Latest Articles
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Now on Facebook: your grandma, mailman, and … the solar industry
You just got poked by the sun.Photo: diogo dubiellaYou have a new friend request … from the sun! OK, it’s actually from a company selling solar panels. “Solar service providers … are increasingly turning to social media tactics in an attempt to create engaged communities around the sunny clean power,” says Earth2Tech. Solar startups are […]
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Pittsburgh’s drinking water is radioactive, thanks to fracking. Only question is, how much?
The drinking water of tens of millions of Pennsylvanians is threatened by natural-gas fracking — including the 2.3 million who live in Pittsburgh.Photo: Via Tsuji Residents of Pittsburgh — as well as potentially tens of millions of other everyday citizens in the Northeast corridor who rely on their taps to deliver safe water — are […]
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NY Times on natural gas fracking:
The New York Times has a multi-bombshell piece on natural gas fracking, “Regulation Lax as Gas Wells’ Tainted Water Hits Rivers.” CP has done a great many pieces on the potential benefits of fracking — and the potential dangers (see “Getting to the bottom of natural gas fracking and links below). But while unconventional natural […]
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Colin Firth’s wife wins Best Lady in a Recycled Gown in our personal Oscars
Photo: Davidlohr BuesoGreen-minded folks in the know about celebrity stuff — i.e. not me — have been on tenterhooks waiting to see what Colin Firth’s wife Livia would wear to the Oscars. That’s because she’s attempting the Green Carpet Challenge again this year, and has sworn to wear nothing on the red carpet that isn’t […]
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EPA lets natural gas industry brazenly pollute my state’s drinking water
That’s some fracked up sh*t: a natural gas rig does its thing in Dimock, Pa. Photo: Helen Slottje, via arimooreIn a perfect world, everyone would read The New York Times’ frankly terrifying exposé on the EPA’s rather timid oversight of the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania — and public outrage would force the EPA to […]
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Will natural-gas fracking turn New York into a 21st century Appalachia?
How much is it worth to you to put up with contaminated drinking water?Photo: Helen SlottjeLet’s define “Appalachia” at the beginning: a place blessed with mountains above below-ground natural resources, but cursed with chronically high unemployment; a place where natural resources are not owned by the landowners; a place where extracting those natural resources poisons […]
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If the GOP can’t destroy nature, they’ll at least make sure others can’t enjoy it
Photo: Rosa SayWhat happens if Republicans, frustrated by opposition to their spending bill amendments (some of which defang the EPA), decide to hold their collective breath until they get their way? Well, the government shuts down. That means a whole lot of government employees get an unwanted furlough (JOBS!). It could also spell disaster for […]
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How bicycling will save the economy (if we let it)
This is the first column in a series focusing on the economics of bicycling. Imagine getting a $3,000 to $12,000 tax rebate this year. Now imagine it coming again and again. Every year it grows by around a thousand dollars. Imagine how this would change your daily life. Sounds like a teabagger’s wet dream, but […]
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Appalachia Keeps Rising
Without question, one of the most rewarding organizing experiences I have ever been a part of was the “Appalachia Rising” mobilization in late September of last year. Appalachia Rising consisted of three very successful days of action in Washington, D.C.: a two-day weekend conference, followed by a Monday morning march of 2,000 people to the […]
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Sen. Sherrod Brown and the Clean Air Act
Sen. Sherrod Brown.Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. There are things to like in Sen. Sherrod Brown’s (D-Ohio) letter to President Obama today about the Clean Air Act and carbon pollution. However, the letter is off base in its concern about EPA’s reasonable steps to assure that big new plants reduce their pollution to […]
