Latest Articles

Urban naturalist: Molly Steinwald challenges city kids to find the wilderness in a sidewalk crack

City kids are often taught that nature is “out there,” beyond the city limits, but this biologist/photographer/educator says “everyday nature” has the power to transform.

As Romney mocks climate, Obama mocks Arctic

President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet. My promise…is to help you and your family. – Willard Mitt Romney, August 30, 2012 The moment Mitt Romney mocked the climate crisis will be cursed, rued, and lamented by future generations. It might even be cursed, rued, and […]

Hurricane Katrina caused a baby dolphin boom

Hurricane Katrina was irredeemably terrible for everyone involved — except, it turns out, baby dolphins. (And presumably adult dolphins, who got to enjoy making baby dolphins.) In the years after the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast, these cuties multiplied like excuses at a BP press conference, Scientific American reports: Around two years after the hurricane […]

Governor Romney’s 2004 climate plan: Solyndra-style investment in renewables

Back in the day, as governor of Massachusetts, Romney proposed greenhouse-gas cuts, government investment in cleantech companies, better auto fuel economy, and lots of other good stuff.

One-fifth of creepy spineless animals could disappear forever

Most species are spineless piles of goo. That’s not a value judgment: About 80 percent of the world’s species are invertebrates, which actually do lack spines. Metaphorically, though, it is we who are the spineless piles of goo, for standing by while these creatures disappear. A new report from the Zoological Society of London found […]

Lawmaker: We’ll keep the wind tax credit if you give us Keystone

This is perhaps the worst proposed deal in recent Capitol Hill history.

Chicago’s notorious Fisk and Crawford coal plants go offline

Chicago will no longer be the only major U.S. city with two coal plants operating within its borders, and that means vast improvements in the health of local residents.

Earthquake! Quick, everyone into the $6,000 earthquake-proof bed!

When there is an earthquake most people run to a table or a doorway to ride it out. But if the people at Shinto Industries have their way, the new go-to destination for seismic activity will be this bed, made out of aged cedar and reinforced with special metal fittings.

Hapless Shell inches forward with drilling in the Arctic

With clearance from the Department of the Interior to proceed, Shell will shortly start digging underwater holes in the Earth.

Curtain rises on California’s planned carbon market

From big emitters to tomato tinners, over 100 California businesses got their first taste of cap-and-trade. Here's how it works.