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Kerry on My Greenward Son

Kerry Pushes for High Fuel Economy As Americans face record-high gas prices, Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry is hawking his plan to raise automobile fuel-economy standards by as much as 50 percent by 2015. While few think Kerry could actually achieve this goal — most congressional Republicans and many Midwestern Democrats oppose the plan — […]

A Thousand Points of Green

Enviro Movement Becoming Decentralized and Diversified Environmentalism is going grassroots. While two-thirds of Americans identify themselves as environmentalists, membership in big, mainstream enviro organizations stayed flat throughout the 1990s. IRS data explains why, at least in part: The number of environmental groups with an annual income of $1 million or more fell by nearly half […]

The Environment Is a Girl’s Best Friend

Renowned Jewelry Firm Speaks Out Against Mine Proposal Jewelry company Tiffany & Co. — of “Breakfast at” fame — shocked the mining industry and the Bush administration yesterday when it took out a full-page ad in The Washington Post opposing the proposed Rock Creek copper and silver mining project in Montana, which would involve tunneling […]

The Voluntary Duplicity Movement

California May Try Voluntary Fix for Dirty Diesel Engines Comedy? Tragedy? You decide. The story begins in 1998, when California regulators discovered that manufacturers of diesel engines for trucks, buses, and motor homes had been, in effect, cheating to get around clean-air rules, putting computer chips in their engines that made them behave differently when […]

You Big Baby!

Pesticide Ban Leads to Higher Baby Birth Weights A ban on two common household pesticides resulted in a striking decline in the number of underweight infants born in areas where the chemicals had been used regularly, found a study by researchers at Columbia University. In 2000, the U.S. EPA banned indoor applications of chlorpyrifos and […]

Dispatches from a U.N. population meeting in the Big Apple

Caron Whitaker manages the Population & Environment Program at the National Wildlife Federation. This week she is attending a U.N. meeting to mark the 10th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development. Wednesday, 24 Mar 2004 New York, N.Y. Government delegates from 41 countries are convening this week at the United Nations headquarters […]

Raising a Stink

Rural Residents Join Fight Against Factory Farms Environmental groups who oppose industrial-style concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) on the grounds that they pollute air and water are finding support from an unexpected source: rural residents. Fed up by lax federal and state regulations — a report last year from the General Accounting Office found that […]

Just In: Timber Take

Bush Plan Likely to Up Old-Growth Logging in Northwest The Bush administration is changing the Northwest Forest Plan to make it easier to log old-growth forests on public land in Washington, Oregon, and California. The rule changes — previously announced, finalized yesterday — scrap the survey-and-manage program that required the U.S. Forest Service and the […]

Depot Man

Office Depot Announces Plan to Go Green Office-supply giant Office Depot is teaming up with respected conservation groups in an effort to green its business practices. A new five-year, $2.2 million environmental strategy should demonstrate that the company is “about commitment, not compliance or convenience,” said Office Depot President Bruce Nelson. The corporation is collaborating […]

We Are the World Bank

Proposal to Limit World Bank Fossil-Fuel Investments Sparks Controversy The World Bank has not yet officially responded to an independent report released last year that recommends it cease investing in oil and coal projects, but that hasn’t stopped industry and enviro leaders from taking sides in a fierce debate over the matter. The World Bank […]