Latest Articles

Here’s your holiday reading!

It is getting so close to that magical week between Christmas and New Year's where offices are either closed or abandoned by the vast majority of employees, and no work gets done. Whether you plan to be snuggled on a couch by an open fire or logging truncated days of semi-productivity in a half-empty office, […]

This Chicago park will be almost 10 times as big as Manhattan

On Chicago's South Side, 140,000 acres of brownfields and other underused land are just sitting there. But Illinois is putting $17 million into turning that fallow ground into what will be the largest city park in the lower 48. (Alaska has one that's bigger.) The park will be called the Millennium Reserve and will promote […]

Critical List: Seattle bans plastic bags; at least 100 million trees died in Texas this year

Seattle is banning retail stores from giving out single-use plastic bags. Paper bags will cost a nickel. Google is investing $94 million in solar projects. As many as 500 million trees died in the Texas drought this year. India could join the U.S. in officially complaining that China's been selling solar panels at too low […]

Now we’re cooking: How to get Americans back in the kitchen

Photo from the video Tamar Adler Talks About An Everlasting Meal.Editor’s note: It’s unanimous these days: Cooking food from scratch at home is one of the best ways to eat sustainably without breaking the bank. It also enables eaters to easily support food producers who use environmentally sound, ethical, and humane practices. But most Americans […]

Neverending nigiri: Kristofor Lofgren fights for sustainable sushi

Grist is proud to present the Change Gang — profiles of people who are leading change on the ground toward a more sustainable society and a greener planet. Some we’ve written about before; some are new to our pages. Some you’ll have heard of; most you probably won’t. Know someone we should add to the […]

Will nature always be the last book on the shelf?

Photo: Martin DeutschCross-posted from Cool Green Science. Driving with my kids the other day, I saw a sign announcing: “Borders Books Going Out of Business: 90% Off!” We headed in with great enthusiasm, thoughts of nearly free books dancing in our heads. The place was swarming with bargain hunters. The remaining inventory had been moved […]

Greens poised to win on Keystone, refuse to act like it

Cheer up! We’re winning!Like everyone else, I have no idea how this fight over the payroll tax bill is going to play out. Things looked resolved on Saturday when the Senate voted 89 to 10 for a compromise bill. House majority leader John Boehner said it was a “good deal.” But then, as usual, the […]

Pipe dreams: Boehner insists pipeline can be approved by deadline

Cross-posted from Climate Progress. Congressional Republicans are sticking to their attempt to force a rushed decision on the controversial Keystone XL tar-sands pipeline. Speaking on Meet the Press yesterday, House Speaker John Boehner called the need for more environmental review “nonsense,” claiming “all the studies have been done.” As part of a package to extend the […]

Frame-out: Why reporters can't admit that Keystone Pipeline is a job-suck

Allow me to bury the lead. The Keystone XL pipeline is a climate disaster. I reiterate this, at the risk of what David Roberts calls “public flatulism,” because this post is about jobs, and I don’t want anyone to infer that any amount of jobs would justify committing climate suicide. IEA’s warnings against imminent climate […]

Bigger subsidies make bigger solar a bad bet

This post originally appeared on Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project. Americans seem unable to resist big things, and solar power plants are no exception. There may be no reasoning with an affinity for all things “super sized,” but the economics of large scale solar projects (and […]