Latest Articles

BP photoshops clean-up command center picture

From Iranian missile tests to George W. Bush campaign ads, using Photoshop to make yourself look better is anything but innovative. Even more so because if you cut corners (literally and figuratively), you’ll probably get caught and wish you could photoshop yourself out of an awkward PR situation. BP is already in a bad enough […]

Bike branding moves from urban chic to mainstream

Fast Company‘s design blog reports on some inspiring advertising: Americans are riding bikes more than ever, yet cycling is still held up as some sort of cultish hobby relegated to aggro dudes with messenger bags who live and die by their fixed gears. So maybe it’s time for a new image, yeah? Colle+McVoy, a Minneapolis […]

Solar startups take a shine to Portland

Portland, the new hub of solar power in the U.S.?Photo courtesy of Keith SkeltonBack in the 1980s and ’90s, the region surrounding Portland was dubbed the Silicon Forest for the cluster of computer chip companies that had flocked to Oregon to set up shop. Now those old-growth tech companies are giving way to a new […]

Fate of PACE clean-energy programs about to become clearer

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have shut down most of the nation’s programs using Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE), an innovative tool (explained here) that helps Americans finance green improvements to their homes. Here’s the latest news: The Federal Housing Finance Agency will say Wednesday whether it will allow a 30-month pilot project for Property […]

Global CO2 emissions fall in 2009, but the past decade still sees rapid emissions growth

The temperature’s rising; can the big carbon-emitting countries take the heat? In 2009, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in China — the world’s leading emitter — grew by nearly nine percent. At the same time, emissions in most industrial countries dropped, bringing global CO2 emissions from fossil fuel use down from a high of 8.5 billion […]

The debut of My Intentional Life: Somewhat true stories of attempted sustainability

Welcome to My Intentional Life, Grist’s first original comic strip. In this debut episode, you’ll meet Gabriel Willow, and his pals Josh, Hunny, and Tracie, real-life roommates who are trying to live a more sustainable life in a Brooklyn brownstone. They’re raising a few eyebrows while raising a few chickens, and tending a roof garden and […]

How trains replaced solar-powered transport and gave rise to the Farm Belt

Greens like me tend to fetishize trains. And for good reason. Why risk your life in a private, energy-intensive pod, negotiating traffic and the dubious decisions of hundreds of other drivers, when you could be comfortably reading on a subway? Who would endure the indignities of the airport for a short flight, if a high-speed […]

Help kickstart a documentary on Haiti’s agricultural rebirth

Since 1981 the United States has followed a policy until the last year or so … that we rich countries that produce a lot of food should sell it to poor countries and relieve them of the burden of producing their own food, so thank goodness they can leap directly into the industrial era. It […]

BP Fails to Make Top Ten

Fingers crossed. BP’s oil leak has apparently stopped shy of 200 million gallons spewed into the Gulf of Mexico and a few million more burned off into plumes of toxic smoke. Many have dubbed it the worst environmental disaster in American history. In my view, it’s not even close, but shares a great deal in […]

Accept more poison to get less carbon? Kill this crazy idea NOW

With an increase in industry’s toxic pollutants, will this be the fate of our water sources? In exchange for cutting their carbon emissions, power plants want to undermine the EPA and get permission to increase other kinds of dangerous pollution. They even want the go-ahead to dump more sulfur and deadly mercury into our air […]