News and Events
A dose of nature: New UW initiative to spearhead research on health benefits of time outside
Time spent in nature can reduce anxiety and help you sleep better at night, experts have found. It also offers promising benefits for a range of health issues, including cardiovascular disease, depression and obesity.
But there are still many questions about how time in nature can help with these health conditions, and others. A new University of Washington initiative announced this week seeks to advance research on these questions, connecting academic researchers with pediatricians, childcare providers, mental health practitioners and others who work with various populations on critical health issues.
Can hiking help heal veterans with PTSD? Researchers seek to find out
One fall day on Washington’s Mount Rainier, Josh Brandon and a group of fellow active duty platoon leaders discovered something about the outdoors that could improve the lives of veterans.
It was September 2009 and the group had decided to make a late-season summit attempt of Washington’s highest peak as part of a team-building exercise. The platoon leaders, who were all members of the same infantry company, began their climb in the early morning hours.
Ocean Acidification and Temperature Worsening
Washington Ocean Acidification Center co-director Terrie Klinger talks to King 5’s Alison Morrow about ocean acidification and its effect on our region.
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UW professor of global health a lead author on new climate report
The United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, this week released a new document that looks at the impacts of global warming of 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 F) above preindustrial levels. That was the more ambitious goal established by governments in late 2015 through the Paris Agreement on climate. Governments committed to keeping the planet’s temperature from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 F) above preindustrial levels, but to aim for a change no greater than 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Read moreConversations with Sally Jewell: Federal Government and Environmental Policy
Environmental Conversations feature prominent environmental leaders and practitioners who share their perspective on real world environmental policymaking. In collaboration with the EarthLab, the Center for Environmental Politics will host three such conversations with Sally Jewell, drawing on her experience in the government, the for-profit and the non-profit sector. The first conversation will focus on federal government and environmental policy.
Sally Jewell served as U.S.
Former Interior Secretary Sally Jewell brings leadership to UW community, new EarthLab initiative
Sally Jewell has walked the halls of the White House and cared for a fifth of all U.S. land. She has practiced diplomacy at boardroom tables and leadership at one of the nation’s most successful outdoor retail companies. She has climbed Mount Rainier seven times.
Now, Jewell brings a lifetime of experience in business, nonprofits, government and the outdoors to the University of Washington, where one of her tasks is to help shape the future of EarthLab, a new university-wide institute that seeks to connect scholars with community partners to solve our most difficult environmental problems.
Introducing EarthLab
Harriet Bullitt Endowed Executive Director Ben Packard and Advisory Council Chair Sally Jewell introduce you to UW EarthLab. EarthLab is a new institute that stands at the intersection of science and humanity, focusing where society’s needs are greatest and true impact can be made.
Learn more about the role EarthLab plays as a boundary-spanning organization at the University of Washington.
Center for Creative Conservation transitions to EarthLab
Since its establishment, the Center for Creative Conservation has been a member of UW EarthLab along with others, like the Climate Impacts Group and the Washington Ocean Acidification Center. Now the Center and EarthLab are joining forces in a deeper way, with the Center becoming an integral part of EarthLab. Read about the changes below in a letter from Josh Lawler, Faculty Director for EarthLab and Ben Packard, Harriet Bullitt Endowed Executive Director of EarthLab.
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Reducing embodied carbon and operational emissions in buildings
Last week, at the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco, Microsoft announced it is the first large corporate user of a new tool to track the carbon emissions of raw building materials. Microsoft is piloting the tool, called the Embodied Carbon in Construction Calculator, or EC3, in the remodel of its 72-acre Seattle campus.
The open-source EC3, which is running on Microsoft Azure, was developed by Skanska with the University of Washington Carbon Leadership Forum, Interface and C-Change Labs.
Doris Duke Scholars engage underserved communities around environmental sustainability
Dedication. Passion. Determination. Resilience. Pride. The Doris Duke Conservation Scholars exuded these feelings and many others during the Conservation Scholar Summit, where individuals shared connections with their communities, cultures and environment. Most significantly, they planted their banners of belonging to the environmental movement — a fitting conclusion to the scholars’ summer.
ECOSS was fortunate to host two Doris Duke scholars this summer: Pheng Lor, a UC Berkeley student focusing on conservation and LGBT studies, and MaKail Crawford, hailing from Wesleyan University working on classics and Latino studies.