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There’s Other Fish in the Sea. But Not Many.

Ninety percent of the world’s largest and most economically important fish have disappeared due to a half-century of industrial fishing, according to a groundbreaking study published in today’s issue of the journal Nature. The study found that modern fishing has become so efficient that it can decimate 80 percent or more of a given species […]

To What Porpoise?

Numerous species of whales, dolphins, and porpoises are dwindling and could go extinct within the next decade, the World Conservation Union (IUCN) warns in a report released today. Take the baiji, a freshwater dolphin found only in China’s Yangtze River: Surveys taken in 1985 and 1986 estimated the total population of the species to be […]

I Used to Have a V-8

General Motors — last year dubbed “Global Warmer Number One” by Environmental Defense — is taking small steps to clean up its vehicle fleet, not to mention its image. The company has announced that it will add new gas-saving technology to most of its SUVs and pickup trucks by 2008, beginning with three SUV models […]

A Green and Pleasant Meadowlands

Plans are underway to create a huge urban park in New Jersey that would be 10 times the size of New York City’s Central Park — on land now pocked by old garbage dumps and sewage sites. Unofficially dubbed the Meadowlands Preserve, the new park would encompass 8,400 acres of wetlands and green space, and […]

They Otter Be Proud

The English otter, a beloved mammal once thought to have all but disappeared from the nation’s waterways, is staging an impressive comeback. Otters can now be found in nearly 35 percent of England’s rivers and wetlands, a five-fold increase over numbers from 25 years ago, according to survey results released by the government yesterday. Otter […]

Charlotte Brody, Health Care Without Harm

Charlotte Brody, a registered nurse, is a founder and executive director of Health Care Without Harm, an international coalition of 416 organizations in 44 countries working to make health care more environmentally responsible and sustainable. Monday, 12 May 2003 WASHINGTON, D.C. A sunny, breezy morning. So I walked across Washington instead of taking the Metro. […]

Down Under Water

The folks down under will have a lot to be down about if climate change proceeds as projected. Rising temperatures could trigger a 164 percent increase in heat-related deaths in Australia by 2050 and an increase of up to 240 percent in injuries and deaths caused by flooding by 2020, according to a study commissioned […]

DNA-Ok

J. Craig Venter, leader of a team that successfully decoded the human genome, now has his sights set on reading the DNA of an entire ecosystem — the Sargasso Sea, a warm swath of water in the Atlantic around the Bermuda Triangle. Working with teams he’s assembled at private biotech institutes in Maryland, Venter believes […]

Dairy, Dairy, Quite Contrary

Two businessmen want to build a massive cow town in the Mojave Desert in Southern California, providing a home for 90,000 cattle and 600 dairy farmers and their families. Sounds like a recipe for environmental disaster, right? Maybe not: In this case, the plan is to make the development a model of eco-friendly large-scale farming. […]

Sheep Trick

Angering environmentalists, Aboriginals, and regional government officials alike, the Australian government has announced that it will build a controversial nuclear waste dump at a sheep station in South Australia. Located near the desert town of Woomera, the dump will house low-level radioactive waste from medical, university, industrial, and research facilities around the country. In what […]