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Saving the Great Lakes, one laundry load at a time

Erika Engel

May 13, 2022 |

CollingwoodToday |

Text |

Over 3000 Words

Response Location: Canada, Parry Sound, Ontario

A pilot experiment in Canada shows that adding a filter on a washing machine can prevent microfibers from entering the wastewater system and ending up in marine ecosystems. After installing these filters on machines in a community, there was a 41 percent decrease of microfibers in the washing machine liquid waste. This will not keep all microfibers from ending up in the environment, but legislators are working on passing bills requiring manufacturers to get these filters installed on new machines.

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Can Small Seaweed Farms Help Kelp Scale Up?

Lynn Fantom

March 16, 2022 |

Civil Eats |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Maine

Atlantic Sea Farms strives to create sustainable ocean livelihoods by growing seaweed, which is good for both people and the planet. It's nutritionally dense, provides an extra source of revenue for fishermen, and is environmentally low impact. Ongoing studies also indicate it might absorb carbon dioxide in the ocean and tamp down ocean acidification. In 2018, Atlantic Sea Farms was producing 30,000 wet pounds of seaweed a year but expects a harvest of 1.2 million pounds this year, making it the largest in the U.S.

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Researchers use waste glass to clean up polluted sea

Yui Sawada

March 09, 2022 |

J-Stories |

Text |

Under 800 Words

Response Location: Japan, Nagasaki

The beach in Omura Bay in Japan isn’t a normal beach covered in sand: It’s covered in glass. This glass beach, developed by the Nagasaki Prefectural Environmental Health Research Center, is meant to recycle waste from the ocean and promote the growth of shellfish to maintain the water’s health. After five years, the center has seen about 525 clams per square meter, an increase over previous years.

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Catching Crabs in a Suffocating Sea

Julia Rosen

March 01, 2022 |

Hakai Magazine |

Multi-Media |

Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Newport, Oregon

Frances Chan, a researcher at Oregon State University first came across hypoxia or dangerously low-levels of oxygen in the ocean in Oregon back in 2002. To better understand the issue and empower crab fishers whose livelihoods suffered as a result, he helped develop "small, low-cost oxygen sensors" that fit into their crab pots and read the levels of oxygen in water in real time as they fish. This year, 38 instruments were sent out on eight boats, and with time, the information could help fishers adapt.

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How to Plant Millions of Oysters in a Day

Ally Hirschlag

February 17, 2022 |

Hakai Magazine |

Text |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Annapolis, Maryland

Conservationists are injecting millions of baby oysters into the Chesapeake Bay region to boost the native populations and improve the water quality. With their efforts, they’ve been able to restore 10 tributaries and about 324 hectares of oyster reefs have been restored.

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Off the coast of Italy, a radical approach to battling illegal fishing: a seafloor sculpture museum

Veronique Mistiaen

February 07, 2022 |

National Geographic |

Multi-Media |

1500-3000 Words

Response Location: Italy

An unlikely sculpture museum is helping to battle illegal fishing off the coast of Italy, but this one museum you'll have to dive to see. Over 39 sculptures make up this underwater exhibit and serve as a physical barrier to seafloor trawling.

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Could crushed rocks absorb enough carbon to curb global warming?

Peter Yeung

December 21, 2021 |

National Geographic |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: Spain, Gran Canaria

Scientists are testing if adding alkaline substances to seawater can allow oceans to absorb more carbon dioxide emissions. Early tests suggest this could be a potential way to combat climate change, but there are still many questions about how this can scale, how it impacts the natural ecosystem, and if it’s cost effective to implement.

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This Scientist Created a Rapid Test Just Weeks Into the Pandemic. Here's Why You Still Can't Get It.

Lydia DePillis

December 21, 2021 |

ProPublica |

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Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States

E25Bio created a rapid COVID-19 test soon after the pandemic began and had an existing factory that could be repurposed to quickly manufacture tests. The prototypes, priced under $10 each, attracted major donors and would have made at-home antigen tests that identified around 80% of contagious cases available from the pandemic’s early days. Instead, an unclear FDA review process that prioritized higher detection rates over inexpensive ways people could test often, as well as resistance from medical device regulators, prevented the company from producing the tests for the public early in the pandemic.

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They Said the Tornado Would Hit at 9:30. It Hit at 9:30.

Thomas Fuller Tariro Mzezewa

December 14, 2021 |

The New York Times |

Text |

800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, Mayfield, Kentucky

Advances in meteorological technology have helped drive down the fatality rate from tornadoes in the U.S. to a fraction of what it was a century ago. Violent tornadoes rarely evade advance detection, thanks to weather satellites, advances in radar, and a communication system to announce warnings. The deadly tornadoes that struck Kentucky and other states in December 2021 illustrate the ways in which even this system – one scientist called it "one of the most incredible success stories in applied science" – can fail, including when people ignore warnings or buildings cannot withstand the high winds.

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A River's Right to Flow

Sara Van Note

October 22, 2021 |

bioGraphic |

Text |

Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States, New Mexico

In order to preserve and protect rivers a new movement that grants rivers personhood rights is growing. In places like New Zealand and Oregon, where some of these measures have passed rivers have the right to flow without having to be used as a resource for consumption. In New Mexico, the state engineer approved a water lease submitted by the National Audobon Society. The lease allows about 13 million gallons of water to flow annually solely for its own sake, similiar to personhood rights. The creative approach is one way conservationists are fighting for water preservation.

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