Latest Articles

When pleasing industry compulsively takes precedence over public interest

It’s gratifying to see EPA chief Stephen Johnson writhing under pressure to resign in disgrace. The agency is being hounded by lawsuits from states while Johnson faces perjury accusations from Congress. My question: what took so long? Documenting the agency’s recent betrayals of the public interest would take a book, not a blog post. Myself, […]

Meet the eco-activist athletes who’ll be competing in Beijing

Photo: Mansoor Ahmed/WireImage LeBron James, U.S., Basketball The Cavaliers’ superstar forward LeBron James not only passed Olympic muster this year, but also met SpongeBob SquarePants’ approval. The two celebs have teamed up as part of Nickelodeon’s Big Green Help campaign aimed at encouraging kids to go green.

World Bank finally releases ‘secret’ report on biofuels and the food crisis

Remember a few weeks ago, when The Guardian leaked word of a “secret” World Bank report that essentially blames U.S. and (to a lesser extent) E.U. biofuel policies for causing the global food crisis? You know, the food crisis that continues to generate excoriating hunger in the global south? Well, the World Bank quietly released […]

Oil companies’ continued record profits tick off Democrats, consumers

Major oil companies reported ginormous second-quarter profits this week, irking consumers and fueling harsh rhetoric from congressional Democrats. ExxonMobil reported a record-breaking profit of $11.68 billion — the highest of any U.S. company ever — besting its own previous record set in the first quarter of this year. Royal Dutch Shell raked in $11.56 billion, […]

EPA OKs giant coal plant on Navajo land in New Mexico

After more than four years of deliberation, the U.S. EPA has bestowed an air permit to a proposed 600-acre coal plant on Navajo land in New Mexico. Announcing the step forward for the 1,500-megawatt Desert Rock Power Plant, the EPA noted that Navajo Nation leaders have “staunchly supported” the project since its inception — though […]

Ninth time’s the charm?

Yesterday, for the eighth time this session, the Senate took up the extension of the critical tax credits for solar and wind. The Republicans filibustered and the cloture vote failed. Read the sordid story here.

Congress is now adjourning for a summer vacation. While our representatives recharge their batteries, we think they should be thinking about America's batteries. Take action here.

By century’s end we can expect extremely high surface temperatures

Sure glacier melt, sea level rise, extreme drought, and species loss get all the media attention -- they are the Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, and Barack Obama of climate impacts. But what about good old-fashioned sweltering heat? How bad will that be? Two little-noticed studies -- one new, one old -- spell out the grim news.

Bottom line: By century's end, extreme temperatures of up to 122°F would threaten most of the central, southern, and western U.S. Even worse, Houston and Washington, D.C. could experience temperatures exceeding 98°F for some 60 days a year.

The peak temperature analysis comes from a Geophysical Research Letters paper [PDF] published two weeks ago that focused on the annual-maximum "once-in-a-century" temperature. Researchers looked at the case of a (mere) 700 ppm atmospheric concentrations of CO2, the A1b scenario, with total warming of about 3.5°C by century's end. The key scientific point is that "the extremes rise faster than the means in a warming climate."

Ads from Sierra Club and MoveOn hit McCain over energy policy

“Big Oil companies have our economy and politics in a choke hold,” says a new TV ad released today by the Sierra Club Political Committee. “They are getting billions from the government, raking in record profits, while we pay more and more for gas.” “John McCain’s answer?” the ad continues. “Another $4 billion giveaway to […]

New Obama ad responds to McCain’s Britney ad

Barack Obama is hammering back after John McCain ran an ad comparing him to Britney Spears. In a new ad of his own, Obama accuses the Republican candidate of taking “the low road.” “John McCain: Same old politics, same failed policies,” says the ad, before touting Obama’s plans to grant a $1,000 middle-class tax, fight […]

Edible landscapes can outgrow the elite

Monday's New York Times had a great opinion piece about My Farm's Trevor Paque -- the same guy recently profiled in the Times' Style section. In fact, I had to look twice to make sure it was the same T. Paque because the two articles emphasized such different aspects of the urban CSA mission. Kim Severson, in the style piece, describes it thus:

Call them the lazy locavores -- city dwellers who insist on eating food grown close to home but have no inclination to get their hands dirty. Mr. Paque is typical of a new breed of business owner serving their needs.

She devotes so much time and script to the eco-chic aspect that I, like Tom Philpott, was initially put off by the idea of armchair gardening. But just like Tom, who later posted that he was "too hard" on it, I softened after reading Allison Arieff's opinion piece. She writes: