Latest Articles

Viral epidemic hits Mediterranean

Striped dolphins in the Spanish Mediterranean are under attack from a virus similar to measles that could kill roughly 75,000 of the creatures before the disease loses steam.

Authorities confirmed the disease, Morbillivirus, was also responsible for a plague that killed hundreds of thousands of dolphins in the early 1990s and also recently affected the Canary Island right whale population.

This is definitely not the year for dolphins -- perhaps you remember the reports late last year of the Yangtze River dolphin effectively becoming extinct. Human impacts, including industrial pollution, boat traffic, and overfishing, were to blame. A video surfaced earlier this summer showing Brazilian fishermen killing 83 dolphins for kicks.

True, this virus may be a natural phenomenon despite its disastrous potential. Things like poaching, pollution and overfishing can be prevented and helped -- and should be.

Aspen, Colo., unveils its own carbon-offsetting program

Aspen, Colo., home of many insanely rich folk, has become the first municipality in the nation to sell its very own brand of carbon offsets. check out the offsets: <a href="

A mysterious World Cup goes green

The sporting! It continues to go green! Solar panels on stadium roofs, recycled pitch-watering systems and fair trade snacks for half time should make the World Cup a model for environmentally friendly sporting events, French officials said on Tuesday. It’s the rugby World Cup that they speak of, by the by. You’d have to search […]

Vietnam hospital waste turned into plastic utensils

Recycling gone bad: Environmental officers in Vietnam have found that nearly 300 tonnes of medical waste from a Hanoi hospital was illegally processed into household plastic utensils, state media said Wednesday. A staff member at the Vietnam-Germany Hospital sold the used plastic items — including IV transmission lines and syringes, some still contaminated with blood […]

Climate change could cause more flooding than currently predicted, says research

Do you like news of the “If you thought you were screwed, it’s even worse!” variety? Then with no further ado: a new study in Nature suggests that climate change brings a higher risk of flooding than previously thought. Researchers say that current predictions overlook the fact that rising levels of carbon dioxide decrease plants’ […]

The Wall Street Journal contradicts itself on global warming

The Wall Street Journal is universally admired among journalists for its news and analysis; for its editorial page, not so much. A spectacular example of the latter's ability to mislead appeared yesterday, under the cute title Not So Hot, in which the anonymous editorializers adroitly attacked NASA, environmentalists, climate change models, and climatologists James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt over a statistically insignificant data correction. The misleading editorial was rewarded with great popularity, as the piece was the second-most emailed of the day, right after a feature on beer pong.

But interestingly, two weeks ago the number-crunchers at the WSJ ran a feature analyzing the exact same controversy in the column called The Numbers Guy, prosaically entitled "Global Warming Debate Overheats with Bad Numbers." This gives Grist readers a unique opportunity to compare the WSJ news-and-analysis team versus the WSJ editorial team. Judge for yourself.

John Edwards encourages Americans to give up SUVs

John Edwards told a labor group that if he were president, he would encourage Americans to give up their SUVs. Ballsy!

Drinking water across the globe contaminated by arsenic, says research

Some 137 million people across the globe unknowingly consume water with unsafe levels of arsenic, according to new research. The odorless, tasteless chemical occurs naturally in soil, but also reaches drinking water from agricultural and industrial sources and the vials of paperback-mystery villains. Arsenic can lead to lung, bladder, and skin cancer and is “the […]

Crushed glass may help replenish Florida beaches

In order to deal with the constant erosion of Florida’s beaches, one county has decided to stop building outrageously expensive real estate so close to the water’s edge it practically begs nature to destroy it. Ha, ha. Just kidding. Actually they’re looking into replenishing beaches with recycled beer bottles, crushed, of course, into tiny sand-size […]

China’s one-child policy reduces population, helps climate

Perhaps a wee bit sensitive about being vilified for its excessive impact on climate change, China has pointed out that its one-child policy, instituted in the late 1970s, has kept 300 million consumers off of the planet.