Institute on the Environment Covers Wide Range of Issues

How soon can the United States rely on wind power for a significant portion of its energy needs? What debates exist over how best to manage wildfire risk on national forest lands? How are scientists attempting to measure global warming more accurately? What happens when free trade agreements such as NAFTA leave loopholes for environmental degradation that the public is unaware of?

Twenty-five journalists who attended the third annual Scripps Howard Institute on the Environment at the University of Colorado at Boulder from May 13-18 addressed these questions and others during the intensive week-long event designed to increase their knowledge about a range of crucial environmental issues. The institute covered key current topics such as climate change, energy policy, public lands management, environmental toxins, and the environmental impacts of global trade agreements. Participants heard from a range of experts including top scientists, academics and policy analysts.

Journalists also got a hands-on session with the university’s new environmental information database, an online resource developed as a joint project by the University Libraries at CU and Center for Environmental Journalism. The site is called “Environmental Resources on the Web.”

Dr. Susan Avery, director of CU’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, served as institute director for the third year. Her lively opening address aimed to help journalists interpret scientific information more effectively. Avery used a case-study format, as if she were a scientist talking to the press about drought conditions in the West, and asked journalists to identify the headline and focus for the story based on the data she presented.
In addition to sessions on the CU-Boulder campus, participants took three field trips. At the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, journalists learned about the latest developments in photovoltaics, wind power and biofuels. Climate change topped the agenda during visits to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration laboratories and the National Center for Atmospheric Research, where journalists conversed with leading scientists.

A third field trip focused on public lands issues. Journalists visited the alpine reaches of Rocky Mountain National Park, stopping en route at one of city of Boulder’s vast Open Space tracts to examine an ecosystem at the urban-rural interface. The group made a final stop at a water diversion tunnel near Estes Park, which moves water from the Colorado River drainage on the Rockies’ Western Slope across the Continental Divide to the heavily populated Front Range on the east side. Presentations by scientists along the way focused on the impact of growth on biodiversity, national forest policy debates, elk management issues in Rocky Mountain National Park, and problems with water availability and usage in a dry yet rapidly growing region.

Institute participants came from a variety of geographic locales and media settings including the Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Albuquerque Tribune and High Country News papers, several magazines including Audubon and U.S. Water News, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and various freelance backgrounds.

Institute participant Robert Braile, senior fellow with the Institutes on Journalism and Natural Resources and former environment correspondent for the Boston Globe, had high praise for the program: “You gathered an intelligent group of journalists and speakers, put them in one interesting and informative arena after another, and allowed our conversation to evolve through the week, becoming deeper and richer with each passing day.”

The Institute, hosted by CU’s Center for Environmental Journalism, is funded by a grant from the Scripps Howard Foundation. Application information for the 2003 Institute on the Environment will be available on this web site later in the fall.