With a temporary change in the New York tap water, who’s to say what our bagels and pizza are going to taste like.
Happening in the World: Switzerland and Italy are set to redraw their border in the Alps due to glacial meltings. The areas affected will be beneath the Matterhorn as well as numerous popular ski resorts. Most of the Swiss-Italian border is determined by the ridgelines of the glaciers, but due to global warming the glacier’s have begun to melt, resulting in the placement of these natural boundaries to shift. Thus far, Switzerland’s glaciers have lost four percent of their volume, on top of the six percent loss in 2022. As of Friday, the Swiss government has approved the change, and the approval process is currently underway in Italy. This signing comes after an agreement that was drafted over the matter back in May of 2023. The new border change is set to affect Plateau Rosa, the Carrel refuge and Gobba di Rollin. (BBC)
Happening in the US: The month-long wildfire in Southern California flared up again over the weekend, leading to further evacuations. This time among residents of Seven Oaks, a mountain community east of Los Angeles. According to the San Bernardino National Forest Division, as of Monday, the fire is about 80% contained, but has already burned through 43,000 acres of land. The fire, known as the Line-fire, initially started September 5, as a result of rampant heat up to 100 degrees during the day, and the drying out of lush grasses and shrubbery during the hot summer months. The Line-fire is currently burning in the Santa-Ana river drainage and the Bear and Siberia creek drainages. As temperatures are on the rise, the National Weather Service has issued a heat advisory Monday through Wednesday, warning that these conditions may further lead to fires throughout the Central and Northern Plains. (NYT)
Happening in NYC: New Yorkers have a deep love for their tap water, but this may change soon enough as a result of upcoming tunnel shutdowns. The watershed in the Catskill Mountains that provides up to 90 percent of the city’s water is to be reduced by 50 percent as portions of the Delaware Aqueduct are closing for repairs over the next eight months. Without access to the Delaware portion of the watershed, a core water source that surrounds five counties in New York State is lost. The plan to make up for this deficit is to utilize another watershed, known as the Croton Watershed, that normally only supplies about 10 percent of the city’s water and is prone to picking up discharge and drainage. Due to the contaminants within the water, it is typically required to go through the Croton Water Filtration Plant in the Bronx to make it ideal for consumption by civilians. However, due to the large quantity of water used in the city on a daily basis and the inability for the plant to keep up with this demand, some unfiltered Croton water is to be mixed with the water from the Catskills at a one to three ratio. The blending of low quality with high quality water is controversial, and even though it dilutes the concentrations, you may still be exposed to what’s in the Croton water. (NYT)
Happening in our Community: On Tuesday from 12:15 to 1:45 pm, the Harriman Institute is hosting a book talk for Alexis Peri’s Dear Unknown Friend: Correspondence between American & Soviet Women. Peri’s latest book looks into the letters sent between both parties of women during WWII and the Cold War, uncovering the friendships and examination of societies that occur. The event is to be moderated by Elise Giuliano and discussed by Yana Skorobogatov. For more information, look here.
Water via Wikimedia Commons.