What do the National Chicken Council, the National Turkey Federation, United Egg Producers, and Tyson Foods have in common? Crying fowl. Photo: USDA. Well, first there's the obvious fowl connection. Then there's the foul connection: Their facilities, known as "concentrated animal feeding operations" (CAFOs), have growing air-pollution problems thanks to the mountains of gas-emitting excrement deposited daily by their tens of thousands of cooped-up feathery charges. These industry groups also share another connection: membership in the Ag Air Group, a coalition of special interests that includes the National Pork Producers Council and the National Milk Producers Federation (whose hogs and …

Demand for Hybrids Exceeds Expectations Demand for gas-electric hybrid vehicles has automakers scrambling to keep up. Ford's new Escape hybrid SUV won't go on sale until August, but already 30,000 people have expressed the desire to buy one via Ford's website, whereas the company had planned to sell just 20,000 a year. Meanwhile, waiting lists for Toyota's Prius are growing, prompting the company's U.S. arm to request a substantial increase in manufacturing from the Japanese factory that produces the hybrids. Toyota's initial goal was to sell 34,000 this year; it now expects to sell 50,000. Sales of the Prius last …

When right-wing pundits and corporate flacks compare environmentalists to watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside), they mean it as a slur. But when eco-socialists look at the wider environmental movement, they see a big green tomato that had better ripen up, and soon. Hybridizing the analyses of Karl Marx with those of modern-day ecological economists, they maintain that we'll never stop degrading the ecosphere unless we tackle capitalism and the unsustainable growth that lies at its core. For at least one part of their argument -- that economic growth is out of control -- eco-socialists can call …

Smokestacking the deck? Photo: USGS. This just in, from the Department of Near-Tautologies: Mandatory emissions caps rein in power-plant pollution more effectively than voluntary programs. That's the conclusion being drawn from a report on the environmental records of the 100 largest electricity companies in the U.S., released last week by an alliance of bottom-liners and tree-huggers, including the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES), the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Public Service Enterprise Group, Inc., New Jersey's largest utility. Some folks might regard that conclusion as a no-brainer, but those folks don't work for the Bush administration -- it's …

Eugene-Richard. Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize. The Old Diamond neighborhood of Norco, in far southern Louisiana, sits between a Shell Chemicals plant and an oil refinery owned by a Shell joint venture. "We're like the meat in the sandwich," says Margie Eugene-Richard, 62, who grew up just 25 feet from the fenceline of the chemical plant. For decades, the 1,500 residents of this predominantly black neighborhood suffered unusually high rates of cancer, birth defects, and respiratory diseases. They didn't sleep well, either -- they lived in fear of a major industrial accident, like the 1973 pipeline explosion that killed an Old …

Gore Blasts American Companies for Lagging on Green Tech American companies spend too much time fighting environmental regulations and too little time researching and developing the next generation of green technologies, said former vice president and 2000 popular-vote winner Al Gore in a speech to Stanford University business students yesterday. Gore cited a recent deal wherein Ford Motor Co. purchased hybrid-engine technology from Toyota, having fallen too far behind in R&D to catch up on its own. "Unless they change, that story is going to happen over and over and over again," said Gore. "Detroit should be embarrassed." He ended …

Water Privatization Sweeps World Despite Problems Water will be to the 21st century what oil was to the 20th, predicted Fortune Magazine in May 2000, and it is shaping up to be a prescient claim. Multinational corporations now run the water systems that provide for 7 percent of the world's population, with analysts expecting that number to rise to 17 percent by 2015. Private water management is a $200 billion business, and if the World Bank -- which aggressively promotes water privatization -- is to be believed, it will be a $1 trillion business by 2021. This would be good …

Eco-Friendly, Socially Conscious Company Faces Tough Choices Seventh Generation, the biggest U.S. brand of eco-friendly household products -- toilet paper, diapers, soaps, etc. -- is a case study in the possibilities and perils facing companies with a social conscience. Founder and CEO Jeffrey Hollender recently struggled over his decision to continue supplying the company's products to Albertsons while the supermarket mega-chain battled with its unionized employees over benefits. In the longer term, especially as Seventh Generation grows at 20 to 40 percent annually, the company must address what Hollender calls the toughest problem facing responsible companies: scale. How can a …

Shareholders Call on Companies to Address Global Warming A group of pension-fund managers representing public employees announced yesterday that they had filed shareholder resolutions with 10 North American oil and gas companies, calling on them to report to investors how they plan to deal with the problem of global warming and, more to the point, restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions that many expect to come into force within a few years. The resolutions -- coordinated by the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies and the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility -- are part of a growing trend by shareholder activists to …

Green Investment Fund Doubles Returns The Winslow Green Growth Fund, established in 1994 and run by Matthew Patsky, has doubled its worth in the last 12 months -- and outperformed stock benchmarks like the Standard & Poor's 500 Index -- by investing in environmentally and socially responsible companies. Winslow targets such companies as Quantum Fuel Systems Technology Worldwide, a maker of hydrogen and natural-gas fuel tanks for cars, and Chiquita, which emerged from bankruptcy in 2002 with a firm commitment to environmental stewardship. Winslow's rise mirrors the wider rise of socially responsible funds -- funds that avoid companies involved in …