Spring 2023
It’s in the water
PFAS, forever chemicals, are modern minutia that’s now seen as a very big and widespread problem. » More ...
Environmental Studies
Summer 2022
Permanence
The ancient Roman architect Vitruvius conceived of three primary virtues for structures: beauty, utility, and firmitas, a term that can be translated as permanence. Naturally, buildings can’t be crafted to last through time immemorial. What is permanence if even stone monuments wear away into sand?
Moreover, as Washington State University architecture professor Ayad Rahmani asks in this issue’s essay, maybe the longevity of structures should be questioned. Rahmani writes about Frank Lloyd Wright’s organic view of buildings and their inevitable decay, and that we should perhaps consider their “measured return to the earth.”
We don’t really expect our buildings to last forever, but we rely … » More …
Winter 2021
The great recession
From satellite observation to boots on the ground, Northwest climate patterns and declining snowpack are laid bare. » More ...
Winter 2021
Plastic
Piling up without foreseeable end, Washington State University researchers work to solve the “plastics problem.” » More ...
Summer 2020
In our new backyard
A portrait of resilience from the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens to the COVID-19 pandemic » More ...
Summer 2020
Great floods from simple sources
Farming on floodplains support both good agriculture and biodiversity, which inspires Jordan Jobe from WSU Puyallup Extension to educate on the worth of floodplains. » More ...
Summer 2020
Remains of the day
When the ash fell on May 18, 1980, faculty and students at WSU gathered it, bagged it, and placed it in barrels. The volcanic ash still waits for examination four decades later. » More ...
Summer 2020
A natural understanding
What we don’t know is immense. Natural history can be a profound catalyst for understanding. » More ...
Summer 2020
Mount St. Helens: The aftermath and lessons learned
The sky was falling. And Richard “Dick” Mack gathered a group of graduate students to help collect it. In the first few days after Mount St. Helens erupted—sending some 540 million tons of ash over an area of 22,000 square miles—the WSU ecology professor was already thinking of its potential research value.
Mack‚ now a professor emeritus in WSU’s School of Biological Sciences, spent the summer of 1980 doing field work between Pullman and Vantage, studying the effects of the ash on vegetation—particularly native plants, such as certain willows and grasses. For about five years or so after that, he and … » More …
Spring 2020
To Think Like a Mountain: Environmental challenges in the American West
Niels Sparre Nokkentved
WSU Press: 2019
“Thinking like a mountain” is the name of a short essay from Aldo Leopold’s 1949 book A Sand County Almanac. In it, he reflects on an old wolf he shot and killed as a young hunter and how he came to realize wolves play a critical role between prey, such as deer and elk, and the flora of the forest and other natural habitats. He lamented humans need to learn to think … » More …