Earth Week events at SCC - Dying Oceans - Biofuels and Climate Change

EARTH WEEK at Shoreline Community College

            Dying Oceans, Tuesday, April 19, 11:30am-12:20pm, Room 9202

            Biofuels and Climate Change, April 21, 7:00-8:30pm, Room 9208

The Global Affairs Center at Shoreline Community College  will present two great events as part of the college's celebration of Earth Week, which will be FREE to the public.

The first is on Tuesday, April 19, from 11:30am to 12:30pm,  a discussion on Ocean Acidification, featuring a panel with Meg Chadsey, Ocean Acidification specialist, Paul Williams, a Shellfish management policy advisor with Suquamish Tribe, and Dina Kovarik, Biology Faculty and Chair of the Biotechnology Lab Specialist Program of Shoreline Community College to help moderate the discussion.

Ocean Acidification is the decrease of the pH in the ocean caused by increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere which dissolves into oceans, rivers and lakes. Some of this carbon dioxide reacts with the water to form carbonic acid, thereby increasing ocean acidity. 

Increasing acidity is thought to have a range of possibly harmful consequences, such as depressing metabolic rates and immune responses in some organisms, and causing coral bleaching, and contributing to global warming.

The second program is Thursday, April 21st, from 7:00pm to 8:30pm., Biofuel and Climate Change.

We will be joined by our panelists Evan Henrich, Bioinformatics Intern with Matrix Genetics, Brian Young with Office of Economic Development and Competitiveness, and Chip Dodd, Geography and International Studies of Shoreline Community College to help moderate the discussion.

Can biofuels, fuels derived from recently alive plant materials (or manure), serve as the fuel of choice to power our nation's huge fleet of automobiles and trucks and power plants without adding to our climate change woes? In principle the answer should be yes. 

Because the carbon in plants is produced from taking carbon dioxide (CO2) out of the atmosphere via photosynthesis, burning those plant-derived fuels simply puts the same amount of CO2 back in the atmosphere -- sort of like no harm, no foul. . . . But being a winner in principle and being a winner in practice are two different things.

--Bill Chameides, Huffington Post, November 18, 2013

Join us for a discussion of the science and economics of biofuels and what it might mean for addressing the challenge of climate change.

There is a small fee for parking on campus during the day. Parking is FREE during the evening.

More Earth Week events here.