by Lindsay E. Brown
Sally Ride Pushed Us to Understand Our Climate and Our World
Sally Ride was the first American woman to voyage into space. During the historic flight, she became the first person to ever retrieve a satellite with the robotic arm that she helped design. Her second flight on STS-41G, also aboard Challenger, was the first flight to carry a full seven person crew and was tasked with deploying a satellite and performing scientific earth observations.
When she left NASA, she formed Sally Ride Science, to get students excited about science. Three years ago she co-authored a book titled “ Mission: Planet Earth” about how and why the climate is changing.
Here’s an excerpt:
[From space,] I could see how fragile Earth is. When I looked toward the horizon, I could see a thin, fuzzy blue line outlining the planet. At first, I didn’t know what I was seeing. Then I realized it was Earth’s atmosphere. It looked so thin and so fragile, like a strong gust of interplanetary wind could blow it all away. And I realized that this air is our planet’s spacesuit — it’s all that separates every bird, fish, and person on Earth from the blackness of space…
How Facebook Could Change the Game for Sustainability
The future of Facebook’s influence will increasingly be on sustainability, according to the company’s manager of energy efficiency and sustainability, Bill Weihl. Facebook is now working with third party app developers around delivering sustainability apps for social good.
Loading the Climate Dice
The New York Times op-ed columnist, Paul Krugman, argues that we must make the connection between the extreme weather happening all around us and climate change. “For large-scale damage from climate change is no longer a disaster waiting to happen. It’s happening now.”
The Complexities Behind Composting
If you compost or are interested in composting, this piece is for you. On Earth discusses the relationship between how we’re treating our gardens and our lawns, and the end, composted product.
The article is an important reminder of the two tenets of ecology: everything goes somewhere and everything is connected.
How Crowdsourcing is Helping Water 10,000 Trees in Chicago
Chicago is grappling with a record heat wave and drought. The Chicago Park District and Friends of the Parks have asked residents of Chicago to pitch in and water trees in their local parks.
US Drought Could Trigger Repeat of Global Food Crisis, Experts Warn
As the 2012 American drought spreads across nearly two-thirds of the country, experts are warning that a food crisis is imminent in the coming year. Rising prices as a result of the drought could trigger a food shortage as bad as the one that plagued the developing world back in 2008.
Have a tip you’d like us to include in our next roundup? Tweet @LauraSeydel and @LindsEBrown using hashtag #EcoRoundup
Photo Credit AP/NASA.
