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Small-town politics meets big-time energy crisis

Last night I went to the town meeting where I live, which — well, if you’ve never lived anywhere podunk enough to have a town meeting, you’re missing out. This one was just as I remember them from my childhood, though PowerPoint has replaced mimeographed pages: ambition, exhaustion, confusion, and the one crusty, bearded guy […]

Biofuel-bound grasses are often invasive species

As biofuel sources go, weeds and grasses are looked on with more favor than land-ravaging, food-price-raising corn and palm. But there’s no such thing as a free lunch-in-your-tank, says a paper presented by green groups at a United Nations meeting Tuesday: “Some of the most commonly recommended species for biofuels production are also major invasive […]

South America’s industrial-ag powerhouse eyes rainforest potash deposits

I’ve been writing for a while about industrial agriculture’s fertilizer problem — about how mass-scale food (and biofuel) production relies on finite, geopolitically problematic, and environmentally destructive resources to maintain soil fertility. (See posts here, here, and here.) Well, that story is heating up down in Brazil, an increasingly important hub in the global industrial […]

Boxer on new L-W amendment: ‘I think I have enough votes for the motion to proceed’

Barbara Boxer. Photo: Kevin Parry/ WireImage Environment and Public Works Chair Barbara Boxer held a press conference this afternoon to officially unveil the outline of her substitute amendment to the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act that she began circulating on the Hill last week. Speaking to collected members of the press, the senator stressed the differences […]

Oregon and Kentucky vote; nation yawns and rolls over

In case anyone’s still paying attention, there were two more primaries today. Hillary Clinton scored a big win in Kentucky, with 65 percent of the vote to Obama’s 30 percent. But Obama looks poised to win Oregon, and says he’s reached the delegate threshold. Various media folks are reporting that he now has an “insurmountable […]

RPJr. is at it again

Roger Pielke Jr., last seen bobbing and weaving in an online bout with an Actual Scientist — and getting pummeled — can now be found in a story in the Moonie-owned, far-right Washington Times: Roger A. Pielke, environmental studies professor at the University of Colorado, and not previously a global warming skeptic, reacted to the […]

Coming to terms with the reality of a world of refugees

There's definitely a survivalist streak building in the environmental movement. Mainstream newspapers are starting to run stories about survivalism.

There are quite a few people who hear that the energy peak or climate change is coming and believe that building up their stocks of ammo and heading for the hills is the way to go. I recognize, even if I do not share, that impulse: It is the impulse to protect your own, the panic you feel when you realize that your society, which on some level is supposed to protect you, hasn't planned ahead for this one. And so there's a tendency of people to get into discussions about what happens when refugees or hungry folk come around, and a lot of times the answer is that you have to protect your own again. Protect your own means "shoot people," in many cases.

Snippets from the news

• Competing forest studies spar over CO2. • Chemical-safety bill introduced in House. • Big investors call on Congress to tackle climate change. • Fisheries Service considers Makah whaling request. • Al Gore receives yet another prize.

Caribou numbers declining in Alaska and Canada

Hello, and welcome back to The Plight of Arctic Wildlife. Previously we’ve covered polar bears, narwhals, seals, and walruses — today we’re going to tackle caribou. (Well, not literally.) After years of steady growth, Alaska’s largest caribou herd lost 20 percent of its population between 2003 and 2007, according to the latest count. The Western […]

Deloitte survey of consumers and utility regulators

On Monday, consultant firm Deloitte released two new surveys, one of consumers and one of utility regulators. There’s some fairly interesting stuff in there. First off, some 87 percent of utility regulators expect the cost of producing electricity to rise next year. Why? Here’s what they attribute it to: Fuel prices (35 percent). Environmental compliance […]