Latest Articles

New solar cells can be printed right onto buildings

The world's largest dye-sensitized solar cell has just made an appearance. These cells have a couple of major advantages over traditional solar cells: one, they're incredibly cheap, and two, they can be printed right onto the materials used to make a building. Right now they’re being incorporated into girders manufactured by Tata steel.

Congress about to let agribiz get liberal — with pesticides

There's a quiet but vicious fight going on in Congress to restrict the EPA's ability to regulate pesticides, and industry is poised to win.

Russia lets VIPs ignore traffic laws

Do you hate sh*tty drivers? Well, in Soviet Russia, sh*tty driver hates YOU! Moscow's road rage problem is epic, perhaps due to the fact that their traffic solution involves giving special police-style sirens to "VIP" drivers (read: 900-plus important people, government officials and so forth, and the 900-plus folks who can get a hold of them in some other way). However poorly the U.S. is doing at managing traffic, Russian solutions make our roads look like a buggy path in Amish country.

Why tapping the strategic petroleum reserve is a bad idea

When it comes to oil, this is what the U.S. looks like to the rest of the world

 

The Obama administration has decided over the next two months to release 60 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. This is kind of like giving Bubbles from the Wire $5 when he's in the middle of one of his smack binges -- it's not really going to affect consumption, and it sure as hell doesn't address the root problem, which is our seemingly insuperable addiction to oil.

Congress: Let’s just rename it the 'Dirty Water Act'

Have we mentioned that our leaders in Congress are working their butts off to undermine the country's foundational environmental laws? It's not just Republicans, either! Yesterday, a bipartisan bill that would weaken the federal government's ability to keep water clean passed out of committee. The bill would amend the Clean Water Act to give "primary responsibilities for water pollution control" to the states.

GOP's tiny cuts wound small farmers

A $2 million cut to the USDA's budget by the GOP-controlled House makes little difference to the nation's bottom line. But it brings big hurt to small farmers by undercutting efforts to reform the meatpacking industry.

Critical List: McKibben's march on Washington; speeding up permits for offshore drilling

Bill McKibben invites you to come to D.C. in August and march on the White House over and over and over again. The goal is to convince the administration that siphoning Canada's tar sands through the Keystone XL pipelines is not a good idea and also to get heat stroke.

Transocean issued a report blaming BP for the Macondo spill. A Norwegian prosecutor issued a report blaming Transocean for $1.8 billion in tax evasion.

House Republicans don't care who was to blame for the Macondo spill; they just want the EPA to approve permits for offshore drilling more quickly. Bored with this spill! Let’s start on a new one!

Which cities can best adapt to climate change?

Here are the most resilient -- and most vulnerable -- cities to climate change.

Join us in civil disobedience to stop the Keystone XL tar-sands pipeline

We want you to come to Washington in the hottest and stickiest weeks of the summer and engage in civil disobedience that will likely get you arrested.

Me, on Seattle public radio, talking cities and climate

On KUOW's "The Conversation," David Roberts talks about the grim prospects for national or international climate policy and the rays of hope coming from cities.