2008 An Environmental Crossroads

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Global warming clouds our future. Pollution degrades our air, soil and water. Environmental toxins compromise the health of our children. Misuse threatens the sustainability of our forests, fisheries, wetlands and coasts, and the health of species that live there.

But there is reason for hope.

Through sound science and policy research, we're finding answers to these problems. Airborne lead and acid rain have been dramatically reduced. Industrial water pollution has decreased. Habitats are being preserved.

Faculty members from the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University are part of the effort to help find these answers and establish new environmental practices and policies to safeguard our natural resources for generations to come.

To contact our experts or learn more about what we're doing in states across the nation, click on the state you're interested in.

Wildlife & Threatened Species
California is home to nearly 290 threatened or endangered plant or animal species, including the California condor; the southern sea otter; the desert tortoise; the chinook and coho salmon; leatherback, loggerhead and green sea turtles; and blue and humpback whales. Exemptions given to military bases may place species such as the desert tortoise at even greater risk.

Larry Crowder is an expert on marine ecology, depletion of marine species due to overfishing and fisheries bycatch, and the use of technology to track and monitor marine wildlife, including sea turtles and marine mammals.
tel:(252) 504-7637 : e: lcrowder@duke.edu

Research focus: Marine ecology and fisheries. Population and community ecology. Endangered species/fisheries conflicts, especially sea turtles and bycatch in fishing gear. Marine conservation biology and policy. International affairs.

In 2004, Crowder and a team of other Duke researchers published the first global assessment of sea turtle bycatch casualties. They found that more than 250,000 loggerhead and 60,000 leatherback turtles are snared each year by longline fishing – far more than previously thought. “There have been few attempts to quantify the magnitude and extent of protected species bycatch, even for fisheries in which bycatch is perceived as a pressing concern,” Crowder says. “Our numbers, though estimates, are firm enough to warrant the development of rules for fishing equipment and practices to reduce or avoid such losses.”

Randall Kramer is an environmental economist who has developed survey research methodology to determine an economic value for species and habitat conservation. The statistical models developed by Kramer also can help governments identify ways to encourage more consumers and producers to take part in conservation efforts.
tel: (919) 613-8072 e: kramer@duke.edu

Research focus: Kramer's expertise lies in the role of economics in environmental policy and management, focusing on improving our understanding of how human and business behavior is shaped by policies intended to protect the environment, especially in the areas of water quality, wetlands, biodiversity.

Stuart Pimm studies ways to preserve endangered species and restore natural habitats in environmental hotspots worldwide.
tel: (919) 613-8141: e: StuartPimm@aol.com

Research focus:Biodiversity, conservation biology and the impact of poor water management decisions on wading birds.

Andy Read studies the impact of bycatch on ecosystems and marine mammal populations. He’s an expert on “smart” fishing gear that’s designed to reduce the risk of ensnarement, and on the use of technology to track and monitor marine mammal populations.
tel:(252) 504-7590 : e: aread@duke.edu

Research focus: Marine mammals, particularly dolphins and porpoises; marine conservation biology; fisheries bycatch; whales and whaling. He is particularly interested in the study of endangered or threatened marine mammals, and in the development of new technology to reduce the risk of marine mammals becoming ensnared in fishing gear.

Although he has taken part in marine mammal rescues, current rescue practices are “really only a Band-aid,” Read says. “It's something to do in the interim while we search for better solutions. What we're doing is kind of like emergency room care for marine mammals that become entangled. The real answer is developing fishing gear that doesn't entangle them in the first place."

John Terborgh is co-director of the Center for Tropical Conservation. He an authority on neotropical habitat conservation and endangered or threatened species, especially birds and mammals.
tel: (919) 490-9081 e: manu@duke.edu

Research focus: Tropical ecology and conservation. Biodiversity. Avian and mammalian ecology in neotropical forests. Predators role in preserving ecological diversity.

Terborgh was one of 12 scientists, conservationists and artists who in Spring 2004 petitioned the Bush administration to cease delaying Endangered Species Act protection for 225 of the nation’s most imperiled plants and animals.

A recent study found that 114 US species have gone extinct since the Endangered Species Act was enacted in 1973, Terborgh notes. “The federal government has chronically dragged its feet on new listings no matter which party was in the White House,” he says.