This study explores the sustainability performance of international companies in the food and beverage industry. The research goal is to investigate whether sustainability performance is correlated (positively or negatively) or is not correlated with financial performance. The Global Reporting Initiative’s sustainability reporting framework, called GRI, provides principles and metrics for reporting corporate environmental and social responsibility impacts. The Financial Accounting Standards Board financial reporting framework, called generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP), is used to prepare corporate financial reports. Both the GRI and GAAP frameworks provide consistency, so report users can analyze a company’s performance over time as well as in comparison to competitors. The Sustainability Performance Assessment (SPA) System developed by Paun (2015) incorporates GRI and GAAP measures for reporting triple bottom line performance (i.e., financial, environmental, human rights, labor practices, product responsibility, society, economic). Using the SPA System, data was extracted from 2016 sustainability and financial reports and analyzed in terms of the following multi-dimensional performance variables: environmental, human rights, labor practices, product responsibility, society, economic, revenue, leverage, and profit. The sample companies are based in Europe and the U.S. Their 2016 revenues ranged from $8.9 billion to $91.5 billion and employees ranged from 42,000 to 328,000. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics (e.g., performance mean, degree of transparency, transparency weighted performance mean). Preliminary research findings suggest that correlations exist among the triple bottom line sustainability variables. This research reveals broader trends about the impacts of multi-national companies on the consumers they support and environment they influence.

The Vava'u Archipelago, Kingdom of Tonga, is an island group located in the central south Pacific Ocean. The waters within the archipelago have abundant and diverse marine zooplankton that are a critical part of the local, and likely regional, food-webs. Invertebrate zooplankton and ichthyoplankton form the biological foundation of the reef ecosystem. They are prey for each other and larger organisms. As such, they are key components of energy transfer throughout the food web, and their dispersal can determine the settlement of many species. Any changes to the plankton assemblage has the potential to damage the higher levels of the ecosystem. Assessing the condition and composition of these groups provides key insights into the health of the community. However, the composition and seasonal cycles of Vava’u’s zooplankton communities have never been studied. This information is needed to establish baseline data for detecting impacts to the zooplankton and surrounding marine ecosystem caused by the current progression of environmental stressors in the region, such as global warming, ocean acidification, and local development-related water pollution. Through assemblage and genetic analyses of samples made in April 2017, I estimated the general zooplankton composition of the area. 

The exceptional biodiversity in the Coral Triangle is partially attributed to the elevated rates of evolution that occur in the shallow reefs of the Indo-Pacific Ocean. Its current geographical location and complex oceanographic history have facilitated rapid speciation in many lineages of coral reef fishes. The processes causing these unique evolutionary patterns can be closely studied in Eviota (Gobiidae), a widespread lineage of rapidly diverging marine fishes. Their restricted dispersal capabilities, short generation time, and specific habitat preferences have facilitated repeated exploitation of novel niches and thus catalyzed their high species diversity. Here, we examine morphological and genetic diversity in relation to biogeography in the Blackbelly Dwarfgoby, the Eviota atriventris species complex. This study analyses E. atriventris from nine localities across its range spanning the Indo-Australian Archipelago to determine whether recent speciation has occurred at fine scales across the Coral Triangle. Our combined morphological and molecular phylogenetic analysis examines differences in meristic, coloration, morphometrics, and gene sequence data from seven mitochondrial and nuclear genes. Results show strong divergence in mitochondrial DNA sequences in Milne Bay, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands (eastern) populations, as compared with a western haplotype from Indonesia. This suggests that lineages within E. atriventris are geographically and genetically isolated. However, evidence from nuclear gene sequences show few differences between groups, and morphological data to support the separation of these populations are inconclusive. These similarities imply that eastern and western haplotypes may be in the early stages of speciation. Due to phylogenetic evidence and lack of geographic overlap, these lineages may be considered separate species under some species concepts. This study illustrates challenges in separating and defining species concepts for closely related species with conserved morphology.

Understanding the permeability structure of sedimentary rocks is important for predicting migration of fluids like water, hydrocarbons, contaminants or CO₂ in the subsurface. Movement of pressurized pore fluid can cause coarse sediments to be injected into fine-grained, low-permeability sedimentary layers, forming “clastic pipes.” Clastic pipes are important because they create pathways that enable fluid to migrate through the cross-cut impermeable layers. We studied the clastic pipes in the Jurassic Carmel Formation, Utah, to understand their formation conditions and timing, and their relationship with hydrocarbon migration in the region. Specifically, we used petrography including cathodoluminescence observations of calcite cements that grew from the migrating fluids to understand whether fluid migration through the pipes occurred in multiple generations or in one single event. Preliminary results of the cathodoluminescence observations show multiple generations of cementation and fluid migration. Some samples exhibit non-luminescent cements, which are typical of near-surface fluids and may represent syn-depositional fluid flow during initial pipe injection and formation. Other samples showed multiple generations of luminescent cements, which are typical of basin fluids. This included (1) large dull orange calcite crystals, with (2) bright yellow luminescent cement deposited along cleavage planes that are cross-cut by brittle fractures. Some of the large grains in these samples were partially coated with (3) dull orange-yellow luminescent cement with blotchy texture that cross cuts calcite generations 1 and 2. Further work in this study will be to use clumped, C and O isotopes to constrain the temperature and source of the different generations of fluids from which the cements grew. The obtained fluid temperatures will then be related to the burial history (temperature-time) curve for the region to understand the timing of fluid flow through the pipes and its relationship with hydrocarbon migration in the region.

Landslides are frequent hazards along the west side of the Cascade Mountains that result in major economic, environmental, and social impacts. The Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest (MBS) has a heightened awareness of landslide risks and potential consequences, particularly since the catastrophic Oso Landslide of 2014. Mapping of existing landslides, which tend to be the areas at highest risk of future instability, is a challenging, time-consuming, and expensive process. Current landslide mapping techniques tend to be inconsistent due to subjective interpretation by individual geologists and most result in insufficient resolution. In this study I use a new mapping tool, called the Contour Connection Method (CCM) that utilizes bare earth LiDAR, to detect landslide deposits on MBS land in an automated manner. The CCM approach requires less user input than other mapping algorithms, and focuses on general landslide geometry such as the slope of landslide scarps and deposits. Use of CCM also provides an opportunity to evaluate very large areas within matters of minutes or hours whereas the same areas, if evaluated based on field inventorying or manual interpretation of the high resolution DEMs, would have taken weeks or months. Publically available LiDAR data from the Department of Natural Resources was first formatted to be used with the CCM tool and then input into the program. Once the CCM landslide map was completed, I compared existing landslide inventory maps to the CCM map to assess the degree of agreement between the results and analyze the overall improvement in landslide mapping using this procedure. The implications of this study point to a less subjective, improved, consistent, and rapid framework for inventorying classified landslides and creating improved maps for designating activity avoidance areas for future projects, and for designating landslide areas crossed by existing infrastructure.

Global temperatures have been on the rise since preindustrial times due to an increased concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. Learning about how past climates have responded to changes in carbon dioxide concentrations is important to understand how our current climate will respond to atmospheric changes. Previous studies have tried to constrain the warming that occurred after the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, ~20,000 years ago), for example in the Central Rocky Mountains, USA, where glacial modeling-based estimates suggest temperature change from the LGM to the modern (interglacial) climate was 5-10 °C. However, these glacier-based temperature estimates were influenced by other factors such as precipitation and seasonality, giving them large uncertainties. This study will use carbonate samples from soils from the LGM and modern interglacial (<3,000 years before present) to develop a more precise estimate of the amount of warming since the LGM. We will measure the clumped oxygen and carbon isotopes of samples collected from the Central Rocky Mountains and arid Western United States. The clumped isotopes measure soil temperature directly, providing a robust proxy for temperature change. This study will also investigate the time of year soil carbonates form, which is important for interpreting the soil temperature recorded by clumped isotopes. Through the use of clumped isotopes we will improve temperature change estimates, which will help improve climate models for the future.