Tag Archives: University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography

Maine institutions collaborating to build a greener lobster boat

Students at the Landing School have built nearly 400 boats since the school was founded in 1978. But nothing quite like the one the school is about to start on, a 21-foot, ocean-ready test model called a “proof of concept” for what the engineers call a “low-impact commercial trimaran” but which is known colloquially as a “green lobster boat.” “It’s like a skiff on top of a canoe, with two small canoes at the back of the skiff,” said Richard Schuhmann, the president of the Landing School. “It looks like a Batmobile in a way.” That’s the view from bow or stern. In the water and viewed from the side, it will look fairly similar to a classic lobster boat, a shape that conjures up Maine as neatly as a L.L. Bean hunting shoe and, the hope is, meets the desire expressed by many of the lobstermen consulted: that it be “pretty.” From design to materials, this boat is intended to have a smaller carbon footprint, burning less fuel than the busy lobster boats already working in Maine’s waters. click here to read the story, view 8 images 09:34

Study: Narragansett Bay temps reached record highs, lows last year

1452890532_193dAn oceanographer at the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography said temperatures in Narragansett Bay hit record highs and lows in 2015. Jeremy Collie said the temperatures represent the “most extreme” fluctuations observed since the school started surveying the waters 56 years ago. The findings came from GSO’s Narragansett Bay Fish Trawl, which is done to sample fish every week in the bay and track seasonal or annual changes of marine life. Water temperature also is recorded weekly at the same site off Wickford Village in North Kingstown. Collie has managed the trawl since 1998. Read the article here 12:25