Protecting Rivers & Your Clean Water
Cherry Blossoms: Ideal indicators of the impacts of climate change?
Fay Augustyn, Intermountain West Blue Trails Manager
March 29, 2012 | Water Pollution, Floods & Floodplains, Climate Change, Water Supply
Like much of the country, spring arrived surprisingly early in Washington D.C. this year. In fact, I didn’t feel like we had a real winter at all. A born and bred Midwesterner, I am used to freezing temperatures, down jackets and snow – lots of it. This year’s unusually warm winter in D.C. and around the country was puzzling for many of us. In fact, D.C.’s iconic cherry blossoms bloomed much earlier this year, which was attributed to the unseasonably warm temperature.
Read more »Green to Go Green for Clean Water in the Chesapeake
Liz G. Deardorff, Director, Clean Water Program Pennsylvania
March 22, 2012 | Water Pollution, Stormwater & Sewage, Floods & Floodplains
My office sits near the bank of the Susquehanna River in central Pennsylvania, so it was a treat to leave the office several days ago to travel downstream to where this 464 mile long river flows into the Chesapeake Bay at Havre de Grace, Maryland. I was there to attend an announcement of $4 million in new federal funding for local governments to use for green infrastructure, like green roofs, parks, and green streets, for cleaner water to help meet pollution reduction goals.
Read more »Portland, Oregon’s Flood Protection Success Story: Reducing Flood Risk and Restoring Floodplains along Johnson Creek.
March 15, 2012 | Water Pollution, Floods & FloodplainsLocated on the southeast side of Portland and on the eastern side of the Willamette River basin, Johnson Creek flows 26 miles west through six different jurisdictions and finally into the Willamette River. Although just a small portion (6 %) of Portland’s “100 year” floodplain is in the Johnson Creek watershed, it accounts for the majority (78%) of Portland’s repetitive flood loss claims.
Read more »Wake Up!
Fay Augustyn, Intermountain West Blue Trails Manager
March 14, 2012 | Water Pollution, Floods & Floodplains, Climate Change, Water Supply
In the last month there has been an outcry by members of Congress, states and the insurance industry to wake up and begin preparing for more large scale and extreme weather events. Illinois Senator Dick Durban commented early last week that it’s time we acknowledge the obvious fact that our climate is changing, and it’s time we do something about it.
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What’s the biggest flood in history? The one that floods you.
Eileen Fretz, Flood Policy Director
March 14, 2012 | Floods & Floodplains
I started writing this blog with the intention of talking about the biggest floods in United States history. But it quickly became a harder task when I tried to figure out how to measure the “biggest” flood. Is it by the amount of water? The most land covered? The most lives lost? The most property destroyed?
Read more »Why Rivers Flood
March 13, 2012 | Floods & FloodplainsFor millennia, floods have intrigued the human mind. No fewer than five civilizations have incorporated great deluges into their creation stories and it is not hard to understand why the power of water has shaped human culture when one stands on the rim of the Snake River Canyon in south-eastern Idaho and reflects on the fact that the sweeping and spectacular landscape was carved by a single, massive flood at the end of the last ice age.
Read more »Top Ten Flood Facts
March 12, 2012 | Floods & Floodplains, Climate ChangeThis week, American Rivers is blogging about floods and flood risk to take part in Flood Safety Awareness Week (March 12-16, 2012), a Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) educational initiative. Today we are highlighting our Top Ten Flood Facts – please join the conversation and let us know what other flood facts we’ve missed!
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