Month: May 2016

ESSIC research assistant professor Melissa Kenney will be a participant in the pending national Earth Observations Assessment (EOA 2016), performed by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) through the U.S. Group on Earth Observations Subcommittee of the Committee on Environment, Natural  Resources, and Sustainability.  The assessment, which responds to a congressional request, aims to provide an evaluation of the Nation’s current Earth-observing …

ESSIC’s Ariana Sutton-Grier was published this month in Volume 44, Issue 2 of Coastal Management.  Her article entitled, “Leveraging Carbon Services of Coastal Ecosystems for Habitat Protection and Restoration” details the efforts of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)–and its partners–to develop new policy opportunities for coastal conservation utilizing “blue carbon.” Blue carbon refers to the carbon stored and sequestered in …

Last April, Prince George’s County became the first county in Maryland to effectively ban hydraulic fracturing within its borders. Local lawmakers voted unanimously to prohibit the practice, which involves pumping pressurized water and chemicals into the ground to crack the underlying shale rock and release a valuable mixture of natural gasses that can be burned to produce energy. While fracking technology has been around since the 1940’s, the United States has only recently …

Last week, hundreds of students, scientists, policy-makers, and business leaders met at the University of Maryland (UMD) to discuss the ever-urgent topic of climate action. Designed as a lead-in to the two-day United Nations sponsored Climate Action Summit held in Washington, D.C. on May 5 – 6, the forum offered a platform for public discussion between a wide variety of stakeholders and interest groups. The event, which was co-organized by members of the UMD academic community, including …

UMD Guardian App The UMD specific Rave Guardian is a mobile app that increases safety on campus. The app has several features and is associated to the individual through their main UMD e-mail. The app provides a direct link to the office of public safety. Features Panic Button – ties directly to UMD police and provides the users profile information and GPS location. Tip Texting – allows 2 way tip reporting with or without revealing the users personal information. Safety Profile – If an …

ESSIC Assistant Research Scientist Christopher Hain could be called an expert at discovery from afar.   As a Visiting Scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS), Hain has worked alongside scientists at the USDA-ARS Hydrology and Remote Sensing Lab on the development of the Atmosphere Land Exchange Inverse (ALEXI) model. This model uses thermal infrared remote sensing to

ESSIC’s Ariana Sutton-Grier was one of four panelists at today's U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Policy Analysis seminar entitled, “Enhancing Resilience using Coastal Green Infrastructure (CGI).”   The seminar addressed the role CGI plays in making coastal communities more resilient to natural hazards. The seminar video can be viewed at the following:…

The partnership between the University of Maryland (UMD) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) was recently highligted in the IDB's 2015 Partnership Report.  The UMD effort, led by ESSIC / AOSC Professor and ESSIC Interim Director Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm,  involves the use of the Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM)  to analyze the water-energy-food nexus in Latin America. The research is part of the IDB collaboration focused on research, knowledge exchange, and …

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