Friday, July 26, 2024

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 26 2024

 



Aloha Tofu Friday!
World Tofu Day was created by the Society for the Protection of Animals (SPA) Canada and the first World Tofu Day was marked in 2014. In Montreal, at least 12,000 people attended a vegan barbecue on the inaugural celebration. Tofu is made from soybeans that are curdled and then pressed into blocks. It is high in protein, relatively low in calories, and low in carbohydrates. It is low in saturated fat but higher in heart-healthy fats. Tofu contains iron, magnesium, manganese, selenium, and calcium, and is sometimes fortified with other minerals and vitamins.

Environmental groups push for toughening of salmon farm rule change
New federal rules for fish farms have cut the amount of allowable sea lice in farmed salmon but environmental groups say it doesn’t amount to much.

Washington State Has Been Sitting on a Secret Weapon Against Climate Change
Wetlands are carbon-storage powerhouses — and many are unmapped.

Project 2025’s extreme vision for the West
The demolition of public lands, water and wildlife protections are part of conservatives’ plan for a second Trump term.

Coastal B.C. First Nations take the lead on many marine search-and-rescue missions
New formalized role and funding helps First Nations become integral part of coastal search and rescue.

Intalco Aluminum agrees to $5.25 million penalty for hazardous pollution violations at Ferndale
Intalco Aluminum, the company that operated the shuttered aluminum smelter in Ferndale, has agreed to pay $5.25 million as part of a settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The settlement stems from Clean Air Act violations discovered during a 2019 EPA inspection of the site.

Planet Sets Record for Hottest Day Twice in a Row
Researchers with the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service said Sunday was Earth’s hottest day. Then it happened again on Monday.
WA nears a plan to remove key culverts for salmon — after spending $4B
As the Washington State Department of Transportation spends billions of dollars removing concrete and metal pipes that block spawning salmon, another state agency is finally finishing a strategy to fix all the state’s fish migration barriers.
Voters to decide on pace of Washington’s transition off natural gas
State election officials on Wednesday certified an initiative for the November ballot that seeks to reverse Washington’s controversial tactics to phase out natural gas use in homes and other buildings.

Hakai Magazine to close down
Founding editor Jude Isabella wrote yesterday to readers: "The only way to deliver this bad news is bluntly: Hakai Magazine will cease to publish at the end of 2024. For nearly a decade, we’ve made our cozy berth within the Tula Foundation, voyaging alongside its core missions that conduct long-term ecological research in British Columbia and deliver essential healthcare of Guatemalan mothers and babes. It has been a privilege beyond measure.... We’re actively looking for new funding sources—if you have ideas, please get in touch, because we’re open to suggestions. Over the next six months, we will keep you informed of our progress in finding a new haven for our next chapter."


These news clips are a selection of weekday clips collected in Salish Sea News and Weather which is compiled as a community service by Mike Sato. To subscribe at no cost to the weekday news clips, send your name and email to mikesato772 at gmail.com. Your email information is never shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Salish Sea News: Communicate, Educate, Advocate

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Friday, July 19, 2024

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 19 2024


Aloha Beekeeping Friday!
 On December 3, 2019, Detroit Hives, a non-profit organization, declared July 19 of every year as National Urban Beekeeping Day. The holiday was created to raise awareness about supporting urban beekeepers, inform the public on the role of urban beekeeping, and also to discuss the importance of bees in our environment.

Tacomans struggle with high temperatures, heat and access to cooling varies across the city
Shade is a problem for Tacomans.  The city is dense and in the Puget Sound region, it has the lowest amount of tree canopy cover for cities. 

Butterfly sightings in Metro Vancouver plummet
Fewer butterflies are flying around Metro Vancouver this year, and their scarcity is leaving scientists and community members with more questions than answers. Extreme swings in weather may be to blame, but planting more native trees in cities could help.

Single-use plastic bags banned as next round of B.C. plastic regulations kicks in
Plastic shopping bags and other single-use products are no longer available at British Columbia stores as the government implements the latest step in its plan to phase out certain plastic items and keep harmful chemicals out of landfills.

Bringing Salmon Home to Kus-kus-sum
In 2020, the Comox Valley Project Watershed Society finally raised enough funds to purchase the eight-acre site from lumber producer Interfor, and in 2021, the land was transferred to the society. Since then, it has removed more than 12,000 cubic metres of concrete from the industrial site and revegetated five acres of it.

At new Marysville water treatment facility, plants filter out pollutants
The city’s new stormwater treatment plant isn’t landmarked by large tanks and pipes — or any buildings for that matter. Near the shore of Ebey Slough, the plant — charged with treating 460 acres of urban runoff — looks like a park, with paved walkways and rows of native grasses.

Seagrass and Plastic Are Not Friends
In 2021, what sounded like a good news story hit the media: in the Mediterranean, seagrasses were trapping plastic waste, capturing fragments in their leaves and locking microplastics in seafloor sediments...But that hopeful narrative is, unfortunately, too optimistic and only tells part of the story.

Seattle Aquarium’s Ocean Pavilion to open in August
Seattle Aquarium’s new, $160 million Ocean Pavilion will open Aug. 29. The 50,000-square-foot exhibit space is already transforming the city’s central waterfront, and will feature the region’s largest tropical reef ecosystem, with sharks, rays, other animals and plants.

WA awards $52 million from carbon auctions for tribal climate adaptation
More than $50 million in revenue from the state’s carbon market auctions is going to 32 tribal nations across the Northwest for clean-energy projects and efforts to better safeguard communities from the effects of climate change.

Birthing the Blob
In 2013, a huge marine heatwave known as the Blob hit the northeast Pacific Ocean.

These news clips are a selection of weekday clips collected in Salish Sea News and Weather which is compiled as a community service by Mike Sato. To subscribe at no cost to the weekday news clips, send your name and email to mikesato772 at gmail.com. Your email information is never shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Salish Sea News: Communicate, Educate, Advocate

Salish Sea Communications: Truth Well Told

Friday, July 12, 2024

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 12 2024


Aloha Kebab Friday!
The first kebabs may have been cooked when soldiers grilled meat of recently-killed animals on their swords. Kebabs emerged from Turkish cuisine and were first mentioned in a Turkish text in the fourteenth century. The dishes spread around the world along with Muslim culture, and now are common in restaurants that serve Turkish, Indian, and Mughlai cuisines.


Southern resident orca numbers decline during census year; Bigg’s orcas continue to expand
Preliminary results are now available from the annual orca census from the Center for Whale Research. At least two southern resident killer whales have died over the past year, with one of them being a little more than a month old. Meanwhile, sightings of Bigg’s killer whales have increased to record numbers. 

Environmental group buys Fraser River island to protect salmon
The Nature Conservancy of Canada says Carey Island is one of the Fraser's last salmon habitat strongholds.
Over half of Clayoquot Sound’s iconic forests are now protected — here’s how First Nations and B.C. did it
The Ahousaht and Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations will now manage 760 square kilometres of old-growth conservancies with the help of philanthropic funding.

The Pacific Northwest is littered with ‘deadbeat dams’
Aging structures dubbed 'deadbeat dams' choke off habitat and threaten human life in some instances. Native nations are at the forefront of the effort to address these lingering dams.

Baker sockeye tribal fishery returns after banner year
Upper Skagit Indian Tribe fishers celebrated the return of the Baker River sockeye fishery this week. A record number of sockeye salmon swam through the Baker River last year, with about 65,000 returning. This year, Upper Skagit tribal fishers are hoping for more of the same.

PNW data center boom could imperil power supply within 5 years
The Pacific Northwest’s power grid could be pushed beyond its limits in just five years by the staggering electricity demands of the booming data center industry, regional power planners recently reported. The forecast cautioned that data centers could consume as much as 4,000 average megawatts of electricity by 2029 — enough to power the entire city of Seattle five times over. Lulu Ramadan reports. (Seattle Times)

Record sockeye salmon run on Columbia now threatened by hot water
Smashing records, sockeye salmon are booming up the Columbia River, in a run expected to top 700,000 fish before it’s over. But a punishing heat wave has made river temperatures so hot many may never make it their last miles home. With water temperatures above 80 degrees in the Okanogan River, sockeye are stacking up at its mouth and waiting rather than entering the tributary to get to their spawning grounds across the U.S.-Canada border. 

Washington issues burn ban on state lands
A burn ban is in effect for all state lands in Washington. The state Department of Natural Resources on Wednesday issued the statewide ban on outdoor burning, campfires, the use of charcoal briquettes and prescribed burns on its lands. The ban started at 1 p.m. on Wednesday and will go until at least Sept. 30, 2024.


These news clips are a selection of weekday clips collected in Salish Sea News and Weather which is compiled as a community service by Mike Sato. To subscribe at no cost to the weekday news clips, send your name and email to msato at salishseacom.com. Your email information is never shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Salish Sea News: Communicate, Educate, Advocate

Salish Sea Communications: Truth Well Told

Wednesday, July 3, 2024

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 3 2024



Great Auks extinction day
Great auks were native to the Arctic and sub-Arctic, and became extinct in 1844. On July 3, 1844, fishermen killed the last confirmed pair of great auks (Pinguinus impennis) at Eldey Island, Iceland.  It is believed that the extinction of these birds was caused by human activities and hunting due to the high demand for their feathers. (National Geographic)


All killer whales will remain one species — for now, according to marine mammal committee
A formal proposal to designate resident and Bigg’s killer whales as separate species has been rejected by a committee widely recognized as the authority in naming new marine mammal species.

A warning signal from grey whales: The animals are getting smaller
A population of grey whales that feeds off B.C.'s coast has seen its adult population physically get smaller over the past two decades, a new study has found.

The Owls Who Came From Away
Over the past 80 years, one of the most resilient and hearty owls has practically engulfed a continent. Not everyone is pleased.

Scientists can now rapidly link heat waves to climate change
Canadian scientists can now estimate how much human-induced climate change contributed to an extreme heat wave or flood within a week of the disaster.

Supporters have submitted 400,000-plus signatures in support of Initiative 2066 to prevent phasing out of natural gas.


These news clips are a selection of weekday clips collected in Salish Sea News and Weather which is compiled as a community service by Mike Sato. To subscribe at no cost to the weekday news clips, send your name and email to msato at salishseacom.com. Your email information is never shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Salish Sea News: Communicate, Educate, Advocate

Salish Sea Communications: Truth Well Told