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SHoP Architects proposed 475 West 18th in New York, uses extensive wood structural elements and other wood products and allows the team to set ambitious sustainability targets in the building's design, construction, and operation. Copyright image, permission for use. - See more at: http://blogs.usda.gov/2015/09/17/secretary-announces-new-york-and-oregon-tall-wood-building-prize-winners/#sthash.vEadkeKi.dpuf
SHoP Architects proposed 475 West 18th in New York, uses extensive wood structural elements and other wood products and allows the team to set ambitious sustainability targets in the building's design, construction, and operation. Copyright image, permission for use. - See more at: http://blogs.usda.gov/2015/09/17/secretary-announces-new-york-and-oregon-tall-wood-building-prize-winners/#sthash.vEadkeKi.dpuf
In September, we’re focused on showcasing the ways USDA is implementing smart policies that build sustainable economic opportunities in rural and urban communities alike while also working to preserve our land, water, soil and natural resources for generations to come.
Reduce wasted food in your home with simple shopping, storage and cooking practices.
Wildfire Smoke Monitors Working to Reduce Health and Safety Impacts Smoke from wildfires can have an enormous impact on the public and on fire personnel, affecting health, interfering with transportation safety and upsetting tourism and local economies.
Environmental markets—the buying and selling of ecosystem services like clean air and water, and wildlife habitat—help more private landowners get conservation on the ground.
Throughout his life, Chris Fields-Johnson has been keenly aware of the need to preserve the natural landscapes, which provide us with clean air to breathe, water to drink and food to eat. As a graduate student of soil science at Virginia State and Polytechnic University, a forestry undergraduate, a student of Tom Brown, Jr.’s Tracker School and a former employee of the Virginia Department of Forestry, he also knows much of the science behind soil restoration and forestry.
All around the world, including here in the United States, builders are adopting new, cutting edge technologies to save energy and reduce a structure’s carbon footprint. Now, technological advances are enabling architects and contractors to use one of the most traditional materials, wood, to construct lighter-weight, more energy efficient tall buildings.
More than 200 attendees from agriculture, utilities, industry, state agencies, and research institutions gathered at the University of Nebraska’s aptly named “Innovation Center” to think critically about how we can improve and expand water quality markets across the country.
As a plant pathologist with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) Rice Research Unit in Beaumont, Texas, Toni Marchetti oversaw a new program in 1972 to develop new cultivars that better resisted costly diseases like rice blast.
Ben Ferencz and Julie Pavlock of Foothills Farm in St. Ignatius, Montana discuss working with NRCS. - See more at: http://blogs.usda.gov/2015/09/15/montana-soil-conservationist-organic-farmer-work-together-to-reach-conservation-goals/#sthash.LEeKaah0.dpuf
Ben Ferencz and Julie Pavlock of Foothills Farm in St. Ignatius, Montana discuss working with NRCS. - See more at: http://blogs.usda.gov/2015/09/15/montana-soil-conservationist-organic-farmer-work-together-to-reach-conservation-goals/#sthash.LEeKaah0.dpuf
Ben Ferencz and Julie Pavlock of Foothills Farm in St. Ignatius, Montana discuss working with NRCS.
Unprecedented in size and scope, the 205,000-acre Coastal Headwaters Forest project is the largest single longleaf pine protection and restoration effort ever proposed on private lands.
A weekly look at some of the events and activities at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In this edition of USDA Week In Review: controlling crop damage with moths, recruiting future farmers and gearing up for giving.
Why we may soon be building ten-story buildings out of wood (Washington Post) The Obama administration — more specifically, its Department of Agriculture, headed by Tom Vilsack — has a surprising idea about the future of large building construction.
“Engineered wood” isn’t a phrase that springs to mind when speaking of Manhattan real-estate projects. But a local partnership wants to change that, and the federal government hopes it succeeds.
In New York and Portland, two high-rise buildings will be made not from concrete or metal, but a throwback material: good old trees.
A Pearl District development that will mix retail, office space and affordable housing where the Albina Bank sits has won an award from the United State Department of Agriculture.
Two Portland firms will spearhead the construction of a 12-story timber high rise in the Pearl District that will be home to workforce housing and office space for socially minded businesses.
When Beneficial State Bank officials started to think about replacing the Pearl District Albina Community Bank building with a new development, a buzz had already started in the construction industry. State and federal officials were promoting a wood building material that was becoming increasingly popular in Europe and Canada.
Recent advances in timber construction technology have led many green advocates and progressive architects to push wood as the main material for a new generation of high-rises and towers.
When you think of high-rise condos, the first thing that probably comes to mind—particularly in the age of the supertall tower—is a building with a steel structure and a stark, glassy exterior. But that may not always be the case: the United States Department of Agriculture recently hosted a competition that challenged architects to create designs for buildings that are at least 80 feet tall, and which incorporate "mass timber, composite wood technologies and innovative building techniques."
This is the present, and the future, of climate change. Our overheated world is amplifying drought and making megafire commonplace.
Top administration officials wrote Congress on Tuesday to urge it–once again–to change the way it budgets for firefighting in light of the disastrous wildfire season in the western U.S.
The Obama administration has directed $250 million toward fighting the wildfires raging in California and elsewhere, in addition to $450 million already transferred from different parts of the federal budget earlier this year to go toward fighting such disasters, officials said Tuesday.
Food waste is a huge problem — each year, around 40 percent of food in the United States ends up as waste, contributing to food insecurity and climate change and costing the country billions of dollars.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced a goal Wednesday to cut the amount of food that Americans waste by 50 percent by 2030.
As part of its effort to act against climate change, theObama administration has taken a sweeping stance to reduce food waste by 50% in the next 15 years.
Word that Americans throw away about one third of our available food has been getting around. Now there's an official goal aimed at reducing that waste.
Two federal agencies on Wednesday called for a 50% reduction in food waste in the United States by 2030 and announced a partnership with charities and private sector organizations to cut waste.
The Iowa League of Cities will receive a $700,000 federal grant to assess the viability of a nutrient reduction trading program in the state, which officials hope will help offset the costs that water and wastewater ratepayers may face with more stringent permit requirements.
A NEW GOAL TO REDUCE U.S. FOOD WASTE Broadcast Date: Thu, September 17, 2015 USDA is among those leading the effort to reduce the amount of food waste in our country by fifty per cent by the year 2030. (Rod Bain and Secretary Tom Vilsack)
Broadcast Date: Thu, September 17, 2015 The Agriculture Secretary announced award recipients for tall wood building demonstration projects he says will have many benefits. (Rod Bain and Secretary Tom Vilsack)
Broadcast Date: Thu, September 17, 2015 Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack describes the two projects winners of the Tall Wood Building awards, and how the awards will help in construction of these projects that use cross laminated timber.
Broadcast Date: Thu, September 17, 2015 Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack explains why USDA is a partner in the Tall Wood Building Competition, and is interested in this technology.
Broadcast Date: Tue, September 15, 2015 Out of 400 project applications, USDA has approved 45 projects for this year's Conservation Innovation Grant program. (Gary Crawford and Jason Weller)
Broadcast Date: Tue, September 15, 2015 Jason Weller, Chief of the USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Service, saying that one aspect of the Conservation Innovation Grants Program is trying to provide landowners some solid proof that putting in conservation practices will actually help their bottom lines.
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