Latest News from the University of Miami

R ead about the latest research and science on climate change, sea-level rise, and sustainability.

May 20, 2016

Green U Hosts Sea-Level Rise Panel Discussion

CORAL GABLES, Fla. (April 11, 2016)—Green U kicks off UM’s Earth Week with a panel discussion on the financial, legal and policy implications of sea-level rise in South Florida.

Dozens of students, faculty, local government officials, and community members gathered on campus Monday to hear panelists discuss the legal, financial, and policy issues regarding sea-level rise in South Florida.

The discussion, entitled Sea-Level Rise and its Impacts on Coastal Policy in Southeast Florida and hosted by the University of Miami’s Office of Sustainability, Green U, kicked off the University’s Earth Week events.

Among many effects of climate change, sea-level rise in South Florida is already threatening local residents and businesses. With an estimated rise in sea levels along the South Florida coast ranging from three to six feet by the end of the century, how will communities be affected financially, legally, agriculturally, socially and in terms of health and wellbeing?

The panel discussion helped address these issues and more.

A topic that received considerable attention was how local governments may be held legally and financially responsible for failing to do enough to protect its citizens from the impacts of sea-level rise.

“Local governments may wind up having to pay millions to its constituents for failure to upgrade or maintain infrastructure, which increases vulnerabilities to sea-level rise,” said Thomas Ruppert, an attorney and a coastal planning specialist at the Florida Sea Grant Program.

Ruppert advocated for local governments thinking in all timescales, short- mid- and long-term, in preparing for sea-level rise consequences.

At the same time, however, “individuals have to be responsible, too, and local government can’t be held accountable as the ultimate purveyor of solutions,” noted Jim Murley, recently-appointed Miami-Dade County’s chief resilience officer.

“No one was forced to live in Miami and no one will be forced to leave. We have freedom of choice. Urban economics is a powerful thing. Probably more powerful than any policy we can implement,” said Murley.

Mitchell A. Chester, a civil trial lawyer and an editor for several online publications on the impacts of sea-level rise, is adamant about protecting the most vulnerable and less affluent communities in South Florida through financial, legal, housing, and social adaptation strategies. Those populations, he said, will be the first and worst hit by sea-level rise impacts and other climate change effects.

“If we continue to ignore this, ultimately this becomes a crime against humanity. Our kids will be climate refugees,” said Chester.

While local and state governments should do what they can to adapt to climate change and sea-level rise and protect natural ecosystems, Brian Soden, professor of atmospheric sciences at the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, said that “ultimately the fate of the Everglades and similar natural places is up to the federal government and working with other countries to lower carbon dioxide emissions.”

Mitigation at the global level should be combined with adaptation at a more local level, he said.

The discussion was moderated by Teddy Lhoutellier, Green U’s sustainability manager.

— Jessica M. Castillo / UM News

Please take a minute to review the University’s Climate Change Special Report at http://climate.miami.edu.

May 18, 2016

A Composite Future

University of Miami researchers unveil a new corrosion-resistant bridge made without a drop of steel.

CORAL GABLES, Fla. (May 18, 2016)—Across the country, billions of dollars are spent by federal and state governments on maintaining a deteriorating infrastructure of highway bridges that are crumbling due to exposure to salt and water.

In addition to the cost, these failing bridges are a public safety hazard to the millions of motorists and pedestrians who traverse the expanses daily.

The University of Miami’s College of Engineering has designed and helped build a bridge on its Coral Gables campus using cutting-edge materials to combat the corrosive effects of salt and water–particularly important to coastal areas of the country that will be impacted by rising seas due to climate change.

The 70-foot-long pedestrian bridge, dubbed the “Innovation Bridge,” was built without a slice of steel, making it resistant to corrosion.

The composite materials that make up this bridge, however, make it durable against the elements, a useful feature in the face of climate change. The pre-fabricated materials are also lightweight and durable.

At UM, the bridge will help students gain access to the main campus from the athletic field. Away from campus, others have taken notice of this one-of-a-kind technology.

A community in Citrus County, on Florida’s west coast, already has called UM College of Engineering professors to implement the technology in one of its bridges.

— Barbara Gutierrez / UM News

May 6, 2016

Race to Zero

UM Architecture and Engineering Students Compete in DOE’s Race To Zero

CORAL GABLES, Fla. (May 6, 2016)—UM School of Architecture Master of Science students Abhirajika Agrawal and Ariela Cassinelli, both of whom focus on sustainable building, were part of the first team from the University of Miami to enter the United States Department of Energy’s Race to Zero Student Design Competition. Bernardo Samuel Benzecry of the College of Engineering was the remaining member of the team, which was advised by UMSoA’s John Onyango, assistant professor and director for the Master of Science program, Wanda Zou, assistant professor at the College of Engineering and professional advisors Greg Hamra and Jonathan Burgess.

The US DOE website states that “The Race to Zero is an annual competition, open to students and faculty from any interested collegiate institution. The competition is based upon a real-world scenario where a builder is developing a new high performance home product line or needs to update an existing product line (house plan) to a high-performance house design. College teams are posed with a design problem and are asked to either create a new house design that satisfies the project requirements or redesign an existing floor plan.” The UM team focused on a site in South Miami, with a goal of low cost affordable housing that met the energy effficiency requirements of the competition.

Agrawal said the competition was a great opportunity, “something of a legend for those aspiring to practice sustainable architecture. This inter-disciplinary student competition entails a highly technical approach to designing Net Zero Energy Homes, far beyond the processes a regular architect would deploy. It was Dr. Onyango who introduced us to the challenge this year and guided us through our participation.”

“Designing Net Zero Energy buildings is much more than what we consider and conceive when we normally talk about ‘green buildings,’” Agrawal said. “We usually think of the standards set by LEED, the Living Building Challenge, WELL and other such rating systems. However, the science of NZE buildings has more to do with understanding of the building interaction with the surroundings, materiality, construction techniques, above and beyond the climatology and spatial logic in designing.”

“When we started, we barely understood the technical processes or even the terms. Picking from there, it was a long journey to understanding and implementing those technical processes and making use of new software,” Agrawal said. “It was a great platform for networking with other students and a hoard of professionals across states engaged in Net Zero Energy buildings. Though we learned a lot, there is still a big ground to cover. Going forward, I hope UM SoA becomes a permanent feature at the event. And given the learning involved in the process, perhaps the competition can serve as basis for an awesome interdisciplinary studio.”

The 2016 competition was held at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory campus in Golden, Colorado, which is “one of the largest Net Zero Energy Campus in the U.S., completely heated by heat ejected from their supercomputers,” according to Onyango.

Onyango said that, even though the UM team did not win, Agrawal went “above and beyond” in her efforts in the competition.

— Special to UM News

May 1, 2016

Dissolving Coral Reefs

MIAMI (May 1, 2016)—In a new study, University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science researchers found that the limestone that forms the foundation of coral reefs along the Florida Reef Tract is dissolving during the fall and winter months on many reefs in the Florida Keys. The research showed that the upper Florida Keys were the most impacted by the annual loss of reef.

Each year the oceans absorb CO2 from the atmosphere and become more acidic, a process called ocean acidification. Projections, based largely on laboratory studies, led scientists to predict that ocean pH would not fall low enough to cause reefs to start dissolving until 2050-2060.

For two years, the researchers collected water samples along the 200-kilometer (124-mile) stretch of the Florida Reef Tract north of Biscayne National Park to the Looe Key National Marine Sanctuary. The data provide a snapshot on the health of the reefs, and establish a baseline from which future changes can be judged.

The results showed that reef dissolution is a significant problem on reefs in the upper Keys with the loss of limestone exceeding the amount the corals are able to produce on an annual basis. As a result these reefs are expected to begin wasting away leaving less habitat for commercial and recreationally important fish species. Florida Keys’ reefs have an estimated asset value of $7.6 billion.

In the natural scheme of things in the spring and summer months, environmental conditions in the ocean, such as water temperature, light and seagrass growth, are favorable for the growth of coral limestone. While, during the fall and winter, low light and temperature conditions along with the annual decomposition of seagrass, result in a slowing, or small-scale loss of reef growth.

However, as atmospheric CO2 is absorbed by seawater, ocean pH declines. The result is that the natural summer growth cycle of coral is no longer large enough to offset the effects of dissolution from ocean acidification.

“We don’t have as much time as we previously thought,” said Chris Langdon, UM Rosenstiel School professor of marine biology and ecology, and a senior author of the study. “The reefs are beginning to dissolve away.”

“This is one more reason why we need to get serious about reducing carbon dioxide emission sooner rather than later,” said Langdon.

The data for the study were collected in 2009-2010. The researchers suggest that a more recent analysis should be conducted to see how the reefs are faring today.

“The worst bleaching years on record in the Florida Keys were 2014-2015, so there’s a chance the reefs could be worse now,” said Langdon.

The study, titled “Dynamics of carbonate chemistry, production and calcification of the Florida Reef Tract (2009-2010): evidence for seasonal dissolution,” was published in the May 2 issue of the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles. The co-authors include Langdon, UM Rosenstiel School alumnae Nancy Muehllehner and Alyson Venti, and David Kadko, now at Florida International University. National Science Foundation funded the study.

— Rosenstiel / UM News

April 4, 2016

Corals Under Stress

UM Rosenstiel School scientists test coral response to multiple environmental stressors

MIAMI (April 4, 2016)—A new study from researchers at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science found that multiple stressors might be too much for corals. The findings have important implications for the resilience of coral reefs to climate change.

Branched finger coral (Porites porites furcata) - James St. John — Branched finger coral (Porites porites furcata) – James St. John

To test the coral’s response to multiple environmental stressors at once, UM Rosenstiel School researchers placed Caribbean branching coral Porites porites in waters with high levels of carbon dioxide (900 parts per million) for two months to mimic high ocean acidification conditions. Following the preconditioning, half of the corals were then subjected to increased water temperatures for two months. Following the five-month period, the researchers analyzed the growth, feeding rates, and photochemical efficiency of their algal symbionts in both groups to understand how they responded to multiple environmental stressors. Many previous studies have assessed the effects of multiple stressors, but this study is novel because it is the first to precondition corals to high CO2 before exposing them to a thermal bleaching event.

Corals preconditioned to high CO2 levels before the increased temperatures showed 44 percent lower growth rates compared to the group that only experienced a single stress of increased carbon dioxide. The researchers suggest that preconditioning to elevated CO2 worsens coral response to thermal stress, which could potentially exacerbate the effects of climate change stressors on coral reefs.

“This study is similar to what corals will likely experience in nature in the coming decades,” said Erica Towle, a UM alumna and lead author of the study. “The findings improve our understanding of how reefs will respond to climate change in the future.”

The carbon dioxide level of 900 parts per million was chosen to represent the value projected by the IPCC for the year 2075 under a ‘business as usual’ scenario.

The new study, titled “Preconditioning to high CO2 exacerbates the response of the Caribbean branching coral Porites porites to high temperature stress,” was published in the March 21 issue of the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series. The study’s authors include: Erica Towle, Andrew Baker and Chris Langdon of the UM Rosenstiel School. The study was funded by a MOTE Marine Laboratories ‘Protect Our Reefs’ grant.

— Rosenstiel / UM News