The abomination of a budget bill shoved through Congress offers a glimmer of hope for the environment and efforts to fight climate change. The government will cease providing subsidies to solar industry investors. These subsidies made it profitable for investors in Boston to outbid two farming families for a 182-acre farm in Shaftsbury, Vermont, nestled…
Without mangroves, the oceans would be significantly less biodiverse. These unique forests provide a nursery for developing marine life and food for numerous species. However, the critical connection between mangroves and marine life goes deeper than their iconic root structure. Every part of the mangrove benefits the ecosystem, from its nutrient-dense leaves to shore-stabilizing roots.…
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…
Last summer, Boston suffered more than 20 inches of rain. This record, set when the weather service began rainfall records in 1872, was only surpassed in 1955 when two hurricanes brought 25 inches of rain. An estimated 1.5 billion gallons of water sluiced off the land, overwhelmed sewage treatment facilities, and surged raw sewage into…
Federal officials overseeing the Green Mountain National Forest in Vermont are scheduled to double the amount of logging in the next five years over the previous five years. Under that plan, as much as 62 million board feet of lumber would be cut from the national forest. Mature and old growth forests are the best…
News clips of forests burning in California, conflagrations on hillsides, black smoke billowing into communities, got me thinking about alternatives to the merits of planting trees to fight climate change. Trees store carbon that photosynthesis has pulled from the air as carbon dioxide. Plants take energy from the sun to break CO2 molecules into carbon…
