow the population, and eventually reestablish them throughout eelgrass meadows in the bay. The good news is “they’re reproducing like crazy, they’re really happy in the tanks. They’ve got no predators, so they’re just doing their thing.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Having worked in ecosystem restoration for years, Boyer intimately understands the complexities inherent to the work. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“There’s lots of interest in just going out and restoring a bunch of eelgrass, but the grass doesn’t live in a vacuum out there in the bay. It interacts with all these other species. It brings up lots of questions about ‘What are restoration best practices?’”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970795\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970795\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1920x1080.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass meadows provide a safe haven for sea hare eggs and protection for their young. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The disappearance of the sea hares offers a rare opportunity to observe what happens when a species suddenly vanishes from an ecosystem. “Sometimes you don’t know what you have until you lose a bit of it,” Boyer said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also, Elkhorn Slough has sea otters, but the San Francisco Bay does not, which translates to a big difference in how the food webs function in each location.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Whether the trophic cascade will have the same levels, and effect, as Brent is seeing down in Elkhorn, we really have no idea,” says Boyer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There are different sets of animals in the food web in the San Francisco Bay, but it seems that reintroducing otters is a real possibility. Because their populations have been so scarce over the past century, scientists had assumed sea otters lived primarily in ocean waters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970801\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970801\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_XCU1.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"590\" height=\"331\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares symbiotically co-evolved with eelgrass, a type of seagrass found near coastlines worldwide. Their patterning helps them bland seamlessly into their grassy home. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The amazing thing with the otters is that as they’re recovering, they’re revealing their true range of habitats that they can use right now,” Hughes says, citing the recent success of the Elkhorn Slough otter population. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Now researchers are focusing on these estuaries as areas for sea otter recovery, in areas away from predators, away from big waves that you might experience in a kelp forest, somewhat removed from human influence”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Both Boyer and Hughes are co-authors of a research paper suggesting that if properly reintroduced, the San Francisco Bay could be home to as many as 6,000 sea otters, effectively tripling the current population of sea otters in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Whether or not sea otters should be a part of the Taylor’s sea hare reintroduction plan in the San Francisco Bay is still an open question, but it is definitely on Boyer’s mind as she wrestles with the complex decisions of when and how to bring the sea hares back to the bay’s meadows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Despite the challenges of eelgrass ecosystem restoration, Hughes remains inspired by the example of the Taylor’s sea hares. He says Elkhorn Slough is “a gold mine in terms of scientific discoveries. It’s a story of recovery, of conservation, and it involves not only the imperiled species, the sea otter, but these imperiled habitats that they’re returning to, such as seagrasses and salt marshes.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s also a story of how even a little green slug can be so much more important than its modest appearance might, at first, suggest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "See Sea Slugs Scour Seagrass by the Seashore | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“They’re so majestic,” ecologist Brent Hughes says as he looks out across Elkhorn Slough, a large winding estuary off the Monterey Bay coastline. He’s not talking about whales or pelicans. He’s talking about a tiny, slimy, aquatic slug — the eelgrass sea hare. Donning his wetsuit, Hughes hops into his kayak and paddles off toward a section of water where the sea hares live, in an underwater meadow of seagrass.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also known as the Taylor’s sea hare, these humble, zebra-striped slices of green jello are actually crucial to the health of their eelgrass meadow ecosystem.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eelgrass sea hares — named for the bunny-like tentacles on top of their heads — can be found munching on the microscopic algae that grow on the surface of eelgrass, a type of marine seagrass. They don’t eat the grass itself; instead they help the meadows grow by clearing the way for sunlight to reach the plants, scraping the blades of grass clean with their rows of tiny teeth. The seagrass, in turn, serves as a safe haven to lay their eggs, and protection from predators like crabs and fish.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970800\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1970800 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_slide.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"590\" height=\"331\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares symbiotically co-evolved with eelgrass, a type of seagrass found near coastlines worldwide. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy /KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The blades of grass also protect more than just these voracious little cleaners. At Elkhorn Slough off of the Monterey Bay, the eelgrass beds form a habitat for a diverse community of animals and plant life, which includes sea otters, Dungeness crabs, clams, skeleton shrimp and various fish.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Eelgrass is like the ugly duckling of the charismatic habitat world,” says biologist Grace Ha of UC Davis, who studied the camouflage of the Taylor’s sea hare. “Seagrasses are among the most productive habitats in the world, if you compare them to rainforest or coral reefs, but most people don’t even know what eelgrass is.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eelgrass forms submarine meadows in shallow seawater, estuaries and salt marshes across the Northern Hemisphere. Seagrasses absorb carbon from the atmosphere and prevent coastal erosion, but climate change, and human activities like large-scale agriculture threaten their existence worldwide. Biologists compare the steady decline of seagrass beds to the global crises of disappearing rainforests and coral reefs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For decades, the eelgrass meadows of Elkhorn Slough were also disappearing. Since the 1950s nitrogen-based fertilizers from farms in the Salinas Valley have drained into the estuary, overloading the water with nutrients, causing massive algae blooms. Too much algae living on the surface of the water blocks the sunlight necessary for eelgrass meadows to grow, and the grasses begin to die out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970796\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1970796 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_MW2-1920x1080.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares clean the eelgrass of the microscopic algae that coats it. Seagrass meadows help absorb carbon from the atmosphere and control erosion. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2013, Hughes, now at Sonoma State University, published the results of a surprising discovery. He noticed that the eelgrass in Elkhorn Slough was actually rebounding, despite the extreme algal blooms. Strangely, his data showed, this was happening right around the time sea otters were reintroduced to the area.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sea otters had been totally missing from the estuary ecosystem since the early 20\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">th\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> century. By that time, fur traders had hunted otters almost to extinction along the California coast. But in the late 1980s, the Monterey Bay Aquarium rereleased a small population of sea otters back into the slough, and their numbers have steadily increased.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hughes’ research established that the hungry otters were eating copious amounts of local crabs, a natural predator of Taylor’s sea hares. “The otters recovering allowed for an explosion of sea hares that really kind of facilitated the resilience of that seagrass.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970797\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970797\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_sea_otter2.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When sea otters were reintroduced to Elkhorn Slough, they started eating the crabs that eat the sea hares. This meant the sea hares could get back to work cleaning the eelgrass of excessive algae, enabling the eelgrass to grow again. Researchers call this a trophic cascade, when a top predator, like a sea otter, has a balancing effect on the ecosystem. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hughes and his colleagues had uncovered a trophic cascade in which the reintroduction of a top predator (in this case the sea otter) results in a balancing effect on the food web.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In an eelgrass ecosystem like Elkhorn Slough, where nutrient-polluted waters cause regular extreme algal blooms, the “grazers just become really, really important for controlling that algal overgrowth.” When otters were missing and not eating crabs, the crab population grew and ate too many sea hares, so the eelgrass had less help dealing with the suffocating algae growth.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The remarkable thing is that the nutrients are still climbing,” Hughes said. “It’s insane how high the nutrients are in that system.” Despite this continued stress on the ecosystem, the eelgrass meadows in Elkhorn Slough have in fact steadily expanded over the past three decades. Hughes credits the otters and their trophic cascade relationship with the sea hares. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970798\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970798\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom-1920x1440.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Elkhorn_Slough_algal_bloom.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Runoff from farms carries excessive nutrients into Elkhorn Slough, which spurs the growth of thick mats of algae. Left unchecked, these algal blooms block sunlight from reaching the eelgrass, and cause them to die. The eelgrass sea hare’s constant appetite for algae helps to counterbalance these harmful effects. \u003ccite>(Brent Hughes/Sonoma State University)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“These grazers are so abundant in Elkhorn Slough, you just have to reach over and grab some seagrass and you’ll end up grabbing a few sea hares too.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Further north, in the San Francisco Bay, Kathy Boyer has been working for years to restore native eelgrass ecosystems. Eelgrass sea hares had also been easy to find in the meadows she was restoring, until recently.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">2017 was an extremely wet winter and spring for the San Francisco Bay Area. Storm after storm brought so much fresh water to the bay that salinity dropped well below the usual level (below ten parts per thousand). Very soon after this dramatic drop in salinity, Boyer and her colleagues noticed that the Taylor’s sea hare (and another symbiotic grazer called the eelgrass isopod) had disappeared from the meadows in the bay. The sea hares had simply vanished from the eight eelgrass restoration sites she and her team had been monitoring.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It was shocking,” she says. “We’ve definitely seen fluctuations in invertebrate populations, but we’ve never seen the complete loss of species.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970799\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 700px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970799\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_Eelgrass_Sea_Hare_bunny_edit.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"393\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sea hares get their name from the bunny-ear-like tentacles on top of their heads called rhinophores, which they use to sense temperature, water movement and smell. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boyer and her team realized at that moment that the only places in the San Francisco Bay with living Taylor’s sea hares were the experimental holding tanks where she does most of her eelgrass restoration studies, at San Francisco State University’s Estuary and Ocean Science Center in Tiburon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Boyer immediately recognized the importance of the animals in her tanks. “We’ve got to try to keep these guys alive, because it’s all that’s left of this population.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She hopes to grow the population, and eventually reestablish them throughout eelgrass meadows in the bay. The good news is “they’re reproducing like crazy, they’re really happy in the tanks. They’ve got no predators, so they’re just doing their thing.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Having worked in ecosystem restoration for years, Boyer intimately understands the complexities inherent to the work. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“There’s lots of interest in just going out and restoring a bunch of eelgrass, but the grass doesn’t live in a vacuum out there in the bay. It interacts with all these other species. It brings up lots of questions about ‘What are restoration best practices?’”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970795\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1970795\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_baby-1920x1080.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass meadows provide a safe haven for sea hare eggs and protection for their young. \u003ccite>(Josh Cassidy/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The disappearance of the sea hares offers a rare opportunity to observe what happens when a species suddenly vanishes from an ecosystem. “Sometimes you don’t know what you have until you lose a bit of it,” Boyer said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also, Elkhorn Slough has sea otters, but the San Francisco Bay does not, which translates to a big difference in how the food webs function in each location.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Whether the trophic cascade will have the same levels, and effect, as Brent is seeing down in Elkhorn, we really have no idea,” says Boyer.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There are different sets of animals in the food web in the San Francisco Bay, but it seems that reintroducing otters is a real possibility. Because their populations have been so scarce over the past century, scientists had assumed sea otters lived primarily in ocean waters.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970801\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970801\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/11/DL719_eelgrass_sea_hare_XCU1.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"590\" height=\"331\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eelgrass sea hares symbiotically co-evolved with eelgrass, a type of seagrass found near coastlines worldwide. Their patterning helps them bland seamlessly into their grassy home. \u003ccite>(Mike Seely/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The amazing thing with the otters is that as they’re recovering, they’re revealing their true range of habitats that they can use right now,” Hughes says, citing the recent success of the Elkhorn Slough otter population. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“Now researchers are focusing on these estuaries as areas for sea otter recovery, in areas away from predators, away from big waves that you might experience in a kelp forest, somewhat removed from human influence”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Both Boyer and Hughes are co-authors of a research paper suggesting that if properly reintroduced, the San Francisco Bay could be home to as many as 6,000 sea otters, effectively tripling the current population of sea otters in California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Whether or not sea otters should be a part of the Taylor’s sea hare reintroduction plan in the San Francisco Bay is still an open question, but it is definitely on Boyer’s mind as she wrestles with the complex decisions of when and how to bring the sea hares back to the bay’s meadows.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Despite the challenges of eelgrass ecosystem restoration, Hughes remains inspired by the example of the Taylor’s sea hares. He says Elkhorn Slough is “a gold mine in terms of scientific discoveries. It’s a story of recovery, of conservation, and it involves not only the imperiled species, the sea otter, but these imperiled habitats that they’re returning to, such as seagrasses and salt marshes.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s also a story of how even a little green slug can be so much more important than its modest appearance might, at first, suggest.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Long-Term Health Effects of Wildfire Smoke Feared, With COVID as Wild Card",
"headTitle": "Long-Term Health Effects of Wildfire Smoke Feared, With COVID as Wild Card | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>Wildfire smoke had choked the mountain valleys of western Montana for nearly two months when a team of university researchers landed in Seeley Lake in the fall of 2017. Students and faculty left their labs behind, headed to the small community and launched a study on how the relentless wildfire smoke was affecting the health of the people breathing it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.mdpi.com/2305-6304/8/3/53/htm#B16-toxics-08-00053\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">results\u003c/a> of their study, published in the journal \u003cem>Toxics\u003c/em> this summer, were stunning. They showed that lung function in the 100 Montanans who participated declined the year after the fires and stayed compromised the year after that, said lead researcher, Christopher T. Migliaccio, whose work at the University of Montana focuses on how environmental factors affect respiratory function and immunity, with an emphasis on wildfire smoke exposures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Seeing that there is this long-term effect is new,” he said, in telling how the findings showed that short-term symptoms like scratchy throats and persistent coughing were only part of the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a year when wildfires have burned 8 million acres across America, findings like these have raised concern to new levels — not only because Colorado and California both suffered through their\u003ca href=\"https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/147443/record-setting-fires-in-colorado-and-california\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> largest fires \u003c/a>in history this year, but also because of the global pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Worry is only growing as the fire season expands into the flu season, and continues to choke the air with wildfire smoke, while the risk of COVID-19 infections swells, too. Roughly 78 million people who live in the smoky West also face heightened health risks from two viruses, the common flu and the strange and unchecked coronavirus that has claimed more than 223,000 American lives in a matter of months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Growing Concern About Health Risks From Wildfire Smoke\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than a dozen studies have emerged from around the world in recent weeks on how air pollution affects COVID-19, but many urgent questions remain. Will I get sicker from the coronavirus because I inhaled so much wildfire smoke for so long? Am I more likely to die from COVID-19 because I live downwind of these massive wildfires? As a coronavirus survivor, am I more vulnerable to wildfire smoke? Does wood smoke harm my health even more than urban pollution?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When it comes to how we might expect wildfire smoke to exacerbate COVID-19 risks, we don’t know yet, since we are just now experiencing our 2020 wildfire season with this new emerging infectious disease,” said Erin Landguth, an associate professor at the Center for Population Health Research at the University of Montana. “However, we have a lot of pieces to this puzzle that warrant concern.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Solid answers about the connection between air pollution and COVID-19 are probably two years away, said C. Arden Pope, a researcher at Brigham Young University who pioneered air pollution epidemiology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, he added, “It would not surprise me if air pollution contributes to the risk of coronavirus infection.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"media media-element-container media-image_centered_medium\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970690 alignright\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"529\" height=\"680\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px.png 529w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px-160x206.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 529px) 100vw, 529px\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>Pope’s own research, reported two years ago in the \u003cem>American Journal of Respiratory Critical Care Medicine\u003c/em>, has \u003ca href=\"https://www.atsjournals.org/doi/full/10.1164/rccm.201709-1883OC\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">linked \u003c/a>PM2.5 air pollution — particulate matter that is smaller than 2.5 microns, or about 30 times smaller than a human hair — to the influenza virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And even though that link has been well-established in research, the most prominent study so far linking air pollution with the coronavirus has taken heat, Pope noted. The T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard University last spring \u003ca href=\"https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/c-change/subtopics/coronavirus-and-pollution/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">projected\u003c/a> an 8% increase in mortality for increased pollution concentrations as small as 1 microgram of PM2.5 per cubic meter of air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, other studies have linked higher air pollution exposures to increased severity of COVID-19 infections. But so far, no research specifically ties wildfire smoke exposure to increased infection from the coronavirus or severity of symptoms, scientists told InsideClimate News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Air Pollution, Regardless of its Source, Harms Health\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">How PM 2.5 makes people sick has been the subject of thousands of studies over decades. These microscopic particles of soot, which come from fossil fuel combustion as well as from burning forests and grasslands, burrow into the sensitive lining of the lungs, triggering heart and lung damage. They also are sometimes small enough to pass into the bloodstream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">The World Health Organization blames indoor pollution from burning wood and other fuels used for cooking and heating for 4 million premature deaths a year — just as many as from outdoor pollution sources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Landguth pointed out that groups considered “sensitive” to air pollution make up about 30 percent of the U.S. population. Children under 18, adults over 65, women who are pregnant and those with medical conditions such as heart or lung disease, COPD, asthma, diabetes or compromised immune systems are included in that group. So are those who work outdoors or who have lower socioeconomic status, such as people who are homeless and those with limited access to medical care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">A subset of studies has begun drilling down into the health impacts of pollution from wildfires. One was led by Landguth, who reviewed a decade’s worth of data on PM 2.5 from wildfires in Montana and hospitalizations and urgent-care clinic visits for influenza.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Past studies of wildfire smoke have focused on acute cardiopulmonary health effects that happen within days or weeks of exposure. Landguth said that’s the timeframe the researchers expected to see increased treatment for flu in this study. Her team, however, was shocked to find \u003ca href=\"https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0160412019326935?token=73D3A077751F8235C4B160A8E5876A0E6C06B9170186805735E20068707909ED57F0B514DCBA5D20035335C1ECFB5146\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">delayed effects\u003c/a>, as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After bad summer fire seasons, influenza was three to five times worse during the traditional flu season of fall and winter. After four bad fire years, including 2017, the number of annual flu cases in Montana jumped from the typical 3,000 to around 12,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were just — we couldn’t believe it,” she said, noting that the lag time was months, rather than days or weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re furiously pulling in that data right now trying to see if this association is gonna hold across other states [because] wildfire season is a lot longer in California, and it’s different in Oregon and Washington and Colorado,” she said. “We don’t know. We need to investigate that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even though there hasn’t been enough time to compile the peer-reviewed research that doctors and public health professionals rely on, the coronavirus-wildfire smoke connections are already seen as significant. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/disasters/covid-19/wildfire_smoke_covid-19.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">coronavirus website\u003c/a> this summer to say that people with COVID-19 are at increased risk from wildfire smoke, Landguth pointed out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wildfire smoke can irritate your lungs, cause inflammation, affect your immune system and make you more prone to lung infections, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19,” the CDC page says. “Know how wildfire smoke can affect you and your loved ones during the COVID-19 pandemic and what you can do to protect yourselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The size and duration of this summer’s Western wildfires have prompted a growing urgency to find answers to questions about the smoke-pandemic dynamic. But researchers mention longer-term concerns too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv>\n\u003cp>Climate change is increasing the likelihood of wildfire, and the health burden of fire pollution on public health is growing, too. And the addition of the coronavirus to the mix adds still more concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00610-5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">study\u003c/a> published this week in \u003cem>Nature Sustainability\u003c/em> underscores the scope of the potential impacts from the converging trends. In it, researchers detailed how the health care costs associated with PM 2.5 from the 2019-20 Australian megafires was nearly $1.4 billion, with 3,230 hospital admissions for cardiovascular and respiratory disorders and 429 premature deaths attributed to the smoke.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marshall Burke, associate professor in Stanford University’s Department of Earth System Science, is \u003ca href=\"http://www.g-feed.com/2020/09/indirect-mortality-from-recent.html\">researching\u003c/a> the overall health costs of exposure to six weeks of smoke from the recent wildfires across the West Coast. Early findings suggest that the smoke impacts are huge, possibly responsible for serious disease or death in thousands of people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really important in thinking about the overall cost,” he said, “putting a sort of a back of the envelope magnitude, on how large these hidden costs could be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burke said he needs to see more data before he would conclude that a bad fire year will cause more severe illness and more frequent death from COVID-19. Studies only suggest “the plausible biological story that exposure to air pollution worsens immune function,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve seen that it causes you to either be more susceptible to viral infection or more harmed by it if you are exposed or infected,” he said. But “there has not been the smoking gun study that totally proves that true.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many experts on air pollution and health have been fielding questions about COVID-19 and the wildfire smoke all summer. It’s hard to find the right answer, said \u003ca href=\"https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/ehp.1409277\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Colleen E. Reid\u003c/a>, an assistant professor in the department of geography at the University of Colorado in Boulder, who has literally been in the thick of it, as hundreds of thousands of acres burn in her state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The recommendations we have for protecting health need to be studied more to know what’s really effective,” she said, noting that most recommendations are based on common sense and good judgment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some are asking how to tell if their cough is from COVID-19 or from breathing wildfire smoke for days. People who live in poorly insulated or leaky homes might seek relief from the heat and smoke at a mall or public library with better ventilation, but that could increase the risk of being exposed to the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need more evidence,” she said, “about the efficacy of different specific interventions that could protect people from smoke.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Migliaccio, the University of Montana researcher, has also been fielding calls about managing personal risk as coronavirus case rates climb in his state and the flu season picks up. Some of those calls are from the 109 people who participated in the Seeley Lake study two years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The pandemic prevented researchers from doing follow-up spirometry tests this summer, he said, so his team hasn’t been able to measure how much those research subjects have healed from the smoke of 2017. Migliaccio said he talks to them about the importance of taking precautions against the flu, such as getting the annual vaccine, as well as the masks and social distancing credited with the spread of COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Be even more vigilant” about taking steps against the twin viruses, he said he tells them, “because you’re going to be a little bit compromised, unfortunately.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Wildfire smoke had choked the mountain valleys of western Montana for nearly two months when a team of university researchers landed in Seeley Lake in the fall of 2017. Students and faculty left their labs behind, headed to the small community and launched a study on how the relentless wildfire smoke was affecting the health of the people breathing it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://www.mdpi.com/2305-6304/8/3/53/htm#B16-toxics-08-00053\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">results\u003c/a> of their study, published in the journal \u003cem>Toxics\u003c/em> this summer, were stunning. They showed that lung function in the 100 Montanans who participated declined the year after the fires and stayed compromised the year after that, said lead researcher, Christopher T. Migliaccio, whose work at the University of Montana focuses on how environmental factors affect respiratory function and immunity, with an emphasis on wildfire smoke exposures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Seeing that there is this long-term effect is new,” he said, in telling how the findings showed that short-term symptoms like scratchy throats and persistent coughing were only part of the story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a year when wildfires have burned 8 million acres across America, findings like these have raised concern to new levels — not only because Colorado and California both suffered through their\u003ca href=\"https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/147443/record-setting-fires-in-colorado-and-california\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> largest fires \u003c/a>in history this year, but also because of the global pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Worry is only growing as the fire season expands into the flu season, and continues to choke the air with wildfire smoke, while the risk of COVID-19 infections swells, too. Roughly 78 million people who live in the smoky West also face heightened health risks from two viruses, the common flu and the strange and unchecked coronavirus that has claimed more than 223,000 American lives in a matter of months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Growing Concern About Health Risks From Wildfire Smoke\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than a dozen studies have emerged from around the world in recent weeks on how air pollution affects COVID-19, but many urgent questions remain. Will I get sicker from the coronavirus because I inhaled so much wildfire smoke for so long? Am I more likely to die from COVID-19 because I live downwind of these massive wildfires? As a coronavirus survivor, am I more vulnerable to wildfire smoke? Does wood smoke harm my health even more than urban pollution?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When it comes to how we might expect wildfire smoke to exacerbate COVID-19 risks, we don’t know yet, since we are just now experiencing our 2020 wildfire season with this new emerging infectious disease,” said Erin Landguth, an associate professor at the Center for Population Health Research at the University of Montana. “However, we have a lot of pieces to this puzzle that warrant concern.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Solid answers about the connection between air pollution and COVID-19 are probably two years away, said C. Arden Pope, a researcher at Brigham Young University who pioneered air pollution epidemiology.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, he added, “It would not surprise me if air pollution contributes to the risk of coronavirus infection.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"media media-element-container media-image_centered_medium\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970690 alignright\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"529\" height=\"680\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px.png 529w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/PM2.5ExplainerSmoke529px-160x206.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 529px) 100vw, 529px\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>Pope’s own research, reported two years ago in the \u003cem>American Journal of Respiratory Critical Care Medicine\u003c/em>, has \u003ca href=\"https://www.atsjournals.org/doi/full/10.1164/rccm.201709-1883OC\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">linked \u003c/a>PM2.5 air pollution — particulate matter that is smaller than 2.5 microns, or about 30 times smaller than a human hair — to the influenza virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And even though that link has been well-established in research, the most prominent study so far linking air pollution with the coronavirus has taken heat, Pope noted. The T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard University last spring \u003ca href=\"https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/c-change/subtopics/coronavirus-and-pollution/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">projected\u003c/a> an 8% increase in mortality for increased pollution concentrations as small as 1 microgram of PM2.5 per cubic meter of air.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, other studies have linked higher air pollution exposures to increased severity of COVID-19 infections. But so far, no research specifically ties wildfire smoke exposure to increased infection from the coronavirus or severity of symptoms, scientists told InsideClimate News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Air Pollution, Regardless of its Source, Harms Health\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">How PM 2.5 makes people sick has been the subject of thousands of studies over decades. These microscopic particles of soot, which come from fossil fuel combustion as well as from burning forests and grasslands, burrow into the sensitive lining of the lungs, triggering heart and lung damage. They also are sometimes small enough to pass into the bloodstream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">The World Health Organization blames indoor pollution from burning wood and other fuels used for cooking and heating for 4 million premature deaths a year — just as many as from outdoor pollution sources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Landguth pointed out that groups considered “sensitive” to air pollution make up about 30 percent of the U.S. population. Children under 18, adults over 65, women who are pregnant and those with medical conditions such as heart or lung disease, COPD, asthma, diabetes or compromised immune systems are included in that group. So are those who work outdoors or who have lower socioeconomic status, such as people who are homeless and those with limited access to medical care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">A subset of studies has begun drilling down into the health impacts of pollution from wildfires. One was led by Landguth, who reviewed a decade’s worth of data on PM 2.5 from wildfires in Montana and hospitalizations and urgent-care clinic visits for influenza.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Past studies of wildfire smoke have focused on acute cardiopulmonary health effects that happen within days or weeks of exposure. Landguth said that’s the timeframe the researchers expected to see increased treatment for flu in this study. Her team, however, was shocked to find \u003ca href=\"https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0160412019326935?token=73D3A077751F8235C4B160A8E5876A0E6C06B9170186805735E20068707909ED57F0B514DCBA5D20035335C1ECFB5146\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">delayed effects\u003c/a>, as well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After bad summer fire seasons, influenza was three to five times worse during the traditional flu season of fall and winter. After four bad fire years, including 2017, the number of annual flu cases in Montana jumped from the typical 3,000 to around 12,000.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were just — we couldn’t believe it,” she said, noting that the lag time was months, rather than days or weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re furiously pulling in that data right now trying to see if this association is gonna hold across other states [because] wildfire season is a lot longer in California, and it’s different in Oregon and Washington and Colorado,” she said. “We don’t know. We need to investigate that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even though there hasn’t been enough time to compile the peer-reviewed research that doctors and public health professionals rely on, the coronavirus-wildfire smoke connections are already seen as significant. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/disasters/covid-19/wildfire_smoke_covid-19.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">coronavirus website\u003c/a> this summer to say that people with COVID-19 are at increased risk from wildfire smoke, Landguth pointed out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Wildfire smoke can irritate your lungs, cause inflammation, affect your immune system and make you more prone to lung infections, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19,” the CDC page says. “Know how wildfire smoke can affect you and your loved ones during the COVID-19 pandemic and what you can do to protect yourselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The size and duration of this summer’s Western wildfires have prompted a growing urgency to find answers to questions about the smoke-pandemic dynamic. But researchers mention longer-term concerns too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv>\n\u003cp>Climate change is increasing the likelihood of wildfire, and the health burden of fire pollution on public health is growing, too. And the addition of the coronavirus to the mix adds still more concern.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00610-5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">study\u003c/a> published this week in \u003cem>Nature Sustainability\u003c/em> underscores the scope of the potential impacts from the converging trends. In it, researchers detailed how the health care costs associated with PM 2.5 from the 2019-20 Australian megafires was nearly $1.4 billion, with 3,230 hospital admissions for cardiovascular and respiratory disorders and 429 premature deaths attributed to the smoke.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marshall Burke, associate professor in Stanford University’s Department of Earth System Science, is \u003ca href=\"http://www.g-feed.com/2020/09/indirect-mortality-from-recent.html\">researching\u003c/a> the overall health costs of exposure to six weeks of smoke from the recent wildfires across the West Coast. Early findings suggest that the smoke impacts are huge, possibly responsible for serious disease or death in thousands of people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really important in thinking about the overall cost,” he said, “putting a sort of a back of the envelope magnitude, on how large these hidden costs could be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burke said he needs to see more data before he would conclude that a bad fire year will cause more severe illness and more frequent death from COVID-19. Studies only suggest “the plausible biological story that exposure to air pollution worsens immune function,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve seen that it causes you to either be more susceptible to viral infection or more harmed by it if you are exposed or infected,” he said. But “there has not been the smoking gun study that totally proves that true.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many experts on air pollution and health have been fielding questions about COVID-19 and the wildfire smoke all summer. It’s hard to find the right answer, said \u003ca href=\"https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/ehp.1409277\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Colleen E. Reid\u003c/a>, an assistant professor in the department of geography at the University of Colorado in Boulder, who has literally been in the thick of it, as hundreds of thousands of acres burn in her state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The recommendations we have for protecting health need to be studied more to know what’s really effective,” she said, noting that most recommendations are based on common sense and good judgment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some are asking how to tell if their cough is from COVID-19 or from breathing wildfire smoke for days. People who live in poorly insulated or leaky homes might seek relief from the heat and smoke at a mall or public library with better ventilation, but that could increase the risk of being exposed to the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need more evidence,” she said, “about the efficacy of different specific interventions that could protect people from smoke.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Migliaccio, the University of Montana researcher, has also been fielding calls about managing personal risk as coronavirus case rates climb in his state and the flu season picks up. Some of those calls are from the 109 people who participated in the Seeley Lake study two years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The pandemic prevented researchers from doing follow-up spirometry tests this summer, he said, so his team hasn’t been able to measure how much those research subjects have healed from the smoke of 2017. Migliaccio said he talks to them about the importance of taking precautions against the flu, such as getting the annual vaccine, as well as the masks and social distancing credited with the spread of COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Be even more vigilant” about taking steps against the twin viruses, he said he tells them, “because you’re going to be a little bit compromised, unfortunately.”\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp class=\"p1\">Let’s say you’re a Green-New-Deal-type environmentalist hell-bent on avoiding planetary destruction while also fixing societal problems like economic inequality and racial injustice. Then, somehow, someway, just as California is digging itself out of a pandemic-induced recession, you have $30 billion to invest any way you want.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What are you going to do?\u003cbr>\n\u003cspan class=\"s1\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>In early October, environmental groups convened a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZRRMdMYe8U\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">livestreamed\u003c/span>\u003c/a> panel with some of California’s climate intelligentsia for just such an exercise. Organizers are testing the waters for putting a \u003ca href=\"https://www.movela.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">“\u003c/span>\u003cspan class=\"s3\">California Climate and Clean Air Initiative” \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan class=\"s3\">on the \u003c/span>\u003cspan class=\"s2\">2022 ballot \u003c/span>and hoped the conversation could generate some policy ideas. For example, Kevin de León, former president pro tempore of the state Senate, wanted to spend money on building infrastructure for charging electric cars, plus a cash incentive for low-income people to buy them. Senate Majority Whip Nancy Skinner wish-listed $10 billion toward affordable housing near job centers and funds for green hydrogen, carbon sequestration and electric vehicles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmentalists often argue economic stimulus is a tea best served with two lumps of clean energy and a heavy dose of social justice. So now that the policy bigwigs have opined, we decided to bring the same fantasy question to community organizations working in Oakland, a city where chronic exposure to particulate matter from smog generated by the heavily trafficked port and spider-webbed freeways exacerbates lung and heart disease in poorer neighborhoods; and where air pollution can also \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7345938/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">enable\u003c/a> the spread of COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">So we asked activists from four organizations: If you were suddenly awash in $30 billion worth of funding, what would be your priorities for Oakland?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Here’s how the groups would want to spend those billions …\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cbr>\n\u003cb>Crystal Huang\u003c/b>, worker-director of \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.peoplepowersolar.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">People Power Solar Cooperative\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a grassroots-led initiative to develop community solar in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Community members can “control their own power; literally, financially and politically.” The group develops community solar projects, where neighbors pool resources to invest in shared solar projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Building community solar projects,” she said. “People who don’t normally have the ability to get financial benefit or social benefit of solar power can own the solar system through the cooperative. Regardless of their living situation or whether they own real estate, they can participate in the energy transition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003cb>Sonrisa Cooper\u003c/b>, community development program manager with the \u003ca href=\"https://greenlining.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">\u003cstrong>Greenlining Institute\u003c/strong>,\u003c/span>\u003c/a> which advocates for economic opportunity and empowerment for people of color\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Cooper recently co-authored a report calling for a “radical rethinking of community development.” The “\u003ca href=\"https://greenlining.org/publications/2020/greenlined-economy/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">Greenlined Economy Guidebook\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” outlines a framework for government leaders and businesses to invest more equitably.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion? \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Policymakers are talking about recovering from COVID and the recession,” she said. “There is a very real threat of exacerbating the existing inequities, if economic recovery efforts aren’t done with equity as a priority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would make recovery efforts explicit about race. Redlining, urban renewal, even the foreclosure crisis of 2008, all of these policies were race-conscious. We shouldn’t use a race-neutral blanket policy to correct harms that have been done in communities of color, especially when they’re being disproportionately affected by COVID, by the recession, and now by climate change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Noni Session\u003c/b>, director and co-founder of the \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://ebprec.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a democratically run cooperative that creates affordable housing for people of color living in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The idea:\u003c/em> Lift Oakland out of recession by facilitating home ownership and investing in local businesses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would turn that $30 billion into a low-interest technical assistance housing redevelopment fund,” Session said. “We would target standing housing stock, empty lots for land and housing acquisition projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We often treat housing and the economy as two separate issues that need separate solutions. But they should be thought of together. When markets rise and dip, when folks’ tenancy is tenuous, our economic networks always take the first hit, particularly for small holders and small operators like Black and Brown Oaklanders, who are the canary in the well for those rises and dips.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003cb>Amee Raval,\u003c/b> research director for the \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"http://apen4ej.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">Asian Pacific Environmental Network\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, which advocates for communities in Richmond and Oakland’s Chinatown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Raval recently co-authored a \u003ca href=\"http://apen4ej.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Resilience-Before-Disaster-FINAL-UPDATED.pdf\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">report\u003c/span>\u003c/a> calling for California policymakers to invest equally in both hard infrastructure (think climate-adapted bridges and seawalls) and social infrastructure (think services and well-being initiatives).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our members describe Oakland as a wok for pollution,” Raval said. “It’s surrounded by freeways on every side and it’s in close proximity to the port, with all that diesel pollution. We want investment in existing community institutions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need $30 billion, probably more. Working-class communities of color are being hardest hit by the COVID pandemic, by fires, by heat waves, and power shutoffs. Many people already have asthma, respiratory illness and autoimmune disease from breathing polluted air daily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s why we need to strengthen the existing social fabric in communities, coordinate with local governments, invest in resilience hubs and services, and train workers and community members to prepare for and respond to shocks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp class=\"p1\">Let’s say you’re a Green-New-Deal-type environmentalist hell-bent on avoiding planetary destruction while also fixing societal problems like economic inequality and racial injustice. Then, somehow, someway, just as California is digging itself out of a pandemic-induced recession, you have $30 billion to invest any way you want.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What are you going to do?\u003cbr>\n\u003cspan class=\"s1\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>In early October, environmental groups convened a \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZRRMdMYe8U\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">livestreamed\u003c/span>\u003c/a> panel with some of California’s climate intelligentsia for just such an exercise. Organizers are testing the waters for putting a \u003ca href=\"https://www.movela.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">“\u003c/span>\u003cspan class=\"s3\">California Climate and Clean Air Initiative” \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan class=\"s3\">on the \u003c/span>\u003cspan class=\"s2\">2022 ballot \u003c/span>and hoped the conversation could generate some policy ideas. For example, Kevin de León, former president pro tempore of the state Senate, wanted to spend money on building infrastructure for charging electric cars, plus a cash incentive for low-income people to buy them. Senate Majority Whip Nancy Skinner wish-listed $10 billion toward affordable housing near job centers and funds for green hydrogen, carbon sequestration and electric vehicles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Environmentalists often argue economic stimulus is a tea best served with two lumps of clean energy and a heavy dose of social justice. So now that the policy bigwigs have opined, we decided to bring the same fantasy question to community organizations working in Oakland, a city where chronic exposure to particulate matter from smog generated by the heavily trafficked port and spider-webbed freeways exacerbates lung and heart disease in poorer neighborhoods; and where air pollution can also \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7345938/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">enable\u003c/a> the spread of COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">So we asked activists from four organizations: If you were suddenly awash in $30 billion worth of funding, what would be your priorities for Oakland?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Here’s how the groups would want to spend those billions …\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003cbr>\n\u003cb>Crystal Huang\u003c/b>, worker-director of \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.peoplepowersolar.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">People Power Solar Cooperative\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a grassroots-led initiative to develop community solar in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Community members can “control their own power; literally, financially and politically.” The group develops community solar projects, where neighbors pool resources to invest in shared solar projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Building community solar projects,” she said. “People who don’t normally have the ability to get financial benefit or social benefit of solar power can own the solar system through the cooperative. Regardless of their living situation or whether they own real estate, they can participate in the energy transition.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003cb>Sonrisa Cooper\u003c/b>, community development program manager with the \u003ca href=\"https://greenlining.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">\u003cstrong>Greenlining Institute\u003c/strong>,\u003c/span>\u003c/a> which advocates for economic opportunity and empowerment for people of color\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Cooper recently co-authored a report calling for a “radical rethinking of community development.” The “\u003ca href=\"https://greenlining.org/publications/2020/greenlined-economy/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">Greenlined Economy Guidebook\u003c/span>\u003c/a>” outlines a framework for government leaders and businesses to invest more equitably.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion? \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Policymakers are talking about recovering from COVID and the recession,” she said. “There is a very real threat of exacerbating the existing inequities, if economic recovery efforts aren’t done with equity as a priority.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would make recovery efforts explicit about race. Redlining, urban renewal, even the foreclosure crisis of 2008, all of these policies were race-conscious. We shouldn’t use a race-neutral blanket policy to correct harms that have been done in communities of color, especially when they’re being disproportionately affected by COVID, by the recession, and now by climate change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Noni Session\u003c/b>, director and co-founder of the \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://ebprec.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a democratically run cooperative that creates affordable housing for people of color living in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The idea:\u003c/em> Lift Oakland out of recession by facilitating home ownership and investing in local businesses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would turn that $30 billion into a low-interest technical assistance housing redevelopment fund,” Session said. “We would target standing housing stock, empty lots for land and housing acquisition projects.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We often treat housing and the economy as two separate issues that need separate solutions. But they should be thought of together. When markets rise and dip, when folks’ tenancy is tenuous, our economic networks always take the first hit, particularly for small holders and small operators like Black and Brown Oaklanders, who are the canary in the well for those rises and dips.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003cb>Amee Raval,\u003c/b> research director for the \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"http://apen4ej.org/\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">Asian Pacific Environmental Network\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, which advocates for communities in Richmond and Oakland’s Chinatown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Idea:\u003c/em> Raval recently co-authored a \u003ca href=\"http://apen4ej.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Resilience-Before-Disaster-FINAL-UPDATED.pdf\">\u003cspan class=\"s2\">report\u003c/span>\u003c/a> calling for California policymakers to invest equally in both hard infrastructure (think climate-adapted bridges and seawalls) and social infrastructure (think services and well-being initiatives).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>How would you spend $30 billion?\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our members describe Oakland as a wok for pollution,” Raval said. “It’s surrounded by freeways on every side and it’s in close proximity to the port, with all that diesel pollution. We want investment in existing community institutions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need $30 billion, probably more. Working-class communities of color are being hardest hit by the COVID pandemic, by fires, by heat waves, and power shutoffs. Many people already have asthma, respiratory illness and autoimmune disease from breathing polluted air daily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s why we need to strengthen the existing social fabric in communities, coordinate with local governments, invest in resilience hubs and services, and train workers and community members to prepare for and respond to shocks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGtJQhxZB48\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the first time in history, the issue of climate change was a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1970622/climate-change-gets-its-own-segment-at-trump-biden-debate-heres-what-they-said\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">featured issue\u003c/a> at a presidential election debate. Moderator Kristen Welker of NBC asked the candidates how they would tackle climate change, while also supporting job growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Welker also directed the candidates in a rare discussion of environmental justice, starting with a question to President Trump: “Some people of color are much more likely to live near oil refineries and chemical plants in Texas. There are families who worry the plants near them are making them sick. Your administration has rolled back regulations on these kinds of facilities. Why should these families give you another four years in office?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a contentious exchange, Biden, after being pressed by Trump, said he was opposed to banning fracking, except on federal land.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch the entire segment in the video above from ABC News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\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/cGtJQhxZB48'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/cGtJQhxZB48'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>For the first time in history, the issue of climate change was a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1970622/climate-change-gets-its-own-segment-at-trump-biden-debate-heres-what-they-said\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">featured issue\u003c/a> at a presidential election debate. Moderator Kristen Welker of NBC asked the candidates how they would tackle climate change, while also supporting job growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Welker also directed the candidates in a rare discussion of environmental justice, starting with a question to President Trump: “Some people of color are much more likely to live near oil refineries and chemical plants in Texas. There are families who worry the plants near them are making them sick. Your administration has rolled back regulations on these kinds of facilities. Why should these families give you another four years in office?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a contentious exchange, Biden, after being pressed by Trump, said he was opposed to banning fracking, except on federal land.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch the entire segment in the video above from ABC News.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One hour and 20 minutes into Thursday night’s high-stakes presidential debate, the moderator, NBC’s Kristen Welker, asked President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden an unprecedented question.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How, she asked, would the candidates remedy the oil and gas industry’s disproportionately harmful impacts on communities of color?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump’s response: “They’re employed heavily and they’re making more money than they’ve ever made.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote citation=\"Evan Weber, Sunrise Movement\"]‘This debate was historic: the first-ever general election Presidential debate with climate change as a pre-defined topic and the first debate where climate change was framed out of the gate by the moderator in terms of jobs, the economy, and what the candidates’ plans were — not if the existential crisis even exists.”[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden’s response: “It doesn’t matter how much you’re paying them. It’s how you keep them safe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2012, climate change didn’t surface at all in the presidential debates. In 2016, it did, but barely. That the candidates faced substantial questions over the issue in this election cycle was remarkable and, many in the climate change community would say, long overdue. That Trump and Biden faced a question on a debate stage concerning the more nuanced, complex issues of climate change and race suggests how far the conversation has evolved in eight years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The candidates’ discussion on climate change Thursday revealed, again, the significant gulf between a president who has spent the last four years rolling back climate regulations, placating the fossil fuel industry and mocking the climate threat, and a candidate who has called climate change “an existential crisis” and developed a plan to tackle the problem — though one that climate progressives say still falls short.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“This debate was historic: the first-ever general election Presidential debate with climate change as a pre-defined topic and the first debate where climate change was framed out of the gate by the moderator in terms of jobs, the economy, and what the candidates’ plans were — not if the existential crisis even exists,” said Evan Weber, political director of the Sunrise Movement, in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the debate, the last before Election Day, Trump and Biden fielded questions about a range of topics, most prominently the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, though the biggest question lingering in viewers’ minds may have been whether Trump would adhere to the debate rules and focus on issues and policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Late into the hour-and-a-half debate, Welker asked the candidates how they would tackle climate change, while also supporting job growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump began by reprising what has been his stock response to questions about climate change, citing the “Trillion Trees Program” — in the previous debate he erroneously referred to the program as a plan to plant a “billion” trees — and adding, “I do love the environment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Striving to appear conversant with the topic, Trump said, “We have the lowest number in carbon emissions,” an apparent reference to emissions falling during the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump seemed pleased with his mastery of the term and taunted Biden about whether he was familiar with the concept.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I’m not sure he knows what it means,” Trump said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Trillion Trees Program has been broadly embraced by Republicans and some Democrats, but \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/news/26052020/trillion-trees-climate-change\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">scientists\u003c/a> have said the plan is inadequate for addressing climate change, that it will only put a tiny dent in emissions and is a distraction from a necessary shift away from fossil fuels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Emissions dropped during the pandemic, but are now on the rise again, continuing an upward trend that has continued since the beginning of the Trump presidency. The most recent full-year figures from the Environmental Protection Agency, for 2018, show that fossil fuel emissions drove a 3% rise in overall greenhouse gas emissions in that time period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As he has throughout his bid for the presidency, Biden emphasized a shift to renewable energy, saying his $2 trillion clean economy jobs program would create more than 18 million jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“The oil industry pollutes,” Biden said. “It has to be replaced by renewable energy over time. … I’d stop giving federal subsidies to the oil and gas industry.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump, sensing an opportunity to appeal to voters in battleground states with strong fossil fuels ties, pounced on the comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“That’s the biggest statement,” Trump said, turning to look directly into the camera. “Will you remember that Texas? Will you remember that Pennsylvania? Oklahoma? Ohio?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also reiterated a trope of the fossil fuel industry, calling a shift to renewables a “pipe dream” and saying that wind turbines kill “all the birds.” In a muddled response, he misleadingly suggested that the construction of wind turbines “is more than anything that we are talking about with natural gas.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden responded, “Find me a scientist who says that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also attacked Biden’s climate plan, falsely saying it would cost $100 trillion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“They want to take buildings down because they want to take bigger windows and make them smaller windows,” Trump said, referring to the proposal. “Little tiny windows and many other things.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The proposal says nothing about shrinking windows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also attacked Biden on his statements on fracking and natural gas, falsely accusing the Democratic candidate of supporting a ban on fracking and changing his position to court voters in Pennsylvania, a natural gas-intensive and critical swing state, won narrowly by Trump in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden corrected Trump, saying he would only ban new oil and gas permitting on public lands, but supports fracking elsewhere as necessary while the country transitions to a clean energy economy — a position that has been criticized by climate advocates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden framed addressing climate change as an ethical matter and part of a broader shift to rejoining global peers\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We have a moral obligation to deal with it,” he said. “We don’t have much time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We’re going to choose science over fiction. We’re going to choose hope over fear,” Biden said, saying that he’d advance an economy “motivated” by clean energy. “We can grow this economy,” Biden said. “What’s on the ballot here is the character of our country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Environmental activists largely applauded Biden’s performance, even as many vowed to push him to take bolder steps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We are committed to holding a Biden administration accountable to stop fracking and protect our communities,” said 350 Action North America Director Tamara Toles O’Laughlin. “Indigenous, and communities of color continue to bear the brunt of Donald Trump and his fossil fuel lies. It’s time for a just transition for workers across the industry. The planet can’t take four more years of Trump’s deadly mismanagement and plain incompetence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">InsideClimate News\u003c/a> is a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for the ICN newsletter \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden’s response: “It doesn’t matter how much you’re paying them. It’s how you keep them safe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2012, climate change didn’t surface at all in the presidential debates. In 2016, it did, but barely. That the candidates faced substantial questions over the issue in this election cycle was remarkable and, many in the climate change community would say, long overdue. That Trump and Biden faced a question on a debate stage concerning the more nuanced, complex issues of climate change and race suggests how far the conversation has evolved in eight years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The candidates’ discussion on climate change Thursday revealed, again, the significant gulf between a president who has spent the last four years rolling back climate regulations, placating the fossil fuel industry and mocking the climate threat, and a candidate who has called climate change “an existential crisis” and developed a plan to tackle the problem — though one that climate progressives say still falls short.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“This debate was historic: the first-ever general election Presidential debate with climate change as a pre-defined topic and the first debate where climate change was framed out of the gate by the moderator in terms of jobs, the economy, and what the candidates’ plans were — not if the existential crisis even exists,” said Evan Weber, political director of the Sunrise Movement, in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the debate, the last before Election Day, Trump and Biden fielded questions about a range of topics, most prominently the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, though the biggest question lingering in viewers’ minds may have been whether Trump would adhere to the debate rules and focus on issues and policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Late into the hour-and-a-half debate, Welker asked the candidates how they would tackle climate change, while also supporting job growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump began by reprising what has been his stock response to questions about climate change, citing the “Trillion Trees Program” — in the previous debate he erroneously referred to the program as a plan to plant a “billion” trees — and adding, “I do love the environment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Striving to appear conversant with the topic, Trump said, “We have the lowest number in carbon emissions,” an apparent reference to emissions falling during the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump seemed pleased with his mastery of the term and taunted Biden about whether he was familiar with the concept.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I’m not sure he knows what it means,” Trump said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Trillion Trees Program has been broadly embraced by Republicans and some Democrats, but \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/news/26052020/trillion-trees-climate-change\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">scientists\u003c/a> have said the plan is inadequate for addressing climate change, that it will only put a tiny dent in emissions and is a distraction from a necessary shift away from fossil fuels.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Emissions dropped during the pandemic, but are now on the rise again, continuing an upward trend that has continued since the beginning of the Trump presidency. The most recent full-year figures from the Environmental Protection Agency, for 2018, show that fossil fuel emissions drove a 3% rise in overall greenhouse gas emissions in that time period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As he has throughout his bid for the presidency, Biden emphasized a shift to renewable energy, saying his $2 trillion clean economy jobs program would create more than 18 million jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“The oil industry pollutes,” Biden said. “It has to be replaced by renewable energy over time. … I’d stop giving federal subsidies to the oil and gas industry.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump, sensing an opportunity to appeal to voters in battleground states with strong fossil fuels ties, pounced on the comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“That’s the biggest statement,” Trump said, turning to look directly into the camera. “Will you remember that Texas? Will you remember that Pennsylvania? Oklahoma? Ohio?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also reiterated a trope of the fossil fuel industry, calling a shift to renewables a “pipe dream” and saying that wind turbines kill “all the birds.” In a muddled response, he misleadingly suggested that the construction of wind turbines “is more than anything that we are talking about with natural gas.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden responded, “Find me a scientist who says that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also attacked Biden’s climate plan, falsely saying it would cost $100 trillion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“They want to take buildings down because they want to take bigger windows and make them smaller windows,” Trump said, referring to the proposal. “Little tiny windows and many other things.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The proposal says nothing about shrinking windows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Trump also attacked Biden on his statements on fracking and natural gas, falsely accusing the Democratic candidate of supporting a ban on fracking and changing his position to court voters in Pennsylvania, a natural gas-intensive and critical swing state, won narrowly by Trump in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden corrected Trump, saying he would only ban new oil and gas permitting on public lands, but supports fracking elsewhere as necessary while the country transitions to a clean energy economy — a position that has been criticized by climate advocates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Biden framed addressing climate change as an ethical matter and part of a broader shift to rejoining global peers\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We have a moral obligation to deal with it,” he said. “We don’t have much time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We’re going to choose science over fiction. We’re going to choose hope over fear,” Biden said, saying that he’d advance an economy “motivated” by clean energy. “We can grow this economy,” Biden said. “What’s on the ballot here is the character of our country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Environmental activists largely applauded Biden’s performance, even as many vowed to push him to take bolder steps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We are committed to holding a Biden administration accountable to stop fracking and protect our communities,” said 350 Action North America Director Tamara Toles O’Laughlin. “Indigenous, and communities of color continue to bear the brunt of Donald Trump and his fossil fuel lies. It’s time for a just transition for workers across the industry. The planet can’t take four more years of Trump’s deadly mismanagement and plain incompetence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">InsideClimate News\u003c/a> is a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for the ICN newsletter \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Tule Elk Decision Looms: Pt. Reyes Could Soon Renew Ranch Leases and Thin Elk Herds",
"headTitle": "Tule Elk Decision Looms: Pt. Reyes Could Soon Renew Ranch Leases and Thin Elk Herds | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Known for its seaside bluffs and dense summer fog, Point Reyes National Seashore is a landscape of rolling coastal prairie blending into forests and marshlands, a sanctuary for hundreds of plants and animals and a destination for migrating birds and marine life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just a one-hour drive from San Francisco, the 71,000-acre peninsula serves as a haven for native California species like snowy plovers, red-legged frogs, coho salmon and tule elk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The tule elk are one of the primary attractions of the park, which sees over 2 million visitors annually, and they can be easy to spot in the zones where they’re preserved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The elks’ beauty and majesty is hard to miss; one frequent visitor to the park described their strange, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SR2OTFtlUM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">high-pitched bugle\u003c/a> as “otherworldly.” Once on the brink of extinction, tule elk were reintroduced into Point Reyes in 1978. Now, hundreds of elk live in three herds throughout the park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But Point Reyes is also home to about 20 ranches that have operated in the park since the mid-1800s. And the tule elk are at the center of a major battle between ranchers, who say the elk are overpopulated and disruptive to their operations, and animal and environmental activists, who think that ranching has degraded the land, leaving it to resemble a “lunar landscape,” as one activist said. The park, the activists argue, should prohibit ranching and preserve the land entirely as wilderness to protect the elk and other species.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conflict between ranchers and environmentalists is not uncommon in the West, where wildlife and agriculture often collide. \u003ca href=\"https://www.wyomingpublicmedia.org/post/record-population-boom-wild-horses-raises-hackles-among-ranchers-advocates#stream/0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Wild horses \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wyomingpublicmedia.org/post/record-population-boom-wild-horses-raises-hackles-among-ranchers-advocates#stream/0\">in \u003c/a>Utah compete with cattle for resources; black-tailed prairie dogs in Wyoming \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/fseprd493991.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">are shot and poisoned\u003c/a> by ranchers who consider them “pests”; and wolves, reintroduced in Western states in the 1980s, are often blamed by ranchers for \u003ca href=\"https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missing-in-wolf-territory-who-should-pay-the-price\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">killing\u003c/a> livestock.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The tule elk in Point Reyes have virtually no natural predators, so management of their population is left up to the National Park Service, which is in the process of implementing a wildlife management plan that includes killing elk in one of the three herds to control their numbers, a process known as culling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One of the prime considerations for how to manage the tule elk is how their numbers affect the ranchers, who sold their land to the government when the park was established in 1962. Many stayed on the land and continued ranching under renewable five-year permits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Environmental groups \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2016/02/10/point-reyes-lawsuit-challenges-historic-ranching-operations-at-iconic-park/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">sued\u003c/a> the National Park Service in 2016 for planning to extend leases for the ranchers from five to 20 years without analyzing the environmental impact, as required under the National Environmental Policy Act. The groups reached a \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/getinvolved/planning_ranch_cmp_settlement_faq.htm#CP_JUMP_5580712\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">settlement agreement\u003c/a> in 2017 that required the park service to solicit public input and amend its 1980 general management plan with an Environmental Impact Statement before issuing any 20-year leases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The park service considered six alternatives for its amended plan, ranging from eliminating ranching in the park altogether — an option favored \u003ca href=\"https://restoreptreyesseashore.org/comments-to-draft-plan/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">in over 90%\u003c/a> of the 7,600 public comments submitted to the agency — to the plan the park service says it prefers, which includes extending ranchers’ leases and limiting the population of the Drakes Beach herd of elk to 120 animals to prevent them from eating cattle feed, bothering cows and causing other disturbances. If the population were to exceed 120, the park service would begin culling. At the end of 2019, there were 138 tule elk in the Drakes Beach population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On Sept. 18, 2020, the park service released its \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/getinvolved/planning_gmp_amendment_feis.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">final Environmental Impact Statement\u003c/a>, officially announcing its decision to go with its preferred option. That initiated a 30-day waiting period for the park service to conduct its final consultations with other agencies. That period ends on Sunday, after which a “Record of Decision” can be issued, finalizing the amended management plan and allowing leases to be extended and culling to begin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Serengeti of Wildlife\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Laura Cunningham, a wildlife biologist and California director at Western Watersheds Project, likes to picture what the Point Reyes peninsula might have been like 500 years ago: filled with huge herds of tule elk grazing on lush green coastal prairies while coho salmon swam in the creeks and pods of whales passed by off the coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I imagine it as a place of just riches of biodiversity,” she said. “It must have been just a Serengeti of wildlife.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the late 1800s, tule elk were thought to no longer exist, hunted into extinction by settlers. But in 1874, a rancher discovered a herd of fewer than 30 tule elk on his land near Bakersfield, California. The herd was preserved, and now 5,700 tule elk live in about 22 herds around the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1978, 10 tule elk were introduced into Point Reyes National Seashore, fenced in at Tomales Point on the northernmost end of the peninsula to keep them off ranches. Twenty years later, 28 elk from the Tomales Point herd were relocated to Limantour Beach, about 20 miles south of Tomales Point on the east side of Drakes Estero, a large estuary in the center of the peninsula, establishing a second, free-ranging herd. From there, several of the elk migrated to Drakes Beach, on the west side of Drakes Estero, where a third herd of tule elk in Point Reyes now live. \u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970502 alignleft\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"529\" height=\"740\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0.png 529w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0-160x224.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 529px) 100vw, 529px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The 2020 Environmental Impact Statement addresses how to manage the Limantour Beach and Drakes Beach herds, including the Drakes Beach culling plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The National Park Service looked into moving the elk somewhere else before settling on a lethal solution for reducing the population, said Melanie Gunn, park service outreach coordinator for Point Reyes National Seashore. The park service considered relocating individuals from the Drakes Beach herd to somewhere outside of Point Reyes, but tule elk within the park are known to have \u003ca href=\"https://johnes.org/deer-elk/faqs/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Johne’s disease \u003c/a>— a highly contagious and fatal bacterial infection that occurs among ruminant animals. The symptoms of the disease often do not appear until several months after an animal is infected. The elk could not be relocated without risking the spread of the disease to herds outside the park. Tule elk \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/learn/management/upload/planning_tule_elk_mp_ea_1998.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">may have\u003c/a> caught the disease from cattle in Point Reyes, and they can only be effectively tested for it after death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When culling does begin — and it will, unless the Record of Decision does not come through — it will be conducted by the National Park Service and other conservation officials to ensure that genetic diversity and sex ratio are taken into account when selecting which individual elk to kill, especially considering the entire population descended from fewer than 30 individuals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“It will be specific, not random,” Gunn said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Elk Trouble\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Driving through the ranching district — 22,000 acres designated as a national historic district on the National Register of Historic Places — the smell of cow feces is distinctive. In some parts of the park during mid-October, scrub grass coats the landscape in a golden brown color; in other parts, hundreds of cattle stand on muddy land devoid of much vegetation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ranchers operate in the park under one of two types of leasing agreements: a special permit that limits their tenancy to five years, or a so-called reservation of use and occupancy, which gives ranchers use of the land for up to 25 years or, in some cases, for as long as the rancher is alive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bill Niman, who operates a beef ranch with about 300 cattle at the southern end of Point Reyes, has a lease that extends for the rest of his life. The deal is similar to ownership, in that he pays property taxes and maintains his facilities, but has some restrictions; for example, he can’t sell the property.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970503\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 648px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970503\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"648\" height=\"432\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1.jpeg 648w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1-160x107.jpeg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 648px) 100vw, 648px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bill Niman operates a regenerative beef ranch of about 300 cattle in the south end of Point Reyes. \u003ccite>( Julie Kane/InsideClimate News)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Niman and his wife, Nicolette Hahn Niman, a former environmental lawyer and the author of a book defending small-scale, grass-fed beef farms, practice rotational grazing on their land. The couple move their cattle from one patch of land to another to allow time for the land to rest between grazing periods. This keeps the landscape full of diverse plants and helps the soil sequester carbon, they said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“What we’re trying to do is mirror nature and manage the land in the way that nature would if humans were not interfering,” Niman said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Located just north of Bolinas on the south end of the park, far from any tule elk herd, Hahn Niman said they don’t have an issue with elk on their ranch, thanks to park management.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But on some ranches, elk consume grass and supplemental cattle feed, like hay and alfalfa. Some ranchers have reported elk eating this supplemental food, but “it has not yet been identified as a significant or widespread problem,” the final Environmental Impact Statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And Hahn Niman said she has heard about cases of elk creating more serious disturbance, with dozens of the animals entering barns and eating cattle feed, or acting aggressively toward cows. She spoke publicly on behalf of ranchers during the 2016 lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“[Ranchers] have had a number of their heifers that have been injured or even had to be put down because they were mounted by large male tule elk,” Hahn Niman said. “It’s weird stuff like this that I didn’t understand until I talked directly with ranchers involved.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She emphasized that ranchers love seeing tule elk and other wildlife in the park. Ranchers, she said, wanted the park to be established, and without the ranchers, the land, so near the Bay Area, would have instead been developed into prime real estate. But without wolves and bears and hardly any mountain lions, she said, the elk have to be managed and their population needs to be controlled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“You don’t have the robust population of natural predators that once existed here; they’re almost entirely gone,” she said. “The only remaining predator really is the human.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Banned Volunteer\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Diana Oppenheim volunteered for three years in Point Reyes National Seashore — a place she calls “literal magic.” She guided a monthly group that would start the day removing invasive species from the park’s sandy coastal dunes, and then led the group in a yoga class on the beach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oppenheim said she was shocked when she started to hear rumors that the National Park Service was planning to cull the Drakes Beach herd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I was a very heavily involved volunteer; I was there all the time and I didn’t know this was happening,” Oppenheim said. “There was a big lack of public awareness around this issue, and I felt like if people knew, we could change the course of what was going to happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She started \u003ca href=\"https://www.forelk.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">ForElk.org\u003c/a> to increase awareness of the park service’s management plan, putting up tables at grocery stores and farmers markets and approaching visitors at the park. Soon, Oppenheim was organizing protests. In August 2019, the park service opened its 45-day public comment period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As the momentum of the movement accelerated, Oppenheim also made her views clear on her social media accounts. The National Park Service, she said, asked her to remove all references to her working as a volunteer in Point Reyes, in order to protect the agency’s neutrality on the issue. When she refused, Oppenheim — once named the park’s “volunteer of the year” — was banned from volunteering in Point Reyes National Seashore, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“That only fueled my fire,” Oppenheim added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In late September, she and other activists in the Bay Area banded together to organize a \u003ca href=\"https://www.idausa.org/campaign/wild-animals-and-habitats/latest-news/plan-to-kill-wild-elk-and-expand-ranching-in-ca-national-park-draws-record-300-demonstrators/\">demonstration\u003c/a>. Nearly 300 people showed up to protest the culling plan and call for the ranches to be removed from the park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“They’re going to actually kill these elk that have been brought back from extinction in order to appease these ranchers,” Oppenheim said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Crucial Role\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The purpose of Point Reyes National Seashore — stated at the top of the legislation \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/learn/management/upload/lawsandpolicies_usc16sec459c_enablingleg.pdf\">that created it \u003c/a>— is to “save and preserve, for purposes of public recreation, benefit and inspiration” the undeveloped seashore.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nowhere, activists say, does it mention the preservation of ranching. In fact, said Jack Gescheidt, an activist with the \u003ca href=\"https://treespiritproject.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">TreeSpirit Project,\u003c/a> ranching is contradictory to the park’s purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“You can either have large scale dairy and cattle operations in an area, or a national park,” he said, “you can’t have both.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gunn, however, disagreed. She said the park and the ranches have coexisted since the park’s establishment in 1962, and they will continue to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2019, a \u003ca href=\"https://www.congress.gov/congressional-report/116th-congress/house-report/9/1?overview=closed\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">congressional statement\u003c/a> said multigenerational ranching is important economically and ecologically in Point Reyes and is “fully consistent with Congress’s intent for the management of Point Reyes National Seashore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ranching, Gunn said, has been recognized by Congress as being “part of the fabric of Point Reyes National Seashore. It’s part of our responsibility to maintain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hahn Niman said ranching can and should coexist with all wildlife in Point Reyes through regenerative practices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Ranching should be minimizing the use of chemicals and should be always attentive to mirroring natural systems,” she said, adding that ranchers should be “creating a vibrant space here for countless wild animals that are in fact living here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Elk biologist Julie Phillips said that tule elk are a vital part of the Point Reyes ecosystem, and can be considered a keystone species, because plants in the ecosystem rely on them to disperse seeds and maintain the native environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Phillips — who is opposed to ranching in Point Reyes — said she has observed native grasses return and landscapes restored after tule elk have been reintroduced in other areas around California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If cattle are removed from Point Reyes, Phillips said, tule elk “will help restore that degraded land, and the elk will play a critical role in bringing back native habitat.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Unlike so many species that went extinct after European settlement, tule elk got a second chance at survival. In an era where climate change is \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/news/07042020/global-warming-ecosystem-biodiversity-rising-heat-species\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">threatening to demolish\u003c/a> Earth’s ecosystems, Oppenheim said, a biological hot spot like Point Reyes should be easy to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We’re facing a severe loss of biodiversity on the planet,” Oppenheim said, and preservation “should be a no brainer in some of the most protected lands of the world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She added: “Point Reyes is a gem and should absolutely be protected and restored.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">InsideClimate News\u003c/a> is a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for the ICN newsletter \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The elk are a main attraction in Point Reyes. But ranchers who share the park say the elks’ numbers create problems.",
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"description": "The elk are a main attraction in Point Reyes. But ranchers who share the park say the elks’ numbers create problems.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Known for its seaside bluffs and dense summer fog, Point Reyes National Seashore is a landscape of rolling coastal prairie blending into forests and marshlands, a sanctuary for hundreds of plants and animals and a destination for migrating birds and marine life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just a one-hour drive from San Francisco, the 71,000-acre peninsula serves as a haven for native California species like snowy plovers, red-legged frogs, coho salmon and tule elk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The tule elk are one of the primary attractions of the park, which sees over 2 million visitors annually, and they can be easy to spot in the zones where they’re preserved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The elks’ beauty and majesty is hard to miss; one frequent visitor to the park described their strange, \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SR2OTFtlUM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">high-pitched bugle\u003c/a> as “otherworldly.” Once on the brink of extinction, tule elk were reintroduced into Point Reyes in 1978. Now, hundreds of elk live in three herds throughout the park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But Point Reyes is also home to about 20 ranches that have operated in the park since the mid-1800s. And the tule elk are at the center of a major battle between ranchers, who say the elk are overpopulated and disruptive to their operations, and animal and environmental activists, who think that ranching has degraded the land, leaving it to resemble a “lunar landscape,” as one activist said. The park, the activists argue, should prohibit ranching and preserve the land entirely as wilderness to protect the elk and other species.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conflict between ranchers and environmentalists is not uncommon in the West, where wildlife and agriculture often collide. \u003ca href=\"https://www.wyomingpublicmedia.org/post/record-population-boom-wild-horses-raises-hackles-among-ranchers-advocates#stream/0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Wild horses \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"https://www.wyomingpublicmedia.org/post/record-population-boom-wild-horses-raises-hackles-among-ranchers-advocates#stream/0\">in \u003c/a>Utah compete with cattle for resources; black-tailed prairie dogs in Wyoming \u003ca href=\"https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/fseprd493991.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">are shot and poisoned\u003c/a> by ranchers who consider them “pests”; and wolves, reintroduced in Western states in the 1980s, are often blamed by ranchers for \u003ca href=\"https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.12/wolves-when-cattle-go-missing-in-wolf-territory-who-should-pay-the-price\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">killing\u003c/a> livestock.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The tule elk in Point Reyes have virtually no natural predators, so management of their population is left up to the National Park Service, which is in the process of implementing a wildlife management plan that includes killing elk in one of the three herds to control their numbers, a process known as culling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One of the prime considerations for how to manage the tule elk is how their numbers affect the ranchers, who sold their land to the government when the park was established in 1962. Many stayed on the land and continued ranching under renewable five-year permits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Environmental groups \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2016/02/10/point-reyes-lawsuit-challenges-historic-ranching-operations-at-iconic-park/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">sued\u003c/a> the National Park Service in 2016 for planning to extend leases for the ranchers from five to 20 years without analyzing the environmental impact, as required under the National Environmental Policy Act. The groups reached a \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/getinvolved/planning_ranch_cmp_settlement_faq.htm#CP_JUMP_5580712\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">settlement agreement\u003c/a> in 2017 that required the park service to solicit public input and amend its 1980 general management plan with an Environmental Impact Statement before issuing any 20-year leases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The park service considered six alternatives for its amended plan, ranging from eliminating ranching in the park altogether — an option favored \u003ca href=\"https://restoreptreyesseashore.org/comments-to-draft-plan/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">in over 90%\u003c/a> of the 7,600 public comments submitted to the agency — to the plan the park service says it prefers, which includes extending ranchers’ leases and limiting the population of the Drakes Beach herd of elk to 120 animals to prevent them from eating cattle feed, bothering cows and causing other disturbances. If the population were to exceed 120, the park service would begin culling. At the end of 2019, there were 138 tule elk in the Drakes Beach population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On Sept. 18, 2020, the park service released its \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/getinvolved/planning_gmp_amendment_feis.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">final Environmental Impact Statement\u003c/a>, officially announcing its decision to go with its preferred option. That initiated a 30-day waiting period for the park service to conduct its final consultations with other agencies. That period ends on Sunday, after which a “Record of Decision” can be issued, finalizing the amended management plan and allowing leases to be extended and culling to begin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Serengeti of Wildlife\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Laura Cunningham, a wildlife biologist and California director at Western Watersheds Project, likes to picture what the Point Reyes peninsula might have been like 500 years ago: filled with huge herds of tule elk grazing on lush green coastal prairies while coho salmon swam in the creeks and pods of whales passed by off the coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I imagine it as a place of just riches of biodiversity,” she said. “It must have been just a Serengeti of wildlife.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the late 1800s, tule elk were thought to no longer exist, hunted into extinction by settlers. But in 1874, a rancher discovered a herd of fewer than 30 tule elk on his land near Bakersfield, California. The herd was preserved, and now 5,700 tule elk live in about 22 herds around the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 1978, 10 tule elk were introduced into Point Reyes National Seashore, fenced in at Tomales Point on the northernmost end of the peninsula to keep them off ranches. Twenty years later, 28 elk from the Tomales Point herd were relocated to Limantour Beach, about 20 miles south of Tomales Point on the east side of Drakes Estero, a large estuary in the center of the peninsula, establishing a second, free-ranging herd. From there, several of the elk migrated to Drakes Beach, on the west side of Drakes Estero, where a third herd of tule elk in Point Reyes now live. \u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970502 alignleft\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"529\" height=\"740\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0.png 529w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/TuleElkPointReyesCA529px_0-160x224.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 529px) 100vw, 529px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The 2020 Environmental Impact Statement addresses how to manage the Limantour Beach and Drakes Beach herds, including the Drakes Beach culling plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The National Park Service looked into moving the elk somewhere else before settling on a lethal solution for reducing the population, said Melanie Gunn, park service outreach coordinator for Point Reyes National Seashore. The park service considered relocating individuals from the Drakes Beach herd to somewhere outside of Point Reyes, but tule elk within the park are known to have \u003ca href=\"https://johnes.org/deer-elk/faqs/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Johne’s disease \u003c/a>— a highly contagious and fatal bacterial infection that occurs among ruminant animals. The symptoms of the disease often do not appear until several months after an animal is infected. The elk could not be relocated without risking the spread of the disease to herds outside the park. Tule elk \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/learn/management/upload/planning_tule_elk_mp_ea_1998.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">may have\u003c/a> caught the disease from cattle in Point Reyes, and they can only be effectively tested for it after death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When culling does begin — and it will, unless the Record of Decision does not come through — it will be conducted by the National Park Service and other conservation officials to ensure that genetic diversity and sex ratio are taken into account when selecting which individual elk to kill, especially considering the entire population descended from fewer than 30 individuals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“It will be specific, not random,” Gunn said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Elk Trouble\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Driving through the ranching district — 22,000 acres designated as a national historic district on the National Register of Historic Places — the smell of cow feces is distinctive. In some parts of the park during mid-October, scrub grass coats the landscape in a golden brown color; in other parts, hundreds of cattle stand on muddy land devoid of much vegetation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ranchers operate in the park under one of two types of leasing agreements: a special permit that limits their tenancy to five years, or a so-called reservation of use and occupancy, which gives ranchers use of the land for up to 25 years or, in some cases, for as long as the rancher is alive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Bill Niman, who operates a beef ranch with about 300 cattle at the southern end of Point Reyes, has a lease that extends for the rest of his life. The deal is similar to ownership, in that he pays property taxes and maintains his facilities, but has some restrictions; for example, he can’t sell the property.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_1970503\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 648px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1970503\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"648\" height=\"432\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1.jpeg 648w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2020/10/niman-1-160x107.jpeg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 648px) 100vw, 648px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bill Niman operates a regenerative beef ranch of about 300 cattle in the south end of Point Reyes. \u003ccite>( Julie Kane/InsideClimate News)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Niman and his wife, Nicolette Hahn Niman, a former environmental lawyer and the author of a book defending small-scale, grass-fed beef farms, practice rotational grazing on their land. The couple move their cattle from one patch of land to another to allow time for the land to rest between grazing periods. This keeps the landscape full of diverse plants and helps the soil sequester carbon, they said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“What we’re trying to do is mirror nature and manage the land in the way that nature would if humans were not interfering,” Niman said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Located just north of Bolinas on the south end of the park, far from any tule elk herd, Hahn Niman said they don’t have an issue with elk on their ranch, thanks to park management.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But on some ranches, elk consume grass and supplemental cattle feed, like hay and alfalfa. Some ranchers have reported elk eating this supplemental food, but “it has not yet been identified as a significant or widespread problem,” the final Environmental Impact Statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And Hahn Niman said she has heard about cases of elk creating more serious disturbance, with dozens of the animals entering barns and eating cattle feed, or acting aggressively toward cows. She spoke publicly on behalf of ranchers during the 2016 lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“[Ranchers] have had a number of their heifers that have been injured or even had to be put down because they were mounted by large male tule elk,” Hahn Niman said. “It’s weird stuff like this that I didn’t understand until I talked directly with ranchers involved.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She emphasized that ranchers love seeing tule elk and other wildlife in the park. Ranchers, she said, wanted the park to be established, and without the ranchers, the land, so near the Bay Area, would have instead been developed into prime real estate. But without wolves and bears and hardly any mountain lions, she said, the elk have to be managed and their population needs to be controlled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“You don’t have the robust population of natural predators that once existed here; they’re almost entirely gone,” she said. “The only remaining predator really is the human.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Banned Volunteer\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Diana Oppenheim volunteered for three years in Point Reyes National Seashore — a place she calls “literal magic.” She guided a monthly group that would start the day removing invasive species from the park’s sandy coastal dunes, and then led the group in a yoga class on the beach.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oppenheim said she was shocked when she started to hear rumors that the National Park Service was planning to cull the Drakes Beach herd.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“I was a very heavily involved volunteer; I was there all the time and I didn’t know this was happening,” Oppenheim said. “There was a big lack of public awareness around this issue, and I felt like if people knew, we could change the course of what was going to happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She started \u003ca href=\"https://www.forelk.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">ForElk.org\u003c/a> to increase awareness of the park service’s management plan, putting up tables at grocery stores and farmers markets and approaching visitors at the park. Soon, Oppenheim was organizing protests. In August 2019, the park service opened its 45-day public comment period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As the momentum of the movement accelerated, Oppenheim also made her views clear on her social media accounts. The National Park Service, she said, asked her to remove all references to her working as a volunteer in Point Reyes, in order to protect the agency’s neutrality on the issue. When she refused, Oppenheim — once named the park’s “volunteer of the year” — was banned from volunteering in Point Reyes National Seashore, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“That only fueled my fire,” Oppenheim added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In late September, she and other activists in the Bay Area banded together to organize a \u003ca href=\"https://www.idausa.org/campaign/wild-animals-and-habitats/latest-news/plan-to-kill-wild-elk-and-expand-ranching-in-ca-national-park-draws-record-300-demonstrators/\">demonstration\u003c/a>. Nearly 300 people showed up to protest the culling plan and call for the ranches to be removed from the park.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“They’re going to actually kill these elk that have been brought back from extinction in order to appease these ranchers,” Oppenheim said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Crucial Role\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The purpose of Point Reyes National Seashore — stated at the top of the legislation \u003ca href=\"https://www.nps.gov/pore/learn/management/upload/lawsandpolicies_usc16sec459c_enablingleg.pdf\">that created it \u003c/a>— is to “save and preserve, for purposes of public recreation, benefit and inspiration” the undeveloped seashore.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nowhere, activists say, does it mention the preservation of ranching. In fact, said Jack Gescheidt, an activist with the \u003ca href=\"https://treespiritproject.com/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">TreeSpirit Project,\u003c/a> ranching is contradictory to the park’s purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“You can either have large scale dairy and cattle operations in an area, or a national park,” he said, “you can’t have both.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gunn, however, disagreed. She said the park and the ranches have coexisted since the park’s establishment in 1962, and they will continue to do so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In 2019, a \u003ca href=\"https://www.congress.gov/congressional-report/116th-congress/house-report/9/1?overview=closed\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">congressional statement\u003c/a> said multigenerational ranching is important economically and ecologically in Point Reyes and is “fully consistent with Congress’s intent for the management of Point Reyes National Seashore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ranching, Gunn said, has been recognized by Congress as being “part of the fabric of Point Reyes National Seashore. It’s part of our responsibility to maintain.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hahn Niman said ranching can and should coexist with all wildlife in Point Reyes through regenerative practices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“Ranching should be minimizing the use of chemicals and should be always attentive to mirroring natural systems,” she said, adding that ranchers should be “creating a vibrant space here for countless wild animals that are in fact living here.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Elk biologist Julie Phillips said that tule elk are a vital part of the Point Reyes ecosystem, and can be considered a keystone species, because plants in the ecosystem rely on them to disperse seeds and maintain the native environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Phillips — who is opposed to ranching in Point Reyes — said she has observed native grasses return and landscapes restored after tule elk have been reintroduced in other areas around California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If cattle are removed from Point Reyes, Phillips said, tule elk “will help restore that degraded land, and the elk will play a critical role in bringing back native habitat.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Unlike so many species that went extinct after European settlement, tule elk got a second chance at survival. In an era where climate change is \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/news/07042020/global-warming-ecosystem-biodiversity-rising-heat-species\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">threatening to demolish\u003c/a> Earth’s ecosystems, Oppenheim said, a biological hot spot like Point Reyes should be easy to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">“We’re facing a severe loss of biodiversity on the planet,” Oppenheim said, and preservation “should be a no brainer in some of the most protected lands of the world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400;\">She added: “Point Reyes is a gem and should absolutely be protected and restored.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">InsideClimate News\u003c/a> is a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for the ICN newsletter \u003ca href=\"https://insideclimatenews.org/newsletter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Nichols: Devastating Wildfires Strengthened Support for Ambitious Climate Agenda",
"headTitle": "Nichols: Devastating Wildfires Strengthened Support for Ambitious Climate Agenda | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp class=\"p1\">Mary Nichols, California’s top air regulator and longtime climate crusader, says the state’s record-breaking wildfire year has strengthened political support to move away from fossil fuels and gasoline engines.[pullquote align='right' citation='Mary Nichols']‘Recruiting people who are opposed to addressing human-caused climate change is probably the single biggest scandal [of Trump’s EPA].’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols says wildfires that ripped across the state in August and September were what compelled Gov. Gavin Newsom to issue two sweeping executive actions on climate change: a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1969807/california-to-halt-sales-of-new-gas-cars-by-2035\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">ban\u003c/span>\u003c/a> on the sale of new gasoline cars by 2035 and an \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11841850/gov-gavin-newsom-calls-for-protecting-30-of-state-land\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">order\u003c/span>\u003c/a> to conserve 30% of state land.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“It’s been a really bad summer and fire season is not over yet,” she said in wide-ranging comments offered in a livestreaming address to American University’s Center for Environmental Policy and the American Lung Association. The topic of the speech was the future of clean air policy and California’s role in addressing pollution and climate change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">The chair of the powerful state Air Resources Board, Nichols, who is retiring this year, said Californians “see and smell and feel” wildfire smoke “constantly” when the fires are active.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s terrible, depressing, ugly, and it is literally sapping productivity,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The one thing that it has done, in addition to solidifying people’s support for moving away from fossil fuels and combustion of all kinds,” Nichols said, “is help make the connection in people’s minds between natural resources policies and our direct controls over emissions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">She said a major lesson of this year is California needs to “be all in on eliminating all the sources of pollution” and improve “the ability of our natural environment to be able to store and sequester carbon, as well.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols outlined what, in her view, should be the top priorities for the federal Environmental Protection Agency should Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump and ascend to the presidency.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“The rejection of science and scientists has to be reversed,” she said. “That’s fundamental to everything else, all the programs. The dismissal of people with impeccable credentials who appear to have only committed the sin of being in favor of enforcing the laws.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols also said that she believes California will prevail against the Trump administration, either in courts of law or courts of or public opinion, in disputes over clean cars and the state’s ability to set its own tailpipe emission rules.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Early this year, California sued the Trump administration after it \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2019/09/18/761815991/white-house-to-revoke-waiver-allowing-california-to-set-its-own-emissions-standa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">revoked\u003c/span>\u003c/a> a waiver allowing the state to set clean car rules that are more stringent than federal standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Court battles aside, California’s thriving industry is a powerful signal to other states that the business of electric vehicles can be a boon for the economy and the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Electric vehicles are now one of the state’s top exports. “Not almonds or grapes or any other agricultural produce, as you might think,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Surprisingly, perhaps, Nichols said she doesn’t assume Amy Coney Barrett, a right-leaning judge whose confirmation vote is scheduled for Thursday by a Republican-controlled Senate, will automatically rule against laws that protect the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">She pointed out that Justice Antonin Scalia sometimes ruled in favor of more robust environmental polices. “It’s not because he was a liberal, because obviously he was not,” she said. “But he was a believer in reading the statutes and also in science.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Last week during Barrett’s confirmation hearing, Sen. Kamala Harris, the California Democrat running for vice president, asked the Supreme Court nominee if she believed that climate change “is happening and is threatening the air we breathe and the water we drink.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Barrett declined to offer her views on the matter, describing it as a “very contentious matter of public debate.” \u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">The existence of climate change is not contentious, in fact. Multiple studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals \u003ca href=\"https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">show\u003c/span>\u003c/a> that 97% or more of actively publishing climate scientists agree that global warming is a result of human activity.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp class=\"p1\">Mary Nichols, California’s top air regulator and longtime climate crusader, says the state’s record-breaking wildfire year has strengthened political support to move away from fossil fuels and gasoline engines.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols says wildfires that ripped across the state in August and September were what compelled Gov. Gavin Newsom to issue two sweeping executive actions on climate change: a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/science/1969807/california-to-halt-sales-of-new-gas-cars-by-2035\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">ban\u003c/span>\u003c/a> on the sale of new gasoline cars by 2035 and an \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11841850/gov-gavin-newsom-calls-for-protecting-30-of-state-land\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">order\u003c/span>\u003c/a> to conserve 30% of state land.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“It’s been a really bad summer and fire season is not over yet,” she said in wide-ranging comments offered in a livestreaming address to American University’s Center for Environmental Policy and the American Lung Association. The topic of the speech was the future of clean air policy and California’s role in addressing pollution and climate change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">The chair of the powerful state Air Resources Board, Nichols, who is retiring this year, said Californians “see and smell and feel” wildfire smoke “constantly” when the fires are active.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s terrible, depressing, ugly, and it is literally sapping productivity,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The one thing that it has done, in addition to solidifying people’s support for moving away from fossil fuels and combustion of all kinds,” Nichols said, “is help make the connection in people’s minds between natural resources policies and our direct controls over emissions.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">She said a major lesson of this year is California needs to “be all in on eliminating all the sources of pollution” and improve “the ability of our natural environment to be able to store and sequester carbon, as well.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols outlined what, in her view, should be the top priorities for the federal Environmental Protection Agency should Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump and ascend to the presidency.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">“The rejection of science and scientists has to be reversed,” she said. “That’s fundamental to everything else, all the programs. The dismissal of people with impeccable credentials who appear to have only committed the sin of being in favor of enforcing the laws.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Nichols also said that she believes California will prevail against the Trump administration, either in courts of law or courts of or public opinion, in disputes over clean cars and the state’s ability to set its own tailpipe emission rules.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Early this year, California sued the Trump administration after it \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2019/09/18/761815991/white-house-to-revoke-waiver-allowing-california-to-set-its-own-emissions-standa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">revoked\u003c/span>\u003c/a> a waiver allowing the state to set clean car rules that are more stringent than federal standards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Court battles aside, California’s thriving industry is a powerful signal to other states that the business of electric vehicles can be a boon for the economy and the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Electric vehicles are now one of the state’s top exports. “Not almonds or grapes or any other agricultural produce, as you might think,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Surprisingly, perhaps, Nichols said she doesn’t assume Amy Coney Barrett, a right-leaning judge whose confirmation vote is scheduled for Thursday by a Republican-controlled Senate, will automatically rule against laws that protect the environment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">She pointed out that Justice Antonin Scalia sometimes ruled in favor of more robust environmental polices. “It’s not because he was a liberal, because obviously he was not,” she said. “But he was a believer in reading the statutes and also in science.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Last week during Barrett’s confirmation hearing, Sen. Kamala Harris, the California Democrat running for vice president, asked the Supreme Court nominee if she believed that climate change “is happening and is threatening the air we breathe and the water we drink.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">Barrett declined to offer her views on the matter, describing it as a “very contentious matter of public debate.” \u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">The existence of climate change is not contentious, in fact. Multiple studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals \u003ca href=\"https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cspan class=\"s1\">show\u003c/span>\u003c/a> that 97% or more of actively publishing climate scientists agree that global warming is a result of human activity.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "4 Million Acres Have Burned in California. But Scientists Say That's the Wrong Number to Focus On",
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"content": "\u003cp>Wildfires in the West are producing a parade of chilling statistics. More than 4 million acres have burned in California, the most in recorded history. Colorado saw its largest wildfire and in Northern California, the August Complex fire has passed the \u003ca href=\"https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/6983/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">one-million-acre mark\u003c/a>, generating an entirely new term: “gigafire.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, some fire scientists warn that focusing on these record-breaking numbers could do more harm than good.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extreme fires this year have taken a massive human toll, both on those evacuated from their homes and on millions of others breathing unhealthy air. Some experts say the focus on acres burned obscures those human costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The emphasis on acreage also does little to reframe our relationship with fire, since it implies bigger fires are always “bad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fire scientists say returning some fire to the landscape is key to reducing the destructiveness of future fires, either by purposely setting low-grade, controlled burns or allowing wildfires to burn as long as they don’t threaten human development. Those fires remove dense and dead vegetation, which has fueled some of the explosive fires this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Even within a single fire, we have to be able to distinguish between the good and the bad and focusing on area burned doesn’t allow us to do that,” says Crystal Kolden, a fire scientist at UC Merced, writing in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02740-4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">journal Nature\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, some fire scientists say public messaging should focus on the community impact: the number of people evacuated and homes threatened. Fire agencies should also attempt to quantify the benefits a fire may have to natural ecosystems. Wildfire has been absent from many landscapes after decades of suppression and some plants are adapted to and benefit from regular fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While 4 million acres may seem staggering, studies show it’s on par with California’s natural fire cycle over millennia, influenced in large part by Native American tribes who \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/08/24/899422710/to-manage-wildfire-california-looks-to-what-tribes-have-known-all-along\">used fire proactively\u003c/a> to shape the landscape. Since fires happened more regularly then, they wouldn’t have been as extreme.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have not been adapting,” says Ernesto Alvarado, professor of wildland fire at the University of Washington. “We will never be Native Americans, but we can be indigenious to the land. And one of the things we need to accept: this place burns. The West burns.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Instead of reporting acres burned, focus on homes and people\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For firefighting efforts, determining how much acreage is burning is crucial for operational planning, as agencies try to coordinate the needed personnel and resources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the easiest thing for us to calculate,” Kolden says. “When you’re in fire management, it’s the way you report to your superiors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, for the public, wildfire size says little about what’s actually at stake.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It gives you this one perception of fire: that it’s all bad and it’s something to be battled,” says Matthew Hurteau, a forest ecologist at the University of New Mexico.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Often, the human cost of wildfires has little to do with their size. California’s three \u003ca href=\"https://fire.ca.gov/media/11417/top20_destruction.pdf\">most destructive wildfires\u003c/a> aren’t among the state’s largest. The 1991 Tunnel fire in the Oakland hills was relatively tiny at 1,600 acres, but destroyed 2,900 structures and killed 25 people. Even the Camp Fire, which burned more than 18,000 structures in Paradise, California, isn’t even in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/media/11416/top20_acres.pdf\">top 20, ranked by acreage\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we should concentrate more on the human losses,” Alvarado says. “Wildfires in populated areas, it doesn’t matter what size those are.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To convey the human costs in the early days of fire, public messaging could focus on the number of homes threatened or how many people are under evacuation orders. As a fire progresses, it can also be measured by the number of homes destroyed or fatalities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Public authorities could also report on a broader human impact: the number of people experiencing harmful air due to smoke. While detailed maps are available with smoke concentrations, showing the air quality index, there are few measures of the scale of that public health impact. Poor air quality due to smoke is linked to a rise in emergency room visits due to asthma, stroke and heart attacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kolden says shifting that focus could help influence communities and local governments to put more of their efforts into improving evacuation plans or making older houses more fire-resistant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She says: “Focusing on fatalities, focusing on homes is going to get us to the place where we can say: oh, instead of trying to suppress the fire, maybe we should do the things we know minimize home losses.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Categorize a wildfire’s speed and intensity\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, many fire evacuees have had alarmingly similar stories: with just minutes to spare, they fled their homes as a fast-moving wildfire closed in. Some haven’t made it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The thing that’s absolutely striking to me this fire season is how quickly some of these fires are spreading,” Hurteau says. “When we have significant impacts to society, it has a lot to do with how quickly the fire is spreading, because that affects how much firefighters can do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many fires are driven by high winds, others produce so much heat that they generate their own internal weather, including massive \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/08/18/903399662/extreme-heat-and-fire-tornadoes-slow-firefighting-efforts-in-california\">pyrocumulus clouds\u003c/a>, fueling rapid growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A fire can start to create its own winds and then become this self-fulfilling prophecy, right?” Hurteau says. “It can really start to drive itself forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hurteau says more communication about that speed and intensity could help the public understand the threat better and take evacuation orders more seriously. Hurricanes are categorized by their wind speed and destructive power, such as a “Category 5” storm. Wildfires currently have no rating system, aside from a “red flag” warnings about high wind events.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Describe the benefits to the landscape\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a jarring thought to consider, but even wildfires that destroy homes and buildings in one area can still have a positive impact on the ecosystem elsewhere. California’s forests, in particular, are adapted to regular burning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you don’t allow fire to burn in those places regularly,” Kolden says, “you get a build up of too many trees, too much shrubs in the understory and that is what we have seen is driving a lot of these really large fires.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ideally, when a wildfire returns to those ecosystems, it can create a fresh start, allowing fire agencies and land managers to ensure they don’t become overgrown again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How wildfires affect an ecosystem can vary. While it may look like a blob on a map, a fire often burns very differently within its boundaries. Some patches experience severe fire, while others may experience low-grade burning. The fire may skip large pockets altogether, creating islands of living plants and vegetation that send seeds to regenerate burned areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kolden says creating a scorecard for these benefits could help the public see the importance of fire, even if the air is smoky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with warming temperatures and overgrown landscapes, not all wildfires are helpful. Some ecosystems are experiencing such intense burning that it hampers their ability to bounce back. If too many trees are killed in some pine forests, they don’t seed a new generation of trees, allowing brush to take over and creating a permanent ecological shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A more important measure is what fraction of an area burned is characteristic of the ecology of that region vs. uncharacteristic,” Hurteau says. “That’ll give us insight into how the ecosystem will respond.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>4. Describe how climate change is making it all worse\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Average annual temperatures are rising in the West. And even small increases are creating runaway impacts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hotter air pulls moisture out of plants and vegetation, making them more flammable. Drier soils, in turn, make the air itself hotter. Normally, temperatures fall at night, humidity rises and fire activity declines, giving firefighters a break. Now, nighttime temperatures are warming, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside of California, other Western states are experiencing fires beyond their normal fire seasons. In the Pacific Northwest this year, drought conditions have fueled several large wildfires. Normally wet forests, like those in Oregon, are \u003ca href=\"https://www.opb.org/article/2020/09/21/oregon-wildfires-climate-change-role/\">drying out earlier\u003c/a> in the year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While fires are normal in California in October, they’re rare in the Southwest because of cooler temperatures and the arrival of monsoon rains. But this year, the rainfall was remarkably low, on top of record heat waves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have the potential for a significant fire event on a day like today in October, which is really unusual,” Hurteau says . “And that’s a climate signal for sure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Describing how wildfire seasons are shifting could help the public understand how climate change can cause a cascade of effects. Fires are shifting beyond the bounds of what is known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is going to become more common,” says Hurteau. “Especially with a warming climate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=4+Million+Acres+Have+Burned+In+California.+Why+That%27s+The+Wrong+Number+To+Focus+On&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Wildfires in the West are producing a parade of chilling statistics. More than 4 million acres have burned in California, the most in recorded history. Colorado saw its largest wildfire and in Northern California, the August Complex fire has passed the \u003ca href=\"https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/6983/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">one-million-acre mark\u003c/a>, generating an entirely new term: “gigafire.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, some fire scientists warn that focusing on these record-breaking numbers could do more harm than good.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Extreme fires this year have taken a massive human toll, both on those evacuated from their homes and on millions of others breathing unhealthy air. Some experts say the focus on acres burned obscures those human costs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The emphasis on acreage also does little to reframe our relationship with fire, since it implies bigger fires are always “bad.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fire scientists say returning some fire to the landscape is key to reducing the destructiveness of future fires, either by purposely setting low-grade, controlled burns or allowing wildfires to burn as long as they don’t threaten human development. Those fires remove dense and dead vegetation, which has fueled some of the explosive fires this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Even within a single fire, we have to be able to distinguish between the good and the bad and focusing on area burned doesn’t allow us to do that,” says Crystal Kolden, a fire scientist at UC Merced, writing in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02740-4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">journal Nature\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, some fire scientists say public messaging should focus on the community impact: the number of people evacuated and homes threatened. Fire agencies should also attempt to quantify the benefits a fire may have to natural ecosystems. Wildfire has been absent from many landscapes after decades of suppression and some plants are adapted to and benefit from regular fires.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While 4 million acres may seem staggering, studies show it’s on par with California’s natural fire cycle over millennia, influenced in large part by Native American tribes who \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/08/24/899422710/to-manage-wildfire-california-looks-to-what-tribes-have-known-all-along\">used fire proactively\u003c/a> to shape the landscape. Since fires happened more regularly then, they wouldn’t have been as extreme.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have not been adapting,” says Ernesto Alvarado, professor of wildland fire at the University of Washington. “We will never be Native Americans, but we can be indigenious to the land. And one of the things we need to accept: this place burns. The West burns.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Instead of reporting acres burned, focus on homes and people\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For firefighting efforts, determining how much acreage is burning is crucial for operational planning, as agencies try to coordinate the needed personnel and resources.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the easiest thing for us to calculate,” Kolden says. “When you’re in fire management, it’s the way you report to your superiors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, for the public, wildfire size says little about what’s actually at stake.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It gives you this one perception of fire: that it’s all bad and it’s something to be battled,” says Matthew Hurteau, a forest ecologist at the University of New Mexico.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Often, the human cost of wildfires has little to do with their size. California’s three \u003ca href=\"https://fire.ca.gov/media/11417/top20_destruction.pdf\">most destructive wildfires\u003c/a> aren’t among the state’s largest. The 1991 Tunnel fire in the Oakland hills was relatively tiny at 1,600 acres, but destroyed 2,900 structures and killed 25 people. Even the Camp Fire, which burned more than 18,000 structures in Paradise, California, isn’t even in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.fire.ca.gov/media/11416/top20_acres.pdf\">top 20, ranked by acreage\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think we should concentrate more on the human losses,” Alvarado says. “Wildfires in populated areas, it doesn’t matter what size those are.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To convey the human costs in the early days of fire, public messaging could focus on the number of homes threatened or how many people are under evacuation orders. As a fire progresses, it can also be measured by the number of homes destroyed or fatalities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Public authorities could also report on a broader human impact: the number of people experiencing harmful air due to smoke. While detailed maps are available with smoke concentrations, showing the air quality index, there are few measures of the scale of that public health impact. Poor air quality due to smoke is linked to a rise in emergency room visits due to asthma, stroke and heart attacks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kolden says shifting that focus could help influence communities and local governments to put more of their efforts into improving evacuation plans or making older houses more fire-resistant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She says: “Focusing on fatalities, focusing on homes is going to get us to the place where we can say: oh, instead of trying to suppress the fire, maybe we should do the things we know minimize home losses.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Categorize a wildfire’s speed and intensity\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, many fire evacuees have had alarmingly similar stories: with just minutes to spare, they fled their homes as a fast-moving wildfire closed in. Some haven’t made it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The thing that’s absolutely striking to me this fire season is how quickly some of these fires are spreading,” Hurteau says. “When we have significant impacts to society, it has a lot to do with how quickly the fire is spreading, because that affects how much firefighters can do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many fires are driven by high winds, others produce so much heat that they generate their own internal weather, including massive \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/08/18/903399662/extreme-heat-and-fire-tornadoes-slow-firefighting-efforts-in-california\">pyrocumulus clouds\u003c/a>, fueling rapid growth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A fire can start to create its own winds and then become this self-fulfilling prophecy, right?” Hurteau says. “It can really start to drive itself forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hurteau says more communication about that speed and intensity could help the public understand the threat better and take evacuation orders more seriously. Hurricanes are categorized by their wind speed and destructive power, such as a “Category 5” storm. Wildfires currently have no rating system, aside from a “red flag” warnings about high wind events.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Describe the benefits to the landscape\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a jarring thought to consider, but even wildfires that destroy homes and buildings in one area can still have a positive impact on the ecosystem elsewhere. California’s forests, in particular, are adapted to regular burning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you don’t allow fire to burn in those places regularly,” Kolden says, “you get a build up of too many trees, too much shrubs in the understory and that is what we have seen is driving a lot of these really large fires.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ideally, when a wildfire returns to those ecosystems, it can create a fresh start, allowing fire agencies and land managers to ensure they don’t become overgrown again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How wildfires affect an ecosystem can vary. While it may look like a blob on a map, a fire often burns very differently within its boundaries. Some patches experience severe fire, while others may experience low-grade burning. The fire may skip large pockets altogether, creating islands of living plants and vegetation that send seeds to regenerate burned areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kolden says creating a scorecard for these benefits could help the public see the importance of fire, even if the air is smoky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with warming temperatures and overgrown landscapes, not all wildfires are helpful. Some ecosystems are experiencing such intense burning that it hampers their ability to bounce back. If too many trees are killed in some pine forests, they don’t seed a new generation of trees, allowing brush to take over and creating a permanent ecological shift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A more important measure is what fraction of an area burned is characteristic of the ecology of that region vs. uncharacteristic,” Hurteau says. “That’ll give us insight into how the ecosystem will respond.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>4. Describe how climate change is making it all worse\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Average annual temperatures are rising in the West. And even small increases are creating runaway impacts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hotter air pulls moisture out of plants and vegetation, making them more flammable. Drier soils, in turn, make the air itself hotter. Normally, temperatures fall at night, humidity rises and fire activity declines, giving firefighters a break. Now, nighttime temperatures are warming, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside of California, other Western states are experiencing fires beyond their normal fire seasons. In the Pacific Northwest this year, drought conditions have fueled several large wildfires. Normally wet forests, like those in Oregon, are \u003ca href=\"https://www.opb.org/article/2020/09/21/oregon-wildfires-climate-change-role/\">drying out earlier\u003c/a> in the year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While fires are normal in California in October, they’re rare in the Southwest because of cooler temperatures and the arrival of monsoon rains. But this year, the rainfall was remarkably low, on top of record heat waves.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have the potential for a significant fire event on a day like today in October, which is really unusual,” Hurteau says . “And that’s a climate signal for sure.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Describing how wildfire seasons are shifting could help the public understand how climate change can cause a cascade of effects. Fires are shifting beyond the bounds of what is known.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"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. ",
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"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.",
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"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>",
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"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?",
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"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.",
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"possible": {
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
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},
"radiolab": {
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"info": "A two-time Peabody Award-winner, Radiolab is an investigation told through sounds and stories, and centered around one big idea. In the Radiolab world, information sounds like music and science and culture collide. Hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, the show is designed for listeners who demand skepticism, but appreciate wonder. WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Freakonomics Radio, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.",
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},
"reveal": {
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"info": "Created by The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, Reveal is public radios first one-hour weekly radio show and podcast dedicated to investigative reporting. Credible, fact based and without a partisan agenda, Reveal combines the power and artistry of driveway moment storytelling with data-rich reporting on critically important issues. The result is stories that inform and inspire, arming our listeners with information to right injustices, hold the powerful accountable and improve lives.Reveal is hosted by Al Letson and showcases the award-winning work of CIR and newsrooms large and small across the nation. In a radio and podcast market crowded with choices, Reveal focuses on important and often surprising stories that illuminate the world for our listeners.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.revealnews.org/episodes/",
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},
"rightnowish": {
"id": "rightnowish",
"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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},
"science-friday": {
"id": "science-friday",
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"info": "Science Friday is a weekly science talk show, broadcast live over public radio stations nationwide. Each week, the show focuses on science topics that are in the news and tries to bring an educated, balanced discussion to bear on the scientific issues at hand. Panels of expert guests join host Ira Flatow, a veteran science journalist, to discuss science and to take questions from listeners during the call-in portion of the program.",
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