Latest Articles

Bounty hunting: an inside look at a successful farmers market operation [VIDEO]

Last spring, I had the pleasure of following the farm-to-market process with one of the “successful” upstart organic farms in Minnesota. Laura and Adam from Loon Organics let me film and work through their Friday-Saturday operation. I had been idealizing the idea of starting a farm: seeing the beautiful produce stacked up at the market made me […]

Real-life Farmville kills the same amount of time, actually does some good

We knew things were going to get weird once we found out there was a real-world Angry Bird. Now a farm in England is turning itself into live-action Farmville. For a £30 ($49) annual fee, members of MyFarm will get to weigh in on every decision made at Wimpole Estate Farm in Cambridgeshire. They'll vote […]

Water shortages threaten food future in the Middle East

A water tower in Al-Muzahimiyah, Saudi Arabia.Photo: Andrew A. ShenoudaThis piece originally appeared in The Guardian. Long after the political uprisings in the Middle East have subsided, many underlying challenges that are not now in the news will remain. Prominent among these are rapid population growth, spreading water shortages, and ever growing food insecurity. In […]

Daylight-mimicking LEDs save power, might reduce symptoms of Alzheimer’s

All the cool kids know that CFLs are merely a bridge technology — and now students at Drexel University have a grant to enhance their successor, which are household lights comprised of light emitting diodes. LEDs aren’t new tech — they’re already used in your monitor, television, Christmas tree, throwies, etc. They're super efficient, plus […]

I’ve seen the future and I can’t afford it: Marketplace’s botched ‘feed the world’ story

Let’s have a real debate about organic vs. conventional agriculture.Photo: Bio BrothersIn a recent report entitled “The Non-Organic Future,” public radio’s Marketplace program considered the challenge to agriculture of feeding a world population estimated to reach 9 billion by 2050. It was, to be frank, a terrible piece of journalism. Short, virtually fact-free, and weakly […]

So what is this Cycle Chic movement?

Cycle Chic is about the "rehumanification" of cycling. Open your closet, put on something you love, get on your bike, and go.

Baddest-ass hybrid in the world to become a reality

Jaguar has announced plans to build a hybrid-electric supercar that goes from 0 to 60 in three seconds — proving once again that green cars aren't just better for the environment; they're also substantially more bad-ass than the belching, muck-fueled dinosaurs they replace. The C-X75 will have an ultralight carbon-fiber chassis and an all-electric range […]

Hot stuff: chile peppers, climate change, and the future of food

Getting hot in here.Photo: Josh KelloggClimate change is the issue of our time. Its ill effects will fall heaviest on the people who have least contributed to it: billions in the global south. But no one will escape the impact of the warming climate, and one place it will manifest most obviously is on our […]

Nixing pollutants could save $76.6 billion in health care costs

Between medical costs and lost productivity for parents, environmental illnesses in children cost $76.6 billion annually, says a new study in Health Affairs. That’s the cost of all illnesses that are correlated with exposure to pollutants and toxins. (Some of the associations are better-documented than others, but many — like lead poisoning, which costs $50.9 […]

What I want for Mother's Day

This Sunday, I will be celebrating my second Mother’s Day. My daughter Hazel (pictured at right testifying with me last year) was born last year a few days prior to Mother’s Day, and so I had the unforgettable experience of celebrating my first mother’s day with both of her grandmothers — we called it the […]