States of Matter

Over 70 percent of Americans: climate change worsening extreme weather Wind turbine in Minnesota, U.S. Photo by: Tiffany Roufs. According to a new poll, 74 percent of Americans agree that climate change is impacting weather in the U.S., including 73 percent who agreed, strongly or somewhat, that climate change had exacerbated record high temperatures over the summer. The findings mean that a large majority of Americans agree with climatologists who in recent years have found increasingly strong evidence that climate change has both increased and worsened extreme weather events. In the poll the majority of Americans say climate change likely worsened a number of recent extreme weather events, including 71 percent for the current drought and last year's unusually mild winter; 70 percent for this year's heatwave-rocked spring; and 64 percent for the derecho, an especially fierce and long-lasting windstorm, that hit the northeast in June. Related articles Nary a mention of climate change during U.S. presidential debate July 2012: hottest month in U.S. history

Interactive Whiteboard Lessons LessonPlanZ.com - Lesson Plans & Lesson Plan Resources for Teaching Math, Science, Social Studies, Language Arts, Reading, Writing, Thematic Units, Themes, Classroom Activities - preschool, kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school Lesson plans for teachers Common Core Implementation Kit enables the creation of a Common Core State Standards aligned lesson plan with a few easy clicks. Common Core operates from within Word 2013 and provides daily learning targets for Common Core State Standards, along with instructional notes, student friendly “I Can” statements, vocabulary lists, differentiation ideas, activity ideas, assessment ideas, common student misconceptions, and links to open educational resources aligned to the standards. Save time planning lessons and locating resources for your students The Common Core Implementation Kit is a free tool that makes it easy for teachers to create Language Arts and Math lesson plans aligned to the Common Core State Standards all from within Microsoft Word 2013. Common Core consists of a series of course-specific Microsoft Word templates that access Common Core information through a Microsoft Office Task Pane that is displayed next to the lesson plan document. System requirements

New Page 1 Videos Soil Erosion by Wind and its Control Produced by USDA-ARS-EWERU for NRCS, 2003. 35. min./Color. Also available in VHS & DVD and with closed captioning. Send request to: Wind Erosion Research A three-part educational video, which describe the physical basis for wind erosion processes and control systems. Soil Erosion by Wind and Its Control Part I: The Problem of Wind Erosion Part II: Processes of Wind Erosion Part III: Control of Wind Erosion Two years on at Chaitén « The Volcanism Blog Posted by admin in Chaitén, Chile, eruptions, volcanoes. Tags: Chaitén, Chile, volcanic eruptions trackback View of Chaitén caldera and lava dome before the May 2008 eruption (© Eric Manríquez). The eruption of Chaitén volcano in southern Chile began two years ago today, on 2 May 2008. Since that date eruptive activity at the volcano has continued uninterrupted: the intensity has varied, but the activity has never ceased. View from May 2009 of the Chaitén dome complex (courtesy Mr Javier Romero, Vialidad MOP, Puerto Montt). During the coming week, to mark the second anniversary of Chaitén’s awakening, there’ll be a series of posts here at the Volcanism Blog looking at various aspects – volcanological, social, economic and environmental – of this remarkable and endlessly fascinating eruption. Sequence of images of the Chaitén lava dome during March 2010 (SERNAGEOMIN). UPDATE. For all our Chaitén coverage: Chaitén « The Volcanism Blog.

QR Code Generator - create QR Codes online [business card, t-shirt, mug, 2D barcode, generate QR-Code] - goQR.me Hydroelectricity | Clean Energy Electricity from Hydropower Hydropower is considered a renewable energy resource because it uses the Earth's water cycle to generate electricity. Water evaporates from the Earth's surface, forms clouds, precipitates back to earth, and flows toward the ocean. The movement of water as it flows downstream creates kinetic energy that can be converted into electricity. Hydropower is mostly dependent upon precipitation and elevation changes; high precipitation levels and large elevation changes are necessary to generate significant quantities of electricity. Environmental Impacts Although hydropower has no air quality impacts, construction and operation of hydropower dams can significantly affect natural river systems as well as fish and wildlife populations. Although power plants are regulated by federal and state laws to protect human health and the environment, there is a wide variation of environmental impacts associated with power generation technologies. Air Emissions Water Resource Use

National Geographic Freshwater 101: Rivers Rivers and their tributaries are the veins of the planet, pumping freshwater to wetlands and lakes and out to sea. They flush nutrients through aquatic ecosystems, keeping thousands of species alive, and help sustain fisheries worth billions of dollars. Rivers are also the lifeblood of human civilizations. They supply water to cities, farms, and factories. Rivers carve shipping routes around the globe, and provide us with food, recreation, and energy. Hydroelectric plants built from bank to bank harness the power of water and convert it to electricity. But rivers are also often the endpoint for much of our industrial and urban pollution and runoff. Over the course of human history, waterways have been manipulated for irrigation, urban development, navigation, and energy. The Colorado River provides an excellent example of what happens when demand for river water—for cities, industry, energy production, and agriculture—threatens to outpace supply. River Facts

Colorado River Map Balancing Limited Supply With Increasing Demand The Colorado River Basin is a critical component of North American water supply, providing H2O to 30 million people and thousands of acres of farmland. When Colorado River withdrawals were first allocated among the river basin’s seven states, in 1922, the river held 17.5 million acre-feet (5.7 trillion gallons) of water. However, new science has shown that 1922 was part of an especially wet period. The river now averages about 14.7 million acre-feet per year and is allocated among seven states and Mexico. Water managers are trying to address growing challenges associated with over-allocation, rapidly increasing urban populations, development of unused water rights, and expected climate change.

Why We Remove Dams Over the past 100 years, the United States has led the world in dam building – blocking and and harnessing rivers for a variety of purposes, including hydropower, irrigation, flood control, and water storage. The US Army Corps of Engineers has catalogued at least 80,000 dams greater than 6 feet along the waterways of the United States – and at least tens of thousands of smaller dams pepper our rivers and streams. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt recently observed that, “on average, we have constructed one dam every day since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.” While dams can benefit society, they also cause considerable harm to rivers. Dams have depleted fisheries, degraded river ecosystems, and diminished recreational opportunities on nearly all of the nation’s rivers. Today, many dams are old, unsafe or no longer serve their intended purposes. How Do Dams Damage Rivers? 1. By diverting water for power, dams remove water needed for healthy in-stream ecosystems. 2. 3.

What’s So Bad About Dams, Anyway? In our line of work removing old dams to restore rivers, one of the most common questions people ask is “what’s so bad about dams, anyway?” It’s a great question and could be a short or long answer, depending on how detailed you want to get. I’ll attempt to summarize the key issues here. 1. Dams block movement of fish and other species. 2. 3. 4. 5. Hoover Dam Directions Views from a helicopter of Hoover Dam. Hoover Dam, once known as Boulder Dam, is a concrete dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River, on the border between Arizona and Nevada. It was built between 1931 and 1936 during the Great Depression. View of Hoover Dam with Lake Mead behind it. Hoover Dam is 30 miles from Las Vegas. Hoover Dam has no address. When driving from Las Vegas take I-515 South towards Boulder City. Shortly before you reach Boulder City, I-515 ends and Route 93 continues as a two lane highway to Hoover Dam. When driving to Hoover Dam from Las Vegas, stop at the parking garage on the left before you get to the dam.