Good News for the Biosphere at-a-Glance!
Wild Rice Sues State of Minnesota for the Right to Exist
Last August, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources was sued by wild rice. The case of Manoomin v Minnesota Department of Natural Resources alleges that the Minnesota DNR infringed on the wild rice’s right to live and thrive. The Ojibwe name for wild rice is Manoomin, which translates to “the good berry.” It has long played an important role in Ojibwe cultures, but last year, Manoomin took on a new role: plaintiff in a court case. But can wild rice sue a state agency? The short answer is: yes. This is the story about what might happen if rice wins Thanks to Karen Shan for this news, listen to podcast here.
Elders are Radicalizing in a Global Movement to Rescue the Human Future!
There is rising wrath, out there in Elderland. The Elders, it seems, are no longer happy to look on as a bunch of corporates and their political stooges pillage the planet and lay waste their grandchildren’s future. With growing resolve, resources and organization, older people are fighting back. Rather than sitting meekly in their retirement homes, the elders are getting out there, getting themselves arrested and making their opinions felt by the politicians and plutocrats who have ignored them for half a century. Julian Cribb, describes this movement in his blog post. He is a board member of The Council for the Human Future (CHF) which was established to raise global awareness of humanity's growing existential emergency, comprising ten catastrophic risks, and help devise solutions to them all. is a not-for-profit alliance of scientists and concerned global citizens dedicated to understanding and solving the greatest challenge ever to face humanity: the combination of catastrophic threats that face us all. See their turnaround plans here.
A Start Up Discovers How to Use Greenhouse Gas to Make Fiber
With the climate crisis becoming worse, It’s an “all hands on deck” drill to save the biosphere from burning to unlivable conditions. The fashion industry has a massive carbon footprint, partly because fabric usually requires a lot of CO2 from of all the inputs required to produce the fabric. But inside a lab in San Leandro, California, Rubi a startup uses enzymes to “eat” carbon emissions and turn them into cellulose, which it is then using to make textiles that are carbon-negative (reduce more carbon than they consume). Read more here.
An Ohio Conservation Group Acquires Mineral Rights of Coal Mine
This is an innovative way for a land conservancy to directly fight the climate crisis by purchasing ownership of mineral rights to sequester coal/oil deposits under the property they eventually want to protect. The Athens Conservancy recently acquired the mineral rights of a strip mine with intentions to place the mineral rights in Trust and leave the coal resources in the ground and in this case closing down the only active coal mine in the county. The conservancy estimates their acquisition could keep about 30 million tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Find out more about the project here.
Our Biosphere - Is defined as that part of the Earth in which living organisms exist (the entire zone of life). As such, it is viewed as all the places that support life and includes the overlapping zones of the atmosphere, the upper part of the geosphere, and all of the hydrosphere. Or more simply; any place on Earth where life can exist. Not protecting our Biosphere is the root cause for most of the critical environmental, social and economic disasters we face today in the Anthropocene Era.
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