Environmental Headlines for the Houston Region: February 20, 2019
Harris County receives grant for regional watershed study; local agencies partner to address flood mitigation
(Kelly Schafler – Community Impact Newspaper, 02/13/2019. Photo by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers)
“The San Jacinto River Authority, the city of Houston, and Montgomery and Harris counties agreed to partner to provide funds for the San Jacinto Watershed Master Drainage Plan—previously referred to as the Upper San Jacinto River Regional Watershed Flood Mitigation Plan—which could mitigate flooding along the watershed. According to a Feb. 13 release from the SJRA, the project will study the entire Upper San Jacinto River watershed and its major tributaries between I-10 in Houston and Hwy. 30 near Huntsville.” communityimpact.com
City of Houston’s Climate Action Plan
(Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC))
“The City of Houston recently announced its Climate Action Plan that will bring together stakeholders from across the community to develop a variety of cost-effective energy efficiency, renewable energy and transportation measures that will reduce community-wide greenhouse gas emissions and uphold the goals of the Paris Agreement. HARC will serve as the technical advisor and lead researcher on the project.” harcresearch.org
‘Match.com for chickens’: Houston Zoo’s secret weapon for saving a species
(Maggie Gordon – Houston Chronicle, Updated 02/15/2019. Photo by Houston Zoo photographer, Stephanie Adams)
While humans have the luxury to search for “The One” from a seemingly infinite choice of 7.5+ billion people, it is nothing compared to the pressure placed upon endangered species like the Attwater’s Prairie Chicken — the survival of which depends completely on pairing off with ideal partners to reproduce in large numbers. To address this problem, scientists at the Houston Zoo have adopted the same solution humans have tapped as the best way to meet a mate: online dating. houstonchronicle.com
EcoNotes
- 19 February
- Companies pin excessive 2017 air pollution on Harvey, one-time events (Erin Douglas – Houston Chronicle) chron.com
- 18 February
- Amazon wants half of its shipments to be carbon-neutral by 2030 (Jon Fingas – Engadget) engadget.com
- 16 February
- Invasive mussels threaten Texas freshwater ecosystems (Shannon Tompkins – Houston Chronicle) houstonchronicle.com
- Global Warming Is Helping to Wipe Out Coffee in the Wild (Somini Sengupta – The New York Times) nytimes.com
- 15 February
- Climate-fueled nuisance flooding cost this town up to $172,000 in lost revenue (Kyla Mandel – ThinkProgress) thinkprogress.org
- 14 February
- Drink salty water or go thirsty – Climate change hits Tanzanian school children (United Nations Environment Programme) unenvironment.org
- 1 February
- Texas Gulf wetlands face population, development challenges (Kathryn Eastburn – The Associated Press) apnews.com
- March 2019 Issue of The Atlantic
- Do Animals Have Feelings? Scientists Are Totally Rethinking Animal Cognition (Ross Andersen – The Atlantic) theatlantic.com