In the late 18th century, the French chemist Antoine Lavoisier radically changed how we understand the physical world. He was perplexed by the fact that when metal rusted, despite becoming more brittle, it actually gained weight rather than losing it. Why would metal weigh more when it was decomposing? It weighed more, Lavoisier came to
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If there’s one thing all Philadelphia’s mayoral candidates can agree on, it’s that Mayor Jim Kenney botched the water crisis that wasn’t. On the heels of a near-crisis that called into question Kenney’s emergency response and the City’s ability to protect its drinking water system, the candidates to succeed Kenney in office gathered Wednesday night
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Let’s rewind. This past Sunday afternoon, iPhone sirens blared and the following message flashed across the screen of hundreds of thousands of Philadelphians: “City of Phila recommends using bottled drinking water from 2PM 3/26/2023 until further notice for all Phila Water Department customers. Contaminants have not been found in the system at this time but
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Surveyors have begun marking property lines through what some neighbors of the Cobbs Creek golf course had thought were their backyards. Deborah Harris-White, who has lived on the 7600 block of Brockton Road in the Overbrook Park neighborhood for 23 years, says that the orange spray paint and stakes with “property line” written on them
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The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed limits on six per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in drinking water. If enacted, these limits would require public drinking water utilities to reduce the levels of these chemicals, which have been linked to cancers and other illnesses. The EPA published voluntary limits for some PFAS in June
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You hear birds talking (or at least singing) all the time. Maybe sometimes you have something to say back to a bird, perhaps some select words early in the morning when a house sparrow won’t stop chirping outside your window. For a true dialog, though, visit the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University through
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On February 23, 2023, Philadelphia’s Department of Parks & Recreation released the Philly Tree Plan. Philadelphia’s trees help clean the air, slow stormwater runoff, soak up carbon dioxide and cool a city suffering from rising temperatures. With these and other benefits of trees in mind, in 2008 Mayor Nutter set a goal of making sure
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You may be aware that the planet is losing large mammals such as elephants, rhinos, pandas, and whales because of human actions, but insects are also facing devastating declines. While they may be unpleasant or repulsive to many, insects are what the naturalist E. O. Wilson called the “little things that run the world.” In
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Lots of nasty stuff comes out of motor vehicle tailpipes. The policy discussion around shifting away from internal combustion engines and towards electric vehicles tends to focus on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, but pollution like nitrogen dioxide can make people sick by worsening asthma and other respiratory diseases. A new study has now connected the
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Annual campaign finance reports for 2022 dropped last week, and Curtis Jones’s campaign has again benefited from contributions from people and businesses connected with the Cobbs Creek golf course development. In 2022 Grid reported on donations made to the Friends of Curtis Jones Jr., the campaign fundraising body for Councilmember Curtis Jones Jr., from people
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On Thursday Philadelphia City Council unanimously voted to pass a bill to exempt the Cobbs Creek golf course from zoning rules protecting steep slopes from logging. Those steep slope protections exist to prevent erosion and flooding caused when trees, whose roots hold soil in place, are cut down. The bill creates a special “overlay district”
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