THE FUTURE WE WANT and THE FUTURE WE DON’T WANT
By Daniel de la Calle I am sure you have seen this image all over the media these days. I took it on my way to the airport, the night I was leaving Rio: Fish made out of plastic bottles, illuminated at night. They were placed on Botafogo beach, the nearest beach to downtown Rio […]
SINK, a Shell Dissolving Objet d’art
By Daniel de la Calle Artist Julian Priest has created SINK, “a model of anthropogenic ocean acidification”. The materials used are a scallop shell, an internal combustion engine, glass walls, aluminum framing, copper piping, brine and methanol. How it works: “Fuel is burnt by an internal combustion engine to turn a propeller. The carbon dioxide […]
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
By Daniel de la Calle Two news, one good and one bad. Then the ugly: THE GOOD: NASA claims to have developed an innovative method called OMEGA (Offshore Membrane Enclosures for Growing Algae), that grows algae, cleans waste-water, captures carbon dioxide and ultimately generates biofuel without competing with agriculture for water, fertilizer or land. Wow. […]
Winterless Spring
By Daniel de la Calle As seasons disappear and blend together, summer swallowing autumn and winter coming in glimpses and bursts, spring is still our queen of hope, a beginning, the unraveling of emotions and profusion: creativity. If you live in a city spring might make you lust green in the eyes and in mouth, […]
News In Pairs Like Castanets
By Daniel de la Calle Maybe influenced by the traditional Spanish music I was listening to while writing, here are some news in twos: Ω There are two billion tonnes of fish in the oceans, which is about 660 pounds/300 kilograms for each human being on the planet. Villy Christensen, ecosystem modeller with the University […]
President Obama And The Giant Pteropods
By Daniel de la Calle A couple news for the first half of the week: »US President Barak Obama’s weekly address this past Saturday was a remarkable attempt at pushing for a more environmental and alternative energy agenda while making it sound like the opposite. Speaking from a jet-engine factory Mr. Obama seemed to […]
Chile, From Santiago to Valparaíso
By Daniel de la Calle After Puerto Montt, the second half of the series of screenings in Chile unfolded at universities in Santiago and Valparaíso. Although they shared the name, “Universidad Católica”, there was no connection between the two. We were in Santiago thanks to an invitation by Professor José M. Farina, showing the film […]
Information & Communication
By Daniel de la Calle Information and communication, going hand in hand as should be: »Lecture near Lake Tahoe: Dr. Howard Spero, UC Davis, will deliver a lecture titled Changing Seas about the earth’s climate, climate change throughout history and ocean (and Lake Tahoe) acidification. The date is March 22nd at 5:30PM and the location […]
News Wire
By Daniel de la Calle Woke up today missing Jimmy McNulty, hence the title. News, unstoppable, like rolling trains filled with sea adventures, awards, money, great videos and mahi mahi. Who could possibly offer you more?: •MBARI (Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute) researchers started carrying out this past February a three month expedition along the […]
Protection
By Daniel de la Calle »Could the protection of marine areas be counterproductive? That is what Professor Ray Hilborn, from the University of Washington’s School of Aquatic and Fisheries Sciences, believes. Professor Hilborn stated in late February during an interview for an Australian radio station. You can read the transcript HERE and listen to the […]
Summer News
By Daniel de la Calle Children in Rio de Janeiro were on vacation for the three Rio+20 summit days. Schools organized activities that involved the environment, sustainability, recycling, awareness; like this sculpture made out of used plastic bottles. ≈Science Magazine recently published an article on Ocean Acidification and the results coming from a new high […]
All Sorts Of News
By Daniel de la Calle »When the media loves something it just takes over the internet. News came out yesterday about the new study by the Stockholm Environment Institute titled “Valuing the Ocean” where marine experts analyzed the most severe threats facing the world’s marine environment and estimated the cost of damage a year coming […]
News, Some Good
By Daniel de la Calle »Washington State became last month the first in the USA to create an expert panel on Ocean Acidification. The panel, convened by Gov. Chris Gregoire, is made up of scientists, seafood industry representatives and local and tribal officials. It has set up three tasks: 1 Survey the latest […]
Symposia, Volunteer Work, A Job Offer And A Video
By Daniel de la Calle »The Georges River Tidewater Association seeks volunteers to monitor acidification in St. George Estuary (Maine). “GRTA has been developing a monitoring program with assistance from Friends of Casco Bay, the Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment, and the Maine Department of Environmental Protection. GRTA is investing in sampling […]
The Shape of Shells
By Daniel de la Calle Every shell protects the life of the creature that builds it and many of them continue to have a brief second existence as homes for hermit crabs or the base surface onto which algae and intrepid barnacles attach, but with time they inexorably break into sand. The ones I want […]
Tangled Up In Words
By Daniel de la Calle In an LA Times article titled “In Science, Words Matter” oceanographer Elizabeth Tobin refers to the often talked about controversy that terms like the “great Pacific garbage patch”, the algae “red tide”, “global warming”, “Ocean Acidification”, etc tend to be hyperbolic, inaccurate and in occasions simply wrong. She is worried […]
The Transit of Venus
By Daniel de la Calle From Maya Lin’s interview in our film to the recent NYC Pteropod exhibit by Cornelia Kavanagh that we wrote about in April, we have always enjoyed looking at nature, science or Ocean Acidification through an artistic filter. With that in mind we bring you now a sample plate made of […]
Ocean Acidification and Education
By Daniel de la Calle Inspired by our upcoming screenings for students this Thursday and Friday in the Southern Chilean town of Puerto Montt we want to post information for and about students and Ocean Acidification: »Students from the Ridgeway School (Plymouth, UK) were commissioned by the European Project on Ocean Acidification (EPOCA) and the […]
Salt Water Videos
By Daniel de la Calle Great salty videos in today’s menu. Why?: Why not? Fish with transparent head: Encounter with whale: Bizarre Japanese fish: Ocean’s Oases: Might not be fair to take sides, but we all like it when the little one gets away:
“O Rio De Janeiro Continua Lindo”
By Daniel de la Calle After the visit to Southern and Central Chile in early May we are catching up with some of the latest news on Ocean Acidification while preparing as well for the +20 summit at the end of June in “lindo” Rio de Janeiro. Here are some news sifted through the web […]
End Of April News
By Daniel de la Calle »The Center for Biological Diversity has launched a new Endangered Oceans campaign in the US to save our sea life from the “unprecedented threat” of Ocean Acidification. The website is WWW.ENDANGEREDOCEANS.ORG and they want to call on “the Obama administration and the Environmental Protection Agency to produce a national action […]
Learning & Working Around OA
By Daniel de la Calle One learns and then works, and sometimes one’s work is learning. A few opportunities to do both: ≈A month-long research voyage in Scotland is using the latest robotic submersible technology to study the risks of Ocean Acidification to their deep coral colonies. The Mingulay coral reefs were only discovered ten […]
Environmental Capitalism
By Daniel de la Calle Richard Conniff wrote a brilliant piece last year titled “What are species worth? Putting a price on biodiversity” : Had you ever heard about Prochlorococcus, a cyanobacteria responsible for 20% of the oxygen we breathe? It might have only been discovered 25 years ago, but was playing this vital role […]
Little Red Dots
By Daniel de la Calle• Don’t be afraid to scratch if they itch: •Anyone who has been to the Pacific Northeast in general and to Puget Sound in particular can bear witness to its beauty and uniqueness. An invisible contributor to this distinctiveness lies in the origin of its waters: strong currents bring […]
Weekend Material
By Daniel de la Calle ¤Marine Spacial Planning presents a rational approach to ocean management. The system tries to “allocate space in the ocean allowing compatible uses to coexist, separating incompatible ones, all while protecting the environment”. This video presentation with Philippe Cousteau explains things in more detail: “The ocean economy in the USA […]