‘Ew, those are caterpillars': Clusters of crawlers turning heads near Edmonton
People in and near Edmonton might start seeing an increase in the number of caterpillars around. As Connor Hogg reports, the bugs are mostly harmless.
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Cision Canada
2 hours ago
- Cision Canada
HCLTech Grant Americas second edition awards $1 million to three NGOs to create scalable solutions to combat climate change
NEW YORK and NOIDA, India, June 5, 2025 /CNW/ -- HCLTech (NSE: (BSE: a leading global technology company, announced Osa Conservation as the winner and Daily Acts and Ocean Wise as the two runners-up of the second edition of the HCLTech Climate Action Grant in the Americas. The three non-government organizations (NGOs) will be awarded a total of $1 million to help build scalable, sustainable solutions to drive climate action across the Americas. In the second year, applications increased by more than 70%, and after several rounds of review and rigorous due diligence, HCLTech selected Osa Conservation to receive $500,000 and Daily Acts and Ocean Wise to receive $250,000 each. This year's registrations increased by 34% from the 10 eligible countries across the Americas, including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Peru and the U.S. Osa Conservation, based in Costa Rica, will focus its grant award on Climate Lifeboat corridors, which help species migrate and thrive amid climate change. By reconnecting fragmented tropical habitats, the project supports climate adaptation while safeguarding ecosystems across millions of acres. California-based Daily Acts will use its grant for its community-powered climate resilience initiative. The project blends government strategy with grassroots action to advance water management, stormwater mitigation and social infrastructure across neighborhoods in Petaluma, Calif. and beyond. Canada-based Ocean Wise will dedicate its grant to its kelp forest restoration project on the Pacific coast. By managing urchin overpopulation and combining advanced technology and ecological research, the project aims to strengthen marine biodiversity and support coastal communities. "We are excited to support this year's recipients of the HCLTech Grant Americas as they expand their innovative projects to reconnect natural habitats, boost community resilience and rejuvenate marine ecosystems across the Americas," said Dr. Nidhi Pundhir, Senior Vice President, Global CSR, HCLTech. "This year, we saw a substantial increase in applications, highlighting the urgency of mitigating the adverse effects of climate change and the importance of supporting initiatives that pave the way for a sustainable future." In its inaugural year in 2023, HCLTech Climate Action Grant in the Americas committed $5 million in grants over five years to support sustainable solutions to fight the climate crisis across the Americas. The Grant in the Americas builds on HCLTech and the HCLFoundation (HCLTech's CSR arm) focus on continuous global sustainability commitment with a total investment of over $175 million in CSR programs to date. HCLTech is consistently recognized for its commitment to making a positive difference in the environment. Through our technology and collective expertise, HCLTech was recognized as an Industry Mover by S&P Global Sustainability Yearbook 2023 for sustainable business practices and continues to partner with leading U.S.-based organizations, including Feeding America and Girl Up, to serve the broader community. HCLTech is a global technology company, home to more than 223,000 people across 60 countries, delivering industry-leading capabilities centered around digital, engineering, cloud and AI, powered by a broad portfolio of technology services and products. We work with clients across all major verticals, providing industry solutions for Financial Services, Manufacturing, Life Sciences and Healthcare, High Tech, Semiconductor, Telecom and Media, Retail and CPG and Public Services. Consolidated revenues as of 12 months ending March 2025 totaled $13.8 billion. To learn how we can supercharge progress for you, visit For further details, please contact: Meredith Bucaro, Americas [email protected] Elka Ghudial, EMEA [email protected] James Galvin, APAC [email protected]
CBC
3 hours ago
- CBC
A book prescription for mental health?
On the surface, it may seem that bibliotherapy is another personal wellness trend. The practice promotes books and literature as touchstones, to aid mental health and healing. While it's true that anyone can offer book recommendations, there is evidence in the scientific literature to support its clinical use by mental health practitioners. "It's recommended in the Canadian guidelines for treatment of depression and anxiety," said Victoria-based psychiatrist Martina Scholtens. Bibliotherapy is one of the mental health approaches that she makes use of in her private practice, for certain patients. She might prescribe poetry or a memoir, a novel or workbook. "I want the prescription to be evidence-based and tailored to the recipient of the book and their very particular circumstances," she said. Dr. Scholtens, who is a clinical assistant professor of medicine at the University of British Columbia, put together a list of recommended titles, based on evidence. "I wanted to make book prescriptions more accessible to patients and their caregivers by reviewing, organizing, and disseminating recommended reading lists." She first published the extensively-researched list as an academic paper in 2024, but has now created a website for it, divided by diagnosis, at Bibliotherapy as an art Bibliotherapy can range from a science-based approach, to one that is primarily literary. Brooklyn journalist Cody Delistraty sought out an arts-based bibliotherapist when researching ways to address the prolonged grief he felt after the death of his mother. Then in his early 20s, Delistraty undertook a number of experiments and therapies. "I love to read, I love to write. So [bibliotherapy] made sense for me to dive into," said the author of The Grief Cure: Looking for the End of Loss. After an "odd, not-your-usual therapy session" and an intensive reading questionnaire, English bibliotherapist Ella Berthoud furnished him with an annotated and personalized list of international fiction. He particularly resonated with Sum, a collection of surreal and witty short stories by neuroscientist David Eagleman. "Grief can feel so sacred and so scary," said Delistraty. "To realize that it's just part of the wildness and the absurdity of life had the peculiar effect of helping me to really see the world through a new lens." Literary caregiving A Hundred Years of Bibliotherapy: Healing Through Books, is a new essay collection edited by three researchers from the UK's Open University. It takes a historical survey of the practice. "The term bibliotherapy was coined by an American Unitarian minister called Samuel McChord Crothers in 1916," said 20th-century literature professor Sara Haslam. "The First World War is certainly a key inflection point." America's institutionally-backed Library War Service set up military camp libraries at the start of the First World War. At U.S. military hospitals, books were prescribed and dispensed to wounded soldiers by uniformed librarians. The British version of bibliotherapy was somewhat less prescriptive and medicalized. Sara Haslam calls it "literary caregiving." In places like the female-run Endell Street Military Hospital, "it wasn't about medicalizing books as part of soldiers' recovery. It was about freeing wounded and sick soldiers to identify the kind of reading that they wanted to do." Haslam discovered archival proof that a substantial UK war library was amassed by 1917, spearheaded by one woman. Donations poured in from the public after May Gaskell's emotional call-out asking for meaningful books for soldiers. "I see these books as invested with caregiving from the donating public. They gave things that were precious, that they loved. So it went a long way to meeting the need that was being expressed by those who were fighting." Reading in a digital era A hundred years later, it seems that bibliotherapy has been experiencing a renaissance. Two more new books about bibliotherapy are being published this spring: one by bibliotherapist Bijal Shah, and another from social worker Emely Rumble. Edmund King, a co-editor of A Hundred Years of Bibliotherapy, is a historian of reading. He has a theory for the resurgence. "I think the reason that we're so obsessed now with the idea that books can heal, or are good for us, is because we also fear the end of reading." Despite the rise of BookTok, the books community populated by users of TikTok, King worries about the decline of time young people spend with books. "The literary culture that we value so much might be coming to an end." Yet throughout the history of reading, he says, it has been imbued with "this great power to change people's minds, change the way we see the world, transfer thoughts from one mind to another, preserve ideas, transmit ideas to different times and different contexts." For Sara Haslam, books remain powerful. In her view, opening a book is always surprising, and inherently conducive to mental health. "It's a moment when you are in the present. You have slowed down," she said. "I think it's fair to say that there is a wide readership of all ages who still recognize that that moment in engagement with a book is irreplaceable. "And long may that continue." *Written and produced by Lisa Godfrey. Guests in this episode: Martina Scholtens is a psychiatrist in Victoria, and a clinical assistant professor at UBC Faculty of Medicine. She is the author of Your Heart Is the Size of Your Fist: A Doctor Reflects on Ten Years at a Refugee Clinic.
CTV News
4 hours ago
- CTV News
One year later: Calgary marks anniversary of Bearspaw South Feeder Main break
On June 5, 2024, the Bearspaw South Feeder Main in Calgary burst, leading to water restrictions for all residents. A year later, officials say the investigation into what happened is still ongoing. (File) Thursday marks one year since the catastrophic rupture of Calgary's Bearspaw South Feeder Main - an event that sparked a citywide state of emergency, weeks of water restrictions and a long-term rethinking of Calgary's water infrastructure. The six-and-a-half-foot concrete pipe, located under 16 Avenue N.W., burst suddenly on June 5, 2024. Water gushed across the road, flooding nearby sports fields and prompting an immediate emergency response. It was just the beginning of what city officials have described as one of the most significant infrastructure failures in recent memory. In the months following, the City of Calgary carried out 29 separate repairs along the feeder main, with the final repairs completed by November 2024. The system has since stabilized and is operating within acceptable structural limits, according to city engineers. An investigation into the failure found several contributing factors: microcracking in the pipe's protective mortar layer, allowing soil to reach and corrode the prestress wires; corrosion and embrittlement of those wires, exacerbated by chloride penetration; and aggressive soil conditions with high chloride levels, made worse by road salting. While the internal review by APEGA (Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta) is complete, an additional independent review by a panel of industry professionals is still pending. 'There has been a review done by APEGA that verified we met all engineering standards and that our response was to the standard they expected,' said Mayor Jyoti Gondek. 'We have an independent review that is still to come that is a panel of professionals in industry, so we continue to investigate what happened there. We have also invested a greater budget into the monitoring the maintenance and the technology that is required to make sure our water system is in good shape.' City hall is now focused on preventing similar situations from happening in the future. A major initiative currently in the planning stages is the twinning of the concrete portion of the Bearspaw South Feeder Main. 'Creating those backup plans or that redundancy is something that administration has taken very seriously,' noted Gondek. 'We are putting in more feeder mains to ensure that we can meet the needs of Calgarians and the people that are moving here. We are looking at twinning to make sure that redundancy exists, and we rely on administration to come to us with timely information.' The city said the twinning project may use micro tunneling technology to minimize surface disruption. Construction could begin by the end of 2025, but the design and budget for the project have yet to be finalized.
