Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment Commons^™

Detection Of Power Outages And Recovery Following Disaster Events: The Chilean Earthquake Of 1 April 2014, Tony Cole

Von Braun Symposium Student Posters

No abstract provided.

U.S. Drought Monitor, October 28, 2014, Brian Fuchs

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for October 28, 2014 (10/28/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

Extraction And Empowerment: The Application Of Traditional Knowledge Within The Development Of The Nwt Bhp Ekati Diamond Mine, Daniel Vanclieaf

Laurier Undergraduate Journal of the Arts

No abstract provided.

The Status Of Fishes In The Missouri River, Nebraska: Lake Sturgeon (Acipenser Fulvescens), Kirk D. Steffensen, Sam Stukel, Dane A. Shuman

Transactions of the Nebraska Academy of Sciences and Affiliated Societies

Lake Sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens) occurrences in the Missouri River along Nebraska’s eastern border are historically sporadic and rare. Presently, the wild Lake Sturgeon population in this river reach may be extirpated. A Recovery Program initiated by the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) has stocked almost 150,000 hatchery-reared Lake Sturgeon into the lower Missouri River at several sites in Missouri. As a result, the number of Lake Sturgeon collected has increased. Since monitoring began in 2003, no Lake Sturgeon have been collected above Gavins Point Dam while 40 fish were collected downstream of Gavins Point Dam. The majority of …

U.S. Drought Monitor, October 21, 2014, Michael J. Brewer

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for October 21, 2014 (10/21/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

U.S. Drought Monitor, October 14, 2014, Mark D. Svoboda

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for October 14, 2014 (10/14/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

U.S. Drought Monitor, October 7, 2014, Mark D. Svoboda

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of U.S. for October 7, 2014 (10/7/14) plus: U.S. crop areas experiencing drought (map), Approximate percentage of crop located in drought, by state (bar graph), Percent of crop area located in drought, past 52 weeks (line graph) for: Corn, Soybeans, Hay, Cattle, Winter wheat.

The Mechanical And Social Feasibility Of Using Biogas To Fuel An Essential Oil Distillation Unit In The Rural Commune Of Ankarimbelo, Madagascar, Hannah Nesser

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The rural commune of Ankarimbelo is located on the edge of the Ikongo Rainforest Corridor in southeastern Madagascar. The commune’s remote location, an increasing population, and the prohibition of farming in the rainforest corridor have contributed to extreme poverty. In an attempt to mitigate these effects, the Malagasy NGO Ny Tanintsika has implemented an essential oils distillation plant as an alternative livelihood project. While the project may provide needed income to local populations, thereby diverting destructive agriculture practices such as tavy, or slash-and-burn agriculture, the distillation of essential oils still requires that firewood be burned. Over the course of …

Droughtscape, Fall 2014, Kelly Smith

DroughtScape: Quarterly Newsletter of the National Drought Mitigation Center (2007–2023)

Contents

Director’s report

Upcoming events

Drought and climate summary

Drought impacts

Drought planning in Brazil

Ethiopian workshop

Visiting scholar

Help for South Plains ranchers

Wind River tribal workshop

Inter Tribal Buffalo Council

South Dakota ranch workshops

The Perfect Pitch: Car Commercials In The Environment, Alyssa P. Beyer, Sara Moyer

Student Publications

Car commercials, like many advertisements, tempt its viewers with comfort, capability, or safety features, as well as being well‐engineered, affordable, attractive, large or compact sized, or fuel efficient. This study examines the pitches in YouTube car commercial video clips from the 1960s until 2014. We coded a total of 263 total car commercials based on pitch, setting, narrator, decade, and country of origin. The analysis revealed that most car commercials were presented in rural settings and capability was pitched most frequently overall. Fuel efficiency was ranked third overall; however, within urban settings, fuel efficiency had the highest frequency. During the …

Walkable Gettysburg— How Pedestrian Friendly Is The Borough Of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania?, Samuel C. Gilvarg, Shane A. Kesnig

Student Publications

Walkability is a measure of how easily pedestrians can reach a variety of destinations via walking. Greater walkability has been linked to several benefits, including improvements in human health, economic stimulus, and improved air quality. We surveyed 37 blocks in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to record the presence of 13 design factors such as street trees and pedestrian oriented amenities that have been shown to encourage walking. These results were then compared with the Walk Score from walkscore.com, a common measurement tool of walkability. Based on the surveys, we calculated a design quality score (DQI) for each block. There was no correlation …

Noise Pollution? What's The Solution?: Understanding Traffic Noise Pollution In Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Andrew F. Kapp, Joseph M. Passmore, Anika H. Schneider

Student Publications

Noise pollution can be damaging to a community by impacting its atmosphere as well as the health of its residents, local quality of life, and local economy. Our study sought to gain insight into the level of noise pollution in Gettysburg, both in-town and on the Gettysburg College campus, and how noise pollution may be affecting the local residents and students. We selected 9 sampling sites, 6 in-town and 3 on the college campus, and measured the noise pollution in dBA with portable sound meters three days a week and three times a day over a three week period. Our …

What Drives Car Attitudes: An Analysis Of How Demographics And Environmental Views Relate To Car Attitudes, Kelly M. Gross, Alexandra S. Isaacson, Brian J.B. Lonabocker

Student Publications

Successfully marketing new, clean, car technologies to consumers requires an advertising strategy that fits consumers’ priorities and attitudes towards cars. We created a survey to study how attitudes towards cars are associated with demographics and environmental views. Our study examined car preferences and environmental concerns of a sample of Gettysburg College students in comparison to a national sample obtained from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Overall, we concluded that environmental beliefs are a significantly better prediction of car behaviors than demographics. We found that on average people would pay more for a car with a higher fuel economy, but not enough to …

Current Status And Long-Term Trends In Water Quality And Living Resources In The Virginia Tributaries And Chesapeake Bay Mainstem From 1985 Through 2013, Daniel M. Dauer, Todd A. Egerton, John R. Donat, Michael F. Lane, Suzanne C. Doughten, Cindy Johnson, Monika Arora

Status and Trends for Virginia Chesapeake Bay

The period prior to the implementation of the Chesapeake Bay Monitoring Program was characterized by a marked decline in the water quality of the Chesapeake Bay. The disappearance of submerged aquatic vegetation in certain regions of the Bay, declines in the abundance of some commercially and recreationally important species, increases in the incidence of low dissolved oxygen events, changes in the Bay's food web, and other ecological problems have been related to the deteriorating water quality (e.g. USEPA, 1982,1983;Officer et al.,1984; Orth and Moore, 1984). The results of concentrated research efforts in the late 1970s and early 1980s stimulated the …

Predictors Patterns And Processes Of Extinction Risk In Porgies And Seabreams (Family: Sparidae), Mia Theresa B. Conteros

Biological Sciences Theses & Dissertations

A variety of human-induced changes are having profound impacts on the marine environment, and no area on the planet remains unaffected by the detrimental effects of our activities. These stressors can potentially lead to synergistic effects, causing accelerated biodiversity loss and diminished ecosystem functioning. Identification and understanding of the factors that drive species to heightened risk of extinction are important goals in conservation.

The Sparidae are commercially important and ecologically complex marine fishes; global extinction risk assessments using the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species methodology show that 9% (13 species) have increased vulnerability to population declines from intense fishing …

Palm Reading: Predicting The Future Of Four Threatened Palm Species At Pointe À Larrée, Eastern Madagascar, Eva Colberg

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Madagascar has one of the highest concentrations of palm diversity in the world, with 195 species, 192 of which are endemic, but just as for the rest of the island’s natural resources, the future of these palms is at stake. In fact, 83% of the country’s endemic palms qualify as threatened following the most recent version of IUCN Red List criteria, version 3.1, yet 28 are not even found within protected areas. One area awaiting government protection, MBG’s Pointe à Larrée project, is home to 18 different palm species, 11 of which are threatened. This study took sample counts to …

Comparison Of Coral Reef Health: Lokobe National Park And Tanikely National Park, Northwest Madagascar, Kailani Acosta

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Coral reefs are microcosms of biodiversity and life. They are home to about a quarter of all marine life, yet amount to only about 1% of the world’s marine environment. Coral reefs are very vulnerable ecosystems; there are numerous threats to their health, such as damage by echinoderm and fish feeding, natural disasters, coral illness and bleaching events. Coral health fluctuates according to many of these factors and as a result of the fragile symbiotic balance between zooxanthellae algae and corals. Subsequently, coral health is an essential topic for analysis and assessment.

Coral reefs were assessed in Lokobe National Park, …

Mitigating Climate-Induced Migration In Rural Morocco: Improving Sustainable Development To Address Socio-Economic And Environmental Causes Of Migration, Jesse Meisenhelter

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Morocco unique geography has made the country vulnerable to climate-induced migration (CIM) for three reasons. First, Moroccois located in a region identified as the highest vulnerability to climate change (IPCC, 2014). Second, Morocco’s economy remains dependent on natural resources due to a history of neo-liberal development and agriculture policies (Davis, 2006). These policies’ failure to diversify and develop the economy in rural regions has made Morocco the most geographically inequitable country in the MENA region (World Bank). Lastly, located just 14 km from Spain, Morocco has a 50-year history of migrating to Europe for work and opportunity (Eddouada, 2014). This …

U.S. Drought Monitor, September 30, 2014, Richard R. Heim Jr.

United States Agricultural Commodities in Drought Archive

Drought map of the United States for September 30, 2014 (9/30/14) plus: United States crop areas experiencing drought (map), an approximate percentage of crop located in drought by state (bar graph), and the percentage of crop area located in drought during the past 52 weeks (line graph) for corn, soybeans, hay, cattle, and winter wheat.

The Status Of Fishes In The Missouri River, Nebraska: Shovelnose Sturgeon (Scaphirhynchus Platorynchus), Kirk D. Steffensen, Sam Stukel, Dane A. Shuman

Transactions of the Nebraska Academy of Sciences and Affiliated Societies

The Shovelnose Sturgeon Scaphirhynchus platorynchus remains the most abundant riverine sturgeon species in North American despite the anthropogenic modifications that have occurred throughout their historic range; however, their populations have declined throughout Nebraska since the construction of Fort Randall and Gavins Point Dams. Therefore, the objective of this study was to present the current status of Shovelnose Sturgeon in the Missouri River along Nebraska’s border. Data was acquired from 2003 to 2012 from all reaches of the Missouri River along Nebraska’s eastern border. Catch rates of Shovelnose Sturgeon increased in a downstream trend and were highest in the reach below …