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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper

The Spokesman-Review Newspaper The Spokesman-Review

Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

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News >  Nation/World

Earth to hit critical warming threshold by early 2030s, climate panel says

UPDATED: Mon., March 20, 2023

The report published Monday by the world's leading climate science body, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, summarizes the panel's output over the past five years, amounting to some 10,000 pages of dense scientific prose. This synthesis is succinct at 37 pages, and its message is blunt: Burning fossil fuels is threatening human well-being and the stability of much of life on Earth, and our chance to avoid the most severe impacts is fast moving out of reach.
News >  Washington

Washington’s DNR wants to take part in carbon-credit markets

The state House of Representatives last week passed a bill that would authorize the department to use state lands for carbon sequestration or habitat restoration, such as reforesting land post-wildfire, planting forests on lands without trees or aquatic projects in the state's kelp forests. Those projects could then generate carbon credits, which the department could sell in carbon markets, such as Washington's cap-and-trade program.
News >  Business

Critics question grant request to restart Usk papermill

UPDATED: Thu., March 16, 2023

The company that runs a cryptocurrency mining operation in Usk is seeking $400,000 grant from the state that it says will help to restart a shuttered papermill even though the site doesn't have access to the electrical power needed to operate the plant.
News >  Sci/Tech

NASA unveils a new moon suit for Artemis astronauts

UPDATED: Thu., March 16, 2023

In space, moon suits are the height of fashion, and NASA officials Wednesday lavished their highest praise on what astronauts will be wearing when they step on the moon in the coming years.The latest in lunar spacewear — black with orange and blue highlights — comes from Axiom Space in Houston.At an event in Houston unveiling the new suit, an engineer from Axiom who was demonstrating the lunar gear showed how he could easily squat and move around. The large clear bubble around the head provides wide visibility as well as lighting, which will be important when astronauts step into shadowed craters near the lunar south pole. It also has a mount for a high-definition camera.Astronauts will get into and out of the spacesuit via a hatch in the back side.“You would put your feet in, put your arms in, and then kind of shimmy down into the suit,” said Russell Ralston, deputy program manager for extravehicular activity at Axiom Space. “And then we would close the hatch.”On the back is a backpacklike contraption containing the life support system. “You can think of it as a very fancy scuba tank and air conditioner kind of combined into one,” Ralston said.The main difference between the prototype shown today and what will be going to the moon is that the ones going to the moon will be white instead of dark. “That’s really for thermal reasons,” Ralston said.By turning to this private company, NASA is again relying on new commercial space enterprises to provide key components faster and cheaper than it could itself develop.The approach follows the template NASA used in hiring Elon Musk’s company SpaceX to get astronauts to and from the International Space Station and to the lunar surface on the mission for which the Axiom suits were designed.The moon suit is a key component that is required for the Artemis program, which will be sending astronauts back to the moon as NASA faces heightened competition in space and on the moon from China’s booming space sector. The Axiom suits will be worn during the Artemis III mission, the program’s first moon landing, which is scheduled for 2025.Axiom is led by Michael Suffredini, who previously served as NASA’s program manager for the International Space Station. The company has been primarily focused on low-Earth orbit, sending private astronauts to the ISS and building a private module to be added to the space station.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
News >  Sci/Tech

Pythons, invasive and hungry, are making their way north in Florida

UPDATED: Tue., March 14, 2023

So much for all the efforts to slow the proliferation of Burmese pythons in the Florida Everglades over the last two decades, including with paid contractors, trained volunteers and an annual hunt that has drawn participants from as far as Latvia: The giant snakes have been making their way north, reaching West Palm Beach and Fort Myers and threatening ever-larger stretches of the ecosystem.
News >  Agriculture

Bees teach their babies how to dance

UPDATED: Thu., March 9, 2023

For a bee to be successful, it needs to shake its honey maker.Scientists have long known honey bees jiggle their bodies to let nestmates know the location of nearby nectar and pollen. Bees choreograph their twists and turns with cues about the direction, distance and even the deliciousness of flowers around the hive.

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