Archinect - News

Ancient settlements discovered in the Amazon using LIDAR technology

2022-05-27T16:49:00-04:00

Mysterious mounds in the southwest corner of the Amazon Basin were once the site of ancient urban settlements, scientists have discovered. Using a remote-sensing technology to map the terrain from the air, they found that, starting about 1,500 years ago, ancient Amazonians built and lived in densely populated centres, featuring 22-metre-tall earthen pyramids, that were encircled by kilometres of elevated roadways.

According to archaeologists, this is the first clear evidence that urban societies existed in this part of the Amazon Basin, a region that was long believed to have only been wilderness before the arrival of Europeans. Researchers had previously thought that all Amazonians lived in small, nomadic tribes that had little impact on their surrounding environment due to the lack of nutrient-rich soil required to support large-scale agriculture. However, more recent findings suggested the presence of man-made patches of domesticated plants and adequate soil. And, in 2018, archaeologists discovered hundreds of large, geometric mounds, uncovered due to deforestation, that hinted at potential organized societies.

To investigate further, a research team employed LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), in which they flew a helicopter equipped with the technology over six areas previously occupied by the Casarabe people, who first appeared around A.D. 500. The undertaking revealed the size and sh...

EU to pay Gabon to preserve its tropical rain forests

2019-09-23T19:34:00-04:00

Gabon will become the first African nation to receive funding to preserve its rainforests to mitigate the effects of climate change. [...] Norway will pay $150 million to Gabon to battle deforestation and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The deal is part of the Central African Forest Initiative [...] The partnership sets a carbon floor price of $10 per certified ton and will be paid on the basis of verified results from 2016 through to 2025.

According to QZ, since 2000, Gabon has created more than a dozen new national parks to help preserve the country's forests. Roughly 12-percent of the Congo Basin Forest, the second-largest tropical rainforest behind the Amazon, is located within Gabon's borders.

Using data visualization to understand the Amazon rainforest fires

2019-08-23T16:00:00-04:00

For the past few weeks, the media has slowly increased its coverage of the devastating fires being intentionally set in the Amazon rainforest. Besides the politically charged issues and highly questionable leadership in Brazil, matters like this can quickly become headline news that leaves people 'social media-aware' but not necessarily informed.

For starters, forest fires in the Amazon are not uncommon and often related to seasonal temperature and weather fluctuations. However, these particular fires are due to intentional land-clearing methods employed by loggers and farmers rallied by the Brazilian president President Jair Bolsonaro and his pro-business agenda. His blatant aggression against indigenous rights, environmental conservation, and concern for sustainable practices has put Brazil and the rest of the world in a difficult position.

Increased deforestation efforts by the Bolsonaro administration have been propelled by a desire for promoting development and agriculture thr...

Smoke from burning Amazon rainforest drops São Paulo into sudden darkness

2019-08-20T19:29:00-04:00

In the height of daytime, the sky suddenly blackened, and day became night in Sao Paulo. Sure, smog is bad in the Western Hemisphere’s largest city, where traffic jams can stretch for dozens of miles. But not this bad. What was going on? Was the end near?

A combination of meteorological events paired with smoke that had traveled hundreds of miles from intense forest fires in remote parts of the Amazon caused a period of sudden midday darkness in the most populous city in the Western Hemisphere on Monday, reports The Washington Post.

Meanwhile on Twitter, #PrayforAmazonia emerged as a trending hashtag, channeling the global outrage over the lack of media coverage and political action towards the vast forest fires which have been raging in the drought-stricken Amazon rainforest region of Brazil for more than two weeks now.

Fires are burning across central South America. Yesterday #NOAA20's OMPS instrument detected the aerosol index - an index that detects the presence of particles like soot and dust in the atmosphere - in the vicinity of the fires. This can help inform air quality forecasts. https://t.co/lCMwTqWxtA
— Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) (@JPSSProgram) August 19, 2019

Much of the blame for the lack of disaster response i...

The Amazon rainforest is doomed

2019-06-05T12:57:00-04:00

The world’s greatest rainforest – which is a vital provider of oxygen and carbon sequestration – lost 739sq km during the [month of May], equivalent to two football pitches every minute, according to data from the government’s satellite monitoring agency.

Deforestation of the Amazon rainforest has accelerated at a drastic clip since far-right Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro was inaugurated in January 2019. The Brazilian government takes monthly satellite observations to survey the deforestation, and it found that logging rates increased dramatically in May, the traditional start of the logging season, over the same month last year.

Since taking office, Bolsonaro has moved to weaken many environmental protections in the country by knee-capping the nation's environmental ministry. To boot, the president's son, Flavio, serves in the Brazilian senate and is pushing there to eliminate forest preservation regulations for the agriculture industry. The move, according to The Guardian, could open up an area larger than the country of Iran to further deforestation.

Carlos Souza, a member of the independent monitoring group Imazon, told The Guardian, "The government can’t deny these numbers from their own agency. The question now is what th...