USM National Green Campus
News Archive

Week of January 31, 2011

News from Across the USM Campuses

Feb. 1st - Purple Line Town Hall Meeting Reminder - From 4-6pm in the Colony Ballroom, on the second floor of the Stamp Student Union. Faculty, staff, students and members of the community are invited to a town hall meeting, hosted by the President's Office, to discuss the Purple Line light rail system.  The proposed transit line would run between Bethesda and New Carrollton, passing through Silver Spring, Takoma Park, the College Park campus, and Riverdale. Following short formal presentations, questions, suggestions, and comments from the audience will be welcomed.  Because of limited time, questions and comments need to be kept to two minutes. Proceedings of this forum can also be viewed live via web stream (please check www.umd.edu on Feb. 1 for the streaming link), and a videotape of the meeting will be posted on the University website.  Those who cannot attend the meeting can also submit their comments to president@umd.edu.

Feb. 1st - Julie Gabrielli, NCARB, LEED-AP, founder GoforChange, green business consultants - "The Global Importance of Sustainability" - This event will be held at 5pm in the Lecture Hall of the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, on the University of Maryland, College Park campus. This lecture is a part of the Sustainable Tuesdays Lecture Series.

Feb. 4th - Dr. Elie Bou-Zeid, Princeton University?- "Experimental and Numerical Investigations of Coupled Energy and Water Transport in the Built Environment." This seminar, sponsored by the Center for Urban Environmental Research and Education, will be held on Friday at 2:00pm in the Technology Research Center, Room 206, on the University of Maryland, Baltimore County campus, and is free and open to the public. Registration is not required. Visitor parking passes for the TRC lot may be purchased for $4.00 in the CUERE office in TRC 102/105 on the UMBC campus shortly before seminar.

Feb. 6th - April 2nd - 2011 Recyclemania event -  Several USM campuses are participating in this event: Bowie State University, Frostburg State University, Salisbury University, Towson University, University of Maryland Baltimore County, and University of Maryland College Park.

Environmentalists, oil industry seek mention of Gulf oil spill (By Gerard Shields, The Advocate, 1/25/11) [Dr. Donald F. Boesch, President of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, is a member of President Obama's Gulf Oil Spill Commission]

UMES research examines aspects of water quality (By Corrie Cotton, DelMarVaNow.com, 1/25/11)

Researchers find virus plaguing soft-crab businesses: With Dundalk crabbers' help, discovery may boost sales, ease harvest pressure (By Timothy B. Wheeler, The Baltimore Sun, 1/24/11)[Article quotes Eric Schott of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science]

Battles Over Mountaintop Coal Mining Rage in Wake of EPA Veto (By Paul Quinlan, Greenwire as reported by The New York Times - Energy and Environment, 1/24/11)[Article quotes Margaret Palmer of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science]

State of Maryland News

Healing Baltimore's harbor: A movement is under way to purge the trash, bacteria and pollution that have long infected the city's heart (By Timothy B. Wheeler, The Baltimore Sun, 1/30/11)

Pepco struggles to end power outages (By Joe Stephens, The Washington Post, 1/31/11)

Chesapeake Bay Foundation spent extra to make its headquarters eco-friendly (By Darryl Fears, The Washington Post, 1/25/11)

Md. University Fined For Air Pollution: Mount St. Mary's Faces $40K Fine (WBALTV.com, 1/25/11)

Solar panel leasing for homes, businesses coming to Maryland: California firm acquires Clean Currents solar unit (By Timothy B. Wheeler, The Baltimore Sun, 1/24/11)

USM Environmental Sustainability and Climate Change Initiative

National and International News

Unrest in Egypt Unsettles Global Markets (By Nelson D. Schwartz, The New York Times as reported by Yahoo News, 1/31/11)

Arctic Current Warmest In Over 2,000 Years, Warning Of Ice-Free Seas (Reuters as reported by Huffington Post - Green Blog, 1/31/11)

New Electricity Meters Stir Fears (By Felicity Barrenger, The New York Times - Environment, 1/30/11)

IEA calls on OPEC to be flexible, watch Egypt (By Dmitry Zhdannikov, editing by Mike Peacock, Reuters, 1/29/11)

Gulf Oil Spill Blowout Preventer Testing Could Be Compromised (By Harry R. Weber, The Huffington Post - Green Blog, 1/28/11)

Ban Ki-moon: World's economic model is 'environmental suicide': UN secretary general tells Davos panel that an economic revolution is needed to save the planet as he shifts his focus from climate change to sustainability (The Associated Press as reported by The [UK] Guardian - Environment, 1/28/11)

Arctic Defrost Dumping Snow on U.S. and Europe: The world's northern freezer is on rapid defrost as large volumes of warm water are pouring into the Arctic Ocean, speeding the melt of sea ice, according to a new study. (By Stephen Leahy, IPS News, 1/28/11)

Loss Of Solar Jobs Has Mass. Rethinking State Aid (By Tovia Smith, NPR - Morning Edition, 1/28/11)

No, clean energy is not a substitute for climate change - Grist: President Obama talked about clean energy in his state of the union address, but avoided climate change. Than strategy won't work in tackling the climate challenge, Says David Roberts (By David Roberts, Grist.org as reported by The [UK] Guardian, 1/28/11)

Gulf Oil Spill Fund Fraudulent Claims Top 7,000 (Brian Skoloff and Harry R. Weber, The Huffington Post - Green Blog, 1/27/11)

CU: Warming water in the North Atlantic tied to heating Arctic (By Laura Snider, The Boulder Daily Camera, 1/27/11)

BREAKING: In a stunning reversal, USDA chief Vilsack greenlights Monsanto's alfalfa (By Tom Phillpot, Grist.org, 1/27/11)

Obama touts "clean" energy, skips climate change (By Tim Wheeler, The Baltimore Sun - B'More Green Blog, 1/26/11)

Study finds oil dispersants lingered deep under Gulf (By Renee Schoof, McClatchy Newspapers, 1/26/11)

Climate sceptic 'misled Congress over funding from oil industry': Patrick Michaels, fellow at the Cato Institute, claimed 3% of his funding came from industry, later revealed that figure to be 40% (By Suzanne Goldenberg, The [UK] Guardian - Environment, 1/25/11)

100 Percent Renewable Energy Achievable By 2030: Study (By Joanna Zelman, The Huffington Post - Green Blog, 1/25/11)

Penn State to Dump Coal for Natural Gas (By Scott Carlson, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 1/25/11)

State Of The Union 2011: Obama's Clean Energy Promises (By Amy Lee, The Huffington Post - Business Blog, 1/25/11)

Video: Tree Harvesting for a Sustainable Project at University of Vermont (By Scott Carlson, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 1/25/11)

Newt Gingrich: EPA Should Be Eliminated (By Mike Glover, The Huffington Post - Politics Blog, 1/25/11)

OVERNIGHT ENERGY: Energy on the Senate agenda, House Energy panel to unveil EPA bill in a month (By Andrew Restuccia and Ben Geman, The Hill, 1/24/11)

Chevron Accused Of 'World's Worst Oil-Related Disaster' In Ecuador: Alleged Evidence Submitted In Lawsuit (PHOTOS) (By Joanna Zelman, The Huffington Post - Green Blog, 1/24/11)

Welcome to the year of living dangerously: Are riots, protests, revolts, mounting oil prices, and mammoth worldwide unemployment the new norm? (By Michael T. Klare, Salon - News, 1/24/11)

Director of Policy on Climate Will Leave, Her Goal Unmet (By John M. Broder, The New York Times - Politics, 1/24/11)

Please send your ideas and comments regarding campus sustainability to green@usmd.edu