In The News: Department of Geoscience
A new study shows that even low doses of asbestos fibers found around the Lake Mead area make mice sick. The study was conducted to understand whether rocks in Boulder City are toxic and cause negative health effects.
More than 80 percent of land in Nevada is publicly owned. This wealth of open space is a treasure trove for paleontologists. Their digs into the dirt can teach us about what our world was and hint at issues we might have to confront tomorrow.
If the Trump Administration plans to shrink national monuments in Nevada—as it does in Utah, according to documents obtained today by The Washington Post—groups supporting Gold Butte and Basin and Range National Monuments have readied a litigious rebuttal.
Conservation groups hoped a new national monument would halt mining, but President Obama passed on the proposal.
Timed to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service, the book “Conserving America’s National Parks” by local author Scott R. Abella tells the story of challenges and successes in conservation efforts in the United States’ more than 400 national parks. Illustrated with 247 photos, maps and sketches, the book explores topics such as the return of wolves and panthers to parks, the removal of dams to restore salmon runs, efforts to save trees infected by pests and adaptation to changes brought on by drought, contamination and climate change. Of local interest are sections on Tule Springs Fossil Beds National Monument and the drought’s impact on Lake Mead National Recreation Area. Visit sites.google.com/site/conservingnationalparks.
Half a dozen seismic faults along the Nevada-California border — including two within 60 miles of Reno and one about 100 miles from Las Vegas — appear primed to unleash a moderate to major earthquake, according to a new study.
Conservationists and other campaigners are urging President Obama to designate 1.7 million acres of the Canyon watershed a national monument before he leaves office