A team of researchers from Newcastle University traveled to Madagascar to study endangered lemur species, but had to change locations due to security issues. They ended up in Tampolo Forest, where they found illegal logging had greatly disturbed the ecosystem. The team believes promoting tourism could generate income for villagers and protect the forest if its inhabitants. The young researchers hope to collaborate with a local university to promote conservation in the area.

1. The Courier I Monday24 February 2014 -I-
news.7
Students savingla LemurlocoBy Antonla Velikova
Young researchers from Newcastle Uni
versity have recently returned from an
environment awareness expedition in
Africa.
Initially, Rachel Blow, Jessica Fish
er, Donna Wintersgill, Camifla Blasi
Foglietti and Rachel Cornfoot were
meant to go to Madagascar and study
two particular endangered lemur spe
cies, However, due to a breakdown in
security in the South ofMadagascar, the
research team was strongly advised to
change locations.
“We threw a years worth of planning
out of the window:’ explained team
member Rachel Blow, “and we set about
trying to find a new research site - hop
ping in and out of Internet cafes whilst
travelling around an African Island!”
Fortunately, the issue was resolved
quickly, and the team ended up visit
ing Tampolo Forest in the North East of
the island. Despite the sudden change
of plans, the research turned out to be
very important. The area’s flora and
fauna had been greatly disturbed by the
amount of illegal logging, which caused
many problems for Tampolo Forest’s en
tire ecosystem.
The researchers had set out to investi
gate S species of nocturnal lemurs, but
found no traces from two of these — the
aye-aye and sportive lemurs. Based on
their immediate observations, they
believed this was the result of human
disturbance to their habitat. Although
the team’s data analysis has not yet
been completed, they are sure that un
less something changes drastically in
the villagers’ attitude towards Tampolo
Forest, its inhabitants will continue to
suffer.
“Once in the field, we found that the
expedition would need to be more hu
man-oriented than originally thought:’
Rachel Blow said.
“This was because the main threats on
the forest were due to human distur
bance; however it was not as simple as
saying ‘do not do this anymore’ because
the forest is all these people have, it is
their livelihoods.”
The group believe that the most im
portant outcome of their study is the
discovery of more lemurs than they had
initially anticipated.
The young researchers are hoping that
they will manage to, in collaboration
with Antananarivo University, promote
tourism and engage public interest in
the Tainpolo area.
They believe that if they manage to get
this to generate more income for the lo
cal villagers, then the forest and its in
habitants will be undisturbed.
Dr Peter Garson, former lecturer at
Newcastle University, talked about the
~‘oung researchers’ experience. He said:
Their energy and self-belief is to be
wondered at, but so is their develop
ing professionalism in all their prepa
rations. And they collected some First
Class Honours degrees in July in the
midst of all these. These are truly gifted
people who are doing great credit to
Newcastle University~”
“The team worked very well together,
including the 3 Malagasy students that
joined the team, to produce some ex
cellent results:’ Rachel commented.
“Although nerves got a little frayed at
times, we all came home as friends after
a highly rewarding, adventurous experi
ence: Can’t wait for our next one!”
Despite recent floods, l~Iewcastle aca
demics warn that the country could
shut down due to general water short
ages.
A team of academics from Newcas
tle and Oxford University say climate
change could force coal and gas fired
power stations to shut down during
droughts.
Edward Byers, Postgraduate Re
searcher in Infrastructure Systems at
Newcastle University, said: “It is difficult
to fathom that we should start to think
about water shortages in the middle of
these storms but only two years ago ar
eas of Britain were suffering from severe
• droughts.
“Other countries are already facing
pressures between water and energy
supplies and have found, in some cir
cumstances, that the electricity supply
system is cobsuming and dependent
upon large volumes of water, that could
otherwise be used in other sectors such
as agriculture and public water supply”
Byers, with Newcastle colleague and
Professor Jim Hall, director of the En
vironmental Change Institute at Ox
ford University, has been studying the
impact on water of the government’s
proposed different energy “pathways”
taken from the 2011 Carbon Plan.
• “We asked ourselves the question: how
‘much water is the electricity system
currently using and how much will it
use in these, different scenarios put for
wards to 2050?
“Our power, stations in the UK are
currently quite efficient when it comes
to water use, however, the government
has plans going forward to de-carbonize
the electricity system in order to meet
climate change targets.
“Some of the proposed technologies,
such as carbon capture and storage, may
result in up to a doubling of fresh water
consumption.”
Byers warned of the need for an ef
ficient future-proof electricity system.
“Given that the Government has plans
for the development of new electric
ity generation capacity, and that typi
cally power stations have a lifetime of
40 years, we need to make sure that we
have an electricity system that uses wa
ter efficiently and is also resilient to the
potential impacts of climate change:’ he
said.
The academic paper concluded that
a renewable power technology, with a
consequent reduction of other more
water-intensive power systems, could
result in fresh water consumption fall
ing in the electricity sector by about
60%.
“Pathways with higher levels of re
newables, use lower levels of fresh water
and sea water, which may be favourable
given the expected impacts of a growing
population and climate change on the,
UK’s water resources:’ he said.
Byers revealed the onus on govern
ment policy.
“The regulators need to ensure that
our future electricity system uses water
efficiently, is low carbon, while keeping
costs down for consumers:’
WF-IY AYE-AYE MAN: The nocturn~I I lemurs were the ma in focus of research. Images: Rachel Blow
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