Planning & Growth

Author Cynthia Barnett explains water-use truths and fallacies, offers tips for investigating water projects proposed for your audience area, and reports how some of the country’s most progressive engineers and local governments are showing that it’s absolutely possible to live with far less water.

A new United Nations Environment Programme report offers recommendations to help make refrigerants less of a greenhouse gas problem, while still addressing ozone concerns. Get tips here on how your reporting on this issue can range from the local to the global scale.

The chosen include 24 improving recreational access to rivers and waterways; 23 to construct new trails or improve recreation sites; 20 to create and enhance urban parks; 13 to conserve significant landscapes; and 11 to establish new national wildlife refuges; national park units, etc.

The agency says the remaining 17 sites covering ~285,000 acres in six states have the best solar gain and energy transmission traits, the fewest conflicts with environmental, cultural, and historic resources, and the best compatibility with each state's efforts. Public meetings commence Nov 30 and a 90-day public comment period ends Jan. 27, 2012. A variance process could be used to approve additional solar development elsewhere.

In June 2012, the nations of the world will convene in Rio de Janiero for the 20th anniversary of the landmark 1992 Rio Conference on Environment and Development that set the stage for a number of important treaties, including the Montreal Protocol to protect the ozone layer and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.