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Sonsbeek Park, Arnhem: Wikimedia Commons
by Julia Fine, ODP Contributing Writer
Climate change is already causing flooding and heatwaves worldwide. Thankfully, one Dutch city has a plan to tackle it. Arnhem, the capital city of the province Gelderland, recently made a 10-year plan to re-landscape the city in order to deal with the impacts of climate change.
As part of this plan, as India Block reported in Dezeen, “selected roads will be replaced by grass, and trees will be planted to provide shade for other routes, cooling parts of the city” as well as preventing flooding. Furthermore, Arnhem will “continue to invest in gas-free houses, windmills and solar parks in order to prevent further harm to the climate,” Janene Pieters noted in the NL Times.
Why This Matters: Arnhem is at the frontlines of climate change. The city has experienced multiple floods in the past few years, and according to the NL Times, parts of heat stress rages in parts of the city. That the city is taking swift and well-thought out action on these issues– even going so far as to run “downpour simulations” in 2019— provides potential models for other cities worldwide that want to adapt to and combat climate change. As climate expert Marjolein Pijpers-Van Esch told Trouw, “Most municipalities are still not doing enough to prepare for a more extreme weather forecast.” Perhaps with Arnhem’s lead, other cities will soon follow.
As wildfires across the West continue to rage, President Trump has continued to push the message that the cause of the fires is solely due to poor forest management. It’s not a new message for Republicans, but science unequivocally points to the ways in which climate change is supercharging wildfires. Ezra Romero, an environmental reporter […]
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by Julia Fine, ODP Contributing Writer As Stefanie Glinski reported for the Thomson Reuters Foundation this week, large-scale deforestation in Afghanistan, due primarily to the past 40 years of war, has advanced flooding in the country (as trees prevent soil erosion and serve as a buffer against flooding). According to Glinski, “Trees have long been […]
Continue Reading 646 wordsAfter its first proposed sale was blocked by a federal judge, the Trump Administration proposed on Friday a second timber sale in the pristine Tongass National Forest in Alaska, The Hill reported. The sale would cover 6000 acres, including 5000 acres of old-growth trees and the proposal also includes road-building activities.
Why This Matters: The Tongass is the largest national forest and one of the most important forests in the world (as the Ag Department itself says – watch the video) because it contains some of the last surviving old-growth temperate rainforests in North America and is home to numerous species of endangered wildlife and is very important to several native tribes.
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