New study finds that fish are ingesting large quantities of fibers that likely came off your outerwear in the wash and flowed into the sea. Outside Humanity dumps 8 million tons of plastic into the oceans each year, according to a study published early this year in Science. That’s a mind-blowingly large figure, but it still doesn’t account for the untold billions […]
Washing a single polyester jacket can send 1,900 tiny synthetic micro-fibers into waterways, where they can soak up toxins and get eaten by fish. So what is the outdoor industry doing about it? Outside Magazine August 2015 Gregg Treinish is dismayed about what is coming out of his washing machine. “What I’m seeing is shocking. […]
It maps waves, predicts conditions, turns surfers into citizen scientists, and could be the data-collecting tool climate scientists need to study our rapidly acidifying oceans. As the Internet of Things inches its way into every corner of our lives, no one would blame you for rolling your eyes at the suggestion that even a surfboard should be […]
A tiny coastal town in Norway is about to become home to an ambitious enterprise that will turn a diminishing glacier into a high-end cocktail cooler. Is there cause for alarm? The Guardian April 4, 2015 Glomfjord, Norway, is a coastal town of 1,120 residents just north of the Arctic Circle. For decades, it was […]
Everyone loves animals in little outfits. But couple that with an environmental campaign and you’ve created an unstoppable craft monster. The Guardian January 29, 2015 There is little that is likely to stir readers more than photos of adorable animals dressed up in funny clothes. Add the element of a vulnerable species rescued from the […]
Scientists and technologists are turning numbers about everything from condors to ocean-floor contours into visual representations of environmental issues. Ensia December 16, 2014 We’re living in an era of Big Data, but too often it’s nothing more than a fire hose of numbers and data sets that most would have difficulty understanding. Increasingly, though, entities […]
In 2011, an ecologist released an alarming study showing that tiny clothing fibers could be the biggest source of plastic in our oceans. The bigger problem? No one wanted to hear it. The Guardian October 27, 2014 Ecologist Mark Browne knew he’d found something big when, after months of tediously examining sediment along shorelines around […]