Category: earth law
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Return to the Earth: Washington’s Revolutionary Human Composting Statute
Confronting our own mortality can be challenging, but there is no shaking the truth that we will all die someday. As depressing as that is, the sooner we accept that fact, the sooner we can begin to plan for what we want to happen to the physical body we leave behind and share that plan…
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The OneNYC 2050 and Beef Reduction
New York City, the city that never sleeps, is not sleeping on climate change or global warming. On April 22nd, 2019, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced an ambitious $14 billon plan to fight climate change and global warming. The plan is to reach complete carbon neutrality by 2050 [1]. One of the ways the OneNYC 2050 plans…
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Coronavirus and its Impact on the Environment
2020 is the year that COVID-19 hit the entire world. The year 2020 will forever be the year in history books as the year when human activity paused. The Coronavirus introduced itself in December of 2019 in Wuhan and since then has been spreading and causing mayhem worldwide. Due to the virus, many people are…
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Save Our Trees v. Private Property Owner Rights – an Insight to Florida’s Tree Removal Legislation
This week marks the first anniversary of when House Bill 1159 was brought to the attention of the Florida Legislature. The bill, called “Private Property Rights,” provides for private property owners to have more autonomy over their land. The cost of this new right, however, came at the expense of one of the most vulnerable…
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Minimalism & The Environment
When I first heard about minimalism, I thought about how it was a ridiculous lifestyle that was highly unattainable and impractical. I had seen the videos of vloggers sharing how they fit all of their possessions in a single backpack or how they were able to put a year’s worth of trash in one mason…
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Water, Water Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink
While visiting my extended family recently, I had to opportunity to catch up with one of my cousins with whom I had lost contact. As it goes in these situations, we exchanged pleasantries, talked about our families and major life events since our last contact over a decade ago, and discussed our current careers. I…
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The Hurricane of 1928, the Lake Okeechobee Water Crisis, and Harmful Algae Blooms: How Ghosts of the Past Still Haunt Us Today
The state of Florida, a state I myself call home, is home to some of the most beautiful beaches in the United States of America. The state has some 8,436 miles of coastline facing the Atlantic Ocean on the states east coast and facing the Gulf of Mexico. In addition, there are countless lakes, rivers,…
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Plastic Bags… to Ban or Not to Ban? That is the Question.
I visited St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, back in October, and went grocery shopping, just like I did before I moved away in 2017. I got to the cashier, paid for all of my groceries and she asked me if I wanted to purchase a reusable bag. Annoyed, I said no, thinking, “why should I…
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Are We Beginning to See the Light? The Effectiveness and Resourcefulness of Automatic Light Systems
Few inventions over the past couple of centuries have been more resourceful and beneficial to human existence than electricity and artificial lighting. Consider, for a brief moment, just how often you use artificial lighting on a daily basis. Whether it be for academic endeavors late at night or just keeping your kitchen lit making breakfast…
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Here, Kitty, Kitty…
Florida, USA is home to a few beautiful big cats, but one of those cats is on the precipice of extinction. The Florida panther is the last remaining puma in the Eastern Hemisphere, it is also the most endangered mammal in the Eastern Hemisphere.[1] The panther was first listed as an endangered species in 1967,…
Barry Law Environmental and Earth Law Journal 