Writing on wildlife, technology, and nature
It was when he first heard the call of a red-winged blackbird in the hills north of Fairbanks that John Adams knew something was up. This was a bird he recognized from the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia. It was not one he expected to see in the boreal forest only a few dozen miles from …
Continue reading "Warmed up, Flooded out, and Pissed Off: Climate Change Becomes Personal"
I swear, it is almost impossible to stop yourself. I promised I would be more disciplined, but I’m not. When someone who cares about climate change gets solar panels on their roof, the temptation to keep looking at how much energy you are generating is virtually irresistible. After a long and dark “La Nina” winter …
Continue reading "Solar Power Nerdiness and the Terrifying Problem of Albedo"
In a recent article for Grist, meteorologist Eric Holthaus claims that we are already locked into a devil’s bargain on climate change. The bargain asks us to weigh a trade-off between two things that pollution in the atmosphere does for us. On the one hand, it causes serious health and respiratory problems that kill over …
Continue reading "Philosopher Meets Meteorologist to Talk About Climate Engineering"
When the Milltown Dam upstream of Missoula, Montana came down in 2008 and the impoundment behind it was drained, a hidden treasure trove of century-old lumber was revealed. Hundreds of logs, buried in sediments, had been accumulating behind the dam throughout its life. The lumber had been cut from the surrounding forests during the early …
Ships large enough to carry cargo across the world's oceans have big engines. In fact, they have really big engines. The ones that power the monster container ships that are the linchpin of global trade stand over four stories high and stretch for most of the length of a basketball court. They weigh over two thousand …
Continue reading "When Saving Lives Kills: The Strange Case of Maritime Ship Emissions"
A year and a half ago, when the University of Montana's student-led transit agency made it the first college campus in the nation to buy its own electric buses, one line delivered by the bus manufacturer’s CEO Ryan Popple at the hand-over ceremony stuck out above all the others. “If parents realized how many diesel …
Continue reading "Riding to School in an Anthropocene School Bus"
Christopher J. Preston 