CONCEPT DRAWING KALINAGO RESILIENCE HUB CHANNELING CULTURAL BUILDING PRACTICES AND MYTHOLOGY OF THE CENTIPEDE. PHOTO © ILLYA AZAROFF AND + LAB ARCHITECT PLLC

rocagallery.com - by Illya Azaroff - May 21, 2019

 . . . Since Hurricane Maria struck in 2017, the tiny island of Dominica is rebuilding with the aim of becoming the first climate resilient and 100% sustainable nation in the world . . . Dominica can unlock the DNA of resilience through the vernacular building practices and rich cultural history of the Kalinago people that first inhabited the island . . .

 . . . Rediscovering these historic threads of resilience have been key to developing new master plans for the territory under the Kalinago Institute for Resilience and Regeneration (KIRR), founded by my team together with leading experts and community leaders, including members of the Kalinago council of chiefs, Nichie Louis Patrick Hill and Dr. Michael McDonald. Its mission is to create a thriving Kalinago Territory as a low carbon, resilient region where citizens can live and excel within the carrying capacity of its ecosystems for multiple generations into the future.

Outside the small village of Chicua, in the western highlands, in an area affected by extreme-weather events, Ilda Gonzales looks after her daughter.

newyorker.com - by Jonathan Blitzer - Photography by Mauricio Lima - April 3, 2019

. . . In most of the western highlands, the question is no longer whether someone will emigrate but when. “Extreme poverty may be the primary reason people leave,” Edwin Castellanos, a climate scientist at the Universidad del Valle, told me. “But climate change is intensifying all the existing factors” . . . Farming, Castellanos has said, is “a trial-and-error exercise for the modification of the conditions of sowing and harvesting times in the face of a variable environment.” Climate change is outpacing the ability of growers to adapt.

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Gay, Destine & Rogers, Tom & Shirley, Rebekah, 2018. "Small island developing states and their suitability for electric vehicles and vehicle-to-grid services," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 69-78.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jup.2018.09.006

sciencedirect.com - 19 September 2018

Abstract

Small Island Developing States (SIDS), while at the forefront of international climate action, face a number of development challenges linked to their historic, geographic and socio-economic characteristics. Small populations and limited energy demand cap the penetration of renewable energy technologies. Electric vehicles (EVs) offer solutions for electricity storage, grid services, reduced fuel imports, and reduced pollution with associated health benefits. This paper provides a comprehensive review of literature on island applications of electric vehicles, making the case for SIDS as an area of opportunity for further exploration, and presenting the southern Caribbean island of Barbados as a case study.

CLICK HERE - Small island developing states and their suitability for electric vehicles and vehicle-to-grid services

Ocean heatwaves destroy kelp forests, which provide food and shelter for many other species. Photograph: Thomas Schmitt/Getty Images

CLICK HERE - RESEARCH - Marine heatwaves threaten global biodiversity and the provision of ecosystem services

Extreme temperatures destroy kelp, seagrass and corals – with alarming impacts for humanity

theguardian.com - by Damian Carrington - March 4, 2019

The number of heatwaves affecting the planet’s oceans has increased sharply, scientists have revealed, killing swathes of sea-life like “wildfires that take out huge areas of forest”.

But the definition of circular economy remains unhelpfully broad.

fastcompany.com - by Adele Peters - February 5, 2019

When Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport remodeled a terminal, it didn’t buy light bulbs; instead, the company signed a contract for “light as a service” from Signify, the company formerly known as Philips Lighting. Signify owns the physical lights, giving it the incentive to make products that last as long as possible and that can be easily repaired and recycled if anything breaks.

The service is one example of a shift to a circular economy model. Rather than just mining materials and manufacturing products that ultimately end up in landfills, companies are increasingly trying to figure out how to use resources in closed loops.

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DW Documentary - November 8, 2017

Climate change and rising sea levels mean the island nation of Kiribati in the South Pacific is at risk of disappearing into the sea.

But the island’s inhabitants aren’t giving up. They are doing what they can to save their island from inundation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ0j6kr4ZJ0

Image: One Concern

fastcompany.com - by Katharine Schwab - November 15, 2018

 . . . One Concern is launching a machine learning platform that provides cities with specialized maps to help emergency crews decide where to focus their efforts in a flood. The maps update in real-time based on data about where water is flowing to estimate where people need help the most. It’s the latest in a wave of AI-powered tools aimed at helping cities prepare for an era of severe, and increasingly frequent, disasters.

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Our platform provides unprecedented situational awareness and actionable insights for decision-makers.

A Sept. 7, 2017, satellite image from NOAA shows the eye of Hurricane Irma, left, just north of the island of Hispaniola, with Hurricane Jose, right, in the Atlantic Ocean. Six major hurricanes formed in the Atlantic in 2017, including Harvey, Irma and Maria.  (Photo: AP)

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Dominant effect of relative tropical Atlantic warming on major hurricane occurrence

usatoday.com - by Doyle Rice - September 27, 2018

The catastrophic 2017 hurricane season – which included such monsters as Harvey, Irma and Maria – was fueled in part by unusually warm ocean water, a new study suggests.

And because of human-caused global warming, the study said similar favorable conditions for fierce hurricanes will be present in the years and decades to come . . .

 . . . "We show that the increase in 2017 major hurricanes was not primarily caused by La Niña conditions in the Pacific Ocean, but mainly by pronounced warm sea surface conditions in the tropical North Atlantic," the study said.

New solar flow battery with a 14.1 percent efficiency. Photo: David Tenenbaum, UW-Madison

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Chem - 14.1% Efficient Monolithically Integrated Solar Flow Battery

theverge.com - by Angela Chen - September 27, 2018

Solar energy is becoming more and more popular as prices drop, yet a home powered by the Sun isn’t free from the grid because solar panels don’t store energy for later. Now, researchers have refined a device that can both harvest and store solar energy, and they hope it will one day bring electricity to rural and underdeveloped areas.

The problem of energy storage has led to many creative solutions, like giant batteries. For a paper published today in the journal Chem, scientists trying to improve the solar cells themselves developed an integrated battery that works in three different ways.

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Image via Upworthy

CLICK HERE - The GrowHaus

upworthy.com - by Sam Dylan Finch - August 31, 2018

How do you get healthy food on the table when you can't find any?

This is a question that Ortilia Lujan Flores had grappled with many times before.

She wanted affordable, nutritious food, but lived in a neighborhood that didn’t have an accessible grocery store.

Flores couldn't drive, which limited the few food options she had. "There was nowhere to go," she explains.

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Figure 1. Average estimated annual residential rooftop PV market capacity potential from 2017 – 2030 (Source: NREL)

sepapower.org - by Jeffrey Cook - August 16, 2018

If the solar industry reaches this Department of Energy (DOE) target, it could dramatically alter the energy market and present a future where residential PV becomes a standard, cost-effective home installation, versus a luxury or long-term investment. A recent NREL report — Cost-Reduction Roadmap for Residential Solar Photovoltaics (PV), 2017-2030 — models a set of pathways that the industry could follow to realize this future. The analysis focuses on two key markets for residential PV cost reduction: installing PV at time of roof replacement and installing PV at time of new construction. These two market segments were selected because each offers significant cost reduction opportunities while representing a 30 gigawatt (GW) annual market nationwide (see Figure 1).

A section of the Kalinago Territory about a month after Hurricane Maria

dominicanewsonline.com - June 1, 2018

KALINAGO TERRITORY — The largest disaster-preparedness-focused gathering of Dominicans since Maria made landfall will take place 9AM tomorrow, June 2nd, in the Kalinago Territory. Over 60 Kalinago residents and government officials will come together for a day-long workshop to review how emergency management procedures worked and failed in the wake of Hurricane Maria.

Co-led by the Kalinago Council and the Dominica Resilience Systems, this workshop will ask concerned citizens to review how emergency systems performed with respect to 26 core mission critical functions, which consist of everything from water and evacuation routes to emergency shelters and supply chains.

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ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE HERE - Kalinagos to discuss development agenda for Kalinago Territory

by Roosevelt Skerrit - May 29, 2018

I am preoccupied with what preoccupies my people and as a result, my goal has always been to elevate every family in Dominica.

The ongoing process of procuring land, sourcing funds and signing contracts to build safe, reliable homes continues. Let us build with pride and great efficiency and work together to make our tomorrows better than our yesterdays.

CLICK HERE - Original Announcement

CLICK HERE - CLADE X LIVESTREAM (ARCHIVED)

A panel of experts play out a pandemic exercise on May 15 to demonstrate what policies and strategies the U.S. government should have in place. (Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security)

submitted by Mike Kraft - washingtonpost.com - by Lena H. Sun - May 30, 2018

A novel virus, moderately contagious and moderately lethal, has surfaced and is spreading rapidly around the globe . . .

. . . So began a recent day-long exercise hosted by the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. The simulation mixed details of past disasters with fictional elements to force government officials and experts to make the kinds of key decisions they could face in a real pandemic.

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