Latest Articles

Teenager builds tiny home to avoid mortgage trap

Sixteen-year-old Austin Hay of Santa Rosa, Calif., has been sleeping in a work-in-progress 130 square foot “tiny home” in his parents' backyard for months. The project came about because "like every teenager, I want to move out," says Hay.

The greenest building on Earth

Workers broke ground this week in Seattle on a six-story building that will generate its own power, collect and reuse rainwater, compost its sewage, and depend on daylight instead of halogen lamps. Its owner, the Bullitt Foundation, which supports work in sustainability, set out to build the greenest building on Earth. We'd say they're earning that title. 

Biodegradable cigarettes: Because why should everything else die with you?

Just because your lungs are blackened doesn't mean you can't be green. San Diego-based company Greenbutts makes cigarette filters that not only biodegrade, but sprout when buried into what have to be the world's least healthy plants.

Noise pollution ruins the sex life of tits

Pickup artists among the great tits (a species of bird, ok?) know how to get chicks: They sing at low frequencies just before females of their species begin laying eggs. It's a great technique! Unless they happen to be hanging out near sources of noise pollution, like highways, which force the tits to change their tune to a higher pitch so that the girls can hear their song in the first place. 

But that's when things start going wrong. 

Get ready for Hurricane Eggbeater

XKCD tackles a neglected aspect of the new climate normal: What are we going to call all these new hurricanes?

Critical List: Biden stumps for clean energy; the magical green properties of concrete

"The biggest mistake this nation has made in its entire history" would be not to invest in clean energy, VP Joe Biden said yesterday at the National Clean Energy Summit 4.0

The Russian government just cut a deal with Exxon to look for oil in that country’s sector of the Arctic. The next day, Russia raided BP’s Moscow offices.

George Monbiot argues that fracking without regulation is insane.

How dense: Tea Party rages over smart growth

Brave Tea Party members know the United Nations will begin their global totalitarian government takeover at the local level. So they're taking the battle against conspiracies like denser urban areas, linked transit systems, and smart land use to the front lines: regional planning commissions!

The dilemma of growth, as dramatized by the voices in my head

Is continued economic growth inevitable and necessary to drive improvements in the human condition? Or is continued economic growth impossible, constrained by biophysical limitations? I let the two sides battle it out in my brain.

Green for greens: Philadelphia subsidizes farmers markets

A new farmers market subsidy program for food stamps recipients makes the City of Brotherly Love a just little healthier.

Dissing coal — and the future of West Virginia

When state leaders react to mild criticism of coal like it's an assault on the dignity of all West Virginians, they're doing more than overreacting: They're cheating the Mountain State out of a clean energy future.