Resilient Futures Podcast
University of Georgia Institute for Resilient Infrastructure Systems
This month, Resilient Futures hosts Alysha Helmrich and Todd Bridges welcomed Dr. Lauren McPhillips, a researcher and assistant professor in Penn State’s Institute for Energy & the Environment, to talk about ecological engineering problems. McPhillips has worked on a lot of research in the space of water resources engineering, and now studies how best to implement solar power while preserving ecosystem services in proposed solar fields.
Solar farms get a lot of pushback due to their potential to interrupt ecosystems, whether they’re just taking up important habitat space or actually causing harm through increased erosion or stormwater runoff. But McPhillips argues that, when done carefully, solar power could be just the nature-positive energy solution we need.
Check out the episode for more: Here Comes the Sun: The Resilient Future of Solar Power
The Engineering With Nature Podcast
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Engineering With Nature (EWN)
The Engineering With Nature Podcast has had a few new episodes since we last updated you, starting with a two-part series featuring Chris Lemon, a physician and assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Johns Hopkins University. Podcast hosts Sarah Thorne and Jeff King, EWN National Lead invited Lemon on in order to discuss a growing threat to human health and wellbeing: climate change.
The traditional approach to environmental infrastructure, storm events, and other nature-based threats tends to include (often ill-fasted) attempts to control nature. Lemon argues that the same thing is happening with disease: by working against nature, we’re disrupting natural processes and making diseases more common, deadly and contagious. How can we change our approach to environmental problems to include better disease controls?
Check out this two part series to learn more!
Exploring Dr. Chris Lemon’s Nonlinear Exploration of the Nexus of Climate Change and Health
Channeling Our Superpowers for Planetary Health – Continuing Our Conversation with Dr. Chris Lemon
In another recent episode, Sarah Thorne and EWN Deputy Program Manager Amanda Tritinger spoke with Brian Davis, associate professor of landscape architecture at the University of Virginia and Cathy Johnson, coastal ecologist for the National Park Service Northeast Region. This episode discussed how to combat climate change threats through innovative nature-based solutions in our National Parks.
“Visit your parks and the other natural places around you to better understand what’s at risk from climate change,” Johnson said, “and talk to other folks about it.” Davis also had a positive call to action: “Sometimes, especially studying climate change, the scale of the problem can seem daunting. But just being out in these landscapes…that fills me with optimism.”
Check out the episode here: Creative Applications of NBS to Protect and Preserve National Parks
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