Latest Articles

The world’s largest vertical garden is as long as a city block

At 13,595 square feet, the world's largest vertical garden is definitely bigger than your piddly window box -- think more like “hotel ballroom.”

Wasp named for Lady Gaga sparks nerdy outrage

This wasp is named after Lady Gaga, and fittingly, some people are mad about it.

Japan’s plan to phase out nuclear power lasted a week

The Japanese government has backtracked on plans to end the use of nuclear power.

Very Cold War: China and the West rush to tap the thawed Arctic

Arctic states and international powerhouses are in the early stages of a new struggle to extract resources from way up north.

Increasing Pollution, Dwindling Options

The Food and Environmental Reporting Network released a striking report this week (Sept. 18) describing how industrial agriculture and climate change are fueling massive blooms of toxic algae: Blooms have closed lake beaches or led to swimming advisories from Vermont’s Lake Champlain to Dorena Reservoir in Oregon and from Florida’s Caloosahatchee River to Wisconsin’s Lake Menomin. In addition to […]

Meet the only person who made money off the drought

Renee Haugerud is a farmer's daughter, but she's also the founder of a fancy New York hedge fund. These two attributes have made her basically the only person in the country to have come out ahead from this summer's terrible drought.

Here is a video of a fire tornado, and it is exactly as scary as that sounds

One time I made a joke in a Grist List post about some new horrible form of weather, where I was like “ha ha, what’s next, FIRENADOS?” And then people on Twitter were like “um, firenados are reality” and I was like “WHAT I don’t want to live in the world anymore” but yup. Fire […]

Study: Men recognize cars, women recognize birds

A Vanderbuilt University Study on gender and observational skills reveals strange facts about what men and women recognize.

New Romney ad features miners forced to attend pro-Romney rally — without pay

The miners, employed by a subsidiary of Murray Energy, attended the required rally at the cost of a day's pay. But Romney used them in his ad anyway.

This New Zealand river is officially a person

A river in New Zealand now has person hood status -- we're all so relieved, since everyone treats people great.