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Loan Wolf
In what could be a precedent-setting move, enviros are suing the U.S. Small Business Administration for aggravating sprawl in the Washington, D.C., area. The Forest Conservation Council and Friends of the Earth say that at least 30 percent of SBA loans in the region over the past three years have financed new construction, much of […]
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You Don't Have to Be a Starlink, Baby, to Be in My Show
The U.S. EPA moved yesterday to revoke approval for a variety of genetically modified corn that has illegally made its way into two brands of taco shells, prompting nationwide recalls. The Starlink corn, manufactured by Aventis, had been licensed for use as livestock feed but banned from human food because of concerns that it could […]
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If I Had a Hammer, I'd Hammer in Texas
Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the Democratic candidate for vice president, visited the home state of Texas Gov. George W. Bush yesterday to hammer on Bush’s environmental record, accusing him of endangering the health of Texans by failing to stand up to industrial polluters. Speaking in a poor neighborhood near a petrochemical plant, Lieberman said federal data […]
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Oh! for Two
The national League of Conservation Voters endorsed both Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican Rep. Rick Lazio yesterday in the New York Senate race. The LCV said Clinton has pledged to fight for the environment, promising among other things to push for ratification of the Kyoto climate change treaty. The LCV praised Lazio for being […]
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50 Ways to Love Your Lever
With the help of levers and pedals, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt pulled a 16,000-pound chunk from the face of the Matilija Dam yesterday, a symbolic step toward dismantling the 20-story structure in southern California. Babbitt has been calling attention to the need to take down obsolete dams in the country for the last couple of […]
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Let's Buck This Rider
A coalition of 20 health and enviro groups is calling on President Clinton to refuse to sign a budget bill with riders that would, among other things, block the U.S. EPA from lowering the level of arsenic allowed in drinking water. Clinton has said he would veto funding bills with anti-environmental riders, but activists fear […]
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I'll Take the Environment for $600, Jim
The environment got the most attention it’s ever received in a presidential debate last night, with much of the focus on global warming. Vice President Al Gore argued that actions must be taken now to combat global warming, and that there would be great economic gains for the U.S. if it were the country to […]
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Not-So-Safeway
A variety of genetically modified corn not approved for human consumption has been found in Safeway brand taco shells, just weeks after a similar finding in Taco Bell brand taco shells, says the Genetically Engineered Food Alert, a coalition of consumer and enviro groups. Like Kraft Foods, maker of the Taco Bell shells, Safeway has […]
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Iron Lung
Preliminary research published today in the journal Nature suggests that iron could be dispersed in cold, biologically barren seas near Antarctica to feed large algae blooms that would sop up carbon dioxide from the air and in so doing help fend off global warming. Theoretically, the plants would sink to the ocean bottom, removing CO2 […]
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Buying the Farm
California lost almost 70,000 acres to sprawl between 1996 and 1998, fueled by the state’s yearly influx of 700,000 people, according to a biennial report released yesterday by the state Department of Conservation. About two-thirds of the land lost to development was formerly farmland. One citrus farmer, John Gless, said that rising water bills, restrictions […]