Category Archives: Environment

Cultural Events, Environment

What is the summer solstice? The answer might surprise you.

This year, the northern summer solstice falls on June 21 at 11:54 a.m. ET. South of the Equator, this same moment marks the unofficial beginning of winter. Solstices occur at the same time around the world, but their local times vary with time zones.

Solstices occur because Earth’s axis of rotation is tilted about 23.4 degrees relative to Earth’s orbit around the sun. This tilt is what drives our planet’s seasons, as the Northern and Southern Hemispheres get unequal amounts of sunlight over the course of a year. From March to September, the Northern Hemisphere is tilted more toward the sun, driving its spring and summer. From September to March, the Northern Hemisphere is tilted away, so it feels autumn and winter. The Southern Hemisphere’s seasons are reversed.

On two moments each year—what we call solstices—Earth’s axis is tilted most closely toward the sun. The hemisphere tilted most toward our home star sees its longest day, while the hemisphere tilted away from the sun sees its longest night. During the Northern Hemisphere’s summer solstice—which always falls around June 21—the Southern Hemisphere gets its winter solstice. Likewise, during the Northern Hemisphere’s winter solstice—which falls around December 22—the Southern Hemisphere gets its summer solstice.

You can also think about solstices in terms of where on Earth the sun appears. When it’s a summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, the sun appears directly over the Tropic of Cancer, the latitude line at 23.5 degrees North. (That’s as far north as you can go and still see the sun directly overhead.) During the Northern Hemisphere’s winter solstice, the sun appears directly over the Tropic of Capricorn, the Tropic of Cancer’s southern mirror image.

Earth is not the only planet with solstices and equinoxes; any planet with a tilted rotational axis would see them, too. In fact, planetary scientists use solstices and equinoxes to define “seasons” for other planets in our solar system. READ MORE: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/space/what-is-summer-winter-solstice-answer-might-surprise-you/

African American Issues, Commentary, Cultural Events, Environment, Lifestyle

Gladys Knight, Ahead of Super Bowl Anthem Date, Criticizes Colin Kaepernick

The soul singer Gladys Knight, who will be singing the national anthem at this year’s Super Bowl in Atlanta, seemed to criticize Colin Kaepernick in a statement published by Variety on Friday.

Kaepernick is the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback whose refusal to stand during “The Star-Spangled Banner” — and decision to kneel instead — to protest police brutality has made him a divisive figure nationwide, earning him praise from civil rights groups, but scorn from many conservatives, including President Trump.

“I understand that Mr. Kaepernick is protesting two things, and they are police violence and injustice,” Knight wrote to Variety. “It is unfortunate that our national anthem has been dragged into this debate when the distinctive senses of the national anthem and fighting for justice should each stand alone.”

The statement continued: “I am here today and on Sunday, Feb. 3, to give the anthem back its voice, to stand for that historic choice of words, the way it unites us when we hear it and to free it from the same prejudices and struggles I have fought long and hard for all my life.”

This is the latest twist at the intersection of politics, sports and music that has surrounded this year’s Super Bowl. Kaepernick is still in the middle of an ongoing arbitration case regarding a grievance he filed against the N.F.L. He has accused the league’s owners of colluding to keep him out of the league after not being signed last season.

His protests during the anthems became a cultural flash point, even though he wasn’t in the league. Other N.F.L. players began kneeling to support Kaepernick, as did celebrities off the field. Last fall, Nike made Kaepernick the face of a prominent advertising campaign.

This year’s Super Bowl became particularly fraught because of the halftime show. Some high-profile artists, including the rapper Cardi B, said they would not be willing to perform, in a show of solidarity with Kaepernick. Last year, Jay-Z rapped in one of his songs: “I said no to the Super Bowl, you need me, I don’t need you.”

Earlier this week, the N.F.L. announced the halftime acts would be Maroon 5 and the rappers Travis Scott and Big Boi. Scott’s decision to participate, in particular, received backlash, including from prominent African-Americans like Al Sharpton. Variety reported that Kaepernick and Scott spoke before the announcement and described the conversation as “cordial and respectful.” But on Wednesday, several posts critical of Scott appeared on Kaepernick’s Twitter account.

Perhaps anticipating the criticism, Scott announced on Sunday, in conjunction with the halftime billing, that he and the league were teaming up on a $500,000 donation to Dream Corps, a social justice group.

Environment, TECHNOLOGY NEWS, Trending Right Now

As California firefighters battled the state’s largest wildfire, Verizon throttled their data

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A Northern California fire department says Verizon slowed its wireless data speeds to a crawl last month, rendering some of its high-tech tracking equipment almost useless as firefighters battled the largest wildfire in state history.

In an August 20 court filing, Santa Clara County Fire Chief Anthony Bowden said his department relies on internet services to keep track of fast-moving fires and coordinate resources and efforts among emergency personnel.

“The Internet has become an essential tool in providing fire and emergency response, particularly for events like large fires which require the rapid deployment and organization of thousands of personnel and hundreds of fuel engines, aircraft, and buIldozers,” Bowden wrote.

This requires a lot of data. Bowden wrote that his department’s OES 5262 mobile communication center sent and received five to 10 gigabytes of data through a wireless router each day while tracking the response to the Mendocino Complex Fire.

That fire has burned 406,532 acres in Northern California.

Service slowed to dial-up speed

The department had an unlimited government plan with Verizon, but the company would slow, or “throttle,” data speed once the agency crossed a certain threshold, Bowden wrote.

“In the midst of our response to the Mendocino Complex Fire, County Fire discovered the data connection for OES 5262 was being throttled by Verizon, and data rates had been reduced to 1/200, or less, than the previous speeds. These reduced speeds severely interfered with the OES 5262’s ability to function effectively,” Bowden wrote.

Santa Clara County Fire Capt. Bill Murphy told CNN that the department’s connection speed dropped to what you would expect from a dial-up service, making simple tasks like sending an email or updating a Google document almost impossible.

Verizon: ‘We should have lifted speed restriction’

The document included an email chain that showed that the fire department had been working with Verizon to solve the throttling problem before the Mendocino Fires started and that Verizon did not lift the data caps until the fire department paid for a more expensive plan.

In a statement to CNN, Verizon spokeswoman Heidi Flato said the company made a mistake.

“Regardless of the plan emergency responders choose, we have a practice to remove data speed restrictions when contacted in emergency situations,” she said in an email. “We have done that many times, including for emergency personnel responding to these tragic fires. In this situation, we should have lifted the speed restriction when our customer reached out to us.”

She said Verizon is reviewing the situation and “will fix any issues going forward.”

Bowden said that his firefighters had to use other agencies’ internet connections or their own personal devices to keep their communication system running.

Bowden’s statement is included in an addendum to a brief in a federal lawsuit to overturn the Federal Communications Commission’s repeal of net neutrality rules.

Flato told CNN that this is a customer service issue. “This situation has nothing to do with net neutrality or the current proceeding in court,” she said.

An FCC spokeswoman stressed the importance of cooperation.

“It’s important for communications providers and public safety agencies to work together closely to ensure that agencies have communications services that meet their needs, especially in emergency situations. In addition, we strongly encourage communications providers to waive data allotments in situations involving emergency response,” she said.

Firefighters found workaround

Murphy said that firefighters were able to work around the problem by using their own devices, but he is concerned about what will happen if others see their data throttled during an emergency.

“We’re putting a lot of information out there for the public to receive and the expectation is that they will get it in a timely fashion,” he said. “We believe it’s very important that the public have unrestricted access so they can get the information we need them to get.”

Murphy says the department still uses Verizon and has added a second provider to ensure redundancies in their system.Screen Shot 2018-08-23 at 9.43.17 PM

CIVIL LIBERTIES, Environment, Healthcare

Why People With Disabilities Want Bans On Plastic Straws To Be More Flexible

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It was a hot day at the zoo when Jordan Carlson’s son, who has motor-planning delays, got thirsty. “We went to the snack bar and found out they had a ‘no straw’ policy,” Carlson says. “It was a hot day and he couldn’t drink.”

Their only option was to leave the park and look for a business that sold drinks with a straw. Without one, her son can’t drink beverages. At home they use reusable straws and she tries to keep some on hand when they leave the house, but “I’m human and sometimes I forget,” Carlson explains. People with disabilities have to be much more conscious of what businesses and communities offer, Carlson says.

On social media, many people are ecstatic about the crush of cities and businesses pledging to ban plastic straws once and for all. Ever since a video showing a sea turtle with a straw stuck up its nose went viral, campaigns like #StopSucking for a strawless ocean have gained considerable traction. Seattle this month implemented a citywide ban on plastic straws, Starbucks announced on Monday that it will phase out the use of plastic straws by 2020, and many other municipalities and businesses are likely to follow suit. As one Twitter user posted, “My waiter asked ‘Now, do we want straws OR do we want to save the turtles?’ and honestly we all deserve that environmental guilt trip.”But for many people with disabilities, going without plastic straws isn’t a question of how much they care about dolphins or sea turtles; it can be a matter of life or death.

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There are many alternatives to plastic straws — paper, biodegradable plastics and even reusable straws made from metal or silicone. But paper straws and similar biodegradable options often fall apart too quickly or are easy for people with limited jaw control to bite through. Silicone straws are often not flexible — one of the most important features for people with mobility challenges. Reusable straws need to be washed, which not all people with disabilities can do easily. And metal straws, which conduct heat and cold in addition to being hard and inflexible, can pose a safety risk.

“Disabled people have to find ways to navigate through the world because they know it was not made for us,” says Lei Wiley-Mydske, an autism activist who has autism herself. “If someone says, ‘This does not work for me,’ it’s because they’ve tried everything else.”

“Also, what if you decide on the spur of the moment to go have a drink with friends after work but forgot your reusable straw that day?” adds Lawrence Carter-Long, communications director for the national Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund. “[That] doesn’t leave a lot of room for spontaneity — something nondisabled folks get to largely take for granted.”

On social media, many people have responded to claims that people with disabilities need plastic straws by asking what people did before plastic straws were invented. “They aspirated liquid in their lungs, developed pneumonia and died,” says Shaun Bickley, co-chair of the Seattle Commission for People with DisAbilities, a volunteer organization that’s supposed to advise the city council or agencies on disabilities issues.

How much plastic straw and stirrer pollution is out there? Scientific estimates vary. One report suggests they make up more than 7 percent of the plastics found in the U.S. by piece. By comparison, the same report found plastic bottle caps alone accounted for nearly 17 percent. But straws make up a much smaller percentage of pollution by weight.

Environmentalists have latched onto a figure stating that Americans use over 500 million plastic straws every day — a number that was derived from phone calls made by a 9-year-old boy in 2011. Despite its frequent repetition, there’s uncertainty over the accuracy of that figure.

In a post detailing how the plastic straw became the cause du jour for those who love the oceans, Dune Ives, executive director for the Lonely Whale Foundation, wrote, “We found plastic water bottles too endemic, plastic bags already somewhat politicized, and no viable alternative for the plastic cup in ALL markets.” So they chose plastic straws, a “playful” alternative and a “‘gateway plastic’ to the larger and more serious plastic pollution conversation.”

Most of the plastic in the ocean does come from land, says Darby Hoover, senior resource specialist for the Natural Resources Defense Council. She notes that because plastic breaks up into smaller and smaller particles, it can be hard to tell what it used to be in some cases.

“Straws are maybe not the biggest source of either plastic pollution or disposable plastic we consume, but they’re in there,” Hoover says.

And for many people who want to consume less plastic, she says, straws are low-hanging fruit.

Yet in general Hoover says that she’s wary of outright bans on things. “I personally think we as a country use way too many disposable water bottles. That said, there are times when I’m caught somewhere, don’t have a reusable bottle, and want the option to have water and not a sugary drink.”

“They key is breaking habits,” Hoover says. “Is something a habit because you truly need it or because you got used to doing it that way?”

Carter-Long says he’s sympathetic to environmental concerns about plastic pollution, but any public policy aiming to reduce the use of straws needs to make accommodations for people who might need them. Ideally, he says, “each restaurant owner [would] follow their own conscience, maybe keep a stockpile of plastic straws in their store rooms for people to use who need them.”

A spokesman for Seattle Public Utilities confirmed to NPR that the city’s new plastic straw ban does include a waiver allowing restaurants to give disposable, flexible plastic straws to customers who need them for physical or medical reasons. But Carter-Long and Bickley say there doesn’t seem to be widespread awareness of the exemption.Bickley says he asked over a dozen Seattle chain restaurants – including McDonald’s and Chipotle – “if they had plastic straws available for people with allergies or need, and they told me no.”

And just because an exemption is written into law doesn’t mean businesses will comply, even if they know about it. “So many businesses try to get around already ignoring things with ADA [the Americans With Disabilities Act] until someone says, ‘I need a ramp or wider hallway or ramp in bathroom or Braille menu,’ ” says Jordan Carlson. “Sometimes you need to bring a lawsuit just to have your voice heard.”

Although Bickley serves on a commission that is supposed to advise Seattle’s city agencies on disability issues, he says no one consulted the group before passing the plastic straw ban.

Dianne Laurine, who lives in Seattle, has cerebral palsy, is quadriplegic and has no use of her extremities. “She is old enough to remember a time before plastic and everybody just used rubber straws,” Laurine’s caretaker, Bill Reeves, says on her behalf, since she has a severe speech impediment.

“They ended up being disgusting, hard to clean. The advent of plastic in the 1950s changed her life,” Reeves says.

When asked what it felt like when the straw ban went into effect without consulting those with disabilities, Laurine audibly repeated one word, “Awful. Awful. Awful.”

“You’re putting this burden on disabled people to come up with a solution. You’re not asking companies that manufacture straws to come up with a version that works for us,” autism activist Wiley-Mydske says. “You won’t even take the bus instead of driving your car somewhere,” she says, adding, “How many of you are willing to die for the environment?”