Latest Articles

Population trends as you’ve never seen them before [VIDEO]

As part of my GINK and population coverage, I’ll be bringing you a video each Saturday with a different take on these issues. Check out the previous installment, and stay tuned for more. Hans Rosling uses “colorful new data display technology” (ahem) to show you population trends over the last half century and the half […]

How Obama can wean the country off oil without help from Congress

Obama could kick off the “Big Green Buy.”Photo: Wikimedia CommonsThis article is part of a special issue of The Nation magazine about green energy, “Freedom From Oil.”  In the wake of the BP oil spill, some captains of industry have begun calling for government leadership to spur a clean-energy revolution. In June, billionaire software mogul […]

Six drinks to avoid slipping down your gullet [SLIDESHOW]

Here at Grist we like to think we’re looking out for you guys, so before you stock up on refreshing sippables for your summer potlucks here’s a small checklist of beverage bandits looking to pee in your pool party. Cheers! Photo courtesy racineur via Flickr Fuze Refresh “Peach-Mango” The only thing more confusing than Peach-Mango […]

Ethanol gets skewered by recent CBO assessment

In its calm and measured way, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) just delivered a blistering assessment of the environmental value of corn-based ethanol. The CBO had been charged by Congress to calculate just what the public is getting for its investment in ethanol production: specifically, the $0.45/gallon tax credit that gasoline blenders get for mixing […]

We Won't Accept More Poison For Less Carbon

Written by Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, CEO of Green For All, and Ben Jealous, President of NAACP As Senators enter the final rounds of negotiations on the climate and energy bill, big utility companies apparently are making unconscionable demands that threaten the health and safety of all Americans. For example, The Hill reports: “Power company officials are […]

Urbivore’s Dilemma, Week 6: How I turned vegetables into a time machine

This week’s bounty.(Jennifer Prediger photos) Welcome to week 6 of my adventures as a veggie box subscriber, which I’m chronicling in this Urbivore’s Dilemma series. This week I had an epiphany about my Community Supported Agriculture membership. I think I may have found a way to slow down time with vegetables! The vegetables in this […]

The future of Rust Belt cities in the post-LeBron era

     Keith AllisonContrived news hooks based on LeBron James are so last week, but Aaron Renn at New Geography has a good link between the departing free agent and a struggling Rust Belt city: In a sense though, Cleveland’s disappointment was inevitable. LeBron James was never going to turn around the city. No one […]

California anti-climate ballot measure could have global consequences

Image: Climate Progress This post first appeared at the Center for American Progress. This November, California voters are in danger of undoing one of the most progressive pieces of environmental legislation ever passed. Texas oil companies have taken advantage of California’s quirky initiative system to place Proposition 23 on the ballot. This proposition has one […]

Does New York City’s High Line park matter in the fight against climate change?

1 hr photo via FlickrThe best use for elevated transit tracks is running trains on them. But the next best use might be beautiful, innovative green space, like the newish High Line park built on a defunct railway trestle that runs through Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood and Meatpacking District. Cities around the nation want to emulate […]

Chicagoans get new roots and second chances from Growing Home farm

January 2011 update: Many of the photos have been removed from this series so they can be published in a Breaking Through Concrete book, forthcoming this year from UC Press. The real estate market dealt Melvin Price a double whammy. The 45-year-old builder and carpenter had been making a living in Chicago for years before […]