Echo
More trails, more water access recommended in public lands report
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More access to forests, lakes and trails are among the goals the Michigan Department of Natural Resources has in store for public lands.
Echo
Scientists inch closer to harnessing energy from nuclear fusion
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Achieving nuclear fusion has proven to be elusive for generations of scientists. According to the BBC, American scientists have brought us one step closer to nuclear fusion becoming a viable source of clean energy.
Echo
Michigan tourism workers can afford to live in scenic splendor
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Michigan’s most scenic destinations – like Traverse City and – are typically affordable enough to live at for the state’s tourism workers, according to a new report. This bucks a national trend which shows tourism workers typically can’t afford to live in the cities they work in.
Echo
Restoration success and work in progress: Minnesota
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In this series, Echo samples successful and ongoing restoration projects in each Great Lakes state.
Minnesota projects include restoration efforts to help the moose population and a campaign to fight invasive the spread of species.
Echo
Fears rise about possible moose die-off in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and beyond
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A national trend in moose die-offs may be hitting the Upper Peninsula, Minnesota and beyond — and officials are pointing to climate change as the culprit.
Echo
Little Things, Big Problems: Aquatic invaders
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Last year, the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative began producing a series of educational videos about invasive species in the Great Lakes for the National Park Service. New videos are being uploaded this spring, and you can watch the entire “Little Things, Big Problems” series here on Echo. This video discusses invasive species in Lake Michigan and how they are affecting the food web and the health of birds.
Echo
What’s on your bookshelf?
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By Eric Freedman
The more things don’t change…
I’ve been perusing the shelves of the Knight Center’s conference room library, getting rid of–recycling–outdated books to make room for new ones. These, published from the early 1980s through the mid-1990s, are just a sampling of our castaways:
“Footprints on the Planet: A Search for an Environmental Ethic” by Robert Cahn
“Public Policy for Chemicals: National & International Issues” by Sam Gusman, Konrad von Moltke, Francis Irwin & Cynthia Whitehead
“Fear at Work: Job Blackmail, Labor & the Environment” by Richard Kazis and Richard Grossman
“Radiation & Human Health” by John Gofman
“Renewable Energy: The Power to Choose” by Daniel Deudney & Christopher Flavin
“Environmental Regulation and Economic Efficiency” by the Congressional Budget Office
“Crossroads: Environmental Priorities for the Future” by Peter Borelli
“International Environmental Policy: Emergence & Dimensions” by Lynton Caldwell
“Global Warning: The Economic Stakes” by William Cline
“How Many Americans? Population, Immigration & the Environment by Leon Bouvier & Lindsey Grant
Although their content may be stale–often by decades–what struck me was how the same issues remain prominently in today’s headlines: Alternative energy. Population. Climate change.
Wildlife
With Michigan wolf hunt less than a month away, debate rages onward
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With Michigan’s first wolf hunt set to begin in less than a month, citizens’ right to hunt the once-protected species has developed into a polarizing issue.
Echo
Great Lakes leaders: Choose good policy over convenient math and exaggerated rhetoric
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We’re trained to trust numbers when analyzing complex issues.
The assumption is that numbers don’t lie and will take us to the answer — the truth.
But is that always the case?
Waste
Green Gridirons: University of Maryland
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A football stadium may have green grass but does it have green habits? Each week, Great Lakes Echo highlights a Big Ten football stadium’s attempts to do the most to impact the environment the least. All schools have information on the stadium’s diversion rate – the amount of waste recycled instead of put in a landfill. Stadium: Byrd Stadium
School: University of Maryland*
Built: 1950
Capacity: 54,000
2008 diversion rate: 41 percent
Scouting report: Maryland’s “Feed the Turtle” program began in 2008 to expand food composting and recycling at home football games. The program’s name refers to the mascot of the school, a terrapin.