Latest Articles

Got the Urge for Knowing

Scientists and evangelical leaders form new climate alliance So a minister, a scientist, and a horse walk into a bar. The bartender says, “Why the long face?” The horse just chuckles, but the other two begin a thoughtful discussion about how humans are destroying the planet. Sound far-fetched? Not after yesterday, when a group of […]

A Speechwriter Behind Every Bush

Content of State of the Union speech remains a mystery — kind of Will President Bush crack down on climate change in his State of the Union address? The world may never know — until, of course, he gives the speech next Tuesday. Mutterings that the administration would embrace a cap-and-trade carbon-reduction scheme were flatly […]

It’s Africa

Imagine a place where women must average seven children in their lifetime while risking infection from a fatal sexually transmitted disease (passed to the human population by eating other primates) that has left almost seven percent of those children orphaned.

This place experiences extreme climate shifts, cyclically throwing vast numbers of people into chronic starvation.

This place has been ravaged by constant civil war, wherein rival religious factions like the Lord's Resistance Army enslave and rape the populace while others cajole them to stop using contraception.

This place is home to some of the last of the 380 wild mountain Gorillas, two of which were just eaten.

This place has a ruler who is about to turn over to developers nine more tropical forests to grow biofuel stock (sugarcane and palm oil) instead of food.

Welcome to Children of Men in real time.

Gloom and Doom With a Sense of Doomed-er

Doomsday Clock ticks to 11:55 p.m., thanks in part to climate change Cue ominous music: We’re edging closer to annihilation, according to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists’ famed Doomsday Clock — a symbolic measurement of how close civilization stands to ultra-mega-doom, or “midnight.” Yesterday, the group pushed its famed ticker two minutes forward to 11:55 […]

Is This What the Kids Call Progress?

A slew of new climate legislation heads to Congress What a difference an election makes. After years of see-no-evil, hear-no-evil, be-really-evil, Congress is abuzz with forward movement on climate change. No less than four bills on climate look poised to go before the Senate, with big names like Sens. McCain, Obama, Boxer, and Feinstein jostling […]

Pelosi snubs Dingell

I discussed the climate-change climate in the Senate — things are hopping. The House, of course, is a different and less friendly animal, where Dems are stepping more gingerly. One notable development is that Speaker Nancy Pelosi rather publicly stuck her thumb in the eye of Michigan Rep. John Dingell, announcing today the formation of […]

Senators put for broad array of climate legislation choices

This is a stellar piece of reporting from Felicity Barringer and Andy Revkin at the NYT. There’s a lot of background, context, and detail packed into a small space. What’s made clear by the piece, and by the graphic comparison of emissions scenarios, is that the nation has an astonishing array of climate legislation options […]

Grim

Before it gets too old: The San Francisco Chronicle ran an extraordinary piece over the weekend. It’s a long, detailed, science-based worst-case scenario of what California’s water situation could look like in coming decades. This stuff works so much better than dry facts. Tell a story. People like stories. Kudos to author Glen Martin.

Lines that are bright, how we love them

Bill McKibben’s Step It Up 2007 campaign (read his dispatches) is trying to rally a bunch of simultaneous protests pushing a single goal: reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by 80% by 2050. This approach — picking a goal rather than supporting specific legislation — is known as bright lining, and it’s something you’re going to hear a […]

Happy happy!

The title of this post comes from a specific email request. Yes, I take requests! All right, here’s some non-suicide-inducing news: Mayor Bloomberg in NYC is handing over a big swath of (run down, condemned) city-owned land to a development firm that’s going to create a model green low-income community. (The firm won a design […]