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Got a question? Ever wondered about something related to geography? Then ask away here. Every two weeks, Joe Blanton, director of our Research Correspondence division will post answers to three of the most interesting questions received via e-mail. Unfortunately time constraints preclude individual e-mail responses.
Names that Pack Punches
How do hurricanes get their names?
There are six alphabetical lists of names used for hurricanes. Each uses all the letters of the alphabet except Q, U, X, Y, and Z due to the scarcity of names starting with those letters. The lists rotate on a six-year cycle. Members of the World Meteorological Organization decide on the names used.
Weather forecasters began using given names for hurricanes in 1950 for a practical reason: Its easier to keep up with several storms at once if each has a distinctive name as opposed to a number. For years only female names were used. Equality arrived in 1979 with the inclusion of male names, which now alternate with female names. At this writing, Hurricane Lili is moving up the East Coast of the U.S. Look for Hurricanes Marco and Nana next.
If a hurricane causes a great deal of damage, its name is retired from the rotating lists. Thus far, the following names have been retired: Alicia, 1983; Allen, 1980; Andrew, 1992; Bob, 1991; Camille, 1969; David, 1979; Elena, 1985; Fredrick, 1979; Gilbert, 1988; Gloria, 1985; Hugo, 1989; and Joan, 1988.
I teach at an alternative high school for troubled children. I am discussing acid rain and its effects in an environmental science class. Many of my students feel that there is little hope for the future. I need an example of an area where the effects of acid rain have been reversed. Is there such a place?
One of the bright spots in the acid rain saga was the passage in 1990 of the Federal Clean Air Act. This legislation requires that industries find ways to reduce the amounts of pollutants they put into the air. By 1993, a New York Times article reported that researchers had found significant evidence that pollution linked to acid rain was declining. Concentrations of some of the key building blocks of acid rain had declined in rainwater collected at 26 of 33 sites monitored from 1980 to 1991 by the U.S. Geological Survey.
We are pleased that one project based right here at National Geographic has been a catalyst for change. Our National Geographic Kids Network, a computer network of classrooms around the.world, has for some years involved students in charting the acidity of water in their home regions. Students at Glens Falls Middle School in New Yorks Adirondack Mountains decided to take the project another step and do something about the acidity in their area. Their teacher, Rod Johnson, had told them that one aspect of the Federal Clean Air Act allows power plants to buy and sell allowances. Plants receive permission from the government to release certain amounts of sulfur dioxide, a major component of acid rain, into the atmosphere. If they are able to achieve a reduction in their sulfur dioxide emissions, they are free to sell or trade their remaining allowances. Thus there is an economic incentive to reduce the outflow. Other power plants and new factories are the usual buyers, but ordinary citizens are free to buy them as well and, in essence, take them off the market so nobody can use them. Each allowance taken off the market means one less ton of sulfur dioxide going into the air. The Glens Falls sixth graders worked hard to collect donations from their friends and families, raising a total of U.S. $3,000. With this money, they were able to buy 21 allowances, meaning that sulfur dioxide emissions were reduced by 21 tons.
That was back during the 1994-95 school year. The next class of sixth graders decided to up the ante and involve the entire school in the acid rain cleanup program. After a year of fund-raising events including auctions, bake sales and raffles, they raised U.S. $21,000, enough to buy 292 allowances! Thanks to those students, 292 fewer tons of sulfur dioxide have gone into the atmosphere of the United States.
I hope this will give your students hope and let them know that there are creative ways they can contribute to efforts to clean up the air.
Just what IS the National Geographic Society?
Im really glad you asked that one. The Society is the worlds largest nonprofit scientific and educational organization. It was founded in 1888 in Washington, D.C., for the increase and diffusion of geographic and scientific knowledge. Click here to find out more about the Societys history. To fulfill its goals, the Society has supported more than 5,700 exploration and research projects to study the earth, sea, and sky. It reaches an international audience not only through NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, which is circulated to more than nine million members, but also through its books, maps, atlases, educational films and software, childrens magazine, travel magazine, information services, public and cable television programming, and, of course, this Web site.
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