ESPM professor Scott Stephens is featured in this LA Times article on the millions of drought-stressed and beetle-ravaged dead trees across California forests. Limbs and trunks from the dead trees are piling up, turning the forest floor into a tangled mass of fuel. To lessen the fuel build-up, Stephens says federal land managers should conduct prescribed burns in hard-hit areas.
Vice Munchies | January 26, 2017
BFI executive director Ann Thrupp commented in this Vice Munchies article on a recent Trump administration memo directing the USDA to halt all external communications. Thrupp noted that "It is clear that there is a fair amount of confusion regarding the intent of the memo. We do know, however, that the USDA’s responsibility is to release high-quality, unbiased, peer-reviewed research for the public benefit. [The research community] will be watching to ensure that data regarding critical issues like climate change and environmental sustainability is not suppressed."
UC Science Today | January 14, 2017
ESPM professor Todd Dawson is featured in this UC Science Today audio segment on his work using drone technology to study drought effects on forests. Researchers can survey canopies of individual trees and entire forests, as drones fly over and take images with multi-spectral cameras. "That means we are basically keeping our finger on the pulse of the forest change, which we have never been able to do with any of our other tools before," noted Dawson.
Washington Post | January 10, 2017
ESPM professor emeritius William Libby is highlighted in this Washington Post article on trees falling across California as a result of winter storms combined with the effects of six years of drought. Libby noted that after a heavy rain, trees weakened by drought have been known to die suddenly instead of rebounding, likening it to giving a starving person too much food too fast.
Washington Post | January 04, 2017
ERG grad student Zeke Hausfather is featured in this Washington Post article on the confirmation of a 2015 paper that suggested that ocean temperatures were indeed warming at consistent rates. The recently published study confirms that NOAA scientists correctly adjusted their record of ocean temperatures in light of known biases in some observing systems.
News Deeply | December 16, 2016
ESPM alum Esther Conrad (Ph.D. '15) is interviewed in this NewsDeeply article on the implementation process of CA's Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, passed in 2014. Conrad, who is now a postdoc at Stanford, recently authored a new report that looks at how the process of forming groundwater sustainability agencies (GSAs) is going so far and what lessons can be learned that will help those agencies still involved in the process.
Scientific American | December 15, 2016
ERG professor Dan Kammen was highlighted in this Scientific American article on the American Geophysical Union's annual meeting, which featured a talk by California Gov. Jerry Brown on the Trump administration's impending policy on climate science. Kammen noted that opportunities can be seen with some Trump nominees, who have supported renewable energy development and carbon emission pricing in the past.
BBC | December 15, 2016
ESPM grad student Marco Pfeiffer was featured in this BBC news article on his recent research that shows the remnants of freshwater plants and animals buried in Chile's Atacama Desert. Similar stories appeared in dozens of sources, including Phys.org, Yahoo, LiveScience, and Heritage Daily.