Articles

This is what happens when Hollywood saves the whales

50 Cent. A motley crew of Hollywood homeboys may be banding together for a benefit concert to free Lolita, a killer whale who’s lived in captivity for four decades performing at the Miami Seaquarium. Efforts to return Lolita to her Pacific Northwest home have been underway for years, but it hasn’t gotten much press until […]

Grist staff Culture

Wear blue for Earth Day 2008 to vote for no coal!

(high-res version here; free for distribution)

Earth Day 2008 is going to be historic. We, along with numerous other groups around the nation, are calling on everyone to wear blue during Earth Day 2008 to signify a vote for no coal. Events will be happening around the world from April 19-22, so ...

Edward Mazria Politics

Umbra on tap water

Umbra, I was wondering where the H2O from the tap comes from, and where it goes to. Beth Swarthmore, Pa. Dearest Beth, It comes from and goes back to the water cycle, which I’ve been reading a lot about in Richard Scarry’s classic work What Do People Do All Day? The book answers the “where […]

Ask Umbra® Culture

Thoughts on the NODPA/Stonyfield debate over organic dairy

About four years ago, I attended a workshop by Jonathan White, the maverick New York State cheese maker/baker/dairy farmer of Bobolink Dairy. Photo: iStockphoto Like a Southern Baptist preacher thundering from the pulpit — only with a Northeastern accent and lots of good humor — White had a message to deliver. He exhorted conventional dairy […]

Tom Philpott Technology

What does Spitzer’s exit mean for environmentalism, and how is that funny?

So long, and thanks for all the dish. So how about this Spitzer business, huh? So much to say, so much humor to mine, so little of it related to the environment in any way … days like these, I envy Wonkette. Ah well, here’s an attempt at something reasonably serious. Spitzer was an environmental […]

David Roberts Politics

New York Governor Eliot Spitzer resigns, leaving behind eco-legacy

Prostitution-ring participant Eliot Spitzer has resigned as New York’s governor, leaving behind a not-too-shabby environmental legacy. As New York’s attorney general, he sued the Bush administration over various eco-issues, including greenhouse-gas emissions, mercury pollution and water guzzling from power plants, pesticide use in public housing, and efficiency standards for appliances. Photo: ny.gov Spitzer took plenty […]

Grist staff Politics

Influential CEOs gather to discuss sustainability, by which I mean plot total global domination

Today I’m heading down to sunny Santa Barbara for “a CEO-level view of the rapidly developing relationship between the environment and the bottom line." The list of speakers is daunting, a veritable gaggle (murder?) of CEOs: Jeff Immelt of GE, H. Lee Scott, Jr. of Wal-Mart, Jim Rogers of Duke Energy, Patricia Woertz of ADM, […]

David Roberts Technology

Company agrees to pay record $250 million in Superfund cleanup costs

W.R. Grace & Co. agreed to pay $250 million to reimburse the U.S. EPA for ongoing cleanup of the asbestos-ridden mining town of Libby, Mont. A mine owned by Grace that operated from 1963 until 1990 contaminated much of the town with asbestos-tainted vermiculite. Over 200 area residents have died from related cancers, and over […]

Grist staff Technology

Obamamississippi

Barack Obama won the Mississippi primary today by a huge margin: 60-37. Blacks composed more than half the turnout and 90% of them voted for Obama. Only a third of whites did, marking one of the most racially divided contests yet. This is the beginning of a six-week lacuna between primaries — next up is […]