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Sulfuring in Silence
A bill to cut the power plant emissions that cause acid rain would save 10,000 lives a year while increasing the average household electricity bill by only $1 per month, according to a report by the U.S. EPA. The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-N.Y.) and Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.), would reduce nitrogen […]
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Of Ice and Men
A 345-square-mile iceberg — 10 times larger than Manhattan — has broken off from Antarctica’s Ross Ice Shelf, the National Ice Center reported Friday. The Ross Ice Shelf is one of two large ice fields on the continent that have seen increased calving of massive icebergs in recent years, which some scientists suggest could be […]
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Stacy Mitchell, Institute for Local Self-Reliance
Stacy Mitchell is a researcher with the New Rules Project of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a nonprofit organization that provides research, analysis, and innovative policy solutions for building healthy communities and strong, sustainable local economies. She is author of The Home Town Advantage. Monday, 2 Oct 2000 TOLEDO, Ohio I am at the airport, […]
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Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel — Oh Wait, There Is No Bottom
Radioactive contamination in groundwater may be 400 times higher than the federal standard at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington state because high-level nuclear waste was buried 40 years ago in containers that had no bottoms, the U.S. Energy Department said on Friday. The department’s groundwater manager said the contamination will likely reach the Columbia […]
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Fit to Be Tide
Red tides are becoming a severe environmental problem along China’s coast, killing tons of fish and costing the country more than $100 million every year. Red tides, which can be caused or exacerbated by industrial and sewage waste, are massive and fast-spreading algae outbreaks that poison the water or deplete its oxygen supply, suffocating marine […]
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Double, Double Oil and Trouble
George W. Bush unveiled an energy plan on Friday that would boost domestic oil production significantly and open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and other federal lands to drilling. Speaking at a Michigan auto plant, Bush hammered at some of Al Gore’s environmental beliefs. “The vice president likes electric cars — he just doesn’t […]
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Bush Oil Plan: Exhibit A
The Supreme Court refused today to hear a case in which the ExxonMobil Corp. contended it should not have to pay $5 billion in punitive damages for the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska. The corporation’s lawyers had urged the justices to throw out the penalty on grounds of irregularities during jury deliberations when […]
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Nafis Enough
Under the leadership of Nafis Sadik, the U.N. Population Fund has been transformed from an organization that foisted contraceptives on women in order to meet fertility-control targets to one that has as its central mission giving women more power not just over their own fertility but over health care, education, and many other aspects of […]
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Royalty Flush
The White House and congressional leaders reached a compromise late last week on a landmark bill that would set aside $12 billion over six years for land conservation. The program, which would be financed in part by oil royalties, would double funding to acquire new federal lands, protect sensitive ecosystems, create urban parks, and preserve […]
