Latest Articles

An oil spill looks a lot bigger in your (yes, your!) backyard

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is big. Twenty-five hundred square miles big. But that oily mess is out in distant ocean waters, not your backyard, making it difficult to relate to the scale of this petro-tastrophe. Helpfully, Google Earther Paul Rademacher makes it easy to imagine what the oil spill would look like in […]

Health risks of potassium bromate maybe not so ‘Fringe’

Fringe mad scientist Walter Bishop goes postal over potassium bromate The sci-fi TV show Fringe had a surreally satisfying sequence in the May 6 episode, available on Hulu.com, in which supposedly mad scientist Walter Bishop goes food shopping. Walter, who in the series spends a lot of time in alternate universes, is holding a box […]

Oil spill update: The ‘junk shot’ solution, BP’s poor safety record, right-wingers discredited

“Eww.” A toxic-smelling trail of “dispersed” oil in the Gulf.Photo: National Wildlife FederationDown $350 million so far and its much-hyped containment dome done in by clumps of icy slush, BP is mulling other options to shut off the gushing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  It might try again with a smaller dome.  Or […]

Why it’s worth passing a crappy climate bill

This weekend I was asked to contribute to The New York Times‘ Room for Debate. I was kind of under the impression that the question was, “Is the Kerry-Graham-Lieberman bill worth passing?” Apparently, though, it was, “Does the climate bill stand a chance?” Obviously those questions have different answers! Mine was geared to the former, […]

Clearing the Clean Energy Innovation Threshold

The latest from the Brookings Institution’s Mark Muro is a perfectly succinct summary of how one should judge the coming Kerry-(Graham?)-Lieberman Senate climate and energy bill, reportedly scheduled for release this Wednesday: What is clear, though, is this: To get to a good bill senators need to deal properly with the revenue–whether from offshore oil […]

Oil spills and human health: Lessons from history

Cleanup crews get the highest exposures to both the oil spill itself and chemical dispersants.Cross-posted from NRDC’s Simple Steps blog. Oil spill clean-up brings workers and volunteers into close contact with chemicals that are known to be hazardous to human health.  As we deal with the oil spill in the Gulf, it helps to brush […]

First look at Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s green cred

Update: Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan hasn’t said much about her environmental views, but she has a solid record of supporting climate law. Here’s the full story on her green cred. Courtesy Doc Searls via Wikimedia Commons—– Well, President Obama picked Solicitor General Elena Kagan as his second Supreme Court nominee. Here’s what we learned […]

No more nuggets: Berkeley schools serve Epic Chicken

In this second, multi-post set of his Cafeteria Confidential series, Ed Bruske reports on his recent week-long, firsthand look at how Berkeley, Calif., schools part ways from the typical school diet of frozen, industrially processed convenience foods. Cross-posted from The Slow Cook. And check out the rest of the Cafeteria Confidential series. My instructions, simple […]

Ask Umbra on the word “green,” DIY laundry detergent, and computer batteries

Send your question to Umbra! Q. Dear Umbra, Whenever I read the word “green” in quotation marks, I get the same sensation as when I hear nails on a chalkboard. Can you help me understand how this practice came about and what differentiates something as being “green” vs. just plain old green (sans quotation marks)? […]

Al Gore, Bill McKibben and the urgency of now

  Question #1: Who has done more to build the 21st century climate movement, Al Gore or Bill McKibben?   Question #2: Who is doing the most right now to build the kind of climate movement we need?   Short answers: Al Gore for question #1, Bill McKibben for question #2.   Another question: Is […]