Much news about the environment in 2017 focused on controversies over Trump administration actions, such as proposals to promote more use of coal and budget cuts at relevant federal agencies. At the same time, however, many scholars across the United States are pursuing innovations that could help create a more sustainable world. Here we spotlight five examples from our 2017 archives.

  1. Restoring the Rio Grande
    Gabriel Diaz Montemayor, assistant professor of landscape architecture at the University of Texas at Austin, proposes a bolder vision: greening the entire Rio Grande Valley, which forms more than half of the border.
  2. Making jet fuel from sugarcane
    Jet airplane travel is one of the world’s fastest-growing greenhouse gas emissions sources. For this and other reasons, including concerns about oil price spikes, there is growing interest in producing jet fuel from nonpetroleum sources.
  3.  A legal right to a clean environment
    West Virginia University legal researcher Nicholas Stump and his colleagues are exploring the Appalachia, where mining and logging have severely damaged the environment and polluted the air, water and soil.
  4. Stemming world hunger with marine microalgae
    Large-scale farm production pollutes air and water, generates greenhouse gas emissions and degrades soil. William Moomaw, professor of international environmental policy at Tufts University, and Asaf Tzachor, a Ph.D. candidate at University College London, see marine microalgae as a key untapped resource towards sustainably feeding the world's population.
  5. Understanding biodiversity in cities
    Geographer Christopher Swan of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, studies biodiversity in parks, backyards and other natural areas around the city of Baltimore. Swan wants to see what species thrive in cities and how human activities affect them.

Read the full article about an environmentally sustainable future by Jennifer Weeks at The Conversation.