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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24540\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/droughtpic1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24540 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/droughtpic1.jpg\" alt=\"A car sits in dried and cracked earth of what was the bottom of the Almaden Reservoir on January 28, 2014 in San Jose, California. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)\" width=\"640\" height=\"430\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A car sits in dried and cracked earth of what was the bottom of the Almaden Reservoir south of San Jose on Jan. 28. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California’s current drought is pretty exceptional — like the driest in about a millennium — according to an article published today in the journal \u003cem>Geophysical Research Letters\u003c/em> by scientists with the University of Minnesota and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But how could they know that? There weren’t a lot of rain gauges in California in 800 A.D. — at least, not the plastic kind.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So authors Daniel Griffin and Kevin Anchukaitis looked to tree-ring samples from California blue oaks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24564\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 320px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/ring-core-ejon_ranch_DSC3975-243x162.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24564\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/ring-core-ejon_ranch_DSC3975-243x162.jpg\" alt=\"Pencil-like tree-ring cores are collected non-destructively using a Swedish increment borer in May, 2014. (Daniel Griffin/University of Minnesota)\" width=\"320\" height=\"213\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pencil-like tree-ring cores are collected non-destructively using a Swedish increment borer in May, 2014. (Daniel Griffin/University of Minnesota)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“California’s old blue oaks are as close to nature’s rain gauges as we get,” said Griffin, a NOAA Climate and Global Change Fellow with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. “They thrive in some of California’s driest environments.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The researchers collected their own blue oak tree-ring samples from south and central California, giving them a pretty good idea of yearly precipitation in the area back to 1293. They then augmented their samples with data from the \u003ca href=\"http://iridl.ldeo.columbia.edu/SOURCES/.LDEO/.TRL/.NADA2004/.pdsi-atlas.html\">North American Drought Atlas\u003c/a> and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Palmer Drought Severity Index.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The result: The study estimates that in the past 1,200 years, there have been 66 dry periods lasting three-to-nine years and 37 more-severe, three-year droughts. But not one of them has been as extreme as the one beginning in 2012, despite some years in the past seeing similarly low precipitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not only lack of rain that makes a drought, though. \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">Record-high temperatures\u003c/a> added to California’s strife to make this dry spell the worst in more than 1,000 years, according to the study. The researchers estimate high temperatures have intensified the drought by about 36 percent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>UC Berkeley geology professor and researcher Lynn Ingram said the study’s findings appear solid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The tree-ring records provide the highest resolution as they have annual growth layers,” she said, adding the study provides a “cautionary lesson” about how human-caused warming “may already be impacting climate and water in California.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch the California drought progress from the beginning of 2011 to the end of 2014 below. The NOAA U.S. Drought Monitor released the latest outlook today, up-to-date as of Dec. 2. More than half the state is now in “exceptional drought,” defined as “exceptional and widespread crop/pasture losses; shortages of water in reservoirs, streams, and wells creating water emergencies.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http://u.s.kqed.net/2014/12/04/DroughtMapOverTimeLargerupdateDecember.gif\" width=\"640\" height=\"710\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24592\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/drought-legend-1024x396.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24592 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/drought-legend-1024x396.jpg\" alt=\"Click on the legend for a description of each drought category.\" width=\"1024\" height=\"396\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Click on the legend for a description of each drought category.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This animation shows California’s drought through its development, from January, 2011 through early December 2014, as expressed by NOAA’s U.S. Drought Monitor.\u003c/em> (Olivia Hubert-Allen/KQED)\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The result: The study estimates that in the past 1,200 years, there have been 66 dry periods lasting three-to-nine years and 37 more-severe, three-year droughts. But not one of them has been as extreme as the one beginning in 2012, despite some years in the past seeing similarly low precipitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not only lack of rain that makes a drought, though. \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">Record-high temperatures\u003c/a> added to California’s strife to make this dry spell the worst in more than 1,000 years, according to the study. The researchers estimate high temperatures have intensified the drought by about 36 percent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>UC Berkeley geology professor and researcher Lynn Ingram said the study’s findings appear solid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The tree-ring records provide the highest resolution as they have annual growth layers,” she said, adding the study provides a “cautionary lesson” about how human-caused warming “may already be impacting climate and water in California.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watch the California drought progress from the beginning of 2011 to the end of 2014 below. The NOAA U.S. Drought Monitor released the latest outlook today, up-to-date as of Dec. 2. More than half the state is now in “exceptional drought,” defined as “exceptional and widespread crop/pasture losses; shortages of water in reservoirs, streams, and wells creating water emergencies.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http://u.s.kqed.net/2014/12/04/DroughtMapOverTimeLargerupdateDecember.gif\" width=\"640\" height=\"710\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24592\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/drought-legend-1024x396.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24592 size-large\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/drought-legend-1024x396.jpg\" alt=\"Click on the legend for a description of each drought category.\" width=\"1024\" height=\"396\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Click on the legend for a description of each drought category.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This animation shows California’s drought through its development, from January, 2011 through early December 2014, as expressed by NOAA’s U.S. Drought Monitor.\u003c/em> (Olivia Hubert-Allen/KQED)\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24447\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/waterlevel.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/waterlevel.jpg\" alt=\"Receding water levels can be seen around the San Gabriel Reservoir, or San Gabriel Dam, on July 29. The reservoir provides flood control, groundwater recharge flows and hydroelectricity for the heavily populated San Gabriel Valley in the Greater Los Angeles metropolitan area. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)\" width=\"850\" height=\"537\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24447\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Receding water levels can be seen around the San Gabriel Reservoir, or San Gabriel Dam, on July 29. The reservoir provides flood control, groundwater recharge flows and hydroelectricity for the heavily populated San Gabriel Valley in the Greater Los Angeles metropolitan area. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The latest year-over-year \u003ca href=\"http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/drought/conservation_reporting_info.shtml\">residential water use numbers\u003c/a> are out, offering a glimpse at how much of the wet stuff larger cities throughout California are using and how much they’re conserving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The broad view for October’s water conservation efforts isn’t good, but the gloomy news comes with warnings about comparing data 1) between cities that may have very different water needs and 2) across time when temperature could be factor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That said, October represents a significant backslide in water conservation statewide. Water use this October was down 6.7 percent compared to the same time last year. Sounds good, but that’s also a 3.6 percent decrease in water savings compared to \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/11/04/new-numbers-highlight-contrasts-in-california-water-use/\">September\u003c/a>, 2014, which had a statewide conservation rate of 10.3 percent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re using less water, but they’re using less less water than they did last month,” State Water Board Chair Felicia Marcus said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marcus said the gallons per capita, per day average is a new measurement, and officials are still grappling with exactly what it means.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This set of reports has raised more questions than answers for us,” Marcus said, but she added that it could be useful in transferring a best practice from a city with conservation success to another similar community struggling to reduce usage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State and local water officials worry the drive to conserve will falter as winter storms start to hit the state. But it’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/drought/ci_26932356/california-drought-not-likely-end-this-winter-experts\">unlikely\u003c/a> that California will get enough rain this season to break the severe drought, now entering its fourth year.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘If folks don’t take action, we probably will have to.’\u003ccite>Felicia Marcus\u003cbr>State Water Board Chair\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“As we’ve seen over time, conservation wanes a bit when you get into fall and winter months,” said Lisa Lien-Mager, spokeswoman for the Association of California Water Agencies. “Even though we may be in a drought, people aren’t thinking about it as much as they did in the summer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lien-Mager noted that 2014 is on pace to be a record-setting warm year for California, which factors into water usage and \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">the drought\u003c/a>. She said long-term efforts, like water districts offering \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/take-out-your-lawn-and-get-paid-for-it/\">cash rewards to residents who replace lawns\u003c/a> with drought-friendlier landscaping, have yet to impact usage, but they will.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They may not show the results immediately, but those things are happening, we know that,” she said. “Those programs are going through the roof all around the state. We have to show some patience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report does indicate which larger cities and regions are continuing to conserve and which are falling off. The Bay Area “gets a gold star,” Marcus said, noting that San Francisco uses the fewest gallons per capita, per day of any major city in the state. San Franciscans used an average of 45 gallons per person each day in October, with an 8.73 percent reduction this year compared to the same time last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even bigger users in the Bay Area, like the city of Hillsborough down the peninsula, are maintaining conservation. The city guzzles 228 gallons per person, per day, but it has reduced usage by 21 percent, compared to last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not so in parts of Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It really is Southern California bringing down the curve,” Marcus said. “In Northern California people have maintained their percentage year-over-year rates, and in Southern California it seemed to drop significantly with some communities actually using more water and others who had been saving 7 or 8 percent now saving 2 percent. And we’re not entirely sure why that is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State regulators are not currently considering harsher restrictions or fines for people who fail to conserve, Marcus said. Last summer, California became the first state in the country to institute statewide water conservation regulations, which she said are generally better handled by local water districts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We took the unusual step of doing what were relatively modest regulations to help kick [local] agencies into gear because it felt like they kept thinking it was just going to rain,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For now, regulators are opting for positive reinforcement and friendly reminders. The State Water Board is planning a Southern California water conservation workshop for Dec. 17 in the Los Angeles area. But that could change if next month’s conservation rate continues to fall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It depends on what people do about these numbers,” Marcus said. “If it rains a lot, it’s hard to keep the messaging up, and it could go either way. If folks don’t take action, we probably will have to.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The year-over-year water-saving rate slid by more than a third in October, worrying officials calling on residents to reduce water usage during record drought.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24447\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/waterlevel.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/waterlevel.jpg\" alt=\"Receding water levels can be seen around the San Gabriel Reservoir, or San Gabriel Dam, on July 29. The reservoir provides flood control, groundwater recharge flows and hydroelectricity for the heavily populated San Gabriel Valley in the Greater Los Angeles metropolitan area. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)\" width=\"850\" height=\"537\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24447\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Receding water levels can be seen around the San Gabriel Reservoir, or San Gabriel Dam, on July 29. The reservoir provides flood control, groundwater recharge flows and hydroelectricity for the heavily populated San Gabriel Valley in the Greater Los Angeles metropolitan area. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The latest year-over-year \u003ca href=\"http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/drought/conservation_reporting_info.shtml\">residential water use numbers\u003c/a> are out, offering a glimpse at how much of the wet stuff larger cities throughout California are using and how much they’re conserving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The broad view for October’s water conservation efforts isn’t good, but the gloomy news comes with warnings about comparing data 1) between cities that may have very different water needs and 2) across time when temperature could be factor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That said, October represents a significant backslide in water conservation statewide. Water use this October was down 6.7 percent compared to the same time last year. Sounds good, but that’s also a 3.6 percent decrease in water savings compared to \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/11/04/new-numbers-highlight-contrasts-in-california-water-use/\">September\u003c/a>, 2014, which had a statewide conservation rate of 10.3 percent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re using less water, but they’re using less less water than they did last month,” State Water Board Chair Felicia Marcus said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marcus said the gallons per capita, per day average is a new measurement, and officials are still grappling with exactly what it means.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This set of reports has raised more questions than answers for us,” Marcus said, but she added that it could be useful in transferring a best practice from a city with conservation success to another similar community struggling to reduce usage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State and local water officials worry the drive to conserve will falter as winter storms start to hit the state. But it’s \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/drought/ci_26932356/california-drought-not-likely-end-this-winter-experts\">unlikely\u003c/a> that California will get enough rain this season to break the severe drought, now entering its fourth year.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘If folks don’t take action, we probably will have to.’\u003ccite>Felicia Marcus\u003cbr>State Water Board Chair\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“As we’ve seen over time, conservation wanes a bit when you get into fall and winter months,” said Lisa Lien-Mager, spokeswoman for the Association of California Water Agencies. “Even though we may be in a drought, people aren’t thinking about it as much as they did in the summer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lien-Mager noted that 2014 is on pace to be a record-setting warm year for California, which factors into water usage and \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/10/14/high-temps-intensified-california-drought/\">the drought\u003c/a>. She said long-term efforts, like water districts offering \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/take-out-your-lawn-and-get-paid-for-it/\">cash rewards to residents who replace lawns\u003c/a> with drought-friendlier landscaping, have yet to impact usage, but they will.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They may not show the results immediately, but those things are happening, we know that,” she said. “Those programs are going through the roof all around the state. We have to show some patience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report does indicate which larger cities and regions are continuing to conserve and which are falling off. The Bay Area “gets a gold star,” Marcus said, noting that San Francisco uses the fewest gallons per capita, per day of any major city in the state. San Franciscans used an average of 45 gallons per person each day in October, with an 8.73 percent reduction this year compared to the same time last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even bigger users in the Bay Area, like the city of Hillsborough down the peninsula, are maintaining conservation. The city guzzles 228 gallons per person, per day, but it has reduced usage by 21 percent, compared to last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not so in parts of Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It really is Southern California bringing down the curve,” Marcus said. “In Northern California people have maintained their percentage year-over-year rates, and in Southern California it seemed to drop significantly with some communities actually using more water and others who had been saving 7 or 8 percent now saving 2 percent. And we’re not entirely sure why that is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State regulators are not currently considering harsher restrictions or fines for people who fail to conserve, Marcus said. Last summer, California became the first state in the country to institute statewide water conservation regulations, which she said are generally better handled by local water districts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We took the unusual step of doing what were relatively modest regulations to help kick [local] agencies into gear because it felt like they kept thinking it was just going to rain,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For now, regulators are opting for positive reinforcement and friendly reminders. The State Water Board is planning a Southern California water conservation workshop for Dec. 17 in the Los Angeles area. But that could change if next month’s conservation rate continues to fall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It depends on what people do about these numbers,” Marcus said. “If it rains a lot, it’s hard to keep the messaging up, and it could go either way. If folks don’t take action, we probably will have to.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California Drought Boosts 'Cash for Grass' Programs",
"headTitle": "California Drought Boosts ‘Cash for Grass’ Programs | KQED",
"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>http://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/science/2014/11/20141201science.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24339\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1-EdZuckerman-1024x654.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1-EdZuckerman-1024x654.jpg\" alt=\"Ed Zuckerman shows off part of the 1,400-acre sod farm he runs in Stockton. He says no-mow and native varieties are a small but growing part of the business. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"654\" class=\"size-large wp-image-24339\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ed Zuckerman shows off part of the 1,400-acre sod farm he runs in Stockton. He says no-mow and native varieties are a small but growing part of the business. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>By Daniel Potter\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIt would take a truly drenching winter to declare California’s drought over and, at least so far, that hasn’t materialized. One way water companies are nudging homeowners to conserve? Asking them to \u003ca href=\"http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article2594219.html\">rip out their grassy lawns\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some places, they’ve been paying people to do it, and that’s given a boost to companies hawking alternatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Cash for Grass\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The grass in front of Rebecca Lowell’s house was dead — \u003cem>dead\u003c/em> dead — as in, not so much yellow as gray. She moved with her three children to this house in Los Altos last year, as the drought was going from bad to worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We came here from a much smaller yard with a lot less grass,” she says. “I felt guilty this past year watering the grass, so I stopped.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now she’s replacing the lawn with native shrubs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just don’t need it,” she says. “We don’t play in the grass as much, and we have lots of parkland around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lowell says if her kids miss grass, they can ride their bikes to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She is also installing an irrigation system that tracks the weather and only waters when it’s needed. It’ll water close to the ground because with aerial sprinklers, too much of the moisture evaporates before the plants get a chance to use it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Santa Clara Valley Water District pays homeowners $2 per square foot to tear out their lawn and plant something less thirsty. In the case of her large dead lawn, Lowell is hoping to get roughly $6,000 to put toward her landscaping bill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24342\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 334px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Lowell.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-24342\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Lowell.jpg\" alt=\"Los Altos resident Rebecca Lowell let her lawn die over the summer, and is planning to replace it, with help via a rebate from the Santa Clara Valley Water District. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\" width=\"334\" height=\"252\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Los Altos resident Rebecca Lowell let her lawn die over the summer, and is planning to replace it, with help via a rebate from the Santa Clara Valley Water District. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For its part, the water district estimates it saves 36 gallons a year for every square foot of turf that’s replaced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is helping us plan toward the future and save water,” says Ashley Carter, the district’s conservation specialist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The water district used to pay $1 per square foot, but opted last spring to double the rebate. Since July, homeowners have traded in 10 times as much grass, compared to this same period last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carter says there are another 1.4 million square feet of conversions on the way. That could save as much water as 300 homes use in a year, based on the district’s estimates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The increased rebate amount definitely helps people who were maybe on the fence about it,” Carter says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayfriendlycoalition.org/LYL-rebates.shtml\">Dozens of agencies\u003c/a> around the state trying to throttle back on water use have similar “cash for grass” programs, including in the East Bay, Los Angeles and Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>‘Beautiful, In Its Own Way’\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the popularity of such programs, farmer Ed Zuckerman says a lot still has to change about the way Californians think about lawns if residents are to make a long-term transition to a low-water way of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s still a pretty entrenched value system built up around the cultivated English garden with a well-manicured lawn,” Zuckerman says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zuckerman is CEO of Delta Bluegrass, a sprawling sod farm surrounded by levies near Stockton. On an overcast fall day, he showed off seemingly endless bright green acres, including grasses that were native to California before 1830 — that is, before farming became widespread.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">Landscape watering makes up about half of residential water use in California.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Wearing blue jeans and brown boots, Zuckerman strode through a patch of wet grass, pointing to varieties with names such as native preservation and native mow-free. He says the mow-free, which grows long and flops over into what he calls a meadow look, can be a tough sell. Some people like the smell of fresh-trimmed grass and prefer the standard-issue crew cut of a traditional lawn to one with a sort of hippie shag.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It is beautiful, in its own way,” he says, “and guess what: It’s saving half the water you would normally put on it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zuckerman says the meadow look is also appealing if you’re a mouse or vole looking for a new home, which can be a turnoff to humans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can almost look like it’s in disrepair or you’re not paying attention to the maintenance of your house—like ‘Oh, this guy doesn’t mow his lawn — what a pig.’ You know?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even so, Zuckerman says alternative varieties of grass are a growing part of his business, thanks to both homeowners ready to be done with traditional lawns, and companies redoing their campuses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Synthetics, Too\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another approach that’s growing, \u003ca href=\"http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-california-drought-lawn-fake-grass-20141111-story.html\">despite some skepticism\u003c/a>, is synthetic turf. Jason Miller installs it for a living around Sacramento and the Bay Area. He says partly because plastic grass requires no water, business lately has been crazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you see the turf the way that it looks now, it looks completely different,” Miller says. “It’s very soft; it looks very realistic. You can’t tell it’s fake, except for it’s perfect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24355\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 339px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/3-TurfViaJasonMiller.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-24355\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/3-TurfViaJasonMiller.jpg\" alt=\"Jason Miller says the drought has more homeowners looking into artificial substitutes like the kind his company installed at this home, but man made turf still faces critiques over how hot it can get and how little it provides in the way of habitat. (Courtesy: Jason Miller)\" width=\"339\" height=\"254\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jason Miller says the drought has more homeowners looking into artificial substitutes like the kind his company installed at this home, but man made turf still faces critiques over how hot it can get and how little it provides in the way of habitat. (Courtesy: Jason Miller)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Synthetic turf doesn’t always qualify for rebates. And critics argue it’s more akin to a parking lot than a lawn, in terms of the habitat — or lack thereof — it provides, to say nothing of the temperature.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The crumb-rubber infill gets very hot if it’s in direct sun,” Miller says. “That gets up to, I believe, about 145 degrees in direct sun on a 100-degree day. It’s just blistering hot, kinda melts your shoes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miller says a good fake lawn made from the latest materials can be much cooler, but it can’t rival the natural air-conditioning of the real thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s still going to get hotter than grass, because grass is an organism,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watering grass — and other organisms, from flowers to shade trees — makes up about half of residential water use in California. If the drought persists, more homeowners will likely try to wring out their traditional yards for savings.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "California homeowners are replacing Kentucky bluegrass with native species and other water-friendly options to try and cut back on outdoor watering. Depending on what replacement residents choose, water districts may offer a cash reward for tearing out that thirsty lawn.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24339\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1-EdZuckerman-1024x654.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1-EdZuckerman-1024x654.jpg\" alt=\"Ed Zuckerman shows off part of the 1,400-acre sod farm he runs in Stockton. He says no-mow and native varieties are a small but growing part of the business. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\" width=\"1024\" height=\"654\" class=\"size-large wp-image-24339\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ed Zuckerman shows off part of the 1,400-acre sod farm he runs in Stockton. He says no-mow and native varieties are a small but growing part of the business. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>By Daniel Potter\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003cbr>\nIt would take a truly drenching winter to declare California’s drought over and, at least so far, that hasn’t materialized. One way water companies are nudging homeowners to conserve? Asking them to \u003ca href=\"http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article2594219.html\">rip out their grassy lawns\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some places, they’ve been paying people to do it, and that’s given a boost to companies hawking alternatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Cash for Grass\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The grass in front of Rebecca Lowell’s house was dead — \u003cem>dead\u003c/em> dead — as in, not so much yellow as gray. She moved with her three children to this house in Los Altos last year, as the drought was going from bad to worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We came here from a much smaller yard with a lot less grass,” she says. “I felt guilty this past year watering the grass, so I stopped.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now she’s replacing the lawn with native shrubs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just don’t need it,” she says. “We don’t play in the grass as much, and we have lots of parkland around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lowell says if her kids miss grass, they can ride their bikes to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She is also installing an irrigation system that tracks the weather and only waters when it’s needed. It’ll water close to the ground because with aerial sprinklers, too much of the moisture evaporates before the plants get a chance to use it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Santa Clara Valley Water District pays homeowners $2 per square foot to tear out their lawn and plant something less thirsty. In the case of her large dead lawn, Lowell is hoping to get roughly $6,000 to put toward her landscaping bill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24342\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 334px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Lowell.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-24342\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Lowell.jpg\" alt=\"Los Altos resident Rebecca Lowell let her lawn die over the summer, and is planning to replace it, with help via a rebate from the Santa Clara Valley Water District. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\" width=\"334\" height=\"252\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Los Altos resident Rebecca Lowell let her lawn die over the summer, and is planning to replace it, with help via a rebate from the Santa Clara Valley Water District. (Daniel Potter/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For its part, the water district estimates it saves 36 gallons a year for every square foot of turf that’s replaced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is helping us plan toward the future and save water,” says Ashley Carter, the district’s conservation specialist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The water district used to pay $1 per square foot, but opted last spring to double the rebate. Since July, homeowners have traded in 10 times as much grass, compared to this same period last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carter says there are another 1.4 million square feet of conversions on the way. That could save as much water as 300 homes use in a year, based on the district’s estimates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The increased rebate amount definitely helps people who were maybe on the fence about it,” Carter says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayfriendlycoalition.org/LYL-rebates.shtml\">Dozens of agencies\u003c/a> around the state trying to throttle back on water use have similar “cash for grass” programs, including in the East Bay, Los Angeles and Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>‘Beautiful, In Its Own Way’\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the popularity of such programs, farmer Ed Zuckerman says a lot still has to change about the way Californians think about lawns if residents are to make a long-term transition to a low-water way of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s still a pretty entrenched value system built up around the cultivated English garden with a well-manicured lawn,” Zuckerman says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zuckerman is CEO of Delta Bluegrass, a sprawling sod farm surrounded by levies near Stockton. On an overcast fall day, he showed off seemingly endless bright green acres, including grasses that were native to California before 1830 — that is, before farming became widespread.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">Landscape watering makes up about half of residential water use in California.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Wearing blue jeans and brown boots, Zuckerman strode through a patch of wet grass, pointing to varieties with names such as native preservation and native mow-free. He says the mow-free, which grows long and flops over into what he calls a meadow look, can be a tough sell. Some people like the smell of fresh-trimmed grass and prefer the standard-issue crew cut of a traditional lawn to one with a sort of hippie shag.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It is beautiful, in its own way,” he says, “and guess what: It’s saving half the water you would normally put on it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Zuckerman says the meadow look is also appealing if you’re a mouse or vole looking for a new home, which can be a turnoff to humans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can almost look like it’s in disrepair or you’re not paying attention to the maintenance of your house—like ‘Oh, this guy doesn’t mow his lawn — what a pig.’ You know?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even so, Zuckerman says alternative varieties of grass are a growing part of his business, thanks to both homeowners ready to be done with traditional lawns, and companies redoing their campuses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Synthetics, Too\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another approach that’s growing, \u003ca href=\"http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-california-drought-lawn-fake-grass-20141111-story.html\">despite some skepticism\u003c/a>, is synthetic turf. Jason Miller installs it for a living around Sacramento and the Bay Area. He says partly because plastic grass requires no water, business lately has been crazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you see the turf the way that it looks now, it looks completely different,” Miller says. “It’s very soft; it looks very realistic. You can’t tell it’s fake, except for it’s perfect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24355\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 339px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/3-TurfViaJasonMiller.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-24355\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/12/3-TurfViaJasonMiller.jpg\" alt=\"Jason Miller says the drought has more homeowners looking into artificial substitutes like the kind his company installed at this home, but man made turf still faces critiques over how hot it can get and how little it provides in the way of habitat. (Courtesy: Jason Miller)\" width=\"339\" height=\"254\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jason Miller says the drought has more homeowners looking into artificial substitutes like the kind his company installed at this home, but man made turf still faces critiques over how hot it can get and how little it provides in the way of habitat. (Courtesy: Jason Miller)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Synthetic turf doesn’t always qualify for rebates. And critics argue it’s more akin to a parking lot than a lawn, in terms of the habitat — or lack thereof — it provides, to say nothing of the temperature.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The crumb-rubber infill gets very hot if it’s in direct sun,” Miller says. “That gets up to, I believe, about 145 degrees in direct sun on a 100-degree day. It’s just blistering hot, kinda melts your shoes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miller says a good fake lawn made from the latest materials can be much cooler, but it can’t rival the natural air-conditioning of the real thing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s still going to get hotter than grass, because grass is an organism,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Watering grass — and other organisms, from flowers to shade trees — makes up about half of residential water use in California. If the drought persists, more homeowners will likely try to wring out their traditional yards for savings.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Stalled Clean Power Alternative to PG&E Looms Large in New S.F. Electricity Law",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24284\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Hetch.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24284\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Hetch.jpg\" alt=\"Dated signage indicating electricity from Hetch Hetchy. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"850\" height=\"638\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A weathered wooden sign in Fremont boasts electricity from Hetch Hetchy. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a move that could generate tens of millions of dollars for the city, San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors passed legislation today that would give the city’s Public Utilities Commission a “right of first refusal” to sell electricity to private development projects in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SFPUC’s Power Enterprise currently sells on the wholesale market electricity that’s left over after municipal uses like powering City Hall. But the city could make about four times as much money selling to private customers at retail rates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new arrangement would switch the default power provider for many larger construction projects, and the long-term electricity needs of whatever’s getting built in booming San Francisco, from Pacific Gas and Electric to the city. It would allow the SFPUC to sell electricity to projects on public lands, those developed with public funds and any private projects seeking city approval.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supervisors’ long-stalled effort to form \u003ca href=\"http://sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=577\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CleanPowerSF\u003c/a>, a city-run, clean-energy alternative to PG&E, looms large in the new law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have had a history of a monopoly in San Francisco, with PG&E, on electricity,” said the ordinance’s author, San Francisco Supervisor Scott Wiener.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He introduced an amendment Monday suggesting that the SFPUC prioritize selling electricity to CleanPowerSF if and when the program launches.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A PG&E spokesman would not comment on the legislation, but provided KQED with a prepared statement that said the company looks forward to continuing to provide clean energy to San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We will continue to work with the city on this issue,” the statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CleanPowerSF was stalled by the SFPUC last year, when the commission refused to set rates for the greener, and thus more expensive, electricity that would be sold by the city but transmitted across PG&E’s network. The program was set up to automatically enroll residents, who would then have to opt out in order to revert to PG&E power. CleanPowerSF’s additional “generation charge,” which could run anywhere from $5.29 to near $10 per month to match a green alternative proposed by PG&E, would appear on customers’ PG&E bill. A final decision on the rate is pending.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Chronicle \u003ca href=\"http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/S-F-clean-energy-program-could-generate-8-100-5897392.php\">reported Monday\u003c/a> that Wiener called the “right of first refusal” legislation “complementary” to the CleanPowerSF effort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24277\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Where-your-hetch-hetchy-power-comes-from.aspx_.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24277 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Where-your-hetch-hetchy-power-comes-from.aspx_.jpg\" alt=\"Where your hetch hetchy power comes from.aspx\" width=\"590\" height=\"251\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The vast majority of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission’s electricity is hydropower from Hetch Hetchy. (SFPUC)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Wiener says the Power Enterprise “has been starved of resources because it is not more of a retail provider.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SFPUC’s Power Enterprise currently takes in about $115 million each year from electricity sales, according to the program’s Assistant General Manager Barbara Hale. About 15 percent of that comes from selling excess energy on the wholesale market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We do have available power to sell to additional retail customers,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More retail-rate customers could mean a $40 million increase in revenue for the SFPUC yearly, Wiener said, and should enlarge the local commission’s footprint in San Francisco’s electricity market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Business Operators and Managers Association and Chamber of Commerce both oppose the legislation because it will force some private entities to purchase power from the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have some serious problems with this legislation, supervisor,” BOMA’s Ken Cleaveland told Wiener at a Land Use Committee meeting Monday. “If the city bids out many of its services, why don’t you allow PG&E and the SFPUC to bid contracts for these new developments?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The city’s rates are equal to or lower than PG&E’s, Hale said, and the power is “100 percent greenhouse gas free.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24284\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Hetch.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24284\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Hetch.jpg\" alt=\"Dated signage indicating electricity from Hetch Hetchy. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"850\" height=\"638\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A weathered wooden sign in Fremont boasts electricity from Hetch Hetchy. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a move that could generate tens of millions of dollars for the city, San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors passed legislation today that would give the city’s Public Utilities Commission a “right of first refusal” to sell electricity to private development projects in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SFPUC’s Power Enterprise currently sells on the wholesale market electricity that’s left over after municipal uses like powering City Hall. But the city could make about four times as much money selling to private customers at retail rates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new arrangement would switch the default power provider for many larger construction projects, and the long-term electricity needs of whatever’s getting built in booming San Francisco, from Pacific Gas and Electric to the city. It would allow the SFPUC to sell electricity to projects on public lands, those developed with public funds and any private projects seeking city approval.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supervisors’ long-stalled effort to form \u003ca href=\"http://sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=577\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CleanPowerSF\u003c/a>, a city-run, clean-energy alternative to PG&E, looms large in the new law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have had a history of a monopoly in San Francisco, with PG&E, on electricity,” said the ordinance’s author, San Francisco Supervisor Scott Wiener.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He introduced an amendment Monday suggesting that the SFPUC prioritize selling electricity to CleanPowerSF if and when the program launches.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A PG&E spokesman would not comment on the legislation, but provided KQED with a prepared statement that said the company looks forward to continuing to provide clean energy to San Francisco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We will continue to work with the city on this issue,” the statement said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CleanPowerSF was stalled by the SFPUC last year, when the commission refused to set rates for the greener, and thus more expensive, electricity that would be sold by the city but transmitted across PG&E’s network. The program was set up to automatically enroll residents, who would then have to opt out in order to revert to PG&E power. CleanPowerSF’s additional “generation charge,” which could run anywhere from $5.29 to near $10 per month to match a green alternative proposed by PG&E, would appear on customers’ PG&E bill. A final decision on the rate is pending.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Chronicle \u003ca href=\"http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/S-F-clean-energy-program-could-generate-8-100-5897392.php\">reported Monday\u003c/a> that Wiener called the “right of first refusal” legislation “complementary” to the CleanPowerSF effort.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24277\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 590px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Where-your-hetch-hetchy-power-comes-from.aspx_.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-24277 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2016/11/Where-your-hetch-hetchy-power-comes-from.aspx_.jpg\" alt=\"Where your hetch hetchy power comes from.aspx\" width=\"590\" height=\"251\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The vast majority of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission’s electricity is hydropower from Hetch Hetchy. (SFPUC)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Wiener says the Power Enterprise “has been starved of resources because it is not more of a retail provider.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SFPUC’s Power Enterprise currently takes in about $115 million each year from electricity sales, according to the program’s Assistant General Manager Barbara Hale. About 15 percent of that comes from selling excess energy on the wholesale market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We do have available power to sell to additional retail customers,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More retail-rate customers could mean a $40 million increase in revenue for the SFPUC yearly, Wiener said, and should enlarge the local commission’s footprint in San Francisco’s electricity market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Business Operators and Managers Association and Chamber of Commerce both oppose the legislation because it will force some private entities to purchase power from the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have some serious problems with this legislation, supervisor,” BOMA’s Ken Cleaveland told Wiener at a Land Use Committee meeting Monday. “If the city bids out many of its services, why don’t you allow PG&E and the SFPUC to bid contracts for these new developments?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The city’s rates are equal to or lower than PG&E’s, Hale said, and the power is “100 percent greenhouse gas free.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California Utilities and Solar Companies Battle Over Electricity Prices",
"headTitle": "California Utilities and Solar Companies Battle Over Electricity Prices | KQED",
"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>http://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/science/2014/11/20141124science.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24195\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/solar.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/solar.jpg\" alt=\"Solar companies worry that newly proposed electricity rates from California utilities will make it less appealing for Californians to install solar panels. (Dennis Schroeder/Department of Energy)\" width=\"800\" height=\"500\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24195\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Solar companies worry that newly proposed electricity rates from California utilities will make it less appealing for Californians to install solar panels.\u003cbr>(Dennis Schroeder/Department of Energy)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Electricity bills could be going up for millions of Californians under a new proposal from the state’s major utilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pacific Gas and Electric is proposing an overhaul of the way customers are charged for electricity, which the utility says would be more fair for many customers. But solar companies see it as a direct attack, because the changes could make installing solar panels less appealing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The debate is just one more battle in a slow-simmering war between electric utilities and solar companies. The front lines are in the homes of average Californians – like Elmore Williams.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s working great,” Williams says, looking up at the solar panels on his four-bedroom Vacaville home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just six months ago, Williams was a solid PG&E customer — his household used more electricity than average for its size. His bill would hit $300 during the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had the air conditioner running all thet time,” he says. With the panels, Williams pays a set amount for solar power and much less to PG&E.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mean, my wife is just so happy!” He says she tells him, “‘Look how much we’re paying this time. Our PG&E bill is just sixteen dollars this time.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One customer may not be a big loss to PG&E, but solar is growing fast.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘There’s no question – the fixed charge is the worst nightmare of the solar installers.’\u003ccite>— Severin Borenstein\u003cbr>UC Berkeley\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“We have far and away the most customer solar,” says Jonathan Marshall, a spokesman for PG&E. One-quarter of all rooftop solar systems in the country are found in PG&E’s service area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marshall says PG&E isn’t \u003cem>against \u003c/em>solar. The problem, as he sees it, is that solar customers aren’t paying their share of keeping up the electric grid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In fact, they use the grid more than almost anyone,” he says, “because they’re selling power back into it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Households with solar still use PG&E’s electricity after the sun goes down, but \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/could-rooftop-solar-kill-utilities-california-grapples-with-solars-success-2/\">they also make money back\u003c/a> by selling PG&E the extra solar power they generate during the day, giving them lower bills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Electricity Price Overhaul\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the newly proposed electric rates, solar customers, along with everyone else, would pay a fixed monthly charge: $10 per month, adding up to $120 a year. Customers with Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric would pay the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s to help share the cost of basic infrastructure that we all use and depend on – lines, poles, meters and so forth,” Marshall says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The second change is to the price of electricity itself. Today, there are four electricity rates for PG&E customers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cheapest rate is for “baseline” power use – a certain amount of electricity that PG&E allocates based on where you live. Currently, it costs 15 cents per kilowatt hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But use electricity beyond that amount and the prices go up, all the way to 32 cents per kilowatt hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24146\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Electric-rates-11212014.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Electric-rates-11212014.jpg\" alt=\"(David Pierce/KQED)\" width=\"2300\" height=\"1644\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24146\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(David Pierce/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Utilities call this \u003ca href=\"http://www.pge.com/en/myhome/saveenergymoney/plans/tiers/index.page\">“tiered” pricing\u003c/a>. Since California’s electricity crisis hit in 2000, the two lower tiers have stayed basically fixed and the higher tiers have been raised. Marshall says the system penalizes heavy users.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s as if going to the grocery store, they had to pay more per gallon of milk just because they have more mouths to feed at the table,” Marshall says. “That doesn’t make much sense. But it is how we today charge for electricity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new system, PG&E would charge two prices for electricity. By 2018, 74 percent of customers would see their bills go up by an average of $12 a month compared to today. About a quarter of customers, the heaviest power users, would see their bills decrease by $31 a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Harming Conservation?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some environmental groups say those changes will send an anti-conservation message to California consumers. High electricity prices are meant to be painful, they say, so the heaviest users are encouraged to conserve or invest in energy efficient appliances and home upgrades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But others say the tiered pricing system as it is today is too complicated for consumers to track.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If people were really aware of which tier they were on, you would get some conservation,” says Severin Borenstein, an economist at UC Berkeley. “But I think it’s unlikely that many people other than electricity nerds actually know what tier their consumption is on. Most people just think there’s some price for electricity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since PG&E customers with historically lower bills would have higher bills under the new rate structure, it could also encourage conservation among a new group of customers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Solar Companies Cry Foul\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The changes in electricity rates would have a major impact on PG&E’s biggest competitor: the solar industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Investor-owned utilities across the country are fighting rooftop solar,” says Sanjay Ranchod of SolarCity, the largest solar company in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n\u003ch5>How Would Electric Bills Change?\u003c/h5>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2017/11/Five-Bill.jpg\" alt=\"Five Bill\" width=\"537\" height=\"360\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-24183\">\u003cbr>\n\u003cstrong>It varies by region. Here’s a sample for customers in the East Bay in 2018:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>400 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes up by $17 — from $58 to $75.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>800 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes down by $16 — from $172 to $156.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>1,200 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes down by $66 — from $302 to $236.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Source: PG&E\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Ranchod says if utilities are changing electricity prices, there’s no need to add the $10 monthly charge on top of it. The only thing that does is make solar less attractive at a time when California’s trying to encourage renewable energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A higher and higher fixed charge that customers can’t escape,” he says, “is designed to undermine the value that solar customers can get from their investment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ranchod says it’s a sign that utilities like PG&E see solar as threat. “For a company that has depended on a monopoly, competition from SolarCity or any other solar company is scary.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Death Spiral\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s no question – the fixed charge is the worst nightmare of the solar installers,” says Severin Borenstein.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says the monthly fee will make it harder for solar companies to compete, though the cost of solar panels still falling. But in the bigger picture, Borenstein says, this debate is just one more sign that solar is a disruptive technology, somewhat like cell phones versus land lines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Analysts even have a name for the way solar is cutting into the utility business model: the “\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/could-rooftop-solar-kill-utilities-california-grapples-with-solars-success-2/\">death spiral\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think there’s a big question in electricity industry right now about what will happen to utilities,” Borenstein says, “and what their business model will be 10 or 20 or 30 years from now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of being power companies, he says, utilities could become electric grid companies, “where they don’t actually bring electricity in, they just shuffle it around between one house and another.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With such a large solar market, California could be one of the first places this plays out. In the meantime, the California Public Utilities Commission is expected to decide on the new pricing structure in the spring. The rates could go into effect next summer.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Solar companies in California have long been able to tell homeowners they can save a lot of money on power bills by going solar. Now PG&E is proposing a rate change the company says will be more fair for everyone. But solar companies say it’s simply an attack on their industry.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24195\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/solar.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/solar.jpg\" alt=\"Solar companies worry that newly proposed electricity rates from California utilities will make it less appealing for Californians to install solar panels. (Dennis Schroeder/Department of Energy)\" width=\"800\" height=\"500\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24195\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Solar companies worry that newly proposed electricity rates from California utilities will make it less appealing for Californians to install solar panels.\u003cbr>(Dennis Schroeder/Department of Energy)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Electricity bills could be going up for millions of Californians under a new proposal from the state’s major utilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pacific Gas and Electric is proposing an overhaul of the way customers are charged for electricity, which the utility says would be more fair for many customers. But solar companies see it as a direct attack, because the changes could make installing solar panels less appealing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The debate is just one more battle in a slow-simmering war between electric utilities and solar companies. The front lines are in the homes of average Californians – like Elmore Williams.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s working great,” Williams says, looking up at the solar panels on his four-bedroom Vacaville home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Just six months ago, Williams was a solid PG&E customer — his household used more electricity than average for its size. His bill would hit $300 during the summer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had the air conditioner running all thet time,” he says. With the panels, Williams pays a set amount for solar power and much less to PG&E.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I mean, my wife is just so happy!” He says she tells him, “‘Look how much we’re paying this time. Our PG&E bill is just sixteen dollars this time.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One customer may not be a big loss to PG&E, but solar is growing fast.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘There’s no question – the fixed charge is the worst nightmare of the solar installers.’\u003ccite>— Severin Borenstein\u003cbr>UC Berkeley\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>“We have far and away the most customer solar,” says Jonathan Marshall, a spokesman for PG&E. One-quarter of all rooftop solar systems in the country are found in PG&E’s service area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Marshall says PG&E isn’t \u003cem>against \u003c/em>solar. The problem, as he sees it, is that solar customers aren’t paying their share of keeping up the electric grid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In fact, they use the grid more than almost anyone,” he says, “because they’re selling power back into it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Households with solar still use PG&E’s electricity after the sun goes down, but \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/could-rooftop-solar-kill-utilities-california-grapples-with-solars-success-2/\">they also make money back\u003c/a> by selling PG&E the extra solar power they generate during the day, giving them lower bills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Electricity Price Overhaul\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the newly proposed electric rates, solar customers, along with everyone else, would pay a fixed monthly charge: $10 per month, adding up to $120 a year. Customers with Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric would pay the same.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s to help share the cost of basic infrastructure that we all use and depend on – lines, poles, meters and so forth,” Marshall says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The second change is to the price of electricity itself. Today, there are four electricity rates for PG&E customers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cheapest rate is for “baseline” power use – a certain amount of electricity that PG&E allocates based on where you live. Currently, it costs 15 cents per kilowatt hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But use electricity beyond that amount and the prices go up, all the way to 32 cents per kilowatt hour.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24146\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Electric-rates-11212014.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Electric-rates-11212014.jpg\" alt=\"(David Pierce/KQED)\" width=\"2300\" height=\"1644\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24146\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(David Pierce/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Utilities call this \u003ca href=\"http://www.pge.com/en/myhome/saveenergymoney/plans/tiers/index.page\">“tiered” pricing\u003c/a>. Since California’s electricity crisis hit in 2000, the two lower tiers have stayed basically fixed and the higher tiers have been raised. Marshall says the system penalizes heavy users.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s as if going to the grocery store, they had to pay more per gallon of milk just because they have more mouths to feed at the table,” Marshall says. “That doesn’t make much sense. But it is how we today charge for electricity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the new system, PG&E would charge two prices for electricity. By 2018, 74 percent of customers would see their bills go up by an average of $12 a month compared to today. About a quarter of customers, the heaviest power users, would see their bills decrease by $31 a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Harming Conservation?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some environmental groups say those changes will send an anti-conservation message to California consumers. High electricity prices are meant to be painful, they say, so the heaviest users are encouraged to conserve or invest in energy efficient appliances and home upgrades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But others say the tiered pricing system as it is today is too complicated for consumers to track.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If people were really aware of which tier they were on, you would get some conservation,” says Severin Borenstein, an economist at UC Berkeley. “But I think it’s unlikely that many people other than electricity nerds actually know what tier their consumption is on. Most people just think there’s some price for electricity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since PG&E customers with historically lower bills would have higher bills under the new rate structure, it could also encourage conservation among a new group of customers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Solar Companies Cry Foul\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The changes in electricity rates would have a major impact on PG&E’s biggest competitor: the solar industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Investor-owned utilities across the country are fighting rooftop solar,” says Sanjay Ranchod of SolarCity, the largest solar company in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n\u003ch5>How Would Electric Bills Change?\u003c/h5>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2017/11/Five-Bill.jpg\" alt=\"Five Bill\" width=\"537\" height=\"360\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-24183\">\u003cbr>\n\u003cstrong>It varies by region. Here’s a sample for customers in the East Bay in 2018:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>400 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes up by $17 — from $58 to $75.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>800 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes down by $16 — from $172 to $156.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>1,200 kilowatt hours per month: Your bill goes down by $66 — from $302 to $236.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Source: PG&E\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Ranchod says if utilities are changing electricity prices, there’s no need to add the $10 monthly charge on top of it. The only thing that does is make solar less attractive at a time when California’s trying to encourage renewable energy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A higher and higher fixed charge that customers can’t escape,” he says, “is designed to undermine the value that solar customers can get from their investment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ranchod says it’s a sign that utilities like PG&E see solar as threat. “For a company that has depended on a monopoly, competition from SolarCity or any other solar company is scary.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Death Spiral\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s no question – the fixed charge is the worst nightmare of the solar installers,” says Severin Borenstein.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He says the monthly fee will make it harder for solar companies to compete, though the cost of solar panels still falling. But in the bigger picture, Borenstein says, this debate is just one more sign that solar is a disruptive technology, somewhat like cell phones versus land lines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Analysts even have a name for the way solar is cutting into the utility business model: the “\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/could-rooftop-solar-kill-utilities-california-grapples-with-solars-success-2/\">death spiral\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think there’s a big question in electricity industry right now about what will happen to utilities,” Borenstein says, “and what their business model will be 10 or 20 or 30 years from now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of being power companies, he says, utilities could become electric grid companies, “where they don’t actually bring electricity in, they just shuffle it around between one house and another.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With such a large solar market, California could be one of the first places this plays out. In the meantime, the California Public Utilities Commission is expected to decide on the new pricing structure in the spring. The rates could go into effect next summer.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "AT&T Could Pay $50 Million for Illegal E-Waste Dumping",
"headTitle": "AT&T Could Pay $50 Million for Illegal E-Waste Dumping | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24110\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/E-Waste_Recycling_7027059003-1024x682.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-24110\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/E-Waste_Recycling_7027059003-1024x682.jpg\" alt='E-waste recycling (Alex Proimos/ <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0\">Wikimedia Commons</a>)' width=\"1024\" height=\"682\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California law requires e-waste to be recycled at designated collection centers. (Alex Proimos/ \u003ca href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0\">Wikimedia Commons\u003c/a>)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of the nation’s largest telecom companies may be paying significant penalties for dumping of electronic waste in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Attorney General’s Office and the Alameda County District Attorney announced a preliminary settlement agreement with AT&T today covering nine years in which the company allegedly discarded hazardous electronic waste illegally, sending it to landfills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The settlement, if approved by the Alameda County Superior Court, will require the telecommunications giant to pay $21.8 million in penalties and another $28 million to update environmental compliance over the next five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>AT&T was allegedly throwing away Internet routers, as well as cable splitters, batteries, aerosol cans and some liquid hazardous materials, prosecutors said. The primary violation was electronic waste going to landfills, in the millions of items.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This actually is the first enforcement action where the primary hazardous waste was electronic waste in the state of California,” said assistant Alameda County district attorney Ken Mifsud, who heads the office’s environmental unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The civil enforcement action brought by state and local prosecutors alleges that more than 235 AT&T warehouses and dispatch facilities, at which technicians installing commercial and residential phone, Internet and cable services are based, were routinely throwing e-waste into general trash bins. Electronic circuit boards often contain heavy metals like lead and other materials defined as hazardous waste under California law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mifsud said investigators became aware there could be violations three years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So we decided to take a look at their waste dumpsters to see if in fact that was true, and we determined through dozens of waste inspections for facilities in northern California that they were systematically disposing of hazardous e-waste items.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prosecutors said AT&T was extremely compliant as soon as the company was informed of the investigation. The company is voluntarily spending $28 million to upgrade environmental compliance, what Mifsud called “above and beyond” what a normal business would spend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We take environmental stewardship seriously, and we’ve cooperated closely with the state and Alameda County to resolve this issue in a way that is in the best interests of the environment, our customers and all Californians,” AT&T spokesman Marty Richter wrote in an emailed response to KQED’s inquiry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Richter wrote that AT&T is now screening and sorting “all waste materials originating from our facilities in California to ensure proper handling, recycling and disposal of all materials — hazardous and non-hazardous.” Contractors inspect “staging bins” before waste is put into the general stream, and AT&T can also expect hundreds of unannounced inspections from environmental regulators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, Richter wrote, AT&T added more than a dozen supervisors whose principal focus is California waste regulation requirements. The company revised employee and contractor training and instituted a color-coded system, with pictures, delineating what trash goes where.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They know we could check at any time to make sure that the program’s still working,” Mifsud said. “They’ve agreed to a number of unannounced inspections of their facilities, hundreds of them, every year for the next five years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the $21.8 million in penalties, $3 million will fund Supplemental Environmental Projects throughout the state. The State Department of Toxic Substances Control, which performed field inspections at AT&T sites as part of the investigation, is expecting to get $1.5 million for upgraded lab equipment to test for hazardous materials. The remaining $18.8 million is earmarked for prosecution of environmental and consumer cases at the Attorney General’s Office and more than 40 county prosecutors’ offices throughout the state, including Alameda.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can’t be used for anything else,” Mifsud said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said he couldn’t comment on potentially ongoing investigations involving other companies that may be unlawfully disposing of hazardous materials, but the Associated Press reports that five other telecommunications companies have disclosed in financial filings with regulators that they are the targets of similar investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Read the proposed final judgement below:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[scribd id=247434057 key=key-9ulc62waEGZONkFbUGfx mode=scroll]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24110\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1024px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/E-Waste_Recycling_7027059003-1024x682.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-24110\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/E-Waste_Recycling_7027059003-1024x682.jpg\" alt='E-waste recycling (Alex Proimos/ <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0\">Wikimedia Commons</a>)' width=\"1024\" height=\"682\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">California law requires e-waste to be recycled at designated collection centers. (Alex Proimos/ \u003ca href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0\">Wikimedia Commons\u003c/a>)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>One of the nation’s largest telecom companies may be paying significant penalties for dumping of electronic waste in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Attorney General’s Office and the Alameda County District Attorney announced a preliminary settlement agreement with AT&T today covering nine years in which the company allegedly discarded hazardous electronic waste illegally, sending it to landfills.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The settlement, if approved by the Alameda County Superior Court, will require the telecommunications giant to pay $21.8 million in penalties and another $28 million to update environmental compliance over the next five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>AT&T was allegedly throwing away Internet routers, as well as cable splitters, batteries, aerosol cans and some liquid hazardous materials, prosecutors said. The primary violation was electronic waste going to landfills, in the millions of items.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This actually is the first enforcement action where the primary hazardous waste was electronic waste in the state of California,” said assistant Alameda County district attorney Ken Mifsud, who heads the office’s environmental unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The civil enforcement action brought by state and local prosecutors alleges that more than 235 AT&T warehouses and dispatch facilities, at which technicians installing commercial and residential phone, Internet and cable services are based, were routinely throwing e-waste into general trash bins. Electronic circuit boards often contain heavy metals like lead and other materials defined as hazardous waste under California law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mifsud said investigators became aware there could be violations three years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So we decided to take a look at their waste dumpsters to see if in fact that was true, and we determined through dozens of waste inspections for facilities in northern California that they were systematically disposing of hazardous e-waste items.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prosecutors said AT&T was extremely compliant as soon as the company was informed of the investigation. The company is voluntarily spending $28 million to upgrade environmental compliance, what Mifsud called “above and beyond” what a normal business would spend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We take environmental stewardship seriously, and we’ve cooperated closely with the state and Alameda County to resolve this issue in a way that is in the best interests of the environment, our customers and all Californians,” AT&T spokesman Marty Richter wrote in an emailed response to KQED’s inquiry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Richter wrote that AT&T is now screening and sorting “all waste materials originating from our facilities in California to ensure proper handling, recycling and disposal of all materials — hazardous and non-hazardous.” Contractors inspect “staging bins” before waste is put into the general stream, and AT&T can also expect hundreds of unannounced inspections from environmental regulators.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Also, Richter wrote, AT&T added more than a dozen supervisors whose principal focus is California waste regulation requirements. The company revised employee and contractor training and instituted a color-coded system, with pictures, delineating what trash goes where.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They know we could check at any time to make sure that the program’s still working,” Mifsud said. “They’ve agreed to a number of unannounced inspections of their facilities, hundreds of them, every year for the next five years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of the $21.8 million in penalties, $3 million will fund Supplemental Environmental Projects throughout the state. The State Department of Toxic Substances Control, which performed field inspections at AT&T sites as part of the investigation, is expecting to get $1.5 million for upgraded lab equipment to test for hazardous materials. The remaining $18.8 million is earmarked for prosecution of environmental and consumer cases at the Attorney General’s Office and more than 40 county prosecutors’ offices throughout the state, including Alameda.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It can’t be used for anything else,” Mifsud said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said he couldn’t comment on potentially ongoing investigations involving other companies that may be unlawfully disposing of hazardous materials, but the Associated Press reports that five other telecommunications companies have disclosed in financial filings with regulators that they are the targets of similar investigations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Read the proposed final judgement below:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003ciframe\n class=\"scribd_iframe_embed\"\n src=\"//www.scribd.com/embeds/247434057/content?start_page=1&view_mode=&access_key=key-9ulc62waEGZONkFbUGfx\"\n title=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/247434057\"\n data-auto-height=\"true\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"scribd_247434057\"\n width=\"100%\" height=\"500\" frameborder=\"0\">\u003c/iframe>\n \u003ca class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__scribdShortcode__scribd_footer\"\n href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/247434057\"\n target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">View this document on Scribd\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "California Drought: A Glimmer of Hope For Winter Rain And Snow",
"headTitle": "California Drought: A Glimmer of Hope For Winter Rain And Snow | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24120\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1280px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS8575_IMG_0263.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24120\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS8575_IMG_0263.jpg\" alt=\"A pedestrian with an umbrella walks in the rain in front of San Francsico's Embarcadero Center. (Mark Andrew Boyer / KQED)\" width=\"1280\" height=\"853\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A pedestrian with an umbrella walks in the rain in front of San Francsico’s Embarcadero Center. (Mark Andrew Boyer / KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Federal forecasters today proffered a 73 percent chance that, overall, California will see at least average precipitation this winter. However, the auspices favor the Southland more than Northern California, where most of the state’s largest reservoirs are located.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/whats-store-united-states-winter\">outlook issued today\u003c/a> includes the months of December, January and February, when wetter storms, \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/11/18/this-weeks-rain-unlikely-to-dent-drought/http://\">if they come, typically hit the state\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s the first time since 2011 that the federal \u003ca href=\"http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/\">Climate Prediction Center\u003c/a>‘s three-month outlook favored average or above-average precipitation for any portion of California. As a testament to the persistence of the current drought, the last time the CDC issued an outlook predicting average-or-better precipitation for the entire state was November of 2009.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24117\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 605px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/DJFPrecipMap.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24117\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/DJFPrecipMap.jpg\" alt=\"The green areas on the map indicate odds on at least average precipitation over the next three months. (NOAA)\" width=\"605\" height=\"648\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The green areas on the map indicate odds on at least average precipitation over the next three months. Note that the optimism fades from south to north in California. (NOAA)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Scientists still have low expectations for the warm-water conditions in the Pacific known as El Niño, which might wring more rain and snow out of the atmosphere. They say there’s about a 60 percent chance of a winter El Niño — but it’s likely to be a weakling, not the rainmaker that is the stuff of \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/drought-myth-busting-why-el-nino-wont-save-california/\">California legend\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Given such a severe California drought, normal precipitation would likely improve (not eliminate) the drought,” CPC meteorologist Dave Unger explained in an email. “So that is the reason for the optimistic drought outlook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s state climatologist has said that the state would have to see at least half again its normal winter precipitation to begin to turn things around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Forecasters are always quick to concede that such long-range outlooks are best taken with at least a grain of salt. Given the state of the science, this glimmer of hope could easily be a mirage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One thing of which they’re fairly certain: California is heading for its warmest year on record. In fact, said climatologist Jake Crouch, even record cold in December would not likely prevent that.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24120\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1280px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS8575_IMG_0263.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24120\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS8575_IMG_0263.jpg\" alt=\"A pedestrian with an umbrella walks in the rain in front of San Francsico's Embarcadero Center. (Mark Andrew Boyer / KQED)\" width=\"1280\" height=\"853\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A pedestrian with an umbrella walks in the rain in front of San Francsico’s Embarcadero Center. (Mark Andrew Boyer / KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Federal forecasters today proffered a 73 percent chance that, overall, California will see at least average precipitation this winter. However, the auspices favor the Southland more than Northern California, where most of the state’s largest reservoirs are located.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"http://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/whats-store-united-states-winter\">outlook issued today\u003c/a> includes the months of December, January and February, when wetter storms, \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/11/18/this-weeks-rain-unlikely-to-dent-drought/http://\">if they come, typically hit the state\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s the first time since 2011 that the federal \u003ca href=\"http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/\">Climate Prediction Center\u003c/a>‘s three-month outlook favored average or above-average precipitation for any portion of California. As a testament to the persistence of the current drought, the last time the CDC issued an outlook predicting average-or-better precipitation for the entire state was November of 2009.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24117\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 605px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/DJFPrecipMap.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24117\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/DJFPrecipMap.jpg\" alt=\"The green areas on the map indicate odds on at least average precipitation over the next three months. (NOAA)\" width=\"605\" height=\"648\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The green areas on the map indicate odds on at least average precipitation over the next three months. Note that the optimism fades from south to north in California. (NOAA)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Scientists still have low expectations for the warm-water conditions in the Pacific known as El Niño, which might wring more rain and snow out of the atmosphere. They say there’s about a 60 percent chance of a winter El Niño — but it’s likely to be a weakling, not the rainmaker that is the stuff of \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/drought-myth-busting-why-el-nino-wont-save-california/\">California legend\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Given such a severe California drought, normal precipitation would likely improve (not eliminate) the drought,” CPC meteorologist Dave Unger explained in an email. “So that is the reason for the optimistic drought outlook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s state climatologist has said that the state would have to see at least half again its normal winter precipitation to begin to turn things around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Forecasters are always quick to concede that such long-range outlooks are best taken with at least a grain of salt. Given the state of the science, this glimmer of hope could easily be a mirage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One thing of which they’re fairly certain: California is heading for its warmest year on record. In fact, said climatologist Jake Crouch, even record cold in December would not likely prevent that.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24028\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/IMG_5282.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24028\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/IMG_5282.jpg\" alt=\"Rain falls in Vallejo in October. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"640\" height=\"1080\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An October downpour in Vallejo. Despite such cloudbursts, early storms like this one failed to deliver much rain to most of the Bay Area. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Rain storms expected to blow through the Bay Area this week will likely have little impact on the statewide drought, now entering its fourth year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The National Weather Service is \u003ca href=\"http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/total_forecast/getprod.php?prod=XXXAFDMTR&wfo=MTR\">forecasting\u003c/a> only about a half-inch of precipitation to fall in most locations from three separate storm systems beginning mid-week and concluding sometime on Saturday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All three storms look to be on the weak side, said NWS forecaster Roger Gaas, with the possible exception of the last storm arriving on Friday — if it swings far enough south to douse the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But we can’t complain when we get three wet systems in a row, particularly within a few days,” says Gass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the region’s water scarcity can be traced to a persistent \u003ca href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1967\">high pressure ridge\u003c/a> that diverts Pacific storms to the north. Gass says the ridge has begun to shift eastward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has allowed the storm systems to actually have an entrance into central California and bring us rainfall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But experts are cautioning against too much optimism following just a little rain that, taking the long view, will have such scant impact on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/drought/ci_26932356/california-drought-not-likely-end-this-winter-experts\">state’s water shortage\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Thursday it’ll rain, and people will say, ‘Oh, I’m very excited,’ and Saturday it’ll rain, and ‘Oh, drought’s over.’ Not even close,” says Jeffrey Mount, a senior fellow with Public Policy Institute of California focused on water policy and management. “This has been three consecutive years of extreme dryness, and that extreme dryness translates to much lower groundwater levels, and very dry soils. It’s going to take a lot of rain to break this drought.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How much? Current estimates from the state Department of Water Resources say the state needs about 1.5 times the rainfall of an average year to break the drought.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, even an average year would revive \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/parched-california-wildlife-suffers-in-drought/\">wetlands that support migrating wildlife\u003c/a>, boost river flows that are currently stressing aquatic life and begin to refill aquifers and reservoirs depleted over the dry years, Mount says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mount sees it, the difference between a wet and a dry year in California is a razor’s edge, or about a week’s worth of storms scattered over the first two months of the year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s usually in that period between Christmas and mid-February — five to seven of those days — that decide whether we have a wet year or not,” Mount says. “And if we don’t get five to seven days worth of heavy rain, we have a dry year. We cut it that fine.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s the time period that the West Coast storms can be carried by \u003ca href=\"http://www.climatecentral.org/news/atmospheric-river-may-help-put-a-dent-in-california-drought-17039\">atmospheric rivers\u003c/a>, which tend to dump a lot of moisture. But those storms, the kind that can turn a drought year into an above-average one for precipitation, don’t always come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If we don’t get any, or just get a few weak ones, we tend to be dry,” Mount explained in an email. “Indeed, 1997 and 1986 were major flood years that would have been labeled below average to dry if those prolonged atmospheric rivers (lasting days) had not occurred.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So it’s much too early to tell whether the 2014-15 water year will be the fourth in a historic drought or the wet year that begins to turn things around. Long-term forecasts, which aren’t considered reliable, have begun to indicate more precipitation this winter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s at least a ray of hope,” says Mount, “and when it comes to rainfall, hope is our strategy.”\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Rain systems so far this season have been on the wimpy side. This next series is likely to continue the trend.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_24028\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/IMG_5282.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24028\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/IMG_5282.jpg\" alt=\"Rain falls in Vallejo in October. (Craig Miller/KQED)\" width=\"640\" height=\"1080\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An October downpour in Vallejo. Despite such cloudbursts, early storms like this one failed to deliver much rain to most of the Bay Area. (Craig Miller/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Rain storms expected to blow through the Bay Area this week will likely have little impact on the statewide drought, now entering its fourth year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The National Weather Service is \u003ca href=\"http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/total_forecast/getprod.php?prod=XXXAFDMTR&wfo=MTR\">forecasting\u003c/a> only about a half-inch of precipitation to fall in most locations from three separate storm systems beginning mid-week and concluding sometime on Saturday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All three storms look to be on the weak side, said NWS forecaster Roger Gaas, with the possible exception of the last storm arriving on Friday — if it swings far enough south to douse the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But we can’t complain when we get three wet systems in a row, particularly within a few days,” says Gass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the region’s water scarcity can be traced to a persistent \u003ca href=\"http://www.weatherwest.com/archives/1967\">high pressure ridge\u003c/a> that diverts Pacific storms to the north. Gass says the ridge has begun to shift eastward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has allowed the storm systems to actually have an entrance into central California and bring us rainfall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But experts are cautioning against too much optimism following just a little rain that, taking the long view, will have such scant impact on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.mercurynews.com/drought/ci_26932356/california-drought-not-likely-end-this-winter-experts\">state’s water shortage\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Thursday it’ll rain, and people will say, ‘Oh, I’m very excited,’ and Saturday it’ll rain, and ‘Oh, drought’s over.’ Not even close,” says Jeffrey Mount, a senior fellow with Public Policy Institute of California focused on water policy and management. “This has been three consecutive years of extreme dryness, and that extreme dryness translates to much lower groundwater levels, and very dry soils. It’s going to take a lot of rain to break this drought.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How much? Current estimates from the state Department of Water Resources say the state needs about 1.5 times the rainfall of an average year to break the drought.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, even an average year would revive \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/audio/parched-california-wildlife-suffers-in-drought/\">wetlands that support migrating wildlife\u003c/a>, boost river flows that are currently stressing aquatic life and begin to refill aquifers and reservoirs depleted over the dry years, Mount says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mount sees it, the difference between a wet and a dry year in California is a razor’s edge, or about a week’s worth of storms scattered over the first two months of the year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s usually in that period between Christmas and mid-February — five to seven of those days — that decide whether we have a wet year or not,” Mount says. “And if we don’t get five to seven days worth of heavy rain, we have a dry year. We cut it that fine.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s the time period that the West Coast storms can be carried by \u003ca href=\"http://www.climatecentral.org/news/atmospheric-river-may-help-put-a-dent-in-california-drought-17039\">atmospheric rivers\u003c/a>, which tend to dump a lot of moisture. But those storms, the kind that can turn a drought year into an above-average one for precipitation, don’t always come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If we don’t get any, or just get a few weak ones, we tend to be dry,” Mount explained in an email. “Indeed, 1997 and 1986 were major flood years that would have been labeled below average to dry if those prolonged atmospheric rivers (lasting days) had not occurred.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So it’s much too early to tell whether the 2014-15 water year will be the fourth in a historic drought or the wet year that begins to turn things around. Long-term forecasts, which aren’t considered reliable, have begun to indicate more precipitation this winter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s at least a ray of hope,” says Mount, “and when it comes to rainfall, hope is our strategy.”\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Designing California Cities for a Long-Term Drought",
"headTitle": "Designing California Cities for a Long-Term Drought | KQED",
"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>http://www.kqed.org/.stream/anon/radio/science/2014/11/20141118science.mp3\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/boat3s-222.gif\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23886 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/boat3s-222.gif\" alt=\"boat3s-222\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED Science reporter Amy Standen kayaks near the end of the L.A. River, where it sheds its concrete channel. (Amy Standen/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Let’s consider the possibility that this drought we’re in could last more than than just a few dry years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Geologic history in California is marked by epic droughts — droughts lasting decades, even centuries. There’s no way of knowing whether we’re at the start of one of those, but scientists say it’s possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, most Californians live in cities designed, to a great extent, on the promise of nearly endless water, imported from wetter parts of the state via massive engineering projects like the \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Water_Project\">California State Water Project\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not hard to imagine a collision looming between how we expect water to behave — piped, channelized, pumped according to our needs — and how it may increasingly behave in coming years — sporadic, unpredictable, sometimes too much, sometimes too little.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When water doesn’t do what we want it to anymore, how does that change the way we live?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Case-Study in Water Hubris\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To begin this story, I wanted to visit a place that could symbolize the near-complete domination of man over nature. And while there are plenty of options for this — \u003ca href=\"http://www.usbr.gov/lc/hooverdam/\">especially \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salton_Sea\">in \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"http://science.kqed.org/quest/delta-map/\">California\u003c/a> — the Los Angeles River stood out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, on a cloudless November afternoon, I found myself scrambling down a steep riprap embankment with a two-seater kayak, accompanied by a local artist and river guide named Steve Appleton.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘It just became one monolithic trapezoidal channel.’ \u003ccite>–Steve Appleton\u003cbr>\nL.A. Artist and River Guide\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Right away, it was clear how little of the L.A. River looks anything like a river.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While efforts are underway to \u003ca href=\"http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/07/140719-los-angeles-river-restoration-kayaking-greenway/\">restore some stretches\u003c/a> of the river to a more natural, riverlike state, many of the L.A. River’s 42-miles look like a concrete bathtub.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes a spot about a half mile upstream of the river’s terminus in Long Beach Harbor where getting wet requires something akin to rock-climbing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here, the industrial vibe was very much intact. On an overpass just north of us, a sign warned anyone who might be temped to do anything fun or outdoorsy:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Danger: No swimming, diving. Waterskiing, jet skiing, sailboarding or other water-contact sports prohibited.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet, once upon a time, this river was a river. People who lived here fished in it and drank from it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Los Angeles River, like all rivers, was unruly. After devastating floods in the 1930s, the Army Corps of Engineers paved it over and channelized it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23935\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1200px-Bull_creek_north_from_victory-1024x732.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23935\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1200px-Bull_creek_north_from_victory-1024x732.jpg\" alt=\"Bull Creek, an L.A. River tributary, flows in the city's Lake Balboa neighborhood. (<a title="User:Junkyardsparkle" href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Junkyardsparkle">Junkyardsparkle</a>/<a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/">Wikimedia Commons</a>)\" width=\"640\" height=\"458\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bull Creek, an L.A. River tributary, flows in the city’s Lake Balboa neighborhood. (Junkyardsparkle/Wikimedia Commons)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the city had begun getting its water from elsewhere. A massive aqueduct pulled in water from the Owens Valley, some 300 miles to the northeast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result of all this engineering, two things happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One: Water suddenly seemed endless. “There it is, take it,” city water director and self-taught engineer William Mulholland famously told the residents of Los Angeles when the aqueduct opened in 1913. Today almost 4 million people live in L.A., which is amazing when you consider that this place gets as much water as Casablanca, Morocco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two: The river? You could almost forget it existed. It was buried and channelized, blocked off by chain link fence as the city expanded up to its concrete banks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just became one monolithic trapezoidal channel,” says Appleton, laughing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Within Modern Plumbing, an Ancient Idea\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, we take it for granted that water can be engineered into submission.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s an idea that comes from somewhere. And that somewhere is ancient Rome, according to David Sedlak, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at UC Berkeley and author of a new history of water, \u003ca href=\"http://www.water4point0.com/\">Water 4.0\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[contextly_sidebar id=”9AAr94v6sIFrynk9CAwP4B25eLHWUGEN”]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Romans gave us the idea of public baths, public toilets, fountains and the convenience of water coming directly into your neighborhood,” Sedlak says. “They were able to provide close to 100 gallons per person, per day, which is similar to what we use in some of our modern cities.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ancient Romans did this in much the same way we do today, by importing water in giant aqueducts from distant places.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To the Romans, too, water seemed endless. They staged mock naval battles in giant stadiums, floating actual ships in artificial lakes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The pride of ancient Rome, Sedlak says, was its hundreds of public fountains, which ran without stopping and served as focal points for civic life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Romans were the richest kids on the block in the ancient world, and as anyone who’s read Roman history knows, they were not hesitant to show the rest of the world how rich they were,” Sedlak says. “For the people who visited it, it must have been a marvel. They must have taken home with them this idea that the Romans were rich and technologically advanced.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To my ears, Sedlak is not just talking about Rome. He’s talking about California, too. California’s massive aqueducts, its vast networks of pumps and dams, allowed cities to bloom in our deserts and provided a foundation for an economy the size of Russia’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But water doesn’t play by those rules anymore.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Designing for a New Water Order\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>2013 was the driest year in history; 2014 is not far behind. Climate change is expected to exacerbate this scarcity by making flows from the Sierra snowpack unreliable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, cities are growing. There’s more competition between cities, farms and ecosystems for precious fresh water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23941\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 320px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS13030_Elmer_Ave_Before_After_4.jpg-alt_178.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23941\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS13030_Elmer_Ave_Before_After_4.jpg-alt_178.jpg\" alt=\"A creek bed runs beside a sidewalk on Elmer Avenue in Los Angeles. (Courtesy of TreePeople)\" width=\"320\" height=\"427\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A “bioswale” running alongside a sidewalk on Elmer Avenue in Los Angeles soaks up rainwater and sends it to an underground storage chamber. (Courtesy of TreePeople)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This brings us to a prototype for the future city, which exists on a single block of Elmer Avenue, in a working-class neighborhood of East Los Angeles called Sun Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the day I visited, I knew I wanted to meet people who lived on this particular block. But everyone I stopped seemed to have come from somewhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rick Martin, for example, was here power-walking with a friend. Neither lives on Elmer Avenue, but they come here for walks. Martin says it’s the nicest block in the neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This wasn’t always the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Until a few years ago, Elmer Avenue had a problem with floods. Heavy rains turned intersections into lakes, and turned sidewalks – such as they were – into muddy swamps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So in 2009, the city embarked on a plan to install new technologies on Elmer Avenue that would transform the way the block used water, including the rain that fell here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In many of the yards – though not all – the Kentucky bluegrass has been removed,” observed Hadley Arnold, my tour guide for the day and a co-director of the \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/\">Arid Lands Institute\u003c/a> at Woodbury University in Burbank, which trains architects and designers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About half of the residents here have replaced their lawns with drought-tolerant landscaping, such as California live oak, rosemary and sage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the bigger changes on Elmer Avenue are less obvious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Making Cities Permeable\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $2.7 million \u003ca href=\"https://lafoundation.org/research/landscape-performance-series/case-studies/case-study/381/\">overhaul\u003c/a> installed “bio-swales” at the foot of the curbs, to absorb rainwater into underground “galleries” that collect and store it. About half the homes added rain-collecting barrels, which provide water for irrigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, when it rains, rather than sending rain water into the sewer and treating it like garbage (as most streets do), or – in a real downpour – flooding the sidewalk, Elmer Avenue soaks water into the ground and stores it for later use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In an average rain year,” says Arnold, “this block puts enough water for approximately 30 families for a year into the ground.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other words, Elmer Avenue is permeable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[edge_animation id=”9″]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you think about it, this is the opposite of ancient Rome, the opposite of California’s giant aqueducts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elmer Avenue uses what it gets naturally, rather than relying entirely on imported water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arnold says it’s a good start, but that more dramatic design changes should follow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Look at those peaked roofs,” she tells me. “It’s a useless vestige that has no authentic purpose in this place.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most of the homes in this neighborhood have triangular roofs, modeled on homes in colder climates where roofs are designed to shed ice and snow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Roofs here in Los Angeles’ sunbaked neighborhoods should look different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Roofs that are like a wide mouth open to the sky,” Arnold says. “Roofs that are like a cup or a bowl, or an umbrella turned upside down.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And cities should, where possible, be porous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arnold is part of a \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/discover/events/divining-la\">collaborative effort\u003c/a> to map the parts of the city where underground aquifers could safely absorb rain water, and the parts that might be better suited for above-ground capture. She believes this tool could be useful for developers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cities, Arnold says, should be designed to \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/project/where-it-lets-reuse-it\">work with\u003c/a> the water that appears there naturally, not throw it away, only to import more from distant places.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Futuristic Structures\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, “speculative” architects are turning their attention to how buildings might be redesigned to accommodate local water sources and a changing climate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a bright and airy studio in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood, Nataly Gattegno, a co-founder of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.future-cities-lab.net/\">Future Cities Lab\u003c/a>, introduces me to Hydramax.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.future-cities-lab.net/hydramax/\">Hydramax\u003c/a> is a model of a theoretical structure (the word “building” doesn’t quite feel adequate; Gattegno calls it a “port machine”) designed for the San Francisco waterfront.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23877\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 750px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Credit-Future-Cities-Lab-2.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23877\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Credit-Future-Cities-Lab-2.jpg\" alt='A rendering of the \"Hydramax,\" a futuristic building designed to capture water from the air, among other things. (Courtesy of Future Cities Lab) ' width=\"750\" height=\"606\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A rendering of the “Hydramax,” a futuristic building designed to capture water from the air, among other things. (Courtesy of Future Cities Lab)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“You have a shell,” explains Gattegno, “where all the occupation and habitation occurs. There are places to live in, places to shop. Then the next tier is [for] hydroponics, where food is grown.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hydramax anticipates a future where sea-level rise causes tides that regularly drench the waterfront. The structure can function submerged or dry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Covering the top of it are fabric structures, 90 feet long, that wave back and forth. They’re fog-harvesting “feathers” which can extract moisture from fog and channel it into the hydroponic farms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It’s About Accommodating Water, Not Fighting It\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I asked Gattegno whether she thought the Hydramax would ever get built. To me, it seemed unlikely; the structure seemed expensive, almost permanently futuristic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gattegno told me sure, she’d love to see the Hydramax and other far-out projects be built one day. But that’s not really the point.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The point she wants to make (just like Hadley Arnold and David Sedlak) is that the old ways of building cities and supplying them with water — ideas we borrowed from the ancient Romans — may no longer make sense in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the past we’ve controlled water,” says Gattegno. “We’ve told it what to do, what pipes to move through, what aqueducts to be contained in, and in this case, we’re proposing a completely alternative model, a model where water maybe is slightly controlled — it’s still controlled in a certain way, or at least it has a kind of known set of properties that we can leverage — but at the same time, it’s also left to be part of the environment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of burying plumbing underneath the street or behind walls, water infrastructure is the Hydramax’s centerpiece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s one example, she says, of how cities might be redesigned not to just survive the current drought, but be transformed by it, perhaps for the better.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Scientists say it’s possible California’s drought may last a lot longer than a few years. No one knows for sure, but we could all simply have to adjust to a drier climate. That could mean changing the way we build cities to make them more porous. The 'Hydramax,' a futuristic design pictured above, rises with the tide and captures water from the air.",
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"description": "Scientists say it’s possible California’s drought may last a lot longer than a few years. No one knows for sure, but we could all simply have to adjust to a drier climate. That could mean changing the way we build cities to make them more porous. The 'Hydramax,' a futuristic design pictured above, rises with the tide and captures water from the air.",
"title": "Designing California Cities for a Long-Term Drought | KQED",
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"headline": "Designing California Cities for a Long-Term Drought",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cdiv class=\"audio-wrap\">\n\u003ch2>Listen:\u003c/h2>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/div>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/boat3s-222.gif\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23886 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/boat3s-222.gif\" alt=\"boat3s-222\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED Science reporter Amy Standen kayaks near the end of the L.A. River, where it sheds its concrete channel. (Amy Standen/KQED)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Let’s consider the possibility that this drought we’re in could last more than than just a few dry years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Geologic history in California is marked by epic droughts — droughts lasting decades, even centuries. There’s no way of knowing whether we’re at the start of one of those, but scientists say it’s possible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, most Californians live in cities designed, to a great extent, on the promise of nearly endless water, imported from wetter parts of the state via massive engineering projects like the \u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Water_Project\">California State Water Project\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not hard to imagine a collision looming between how we expect water to behave — piped, channelized, pumped according to our needs — and how it may increasingly behave in coming years — sporadic, unpredictable, sometimes too much, sometimes too little.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When water doesn’t do what we want it to anymore, how does that change the way we live?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>A Case-Study in Water Hubris\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To begin this story, I wanted to visit a place that could symbolize the near-complete domination of man over nature. And while there are plenty of options for this — \u003ca href=\"http://www.usbr.gov/lc/hooverdam/\">especially \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salton_Sea\">in \u003c/a>\u003ca href=\"http://science.kqed.org/quest/delta-map/\">California\u003c/a> — the Los Angeles River stood out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So, on a cloudless November afternoon, I found myself scrambling down a steep riprap embankment with a two-seater kayak, accompanied by a local artist and river guide named Steve Appleton.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘It just became one monolithic trapezoidal channel.’ \u003ccite>–Steve Appleton\u003cbr>\nL.A. Artist and River Guide\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Right away, it was clear how little of the L.A. River looks anything like a river.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While efforts are underway to \u003ca href=\"http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/07/140719-los-angeles-river-restoration-kayaking-greenway/\">restore some stretches\u003c/a> of the river to a more natural, riverlike state, many of the L.A. River’s 42-miles look like a concrete bathtub.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes a spot about a half mile upstream of the river’s terminus in Long Beach Harbor where getting wet requires something akin to rock-climbing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here, the industrial vibe was very much intact. On an overpass just north of us, a sign warned anyone who might be temped to do anything fun or outdoorsy:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Danger: No swimming, diving. Waterskiing, jet skiing, sailboarding or other water-contact sports prohibited.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet, once upon a time, this river was a river. People who lived here fished in it and drank from it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the Los Angeles River, like all rivers, was unruly. After devastating floods in the 1930s, the Army Corps of Engineers paved it over and channelized it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23935\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1200px-Bull_creek_north_from_victory-1024x732.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23935\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/1200px-Bull_creek_north_from_victory-1024x732.jpg\" alt=\"Bull Creek, an L.A. River tributary, flows in the city's Lake Balboa neighborhood. (<a title="User:Junkyardsparkle" href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Junkyardsparkle">Junkyardsparkle</a>/<a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/">Wikimedia Commons</a>)\" width=\"640\" height=\"458\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bull Creek, an L.A. River tributary, flows in the city’s Lake Balboa neighborhood. (Junkyardsparkle/Wikimedia Commons)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the city had begun getting its water from elsewhere. A massive aqueduct pulled in water from the Owens Valley, some 300 miles to the northeast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result of all this engineering, two things happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One: Water suddenly seemed endless. “There it is, take it,” city water director and self-taught engineer William Mulholland famously told the residents of Los Angeles when the aqueduct opened in 1913. Today almost 4 million people live in L.A., which is amazing when you consider that this place gets as much water as Casablanca, Morocco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Two: The river? You could almost forget it existed. It was buried and channelized, blocked off by chain link fence as the city expanded up to its concrete banks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just became one monolithic trapezoidal channel,” says Appleton, laughing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Within Modern Plumbing, an Ancient Idea\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, we take it for granted that water can be engineered into submission.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s an idea that comes from somewhere. And that somewhere is ancient Rome, according to David Sedlak, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at UC Berkeley and author of a new history of water, \u003ca href=\"http://www.water4point0.com/\">Water 4.0\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Romans gave us the idea of public baths, public toilets, fountains and the convenience of water coming directly into your neighborhood,” Sedlak says. “They were able to provide close to 100 gallons per person, per day, which is similar to what we use in some of our modern cities.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The ancient Romans did this in much the same way we do today, by importing water in giant aqueducts from distant places.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To the Romans, too, water seemed endless. They staged mock naval battles in giant stadiums, floating actual ships in artificial lakes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The pride of ancient Rome, Sedlak says, was its hundreds of public fountains, which ran without stopping and served as focal points for civic life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The Romans were the richest kids on the block in the ancient world, and as anyone who’s read Roman history knows, they were not hesitant to show the rest of the world how rich they were,” Sedlak says. “For the people who visited it, it must have been a marvel. They must have taken home with them this idea that the Romans were rich and technologically advanced.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To my ears, Sedlak is not just talking about Rome. He’s talking about California, too. California’s massive aqueducts, its vast networks of pumps and dams, allowed cities to bloom in our deserts and provided a foundation for an economy the size of Russia’s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But water doesn’t play by those rules anymore.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Designing for a New Water Order\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>2013 was the driest year in history; 2014 is not far behind. Climate change is expected to exacerbate this scarcity by making flows from the Sierra snowpack unreliable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, cities are growing. There’s more competition between cities, farms and ecosystems for precious fresh water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23941\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 320px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS13030_Elmer_Ave_Before_After_4.jpg-alt_178.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23941\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS13030_Elmer_Ave_Before_After_4.jpg-alt_178.jpg\" alt=\"A creek bed runs beside a sidewalk on Elmer Avenue in Los Angeles. (Courtesy of TreePeople)\" width=\"320\" height=\"427\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A “bioswale” running alongside a sidewalk on Elmer Avenue in Los Angeles soaks up rainwater and sends it to an underground storage chamber. (Courtesy of TreePeople)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This brings us to a prototype for the future city, which exists on a single block of Elmer Avenue, in a working-class neighborhood of East Los Angeles called Sun Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the day I visited, I knew I wanted to meet people who lived on this particular block. But everyone I stopped seemed to have come from somewhere else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rick Martin, for example, was here power-walking with a friend. Neither lives on Elmer Avenue, but they come here for walks. Martin says it’s the nicest block in the neighborhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This wasn’t always the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Until a few years ago, Elmer Avenue had a problem with floods. Heavy rains turned intersections into lakes, and turned sidewalks – such as they were – into muddy swamps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So in 2009, the city embarked on a plan to install new technologies on Elmer Avenue that would transform the way the block used water, including the rain that fell here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In many of the yards – though not all – the Kentucky bluegrass has been removed,” observed Hadley Arnold, my tour guide for the day and a co-director of the \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/\">Arid Lands Institute\u003c/a> at Woodbury University in Burbank, which trains architects and designers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About half of the residents here have replaced their lawns with drought-tolerant landscaping, such as California live oak, rosemary and sage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the bigger changes on Elmer Avenue are less obvious.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Making Cities Permeable\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $2.7 million \u003ca href=\"https://lafoundation.org/research/landscape-performance-series/case-studies/case-study/381/\">overhaul\u003c/a> installed “bio-swales” at the foot of the curbs, to absorb rainwater into underground “galleries” that collect and store it. About half the homes added rain-collecting barrels, which provide water for irrigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, when it rains, rather than sending rain water into the sewer and treating it like garbage (as most streets do), or – in a real downpour – flooding the sidewalk, Elmer Avenue soaks water into the ground and stores it for later use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In an average rain year,” says Arnold, “this block puts enough water for approximately 30 families for a year into the ground.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other words, Elmer Avenue is permeable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[edge_animation id=”9″]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you think about it, this is the opposite of ancient Rome, the opposite of California’s giant aqueducts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Elmer Avenue uses what it gets naturally, rather than relying entirely on imported water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arnold says it’s a good start, but that more dramatic design changes should follow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Look at those peaked roofs,” she tells me. “It’s a useless vestige that has no authentic purpose in this place.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most of the homes in this neighborhood have triangular roofs, modeled on homes in colder climates where roofs are designed to shed ice and snow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Roofs here in Los Angeles’ sunbaked neighborhoods should look different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Roofs that are like a wide mouth open to the sky,” Arnold says. “Roofs that are like a cup or a bowl, or an umbrella turned upside down.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And cities should, where possible, be porous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Arnold is part of a \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/discover/events/divining-la\">collaborative effort\u003c/a> to map the parts of the city where underground aquifers could safely absorb rain water, and the parts that might be better suited for above-ground capture. She believes this tool could be useful for developers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cities, Arnold says, should be designed to \u003ca href=\"http://aridlands.org/project/where-it-lets-reuse-it\">work with\u003c/a> the water that appears there naturally, not throw it away, only to import more from distant places.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Futuristic Structures\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In San Francisco, “speculative” architects are turning their attention to how buildings might be redesigned to accommodate local water sources and a changing climate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a bright and airy studio in San Francisco’s Dogpatch neighborhood, Nataly Gattegno, a co-founder of the \u003ca href=\"http://www.future-cities-lab.net/\">Future Cities Lab\u003c/a>, introduces me to Hydramax.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"http://www.future-cities-lab.net/hydramax/\">Hydramax\u003c/a> is a model of a theoretical structure (the word “building” doesn’t quite feel adequate; Gattegno calls it a “port machine”) designed for the San Francisco waterfront.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23877\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 750px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Credit-Future-Cities-Lab-2.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23877\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Credit-Future-Cities-Lab-2.jpg\" alt='A rendering of the \"Hydramax,\" a futuristic building designed to capture water from the air, among other things. (Courtesy of Future Cities Lab) ' width=\"750\" height=\"606\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A rendering of the “Hydramax,” a futuristic building designed to capture water from the air, among other things. (Courtesy of Future Cities Lab)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“You have a shell,” explains Gattegno, “where all the occupation and habitation occurs. There are places to live in, places to shop. Then the next tier is [for] hydroponics, where food is grown.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hydramax anticipates a future where sea-level rise causes tides that regularly drench the waterfront. The structure can function submerged or dry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Covering the top of it are fabric structures, 90 feet long, that wave back and forth. They’re fog-harvesting “feathers” which can extract moisture from fog and channel it into the hydroponic farms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>It’s About Accommodating Water, Not Fighting It\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I asked Gattegno whether she thought the Hydramax would ever get built. To me, it seemed unlikely; the structure seemed expensive, almost permanently futuristic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gattegno told me sure, she’d love to see the Hydramax and other far-out projects be built one day. But that’s not really the point.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The point she wants to make (just like Hadley Arnold and David Sedlak) is that the old ways of building cities and supplying them with water — ideas we borrowed from the ancient Romans — may no longer make sense in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the past we’ve controlled water,” says Gattegno. “We’ve told it what to do, what pipes to move through, what aqueducts to be contained in, and in this case, we’re proposing a completely alternative model, a model where water maybe is slightly controlled — it’s still controlled in a certain way, or at least it has a kind of known set of properties that we can leverage — but at the same time, it’s also left to be part of the environment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead of burying plumbing underneath the street or behind walls, water infrastructure is the Hydramax’s centerpiece.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s one example, she says, of how cities might be redesigned not to just survive the current drought, but be transformed by it, perhaps for the better.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Scientists Suspect a Virus is Causing Sea Star Die-Off",
"headTitle": "Scientists Suspect a Virus is Causing Sea Star Die-Off | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23912\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 4000px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/diseased-davenport-big.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23912 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/diseased-davenport-big.jpg\" alt=\"diseased-davenport big\" width=\"4000\" height=\"3000\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The wasting disease affecting sea stars causes some, like this ochre star in Santa Cruz, to lose their legs. (Nate Fletcher/ UC Santa Cruz) \u003ccite>(Nate Fletcher/ UC Santa Cruz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp class=\"wp-image-23896 size-full\">Scientists have identified the top suspect in the mysterious die-off of millions of sea stars along the west coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Millions of starfish from Mexico to Alaska have lost their legs and turned to mush, confounding and alarming scientists and beachgoers. In affected areas, the mortality rate has been as high as 70 to 99 percent. The phenomenon is known as “\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/03/07/what-we-know-and-dont-know-about-the-sea-star-die-off/\">sea star wasting disease\u003c/a>” but the cause has remained unknown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers from UC Santa Cruz, Cornell University and other institutions now have strong evidence that links the disease to a densovirus, a type of parvovirus commonly found in invertebrates. In a \u003ca href=\"http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/11/12/1416625111.full.pdf+html\">paper published\u003c/a> in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists report that densovirus is also present in museum specimens of sea stars as far back as the 1940s. That means that while the virus has long been present in sea star populations, something has triggered the recent outbreak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mass sea star die-offs have occurred before, says Peter Raimondi, chair of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UC Santa Cruz. But they all corresponded with El Niño years that brought warmer waters to the Pacific Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The key difference with other outbreaks is that in other ones it was unambiguously associated with warm water,” Raimondi says.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘The sea stars may have responded to the viral outbreak by reproducing even more than usual.’\u003ccite>— Dr. Peter Raimondi, UC Santa Cruz\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>This latest die-off doesn’t follow the same pattern. Previous outbreaks spread north as warm waters moved up the coast, but the current outbreak has occurred as a series of individual incidents, popping up all over the west coast, first in the north and then further south and then back in the north. Some of the affected areas saw warmer temperatures but some didn’t, Raimondi says. This outbreak has also lasted longer and affected a larger area than ever before.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Raimondi and his colleagues are still researching what’s driving the current outbreak. They haven’t ruled out warmer water entirely, but they’re investigating a variety of other environmental factors, from pollution to ocean acidification to a decrease in oxygen in the water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t know if it’s an isolated example taking root and spreading, and doesn’t portend anything in future,” Raimondi says, “or if this is a portent of things that will become more common in the future.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Prospects for Recovery\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers aren’t sure whether the sea star population is going to be able to rebound from this die-off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bad news of the study is that, besides sea stars, the virus is found in sediment and in sea urchins, although the urchins don’t show symptoms of the virus. Raimondi says the sediments and urchins are acting as a reservoir for the virus and might infect new generations of sea stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23909\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 4000px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg-BIG.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23909 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg-BIG.jpg\" alt=\"p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg BIG\" width=\"4000\" height=\"3000\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Scientists are now seeing large numbers of juvenile sea stars in areas that were affected by the virus outbreak. (Maya George/UC Santa Cruz)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Beautiful and brightly colored, starfish are a charismatic species and a favorite of beach goers. They’re also voracious predators. Starfish are called a keystone species, meaning they’re at the top of the food chain and have a major effect on the ecosystem. A significant decline in sea star species could have profound ecological consequences, Raimondi says, changing marine ecosystems along the west coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news is that researchers are finding huge populations of baby starfish in some of their monitoring areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When animals get stressed they tend to reproduce,” Raimondi says. The sea stars may have responded to the viral outbreak by reproducing even more than usual. The baby sea stars then drift away from their birthplace on ocean currents. “Because babies tend to go somewhere else, they can repopulate other areas, so recovery can be quicker than we thought.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Raimondi encourages beachgoers, boaters, and divers to visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.eeb.ucsc.edu/pacificrockyintertidal/data-products/sea-star-wasting/index.html\">seastarwasting.org\u003c/a> to see pictures of diseased and baby sea stars and to submit information about their own sightings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We welcome observation,” Raimondi says. “The public can help immensely in our understanding of what’s causing this and what the recovery prospects are like.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>You can see scientists at work trying to solve the mystery of sea star wasting disease, in this QUEST TV story, filmed earlier this year.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\nhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GcseyLU1Rs?feature=player_detailpage\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23912\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 4000px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/diseased-davenport-big.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23912 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/diseased-davenport-big.jpg\" alt=\"diseased-davenport big\" width=\"4000\" height=\"3000\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The wasting disease affecting sea stars causes some, like this ochre star in Santa Cruz, to lose their legs. (Nate Fletcher/ UC Santa Cruz) \u003ccite>(Nate Fletcher/ UC Santa Cruz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp class=\"wp-image-23896 size-full\">Scientists have identified the top suspect in the mysterious die-off of millions of sea stars along the west coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Millions of starfish from Mexico to Alaska have lost their legs and turned to mush, confounding and alarming scientists and beachgoers. In affected areas, the mortality rate has been as high as 70 to 99 percent. The phenomenon is known as “\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2014/03/07/what-we-know-and-dont-know-about-the-sea-star-die-off/\">sea star wasting disease\u003c/a>” but the cause has remained unknown.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers from UC Santa Cruz, Cornell University and other institutions now have strong evidence that links the disease to a densovirus, a type of parvovirus commonly found in invertebrates. In a \u003ca href=\"http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/11/12/1416625111.full.pdf+html\">paper published\u003c/a> in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists report that densovirus is also present in museum specimens of sea stars as far back as the 1940s. That means that while the virus has long been present in sea star populations, something has triggered the recent outbreak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mass sea star die-offs have occurred before, says Peter Raimondi, chair of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UC Santa Cruz. But they all corresponded with El Niño years that brought warmer waters to the Pacific Coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The key difference with other outbreaks is that in other ones it was unambiguously associated with warm water,” Raimondi says.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">‘The sea stars may have responded to the viral outbreak by reproducing even more than usual.’\u003ccite>— Dr. Peter Raimondi, UC Santa Cruz\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>This latest die-off doesn’t follow the same pattern. Previous outbreaks spread north as warm waters moved up the coast, but the current outbreak has occurred as a series of individual incidents, popping up all over the west coast, first in the north and then further south and then back in the north. Some of the affected areas saw warmer temperatures but some didn’t, Raimondi says. This outbreak has also lasted longer and affected a larger area than ever before.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Raimondi and his colleagues are still researching what’s driving the current outbreak. They haven’t ruled out warmer water entirely, but they’re investigating a variety of other environmental factors, from pollution to ocean acidification to a decrease in oxygen in the water.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t know if it’s an isolated example taking root and spreading, and doesn’t portend anything in future,” Raimondi says, “or if this is a portent of things that will become more common in the future.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Prospects for Recovery\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers aren’t sure whether the sea star population is going to be able to rebound from this die-off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The bad news of the study is that, besides sea stars, the virus is found in sediment and in sea urchins, although the urchins don’t show symptoms of the virus. Raimondi says the sediments and urchins are acting as a reservoir for the virus and might infect new generations of sea stars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23909\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 4000px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg-BIG.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23909 size-full\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg-BIG.jpg\" alt=\"p_ochraceus_recruits_sad_2014_0325_mg BIG\" width=\"4000\" height=\"3000\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Scientists are now seeing large numbers of juvenile sea stars in areas that were affected by the virus outbreak. (Maya George/UC Santa Cruz)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Beautiful and brightly colored, starfish are a charismatic species and a favorite of beach goers. They’re also voracious predators. Starfish are called a keystone species, meaning they’re at the top of the food chain and have a major effect on the ecosystem. A significant decline in sea star species could have profound ecological consequences, Raimondi says, changing marine ecosystems along the west coast.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The good news is that researchers are finding huge populations of baby starfish in some of their monitoring areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When animals get stressed they tend to reproduce,” Raimondi says. The sea stars may have responded to the viral outbreak by reproducing even more than usual. The baby sea stars then drift away from their birthplace on ocean currents. “Because babies tend to go somewhere else, they can repopulate other areas, so recovery can be quicker than we thought.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Raimondi encourages beachgoers, boaters, and divers to visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.eeb.ucsc.edu/pacificrockyintertidal/data-products/sea-star-wasting/index.html\">seastarwasting.org\u003c/a> to see pictures of diseased and baby sea stars and to submit information about their own sightings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We welcome observation,” Raimondi says. “The public can help immensely in our understanding of what’s causing this and what the recovery prospects are like.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>You can see scientists at work trying to solve the mystery of sea star wasting disease, in this QUEST TV story, filmed earlier this year.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/em>\u003cbr>\nhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GcseyLU1Rs?feature=player_detailpage\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Study: Warming Climate Means More Lightning",
"headTitle": "Study: Warming Climate Means More Lightning | KQED",
"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23751\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS6281_SanFranciscoLightning5-scr.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS6281_SanFranciscoLightning5-scr.jpg\" alt=\"Lightning strikes the San Francisco Bay Area in summer 2013. (Steve Byrne/Steve Byrne Photography)\" width=\"850\" height=\"554\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23751\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lightning strikes the San Francisco Bay Area in summer 2013. (Steve Byrne/Steve Byrne Photography)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California’s warming climate is likely to mean a surge in lightning strikes, a development that would not bode well for fire season.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new study suggests that the number of lightning strikes nationwide could jump 50 percent during this century, driven by rising temperatures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Warm air can hold more water vapor than cool air,” explains \u003ca title=\"UCB - Romps\" href=\"http://romps.berkeley.edu/\">David Romps\u003c/a>, an atmospheric scientist whose team at UC Berkeley came up with \u003ca title=\"UCB - post\" href=\"http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2014/11/13/lightning-expected-to-increase-by-50-percent-with-global-warming/\">the new projections\u003c/a>, published this week in the journal \u003cem>Science\u003c/em>. “And as we warm the planet, we tend to get more water vapor in the atmosphere, and water vapor is the fuel for thunderstorms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Romps says every rise of about 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit should produce an 11 percent increase in ground strikes. His team came up with the projections using two key ingredients for lightning: precipitation and convection, the rising air that causes storm clouds to quickly pile up to enormous heights. Assuming average temperatures rise by 7 degrees during this century, he says warmer air will increase both, setting the stage for more electrical storms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our hypothesis was that that product of precipitation and storm energy would be a good predictor for lightning, and it turns out to work very well,” says Romps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[contextly_sidebar id=”UVvNEARAmnuHxV4NwdvZPfhxIVv7QylS”]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The initial projection applies to the continental U.S. as a whole. Romps says his team will attempt to fine-tune its models to be able to make regional projections.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As we don’t yet know the distribution of this increase, it could be that regions of the country that get a lot of lightning strikes today will get even more in the future,” Romps says, “or it could be that regions that get very few today will get much more than they’re used to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Or both, presumably. The answer will be important fodder for those who plan and budget for California’s fire season. While most wildfires are caused by human activity, lightning is the spark for many big fires in Northern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s reasonable to speculate that with a 50 percent increase in lightning strikes, we would get an increase in wildfire frequency,” says Romps. “But we haven’t yet done the work to figure out where geographically this increase occurs and when in the season it occurs, and that would be important to know, to really nail down what the increase in wildfire frequency would be.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far this year, lightning has been listed as the cause in 446 wildfires in Northern California that came under the primary jurisdiction of the U.S. Forest Service (which tends to handle the more remote fires). Those fires burned more than 276,000 acres combined. According to CalFire, a “lightning siege” comprising thousands of strikes in July and August were responsible for the season’s largest fire, the 130,000-acre \u003ca title=\"KPCC FireTracker - Happy Camp\" href=\"http://firetracker.scpr.org/happy-camp-complex/\">Happy Camp Complex\u003c/a> in the Klamath National Forest.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23751\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 850px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS6281_SanFranciscoLightning5-scr.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/RS6281_SanFranciscoLightning5-scr.jpg\" alt=\"Lightning strikes the San Francisco Bay Area in summer 2013. (Steve Byrne/Steve Byrne Photography)\" width=\"850\" height=\"554\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23751\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lightning strikes the San Francisco Bay Area in summer 2013. (Steve Byrne/Steve Byrne Photography)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California’s warming climate is likely to mean a surge in lightning strikes, a development that would not bode well for fire season.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A new study suggests that the number of lightning strikes nationwide could jump 50 percent during this century, driven by rising temperatures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Warm air can hold more water vapor than cool air,” explains \u003ca title=\"UCB - Romps\" href=\"http://romps.berkeley.edu/\">David Romps\u003c/a>, an atmospheric scientist whose team at UC Berkeley came up with \u003ca title=\"UCB - post\" href=\"http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2014/11/13/lightning-expected-to-increase-by-50-percent-with-global-warming/\">the new projections\u003c/a>, published this week in the journal \u003cem>Science\u003c/em>. “And as we warm the planet, we tend to get more water vapor in the atmosphere, and water vapor is the fuel for thunderstorms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Romps says every rise of about 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit should produce an 11 percent increase in ground strikes. His team came up with the projections using two key ingredients for lightning: precipitation and convection, the rising air that causes storm clouds to quickly pile up to enormous heights. Assuming average temperatures rise by 7 degrees during this century, he says warmer air will increase both, setting the stage for more electrical storms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our hypothesis was that that product of precipitation and storm energy would be a good predictor for lightning, and it turns out to work very well,” says Romps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_23674\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Obama-Jinping.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/35/2014/11/Obama-Jinping.jpg\" alt=\"U.S. President Barack Obama looks on as Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks during a joint press conference in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on November 12, 2014. Obama began a one-day state visit after the closing of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. (Greg Baker/AFP/Getty Images)\" width=\"640\" height=\"837\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23674\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">U.S. President Barack Obama looks on as Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks during a joint press conference in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on November 12, 2014. Obama began a one-day state visit after the closing of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. (Greg Baker/AFP/Getty Images)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The world woke up to excited buzz Wednesday announcing a tentative emission-cutting deal between the U.S. and China, the world’s worst two polluters that together account for almost half of all greenhouse gas emissions on the planet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The White House trumpteted the agreement that by 2025 would cut U.S. CO2 emissions by 26 to 28 percent from 2005 levels. For its part, China agreed to cap its growth in emissions by 2030 or earlier, and to increase the share of renewable fuels to 20 percent by 2030. The rest of the world today began wondering how, exactly, the non-binding pact would be realized.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are at cross-purposes,” said former U.S. Security Official Jamie Metzl, speaking on KQED’s \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/radio/programs/forum/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Forum\u003c/a>\u003c/em> today. “President Obama and Xi Jinping are today saying that this climate pre-agreement — because nothing has been put down on paper — shows what’s possible when we work together. But at the same time, both countries are very aggressively working to advance their position relative to the other.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For example, Metzl said, the U.S. is moving forward with the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement that doesn’t currently include China. And China is pursuing its own free trade agreements in the region, while building up its military presence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s scaring the bejesus, if that’s a San Francisco word, out of its neighbors — Japan, others in the South China Sea,” Metzl said. “And the U.S. is having its so-called pivot to Asia, where we’re talking about trade but also increasing our military presence in the region. So there’s a huge amount of competition and potential room for conflict, and there’s this other story of trying to find a means of cooperation. So climate change — this is certainly very positive, but it doesn’t erase the overall framework, which is one that’s quite concerning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The brinksmanship is also playing out domestically, with Republican leaders in the House and Senate decrying the climate deal as a “continuation of the president’s job-crushing policies” and an “unrealistic plan the president would dump on his successor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Their ire is directed at the pace of emission reductions that would be required to reach the goal. The U.S. is currently aiming for a 17 percent reduction by 2020, a goal that will have taken 15 years. The deal with China calls for an additional reduction of 10 percent in five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“From 2020 to 2025, for the United States to achieve the goals that the President put forward, we would need to double the pace of the reductions to greenhouse gas emissions that we’re currently on track to do,” L.A. Times reporter Neela Banerjee said on \u003cem>Forum\u003c/em>. “There’s going to be a political backlash, and it’ll probably take the form of legislation that will be introduced, lawsuits, and — like anything else that’s put forward by this administration — it’s somewhat of a gamble. Will it survive those challenges?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Banerjee said it’s not just Republicans who may try to stall the deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are a lot of Democrats from fossil fuel states who may accept that climate change is happening,” she said. “They just don’t want to act on it anytime soon.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the effort to reduce greenhouse gases also has allies, and Banerjee some may be found in big business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are more and more companies, including major Fortune 500 multinationals, that are seeing their bottom lines affected by climate change and by threats that are expected from climate change,” she said. “So they might find support in unexpected quarters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s also a bit a of damper buried in the announcement for anyone celebrating the news as landmark international environmental progress on a subject that’s been intractable. That is, what will replace the coal plants currently generating energy, and pollution, in the two global powers?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In this ‘agreement,’ when [China] talks about going to 20 percent renewables by 2030, the only way they’re going to do that, it’s not by composting, it’s by nuclear,” Metzl said. “We’re also moving, shifting our energy use away from coal a little bit, and towards natural gas – fracking [hydraulic fracturing]. In China, nuclear’s a big part of this story. In the United States, fracking is a part of this story.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Listen to the \u003cem>Forum\u003c/em> segment below:\u003cbr>\n[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/176622110″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The brinksmanship is also playing out domestically, with Republican leaders in the House and Senate decrying the climate deal as a “continuation of the president’s job-crushing policies” and an “unrealistic plan the president would dump on his successor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Their ire is directed at the pace of emission reductions that would be required to reach the goal. The U.S. is currently aiming for a 17 percent reduction by 2020, a goal that will have taken 15 years. The deal with China calls for an additional reduction of 10 percent in five years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“From 2020 to 2025, for the United States to achieve the goals that the President put forward, we would need to double the pace of the reductions to greenhouse gas emissions that we’re currently on track to do,” L.A. Times reporter Neela Banerjee said on \u003cem>Forum\u003c/em>. “There’s going to be a political backlash, and it’ll probably take the form of legislation that will be introduced, lawsuits, and — like anything else that’s put forward by this administration — it’s somewhat of a gamble. Will it survive those challenges?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Banerjee said it’s not just Republicans who may try to stall the deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are a lot of Democrats from fossil fuel states who may accept that climate change is happening,” she said. “They just don’t want to act on it anytime soon.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the effort to reduce greenhouse gases also has allies, and Banerjee some may be found in big business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are more and more companies, including major Fortune 500 multinationals, that are seeing their bottom lines affected by climate change and by threats that are expected from climate change,” she said. “So they might find support in unexpected quarters.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There’s also a bit a of damper buried in the announcement for anyone celebrating the news as landmark international environmental progress on a subject that’s been intractable. That is, what will replace the coal plants currently generating energy, and pollution, in the two global powers?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In this ‘agreement,’ when [China] talks about going to 20 percent renewables by 2030, the only way they’re going to do that, it’s not by composting, it’s by nuclear,” Metzl said. “We’re also moving, shifting our energy use away from coal a little bit, and towards natural gas – fracking [hydraulic fracturing]. In China, nuclear’s a big part of this story. In the United States, fracking is a part of this story.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Listen to the \u003cem>Forum\u003c/em> segment below:\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='”100%”' height='”166″'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/176622110″&visual=true&”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false”'\n title='”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/176622110″'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"id": "code-switch-life-kit",
"title": "Code Switch / Life Kit",
"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
"airtime": "THU 10pm, FRI 1am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Commonwealth-Club-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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"meta": {
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
},
"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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"id": "forum",
"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 9am-11am, 10pm-11pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Forum with Mina Kim and Alexis Madrigal",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM5NTU3MzgxNjMz",
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"id": "freakonomics-radio",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "http://freakonomics.com/",
"airtime": "SUN 1am-2am, SAT 3pm-4pm",
"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
"subscribe": {
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
"rss": "https://feeds.feedburner.com/freakonomicsradio"
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},
"fresh-air": {
"id": "fresh-air",
"title": "Fresh Air",
"info": "Hosted by Terry Gross, \u003cem>Fresh Air from WHYY\u003c/em> is the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues. One of public radio's most popular programs, Fresh Air features intimate conversations with today's biggest luminaries.",
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"link": "/radio/program/fresh-air",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=214089682&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510051/podcast.xml"
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},
"hidden-brain": {
"id": "hidden-brain",
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "NPR"
},
"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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},
"how-i-built-this": {
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"title": "How I Built This with Guy Raz",
"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2018/05/howIBuiltThis.png",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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},
"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/how-i-built-this-with-guy-raz/id1150510297?mt=2",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
"title": "Hyphenación",
"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/hyphenacion",
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"order": 15
},
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/2p3Fifq96nw9BPcmFdIq0o?si=39209f7b25774f38",
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-Political-Mind-of-Jerry-Brown-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
"meta": {
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"order": 18
},
"link": "/podcasts/jerrybrown",
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}
},
"latino-usa": {
"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
}
},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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"rss": "https://feeds.publicradio.org/public_feeds/marketplace-pm/rss/rss"
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},
"masters-of-scale": {
"id": "masters-of-scale",
"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/On-Our-Watch-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "On Our Watch from NPR and KQED",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"meta": {
"site": "news",
"source": "kqed",
"order": 11
},
"link": "/podcasts/onourwatch",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1567098962",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5ucHIub3JnLzUxMDM2MC9wb2RjYXN0LnhtbD9zYz1nb29nbGVwb2RjYXN0cw",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/show/on-our-watch",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510360/podcast.xml"
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},
"on-the-media": {
"id": "on-the-media",
"title": "On The Media",
"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm-3pm, MON 12am-1am",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/onTheMedia.png",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.wnycstudios.org/shows/otm",
"meta": {
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"source": "wnyc"
},
"link": "/radio/program/on-the-media",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/on-the-media/id73330715?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/On-the-Media-p69/",
"rss": "http://feeds.wnyc.org/onthemedia"
}
},
"pbs-newshour": {
"id": "pbs-newshour",
"title": "PBS NewsHour",
"info": "Analysis, background reports and updates from the PBS NewsHour putting today's news in context.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PBS-News-Hour-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/",
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"source": "pbs"
},
"link": "/radio/program/pbs-newshour",
"subscribe": {
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/pbs-newshour-full-show/id394432287?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/radio/PBS-NewsHour---Full-Show-p425698/",
"rss": "https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/show"
}
},
"perspectives": {
"id": "perspectives",
"title": "Perspectives",
"tagline": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991",
"info": "KQED's series of daily listener commentaries since 1991.",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Perspectives_Tile_Final.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Perspectives",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/perspectives/",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 14
},
"link": "/perspectives",
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"npr": "https://www.npr.org/podcasts/432309616/perspectives",
"rss": "https://ww2.kqed.org/perspectives/category/perspectives/feed/",
"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93dzIua3FlZC5vcmcvcGVyc3BlY3RpdmVzL2NhdGVnb3J5L3BlcnNwZWN0aXZlcy9mZWVkLw"
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},
"planet-money": {
"id": "planet-money",
"title": "Planet Money",
"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
"airtime": "SUN 3pm-4pm",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/sections/money/",
"meta": {
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"source": "npr"
},
"link": "/radio/program/planet-money",
"subscribe": {
"npr": "https://rpb3r.app.goo.gl/M4f5",
"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/planet-money/id290783428?mt=2",
"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/Business--Economics-Podcasts/Planet-Money-p164680/",
"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510289/podcast.xml"
}
},
"politicalbreakdown": {
"id": "politicalbreakdown",
"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED Political Breakdown",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 5
},
"link": "/podcasts/politicalbreakdown",
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