|
If the world's cows were a country, they would be the world's 6th largest emitter of greenhouse gases, primarily because of their methane-rich burps. With more people starting to shun beef and dairy products in response, the livestock industry is looking to science for a solution. A Swiss company, for example, is testing a garlic-based product that reduces cow methane production by 30%. www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/business/cow-methane-climate-change.html
0 Comments
COVID-19 has cratered Egypt's tourist industry. But even in good times few tourists stray far from the sites along the Nile River. After all, deserts stretch in both directions from the Nile. The desert landscape is not just sand dunes, though. For example, 6 hours southwest of Cairo in the Western Desert, in Egypt's Farafra Depression, one can visit the other-worldly chalk formations of White Desert National Park featured in this article from Atlas Obscura: www.atlasobscura.com/places/white-desert
Oil prices went negative briefly two weeks ago, but the U.S. is still producing near-record amounts of oil, more than 12 million barrels a day. About 30% of U.S. domestic oil (and 10% of domestic natural gas) production is coming from the Permian Basin of western Texas and southeastern New Mexico, shown in the light purple box on this map. However, an analysis of satellite data shows the petroleum industry operating in the Permian Basin is also generating the highest levels of methane (a greenhouse gas 80 times as potent at CO2) ever recorded in a U.S. oil- and gas-producing region. More than 2.5 teragrams of methane, representing nearly 4% of the region's natural gas production, leaked into the atmosphere in the year ending March 2019, more than double the amount detected the prior year. www.sciencenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/042220_cg_methane_inline1_680_desktop.png (Map from Science News:
www.sciencenews.org/article/permian-basin-oil-region-leaking-twice-methane-once-thought.) This year's National High School Ethics Bowl, like so much else, was canceled. But the 15 case studies and accompanying questions make for interesting reading -- and dinnertime conversation. nhseb.unc.edu/files/2020/03/National-Case-Set-2020.pdf
Students in my "Your Future World: Human Geography 2050" class are finishing up our look at the world's most populous countries in 2050 soon, and three of the last four countries we study are in Africa. This interesting Reddit map captures, among other things, Nigeria's large and growing population and the very low population density of much of northern Africa and the central African rainforest. https://preview.redd.it/whmhhvalj8v41.png?width=960&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=3e3d9be1e26032736516b70cc0dfe3167876166c
School in the UK has gone online too, and the BBC is offering new bite-size lessons, across the curriculum and for all grade levels (ages 5-15), every day. Pick an age/grade and see what's available: www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/dailylessons
|
Blog sharing news about geography, philosophy, world affairs, and outside-the-box learning
Archives
December 2023
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
