#forest

marylandmatters.org

'A great tree has fallen': Remembering Walter Boynton, pioneering Bay scientist

By Timothy B. Wheeler The Chesapeake Bay Journal Walter Boynton, one of the Chesapeake Bay’s preeminent scientists and communicators, died Sept. 14 after a long illness, leaving a legacy of more than 50 years of pioneering research and advocacy for his adopted watershed. He was 79. Scientific colleagues and many others who worked with Boynton over the decades mourned his death but hailed his contributions in the laboratory as well as in the community at large. Beth Polidoro, director of the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, where Boynton worked, called him “an icon of Chesapeake Bay science whose research and leadership profoundly shaped our understanding of the Bay.” Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm, president of University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, of which CBL is a part, hailed Boynton “not only for his contributions to science, but also for his warmth, wisdom and humanity.” Patuxent Riverkeeper Fred Tutman put it more vividly: “A great tree has fallen in our midst,” he wrote on Facebook. Born and raised in Massachusetts, Boynton first came to the CBL in Solomons in 1969 as a summer intern. He returned in 1975 to join the faculty there after earning his doctorate in systems ecology from the University of Florida...

scienceblog.com

The EPA's 2022 inventory puts total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions at 6,343.2 million metric tons of CO₂ equivalent, and notes that the country's forests, croplands,

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s most recent full accounting, the 2022 Inventory of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks, puts total national emissions at 6,343.2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. The same inventory notes that forests, croplands, grasslands, wetlands, and settlements together absorbed enough carbon to offset roughly 13 percent of that gross number, leaving the land sector as a net sink rather than another smokestack on the ledger. That single line, buried in a technical appendix, is one of the more consequential facts in American climate accounting. It is also a fact the country may soon stop measuring. The EPA has proposed permanently removing reporting obligations for most categories of industrial facilities under the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, the data pipeline that has fed the national inventory. In the months since, the agency has extended reporting deadlines, by which point the rule stripping the requirement may already be final. What the 2022 inventory captured, in other words, is a snapshot of something the federal government is in the process of no longer looking at. What the 6,343.2 million metric ton figure actually contains The gross number sums carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and a set of fluorinated gases,...

www.wri.org

RELEASE: Global Forest Watch Becomes Global Nature Watch, Expanding to Cover More ...

Global Nature Watch’s AI-driven Horizon platform is now available in preview, with data on forests and other key ecosystems. Existing Global Forest Watch users will continue to have access to the forest data, tools and workflows they rely on through Global Nature Watch. Over time, a new look and improved user experience will be introduced alongside new capabilities and coverage. Washington, D.C. (September 21, 2026) — World Resources Institute (WRI) today announced that Global Forest Watch (GFW), one of the world's most widely used environmental monitoring platforms, is now Global Nature Watch (GNW). Building on more than a decade of trusted forest monitoring through GFW, Global Nature Watch is expanding beyond forests to help people better understand and manage the world’s lands — supporting better decisions for livelihoods, climate stability and biodiversity. As part of this evolution, a new AI-driven platform, Horizon, is now available on Global Nature Watch in preview. It combines data across land ecosystems with advances in AI, Earth observation and geospatial technologies — making complex nature data easier to find, understand and use for people with different technical backgrounds, languages and levels of experience with mapping tools. Global Forest Watch users will continue to have access...