Canopy, Spring 2019 (PDF)

SPRING 2019 ALUMS MAKING A STRONGER, MORE SUSTAINABLE NEW HAVEN Page 16 A Growing Nation A group of F&ES students travels to Rwanda each year with faculty members Bill Weber and Amy Vedder to learn about wildlife conservation, ecotourism, and local culture. Students visit several national parks, including Nyungwe National Park in Rwanda, where sustainable land management practices like terrace farming (seen here) have become more commonplace. andy lee andy IN THIS ISSUE CANOPY Toolkit for an 'Apocalypse' 4 executive editor Keeping It in the Family 6 Matthew Garrett Director of Communications and Web Operations News & Notes 8 editors Kevin Dennehy Research Updates 13 Associate Director of Communications Josh Anusewicz Keeping It Local 16 Assistant Editor art director Out & About 24 Angela Chen-Wolf Design Manager A Post-Coal Future for Appalachia 26 designer Jamie Ficker Making the Invisible Visible 28 editorial advisory board Danielle Dailey, Kristin Floyd, Brad Gentry, Hannah Peragine It Takes a Network 30 Melanie Quigley, Os Schmitz, Karen Seto, and Julie Zimmerman dean In Defense of the Predator 32 Indy Burke Carl W. Knobloch, Jr. Dean Commencement 2019 37 contributors Katie Bleau Parting Thoughts From an F&ES Favorite 42 cover photo Matthew Garrett Class Notes 44 Canopy is published twice a year (spring and fall) by the In Memoriam 59 Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES). Editorial offices are located at Bookshelf 60 Sage Hall 205 Prospect Street New Haven, CT 06511 Endnote 61 [email protected] 203-436-4805 Every time you get a new email address, relocate, or change positions, please send us an update at [email protected]. If you keep us updated, we’ll keep you updated! Please send story suggestions to [email protected]. follow us! Students walk through This sunbird was spotted by @YaleFES linkedin.com/school/yalefes a longleaf pine savanna F&ES students at Giskura, near ecosystem in the Florida Nyungwe National Park in panhandle during the Rwanda, during an annual trip annual southern forestry overseen by faculty members spring field trip. For more ben zukowski Amy Vedder and Bill Weber. a.j. hudson photos, go to page 26. Copyright © 2019 Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies CANOPY SPRING 2019 3 PROFILE ALUMNI On those days, “you’d feel like, this is the definition of to make checking air quality — which, in India, also varies hell,” said Abhilasha Purwar ’17 M.E.M., who grew up in the drastically day to day — as easy as checking the weather, Toolkit for suburbs of Delhi. “This is as apocalyptic as it can get.” so users can make decisions about, for example, whether Despite that, she says, many people in India seem to to wear a mask when they’re outside or whether or not simply accept the air pollution conditions. Purwar wants to to go out at all. (After recently suffering heatstroke in an an ‘Apocalypse’ empower people to learn more about air quality so they can unseasonal heat wave, Purwar has decided to add heat both protect their own health and, eventually, spur broader wave warnings to the app as well.) BY GEOFFREY GILLER ’ 14 changes in air quality across the country. To do so, she and Of course, masks, air purifiers, and other products her company, Blue Sky Analytics, have launched an app designed to protect individuals from air pollution, called BreeZo. explained Purwar, are like putting “a Band-Aid on cancer.” In some ways, Purwar’s motivation for BreeZo is obvious: They may temporarily address the symptoms but do It’s hard to experience such devastating pollution and not nothing about the root cause. Not that she goes without feel the need to do something about it. She also knows that them: “I would not live in India without having access to The BreeZo app allows users without significant change, air pollution in India is only these products,” she adds. to compare air quality across time and location. going to worsen. Ultimately her ambitions She has a sense of her own ability to effect change — are much grander. She wants and she plans to try. Blue Sky Analytics to be the place “Otherwise, 10 years from today, what would I tell companies in India go to for myself?” said Purwar, who also attended the Indian Institute geospatial data and analysis. of Technology and is a Fulbright scholar. “The system has She believes that by making it given me the best education possible, the best network.” “as easy … to access this high- BreeZo takes advantage of existing datasets. A network quality environmental data as it is of air quality monitors around India provides high-quality, to order your Uber,” she can help real-time data run by the government and some private companies who want to improve companies; lower-cost monitors are also deployed by their environmental impact. individuals and smaller businesses. These on-the-ground By reducing barriers to getting measurements are coupled with satellite imagery that the data they need, Purwar hopes captures reflectance across multiple spectra, from which to make it easier for companies to different contributors to air pollution — such as nitrogen implement existing solutions — In New Delhi, as in many other parts of India, oxides and sulfur dioxide — can be parsed out. for example, by building power the air pollution crisis is painfully obvious Purwar said that her team didn’t need to build the models plants that use leftover crops as to any observer. On the worst days, the air is that convert this imagery into data, as NASA, the European biofuel instead of burning them hazy, obscuring even nearby buildings; Space Agency, and universities already do so. Instead, the in the fields. The smoke from it’s unhealthy to be outside without a mask company is compiling the data into a form that can show those burning crops is a major for any amount of time. The amount of at a glance what the historical and recent air quality has contributor to the deadly haze in airborne particulate matter 2.5 microns in been at locations across India, displayed as a reading on the New Delhi and elsewhere in India. National Air Quality Index, which goes from zero (best) Referring to the app, she said, diameter or smaller can be more than 20 times to 500 (worst). “I think it has potential for real higher than what’s considered a safe level, When she lived in New Haven, with its unpredictable change and real impact.” especially from October through December. New England climate, Purwar noticed that she and her classmates checked the weather forecast every day. She wants courtesy of abhilasha purwar of abhilasha courtesy 4 YALE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY & ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES CANOPY SPRING 2019 5 PROFILE STUDENT Tell us about your project. How did you become involved in these issues? I’m starting in the Lowcountry of South Carolina; In part, my inspiration is personal. My parents are Jamaican Keeping It specifically, I’m exploring a timber investment management expatriates and are very spiritual. Although we lived in the organization model in which I can work with landowners Greater New York area, my parents instilled in us a reverence to create a range of opportunities for income generation, for the land. A few years ago, my dad moved to South in the Family sustainable forest management plans, and an infrastructure Carolina and started cultivating farmland. However, when for generational wealth. My big question is: How does there was a legal challenge to his ownership, his sweat equity Existing laws pertaining to land ownership often this segment of the population take advantage of the and capital investment were immaterial. The vision of an leave American families vulnerable to property opportunities that are available to those with legitimate enterprising organic farm was unceremoniously terminated, loss, depriving future generations of their rightful claim to their land and access the capital necessary to and he was forced to vacate the property. Less than a month inheritance. Tes Myrie is trying to change that. manage their land for income in perpetuity? after learning of this, I met Sam Cook, who delivered a powerful presentation about his work in South Carolina with heirs’ property. BY ALLEGRA LOVEJOY WIPRUD ’ 20 What circumstances are these landowners In that sense it has been very recent, but in another sense generally experiencing? it is also a longstanding interest. I studied economic history On average, these families hold 10 to 25 acres inherited as an undergraduate, focusing on the transatlantic slave trade from preceding generations with diminishing capacity to and its effects on the current world economic order. This work capture and maximize the value of their land. They are often is part of a larger vision of which I am just one small part. older and looking for some steady income as they plan to retire but are not sure how to do that with their land. One of the big challenges people face is the “heirs’ property Where do you hope to go with this in the future? conundrum,” where land is passed down without clear title. My plan is to continue this work in Mozambique to ensure There has to be a generational continuum so that members that its state-owned land is properly managed for long-term of the next generation — including those who have migrated sustainability and for strong income generation, down into to urban centers — do not lose their connection to the land the local communities. There has to be, at some point, vertical and better understand their rights and responsibilities as integration where all parts of the supply chain are directly tied matthew garrett matthew owners and stewards of the land.

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