Latest Articles

Barbara Boxer is on the hunt …

… for 60 votes (sub rqd) to overcome the inevitable filibuster of Lieberman-Warner. Meanwhile, Friends of the Earth — the only green group to come out against L-W early and consistently — has launched a “fix it or ditch” campaign on the bill. It’s running print ads in The Hill and Roll Call. Frankly, I […]

Obama joins Illinois legislators pushing to revive FutureGen

When the DOE announced it was yanking support for FutureGen, I wondered where Obama would come down on it. Pro-Illinois, or pro-green-coal-haters? Here’s our answer: Nine members of Illinois’ congressional delegation are urging President Bush to keep the FutureGen clean-coal power plant on track. In a letter sent to the president today, the bipartisan group […]

More on the powerful legacy Edwards leaves behind in the presidential race

So Edwards dropped out today. (Jockeying has already begun to secure his endorsement.) Here is his graceful announcement: Here is Grist’s factsheet on Edwards’ environmental record; here is our interview with Edwards. It’s practically become a cliche, but it is true nonetheless: Edwards has had an entirely salutary effect on this race, laying out bold […]

Hot liquid increases toxic leaching from plastic bottles, says study

Contact with hot liquid causes a huge spike in the amount of toxic chemical bisphenol A leaching out of plastic bottles, says new research that’s bad news for baby-bottle-sterilizing parents and hot-liquid-drinking hikers. Filling bottles with boiling water boosted rates of BPA ooze by up to 55 times more than room-temperature water did, according to […]

Heroes star opens heart, closet to save whales

Hayden Panettiere. Photo: Paul Morigi/WireImage Heroes star Hayden Panettiere may not be a real cheerleader (she just plays one on TV), but she sure knows how to rile up a crowd. As campaign spokeswoman for Save the Whales Again!, Panettiere has had quite a busy week. Yesterday, she appeared at a news conference with Sen. […]

Public works and investment must be part of the solution to global warming

As I've said before, certain types of goods -- public goods -- simply cannot be allocated efficiently through market mechanisms alone, even if we get prices right. Now this is not a "government good/private sector bad" post. It is a suggestion, as was my original post on this subject, that a market system requires not only regulation but large-scale public investment, and that one of the places we are making way too few public investments is energy infrastructure.

Again, this is not to say that public investment is the way to run everything; just as there are public goods, there are private goods. But we are trying to meet needs that are clearly public goods via private means. Full social pricing, though needed, will not change that.

Before focusing on energy, consider health insurance. The U.S. spends more on healthcare than any other nation, and gets worse results. There are various reasons for this, but one is that a competitive market in health insurance tends to provide more insurance and less healthcare than public insurance mechanisms. (When I gave this example back in October, biodiversivist argued that our healthcare system "does not resemble any free market I know of." That does not change the fact that our healthcare system is less regulated than healthcare systems in any other rich nation.)

Every intervention that can be cited as possible government over-involvement in our medical system can be found in other systems that spend much less on healthcare and get far better results. If I have to, I'll do a whole post on healthcare -- but the bottom line is that moving a large part of the health insurance system from private to public spending would improve efficiency. Note that we are talking health insurance, not health care.

A major part of fighting global warming will consist of switching from polluting to clean energy. That is largely a matter of major infrastructure, and infrastructure, at least since the fall of feudalism, has always required large public investment, not just regulation.

Grist scheduled to appear on Today show tomorrow — not like last time (we hope)

Ah, the fickleness of live television. One day you're slated to be on TV, the next you're unceremoniously booted off before you even get to meet Matt Lauer. (Oh, the humanity!)

But that was yesterday -- Today is tomorrow. Which is to say, Grist's Katharine Wroth is making her way back to the Today show studios for a guest appearance tomorrow morning. Be sure to tune in for a Grist-alicious good time. Katharine's segment is scheduled to air at 8:19 a.m., no matter what time zone you're in.

Green groups sue over eased restrictions on wolf kills

Seven green groups have sued over a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plan that would loosen restrictions on killing gray wolves in Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming.

Sheryl Crow chats about TP, Rove, and the price of oil

In an interview with the New York Times Magazine, Sheryl Crow talks about the One-Square Scandal: Last spring, you were held up as a parody of environmental correctness when you proposed restricting the use of toilet paper to one square per bathroom visit. What was that about? I think it’s a fantastic and eye-opening example […]

Further data on the environmental movement’s diversity challenge

Hot on the heels of a recent Gristmill feature by Marcelo Bonta of the Center for Diversity and the Environment on this issue, an article on the environmental movement's lack of diversity appeared in The Oregonian this weekend, which dug into the details close to home:

The 115 staff members for the Oregon League of Conservation Voters, Oregon Environmental Council, Ecotrust, Oregon Wild and the Audubon Society of Portland include two Latinos, two Asian Americans, one Native American and no African Americans, their leaders say.

So yes, green groups can do better in terms of hiring. But Bonta, who's interviewed, makes the case again that these groups need to go beyond recruiting to engage in dialogue on the issue. They'll be very likely to find, and surveys back this up, that people of color are just as committed to conservation as they are.