Latest Articles
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Meet the woman leading the charge to green America’s schools
Recently I was at a climate conference dominated by Baby Boomers, mostly white men, droning on about the nigh-insurmountable challenges of climate change and laying out their ponderous academic theories for how to change things. In other words, a typical climate conference. Into this dolorous atmosphere came something different: a young woman, bright-eyed and quick-witted, […]
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Brie a hero for Grist
Dear Grist readers, Would you give $5 to have a platter full of green news, astute advice, and tips for taking action at your fingertips? Today, ONE DAY ONLY, we’re asking for your help. As the big cheese of Grist, I know there’s plenty of stuff to scare the holes out of your Swiss when […]
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Big Ag is pissing away our nation’s rich topsoil
Midwest farmland is more scarred and eroded then previous reports suggested.Photo: Environmental Working GroupBad federal policy and intensifying storms are washing away the rich dark soils in the Midwest that made this country an agricultural powerhouse and that remain the essential foundation of a healthy and sustainable food system in the future. That’s the alarming […]
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Three ways to make nuclear power compete on the free market
Even in France, nuclear power isn’t perfect.Photo: Gretchen MahanThis post is coauthored by Cutler Cleveland, Bruce Cooperstein, and Ida Kubiszewski. It’s a condensed version of an article in the April issue of the Solutions journal, based at the Institute for Sustainable Solutions at Portland State University. As the Japanese nuclear disaster shows, the cleanup costs […]
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Why the sustainable food movement should learn to love Nathan Myhrvold’s ‘Modernist Cuisine’
The most expensive cookbook you’ll (n)ever buyNathan Myhrvold’s Modernist Cuisine — in all of its six-volume, 2,438-page splendor — explicitly aims to “reinvent cooking.” Maybe it will; and it will almost surely reinvent a certain kind of high-end book retailing. It sells for a cool $625, and its initial 6,000-copy print run has already sold […]
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Should kids be exposed to more or less toxic pollution?
For some representatives, the health of schoolkids just doesn’t seem to be the priority.Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. Some questions should be easy to answer. But, with Congress, some things are never easy. Fresh off the House vote to let polluters dump unlimited amounts of carbon pollution into the air, a House subcommittee under […]
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Surprise! Times Square air cleaner now that cars are gone
Refreshing, isn’t it?Photo: Ed Yourdon Despite positive reviews from local business owners, area workers, tourists, and other human beings, New York Post columnist Steve Cuozzo won’t stop frothing at the mouth about the pedestrian plazas in New York’s Times Square, lamenting that the once car-clogged streets have become “asphalt loitering grounds,” and that the redesign […]
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Choose the right sweetener with this handy, snarky flowchart
From aspartame to ZSweet, the number of sweeteners available today is staggering. This flowchart gives you the Sweet’N Lowdown on which kind to use:
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Military miracle turns fuel exhaust into water
Man, if there's two things you don't have enough of when you're deployed in the desert and insurgents keep blowing up your fuel runs, it's beer and Wii. Wait no, it's diesel and water. Luckily researchers have devised a way for soldiers to turn one into the other. Membranes full of tiny tubes condense vehicle […]
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First tar-sands mine approved in U.S.
They’re on their way.Photo: ShellThe Canadian tar-sands industry is invading the United States. Alberta-based Earth Energy Resources has won all necessary permits to excavate tar-sands oil from a 62-acre site in Uintah County, Utah. And that’s just the start. Earth Energy has 7,800 acres of Utah state land under lease and plans to acquire more. The company estimates […]
