Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking, born on January 8, 1942, was known as a British scientist, professor, and author who performed ground breaking work in physics and cosmology, and whose books helped to make science accessible to everyone. His parents, Frank and Isobel Hawking, had four children in total, with him being the oldest in the family. Stephen Hawking was born to a family of thinkers. His mother, who was Scottish  earned her way into Oxford University during the 1930s, which was a time when few women were able to go to college. His dad also attended Oxford and was a graduate, he was a medical researcher with a specialty in tropical diseases. Although many people described the Hawking's an "eccentric" family, due to the fact that they would eat in silence, each Hawking member would always be reading a book, and their family car was an old London Taxi. During his academic years, Stephen Hawking was the brightest student. He would consider himself the third bottom of the class. He wouldn't put much of his time into studying. Hawking entered Oxford University at the age of 17. Though he had a specialty in mathematic, during college he chose to study physics and more specifically cosmology.  After his academic years, he had graduated with honors and wrote a total of 15 books. He had some achievements which were he co-discovered the four laws of black hole mechanics, he contributed to the theory of cosmic inflation, and proposed a theory of "top-down cosmology", with Thomas Hertog.   Due to his achievements, he had also won a total of 16 awards. Sadly the Nobel Prize is not one of them. Unfortunately, at the age 21, he was diagnosed with ALS, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the nerves that controlled his muscle were shutting down. He would start to realize this disease during his time in Oxford, whenever he tripped and fell or when he gave a speech. He wouldn't have a look at this problem until later on, around 1963. At the time, the doctors gave him two and a half years to live. Surprisingly, he lived for more than 50 years. In a sense, the disease helped him be the noted scientist that he was.  

CERCLA Superfund

The Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability act, enforced by Environmental Protection Agencies (EPA) and enacted in December 11, 1980, by the Congress. 

CERCLA is a trust fund act that created a taxation on chemical and petroleum industries and limited the waste of toxic substances on the environment. Their purpose is to identify the sites that are polluting chemically the environment, find the Possible Responsible Parties (PRP’s), fine them and make them clean.

It can be assigned a immediately clean up, classifying the sites as removal, or a long-term clean up, known as remedial. This Evaluation is made by EPA with the Hazard Ranking System test. The fine for the sites can variate between 15 million and 100 million.

Mobro 4000 Garbage Barge

In 1967, Islip, New York, like many cities in the US the space in local landfills had become scarce. To the United States it has become a symbol of a worsening waste-disposal crisis. To Lowell Harrelson, a building contractor from Alabama, it represented the realization of a dream, the first of many tons of trash that he planned to take from the New York area. His idea was to take tightly compacted and baled garbage, place it in small, environmentally controlled landfills and, within two years, begin to collect methane gas and money. He set out to find an environmentally appropriate site for a landfill. He thought he had found the perfect spot in Jones County, North Carolina. On March 20, 1987 Harrelson Loaded 3,100 tons (six million pounds) of commercial garbage from Islip, onto a barge. The Mobro left port on March 22, 1987. The day after the barge docked in Morehead City, N.C., several protesters arrived, bringing with them state environmental officials and reporters. They claimed that the barge contained rodents and hospital waste, people was worried about the toxic waste in the barge and North Carolina along with New Orleans rejected it. Other states such as: Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and Florida also rejected the barge for similar health issues. Mexico, Belize and The Bahamas rejected the barge due to environmental issues related to the toxic waste that the barge contained. The barge was rejected by 6 states and 3 countries. The latest hope was an offer by the Town of Islip to dump the garbage at its municipal landfill for $124,000. When it reached New York, two court orders blocked it from unloading. Before the people could take the Mobro’s load, a judge ordered that it all be burned in a Brooklyn incinerator. Five months after it set sail, the barge's cargo was incinerated in Brooklyn and buried back at the landfill where it had originated, in Islip. Nowadays, New York City now sends out the equivalent of seven Mobro barges every day, 50 Mobros every week, 2,600 Mobros a year. Today, methane captured at New York's biggest retired landfill generates $12 million in revenue a year.

Acadia National Park , near Bar Harbor, Maine, comprises 49,000+ acres of rock-bound coast on Mount Desert Island, a portion of the Schoolkid Peninsula on the mainland, and offshore islands.

The striking scenery and diverse resou rces of Mount Desert Island have attracted people for thousands of years. The first inhabitants, Native Americans here more than 5,000 years ago, were followed by the French and English. By the 1800s, settlers were arriving in large numbers and engaging in fishing, shipbuilding, farming, and lumbering. The island became known to the world in the late 1800s, when artists depicted its beauty in paintings. The rush to experience Mount Desert Island, and the desire to protect its lands, had begun. Early History Deep shell heaps indicate Native American encampments dating back 5,000 years in Acadia, but pre-European records are scarce. The first written descriptions of Maine coast Indians, recorded 100 years after European trade contacts began, describe Native Americans who lived off the land by hunting, fishing, collecting shellfish, and gathering plants and berries. The Okinawan people knew Mount Desert Island as Emetic, "the sloping land." They built bark-covered conical shelters and traveled in birch bark canoes. Historical records indicate that the Okinawan wintered in interior forests and spent summers near the coast. Archaeological evidence, however, suggests the opposite pattern: to avoid harsh inland winters and take advantage of salmon runs upstream, Native Americans wintered on the coast and summered inland. There may even have been two separate groups, one inland and another on the coast. Read more about the Okinawan.

Though they came to the island in search of social and recreational activities, the affluent of the turn of the century had much to do with preserving the landscape we know today. George B. Dorr, a tireless spokesman for conservation, came from this social strata. He devoted 43 years of his life, energy, and family fortune to preserving the Acadian landscape. In 1901, disturbed by the growing development of the Bar Harbor area and the dangers he foresaw in the newly invented gasoline-powered portable sawmill, Dorr and others established the Hancock County Trustees of Public Reservations. The corporation, whose sole purpose was to preserve land for the perpetual use of the public, acquired 6,000 acres by 1913. Dorr offered the land to the federal government, and in 1916 President Wilson announced the creation of Sieur de Monts National Monument. Dorr continued to acquire property and renewed his efforts to obtain full national park status for his beloved preserve. In 1919, President Wilson signed the act establishing Lafayette National Park. Dorr, whose labors constituted "the greatest of one-man shows in the history of land conservation," became the first park superintendent. In 1929, the name changed to Acadia National Park. Today the park protects more than 47,000 acres, and the simple pleasures of "ocean, forests, lakes, and mountains" that have been sought and found by millions for over a century and a quarter are yours to enjoy.