Latest Articles

Money can’t buy YOU love — but it can buy the fossil fuel industry the GOP loves

Oil companies, electric utilities and the coal industry have poured more than $250,000 this year into the coffers of the National Republican Congressional Committee, the party’s House fundraising arm that has played a lead role in attacking Democrats who supported climate legislation. All told, political action committees for various fossil fuel industries have given at […]

Congress reverses Chu’s decision, flushes $100 million down the toilet pursuing hydrogen cars

Honda’s FCX Clarity hydrogen fuel cell car: yours for only $100,000!There are only three sure things in life — death, taxes, and you’re never going to buy a hydrogen fuel cell car.  Congress should stop wasting your money pursuing Bush’s phony dream. The fundamental problem with hydrogen as a transport fuel is one that no […]

Nobelist Krugman: Fear of carbon markets and speculation is “99% wrong and bad for the planet”

There are many obstacles to taking action on climate change. Most of those obstacles have deep roots: there are powerful interest groups that don’t want market prices to reflect true costs, and there are ideologues — financially supported by these interest groups — who don’t want to admit that sometimes the government has to intervene. […]

Oh, those sexy building codes: More powerful than 100 nuclear plants

Building energy codes are the key.Are 100 new nuclear plants the solution to our climate troubles? I asked that question in a post last week. The answer lies buried deep within the 1,428-page Waxman-Markey climate bill (H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act), passed by the House and now under consideration in the […]

Reveling in the season’s tomato bounty, from pasta sauce to easy preserving

The jewels of summer, in their glory. Photo: April McGreger Would a summer without garden-grown tomatoes really be summer at all? For me, summer is: tomatoes ripening on the windowsill; picking the hornworms off the tomato plants; a huge bowl of tomatoes on the kitchen counter; tomatoes at every single meal; farmer’s markets so packed […]

The greenest grocery store, biggest “living wall,” and more eco-innovations

The green-building news is coming so fast and furious it can be hard to delve deeply into each story. So here’s a survey of a few of the shiniest, brand-spankin’-newiest, innovativest projects taking shape: The nation’s greenest green grocer.Fore SolutionsHannaford Supermarket, Augusta, Maine. This grocery store in the Pine Tree State’s unassuming, working-class capital has […]

We need an energy revolution

The United States today spends some $400 billion a year importing oil from countries like Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Mexico, Russia, and Venezuela. Think for a moment what an incredible impact that same $400 billion a year could have on our country if that money were invested here and not abroad, in such areas as weatherization, […]

Burrito chain’s Food, Inc. sponsorship generates off-screen drama over farm-worker issues

On July 13, Chipotle Mexican Grill announced it was throwing its marketing weight behind Food, Inc., a documentary that takes a highly critical look at the food system. The fast-food chain would be sponsoring free screenings of the film at 32 theaters nationwide. It would also be distributing material promoting the film at all its […]

Obama stays on message … health care, health care, health care

The White House billed Wednesday night’s primetime press conference as being about health care reform. And sure enough, President Obama and the press by and large stuck to that script. The president made a passing mention of renewable energy in his opening remarks, saying the U.S. economy “simply wasn’t ready to compete in the 21st […]

Recipe for green jobs

In this economy, every state wants jobs. Green jobs are popular, but frankly, they’ll take them in any color. A great way to attract renewable energy jobs to a state is to—and this should be obvious—establish a local market.  If a state provides incentives for a local solar market, for example, you get on the […]