Attleboro, a city of 46,773 in Southeastern Massachusetts, once known as “The Jewelry Capital of the World,” plans to create a Miyawaki pocket forest in O’Connell Field at Capron Park near the High School. Ocean River Institute summer interns, concerned about the plight of right whales suffering from stormwater pollution and water warmed by urban…
From Climate Misconceptions to Sustainable Solutions A new scientific study indicates that changing cloud cover may be behind most of the abrupt global warming observed in 2023, with the rise in carbon dioxide contributing to only 10% of the warming. Climate scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies found that the world’s cloud cover…
ATTLEBORO — An environmental group is hoping the city will help its efforts to save the right whales — by planting a forest or two. The Ocean River Institute recently visited Attleboro because, when contacting eight cities to discuss planting what are called Miyawaki forests, Attleboro was the most responsive. They found two potential sites…
In Shetland’s Lerwick Harbor, the grey stone buildings stand close together. Rows of houses line streets that march downhill in curving lines to meet the sea. They buttress against the cold winds that race across the northernmost fetch of the North Sea. On the first Sunday of October, Saint Columba’s Church of Scotland fills with…
The Miyawaki Forest is one of the most promising developments today in the fight against climate change. “Miyawaki Forest” is a term for a dense urban pocket forest filled with native species of trees, shrubs, and grasses. It is named for Akira Miyawaki, the famed Japanese botanist who is no longer with us. As a…
Climate change isn’t the only factor causing changes in how water moves; it’s also our infrastructure choices. Traditional stormwater management (gray infrastructure) puts us in a fighting position against water, imprisoning its flows in pipes and drains. When we try to resist and restrict what water wants, it retaliates back. Forcefully. This past fall/September, Leominster,…
Phytoplankton in the Gulf of Maine have become 65% less productive. The Gulf of Maine is home to the North Atlantic right whale, a critically endangered species with less than 350 left alive. Right whales feed on zooplankton, krill, and other small crustaceans. These animals are fed by phytoplankton, organisms at the base of the…
The anchor chain clinked and clanked through the hawsehole on the Dutch tall ship Oosterschelde until the large anchor set into white coral sands turned periwinkle blue by clear ocean waters. At first light, the volcanic mountains of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) had stepped out of the mist, turning from blue to green as they…
