June 15, 2023 – Wildfires have become increasingly frequent due to climate change, with record occurrences in areas not historically prone to them. In California, wildfires and regional power shutoffs have cost billions and taken lives. For some 46 million Americans living next to forests – at what scientists call the “wildland-urban interface” (WUI) – […]
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Posted inCalifornia
Quantifying California’s Lithium Valley: Can It Power Our EV Revolution?
The Salton Sea geothermal field in California potentially holds enough lithium to meet all of America’s domestic battery needs, with even enough left over to export some of it. But how much of that lithium can be extracted in a sustainable and environmentally friendly way? And how long will the resource last? These are just a […]
Posted inSci/Tech
Wildfires Could Permanently Alter Alaska’s Forest Composition
Aug. 26, 2019 – This summer, Alaska has experienced record high temperatures and devastating wildfires. If such events become more frequent, how might that impact our northernmost forests? A team of researchers led by the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) projected that the combination of climate change and increased wildfires will […]
Posted inSci/Tech
Glassy menagerie of particles in beach sands near Hiroshima is fallout debris
May 13, 2019 – Mario Wannier, a career geologist with expertise in studying tiny marine life, was methodically sorting through particles in samples of beach sand from Japan’s Motoujina Peninsula when he spotted something unexpected: a number of tiny, glassy spheres and other unusual objects. Wannier, who is now retired, had been comparing biological debris […]
Posted inCalifornia
New Statistical Technique Finds La Nina Years More Favorable for Mountain Snowpack Than El Nino Year
April 30, 2019 – When there are multiple factors at play in a situation that is itself changing, such as an El Nino winter in a changing climate, how can scientists figure out what is causing what? Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have developed an advanced statistical method for quantifying and visualizing changes in […]
Posted inSci/Tech
First Direct Observations of Methane’s Increasing Greenhouse Effect at the Earth’s Surface
April 2, 2018 – Scientists have directly measured the increasing greenhouse effect of methane at the Earth’s surface for the first time. A research team from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) tracked a rise in the warming effect of methane – one of the most important greenhouse gases for […]