What: UBC Okanagan’s Distinguished Speaker Series—Dark Days at Noon: The Future of Fire
Who: Environmental advocate Edward Struzik
When: Wednesday, March 22, 7 pm
Venue: Kelowna Community Theatre, 1375 Water St.

When a wildfire burns through a community, it can leave a trail of destruction, devastation and distress. What if it didn’t have to?

On Wednesday, March 22, UBC Okanagan’s Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science presents Edward Struzik as part of its Distinguished Speaker Series.

Struzik is a highly respected environmental advocate, award-winning writer, photographer, educator and fellow at Queen’s University Institute for Energy and Environmental Policy.

His writings have appeared in various publications including Canadian Geographic and Scientific American, and his photographs have been featured in books, magazines and exhibitions curated by organizations such as the Smithsonian in Washington, DC.

He was also recently featured in National Geographic’s documentary The Last Ice, and is a member of the New York Times Bog Squad—a group of scientists, researchers and experts who answer readers’ questions about the role that bogs, fens and other peat-accumulating wetlands play in climate change and biodiversity.

During his presentation, Struzik will share his perspectives on wildfire, its impact on air and water quality as well as how communities can live with fires that are burning bigger, more often and are increasingly putting people in harm’s way.

He will also discuss his latest book, Dark Days at Noon: The Future of Fire, which explains how fire is part of the natural landscape, and explores its history and modern society’s misguided response to it.

Finally, he will explain how factors such as environmental racism, aggressive firefighting strategies and political indifference have left North America vulnerable to future fires.

The Distinguished Speaker Series brings compelling speakers to the Okanagan to share their unique perspectives on issues that affect our region, our country and our world.

This community event is free and open to the public, but registration is required.

For registration details, please visit: science.ok.ubc.ca/about/community-engagement/distinguished-speaker-series

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A team of international researchers monitoring the impact of climate change on large rivers in Arctic Canada and Alaska determined that, as the region is sharply warming up, its rivers are not moving as scientists have expected. Dr. Alessandro Ielpi, an Assistant Professor with UBC Okanagan’s Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science, is a landscape scientist and lead author of a paper published this week in Nature Climate Change. The research, conducted with Dr. Mathieu Lapôtre at Stanford University, along with Dr. Alvise Finotello at the University of Padua in Italy, and Université Laval’s Dr. Pascale Roy-Léveillée, examines how atmospheric warming is affecting Arctic rivers flowing through permafrost terrain. Their findings, says Dr. Ielpi, were a bit surprising. “The western Arctic is one of the areas in the world experiencing the sharpest atmospheric warming due to climate change,” he says. “Many northern scientists predicted the rivers would be destabilized by atmospheric warming. The understanding was that as permafrost thaws, riverbanks are weakened, and therefore northern rivers are less stable and expected to shift their channel positions at a faster pace.” This assumption of faster channel migration owing to climate change has dominated the scientific community for decades. “But the assumption had never been verified against field observations,” he adds. To test this assumption, Dr. Ielpi and his team analyzed a collection of time-lapsed satellite images—stretching back more than 50 years. They compared more than a thousand kilometres of riverbanks from 10 Arctic rivers in Alaska, the Yukon and Northwest Territories, including major watercourses like the Mackenzie, Porcupine, Slave, Stewart and Yukon. “We tested the hypothesis that large sinuous rivers in permafrost terrain are moving faster under a warming climate and we found exactly the opposite,” he says. “Yes, permafrost is degrading, but the influence of other environmental changes, such as greening of the Arctic, counteracts its effects. Higher temperatures and more moisture in the Arctic mean the region is greening up. Shrubs are expanding, growing thicker and taller on areas that were previously only sparsely vegetated.” This growing and robust vegetation along the riverbanks means the banks have become more stable. “The dynamics of these rivers reflect the extent and impact of global climate change on sediment erosion and deposition in Arctic watersheds,” Dr. Ielpi and his colleagues write in the paper. “Understanding the behaviour of these rivers in response to environmental changes is paramount to understanding and working with the impact of climate warming on Arctic regions.” Dr. Ielpi points out that monitoring riverbank erosion and channel migration around the globe is an important tool that should be widely used to understand climate change. As part of this research, a dataset of rivers found in non-permafrost regions and representative of warmer climates in the Americas, Africa and Oceania was also analyzed. Those rivers migrated at rates consistent with what was reported in previous studies, unlike those in the Arctic. “We found that large sinuous rivers with various degrees of permafrost distribution in their floodplains and catchments, display instead a peculiar range in migration rates,” says Dr. Ielpi. “Surprisingly, these rivers migrate at slower rates under warming temperatures.” The time-lapse analysis shows that the sideways migration of large Arctic sinuous rivers has decreased by about 20 per cent over the last half-century. “The migration deceleration of about 20 per cent of the documented Arctic watercourses in the last half century is an important continent-scale signal. And our methodology tells us that 20 per cent may very well be a conservative measure,” he says. “We’re confident it can be linked to processes such as shrubification and permafrost thaw, which are in turn related to atmospheric warming. “Scientific thinking often evolves through incremental discoveries, although great value lies in disruptive ideas that force us to look at an old problem with new eyes,” states Dr. Ielpi. “We sincerely hope our study will encourage landscape and climate scientists elsewhere to re-evaluate other core assumptions that, upon testing, may reveal fascinating and exciting facets of our ever-changing planet.” The post Arctic river channels changing due to climate change, scientists discover appeared first on UBC Okanagan News.

Parents, you’ve been seen.

New research from UBC Okanagan’s Alanna Shwed has revealed what many parents may already know—packing lunches for your kids has always been stressful, and it got worse during COVID-19.

Findings from Shwed’s study show a need for better support to help ease the burden parents experience when packing their child’s school lunch during an already extremely stressful time.

Shwed undertook the work as a research assistant during her Master of Science degree in Kinesiology at Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario. She is now pursuing a doctorate at UBCO.

It was conversations with her master’s supervisor Dr. Brenda Bruner and Dr. Kristen Ferguson—both working mothers who pack lunches—that led to this research. They wanted to know if other parents were thinking the same thing: what happens at school lunchtime in a pandemic?

“Mostly it came out of curiosity,” Shwed says, “but also from lived experiences of being parents themselves. The pandemic affected everyone, especially parents. We wanted to find out whether there’s a way that we can more creatively support parents.”

The research began before COVID-19 heaped more pressure on parents trying to balance their children’s nutritional needs and their wants.

Rather than shelve their work until after pandemic restrictions eased, Shwed and her colleagues used it to sharpen their focus.

They recruited nearly 300 participants from parent-specific Facebook groups across Ontario. The parents then completed a detailed, online survey about lunch packing habits. Shwed’s team also scoped all earlier research into the subject to design their survey.

They found sizable shifts.

Some schools restricted access to microwaves while others asked children to take all their garbage home with them.

“When you send your child to school with a yogurt, unless they’re washing the container clean, you’re getting some of that yogurt back in the lunch bag at the end of the day,” she says.

Other schools reduced eating time or changed where students ate lunch. And some teachers were limited in how they could help students with packaging or opening lids.

“Parents told us they’d have to practice,” Shwed says. “They’d get their kids to test out what’s going to work, and what’s not going to work. Before the pandemic teachers used to be able to help kids, so it wasn’t something parents necessarily had to think about.”

The data could help parents and teachers understand each other and the stress of school lunches, better, Shwed says.

Her study finds parents would benefit from more transparency behind the reasons for at-school policies, and schools and school systems are reminded of at-home realities.

“Moving forward, there is opportunity for providing support for parents, for teachers, for school administration to make sure that kids are eating enough and have enough time to eat so they can get through the day,” Shwed says “That’s going to make the day easier for teachers and the evening easier for parents.”

The study appears in the Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research.

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As climate change continues to intensify wildfire season in British Columbia, the heavy smoke that frequently settles over vineyards can seep into the grapes and create ashy, smoky or medicinal-tasting wine.

New UBC Okanagan research examines how these wines are being tested and suggests a better chemical marker for predicting smoke taint.

Dr. Wesley Zandberg, an Associate Professor of Chemistry in the Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science, collaborated on new research published recently in the journal Molecules. Key participants in this project included researchers at Kelowna-based Supra Research and Development and the University of Adelaide.

The teams studied 10 Okanagan wines produced in 2018, a serious fire season. All wines were perceptibly influenced by smoke exposure. Three wines were on the market but identified as “smoke affected” and seven were never marketed because of the high levels of smoke taint detected after fermentation.

Researchers sent these tainted wines—as well as model wines deliberately fortified with carefully determined concentrations of chemicals linked to the aroma of smoke—to nine commercial and research laboratories around the world to compare concentration results and assess testing accuracy.

The nine laboratories had very similar—and accurate—results in calculating the concentrations of generally accepted markers of smoke taint like guaiacol and 4-methylguaiacol.

However, they had much lower accuracies for other volatile phenols and particularly for free cresols—a class of related compounds. Not only were the laboratories less accurate in identifying these free cresols, but the calculated concentrations of these free cresols in the tainted wines varied significantly between each lab.

“It’s important to notice that just because these chemical markers of smoke taint are there and can be measured or tasted, that doesn’t mean you have a tainted product,” says Dr. Zandberg. “That’s why it’s important to distinguish between smoke-tainted and smoke-affected wine. Just because smoke can be perceived doesn’t mean necessarily the wine is tainted, since this can be subjective.”

For example, people might appreciate the taste or smell of smoke in wine. Smoke can add to a wine’s profile depending on the balance of other tastes and consumer preferences, he says. However, if the smoke taste is beyond what a majority of people would enjoy, it becomes smoke tainted.

The paper notes that some volatile phenols naturally occur at high levels in certain species of grapes like Shiraz, which is associated with a peppery taste. Guaiacol can also be present in significant levels after wine matures in oak barrels.

In a related project, Dr. Zandberg’s team is currently working on defining the normal levels of naturally occurring phenols in years unaffected by wildfire smoke.

These sensory evaluations included the smoke-tainted Okanagan wines along with several untainted Australian vintages.

Judges differentiated between fruitiness and acidity and the sensory evidence of smoke exposure, like cold ash, medicinal or burnt rubber aromas and flavours, as well as an ashy aftertaste.

Interestingly, concentrations of free cresols—the same compounds that the laboratories were least accurate in identifying—were most strongly correlated to the taste and smell of smoke taint in the sensory tests.

Wildfire smoke will continue to impact Okanagan vineyards and those around the world, Dr. Zandberg says. While the taint will vary between regions, because it is determined by the vegetation that has been burnt, his ongoing research will help wine producers better protect their products.

“This kind of research is valuable because it can provide more accurate and more regionally relevant risk assessment tools,” says Dr. Zandberg. “It can importantly help wine producers connect chemical measurements to the taste and smell of their product, and that leads to improved ways to potentially mitigate this problem and reduce smoke taint in Okanagan wines.”

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If the United Nations’ prediction is accurate, the world’s 8 billionth baby will be born on Nov. 15.

The UN’s World Population Prospects 2022 says the earth will crest 8 billion just before India surpasses China as the globe’s most populous nation—expected in 2023. Further, the UN predicts the world’s population will peak at 10.4 billion in the 2080s.

Yet, that same United Nations estimates 821 million people are undernourished, many of them being low-income consumers, women and children who are especially vulnerable. How will we feed and house all these people? What will they do for work? Who will teach them and keep the laws?

What is a world to do?

UBC Okanagan professors and researchers are acutely aware of the challenges that population growth presents. They are also keenly aware of the hard work necessary to navigate the planet’s growing population. Here is how their research is intersecting with population growth.

Robert Godin researches sustainable energy with a focus on the development of photocatalysts which can harness solar energy to sustainably produce high-energy chemical fuels such as hydrogen. He says technology has created something of a run-on effect with energy.

Robert Godin, Assistant Professor of Chemistry. Tel: 250 807 8438. Email: robert.godin@ubc.ca

“A transition to sustainable energy in a world with 8 billion people is not only possible, but necessary. Population growth and increases in quality of life have driven the constant increase in energy demand. Yet, improved energetic efficiencies don’t balance the growth and often result in even greater energy consumption by making technology more accessible.”

Ross Hickey teaches management and economics at UBC. His research on charitable giving in Canada considers the distributional consequences of population growth. In particular, he studies how Canadians give to help others overseas.

“Population growth can be a major contributor to economic growth, but there are trade-offs: that growth may not be shared equally and the environmental costs associated with more people, goods and services may be difficult to address.”

Ross Hickey, Associate Professor of Economics. Tel: 250 807 8653. Email: ross.hickey@ubc.ca

Katrina Plamondon’s contributions to a global pandemic treaty are made possible through her research into vaccine equity at UBC Okanagan. A 2020 Michael Smith Health Research Scholar, Plamondon leads national dialogue about equity and Canada’s role in global health research, with a special focus on issues of vaccine equity.

“Our collective, global health, solidarity and obligations to others beyond our own borders in the world matters. This requires us to think very differently about the planet, beyond international health.”

Katrina Plamondon, Assistant Professor of Nursing. Tel: 250 807 8681. Email: katrina.plamondon@ubc.ca

Joanne Taylor is a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Postdoctoral Fellow in agricultural climate change adaptation and food security policy. Her work is at the crossroads of sustainable agriculture, climate change and population growth.

“Much of the global population is dependent on an industrialized food system that is currently at capacity and unable to fulfil global food demand due to stressors such as burgeoning population growth, inflation, inequality and catastrophic climate change which is severely impacting food security for the most vulnerable. It is imperative that agricultural adaptation is implemented and practised alongside mitigation policies as a key strategy to becoming more resilient in an increasingly extreme climate. More importantly, humanity must consider alternative food practices such as Indigenous food production and small-scale farming.”

Joanne Taylor, Postdoctoral Fellow. Email: joanne.taylor@ubc.ca.

Lisa Tobber and her team of structural engineering researchers adopt a holistic perspective that considers the social, environmental and economic factors behind the vast engineering problems faced today. Combating natural disasters and the climate crisis takes the ingenuity and creativity of an inclusive group of diverse individuals with a range of expertise and lived experiences.

“Structural engineers will be challenged to build much-needed infrastructure to be safe, sustainable, resilient to climate disasters and earthquakes, quick to construct and economical. We need the construction industry to be innovation leaders, exploring the use of new materials, systems and tools. We also need to think about building for the future, design for the life cycle of the building and design for deconstruction.”

Lisa Tobber, Assistant Professor of Engineering. Email: lisa.tobber@ubc.ca.

Nathan Pelletier is an industrial ecologist and ecological economist whose research addresses the intersection of food system sustainability measurement and management.

“Access to food of sufficient quality and quantity is a fundamental human right that is currently denied to hundreds of millions of people. Food systems are also a key driver of environmental change, as well as particularly susceptible to increasing climate unpredictability. Identifying means to sustainably feed the growing human population constitutes a profound challenge whose resolution requires research to identify and support implementation of a spectrum of technological interventions, dietary changes and redistributive efforts.”

Nathan Pelletier, Associate Professor of Biology. Tel: 250 807 8245. Email: nathan.pelletier@ubc.ca.

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