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Expensive

Of course it isn't Treehugger's fault, but Tim Haab makes a solid but lamentable point here.

A worried mother discovers the secrets of pesticide testing

Three years ago, while my extended family was vacationing at my dad’s cranberry farm, he mentioned that one of his fields would be sprayed that evening. There were five children under 10 in the house, and I was eight months pregnant. The field was 100 feet away. I asked my dad about the pesticides, but […]

Photographer Laurie Tümer shows the hidden paths of pesticides

Click here to see Tümer’s photos. Photo: Laurie Tümer. In a segment this fall, Good Morning America simulated pesticide exposure in a New York City classroom. Using a powder visible only under black light, the program showed how far chemicals could spread through an activity as simple as child’s play. The eye-opening exercise wasn’t news […]

With a CAFE boost looking out of reach, enviros check out other options

Is CAFE kaput? Since 1975, CAFE — or corporate average fuel economy — standards have stood as America’s defining energy-efficiency strategy. Yet, despite much wailing and gnashing of teeth by activists and a handful of politicians, the standards for passenger cars haven’t been raised since 1985 — they still call for automakers’ car fleets to […]

What the meaning of ‘participation’ is

Oh, this is hilarious.

You may recall that at a recent Senate hearing, oil industry execs were asked whether their companies participated in Cheney's notorious 2001 energy task force.

They said No. That was ... what's the word? ... a lie.

Or was it? Apparently there's some dispute:

Yesterday, Marnie Funk, a spokeswoman for the GOP staff of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, one of the two panels that convened the hearing, said its lawyers had reached a preliminary conclusion: Based on a court decision in which two groups unsuccessfully challenged the secrecy of the Cheney task force, Funk said the executives appeared to be telling the truth.

"What we simply determined was that the definition of 'participation' was something litigated, and what the court concluded was that attending meetings, and even making presentations, did not rise to the level of fully participating," Funk said.

Gosh, it seems like, what, only one administration ago that these kinds of carefully parsed word games were considered a dire threat to the moral fiber of our children. Guess times change.

Sierra Club gets positive

As Daily Grist readers will soon learn, the Sierra Club today released "Building Better: A Guide to America's Best New Development Projects." It's just what it sounds like: A complimentary profile of "walkable, transit accessible places to live and work."

I think John Laumer's right: This is an extremely promising development. It's practically a cliche -- particularly since the Death debate -- that the environmental movement needs to offer solutions rather than just problems, to be for something rather than against everything. It's a cliche, and yet the large and lamentably inertia-bound movement hasn't really been doing it.

Perhaps because it's more of a ground-up organization, the Sierra Club has been making some nice, high-profile moves in this direction. I hope all greens will welcome it.

Character Building

Sierra Club celebrates eco-friendly building projects in new report The Sierra Club has often gone to court to stop bad development schemes, but now the venerable green group is trying the carrot instead of the stick. The group has released its first “Guide to America’s Best New Development Projects,” which gives kudos to builders putting […]

Deconstructing Hurricane

Intense 2005 hurricane season may be harbinger of things to come This year’s Atlantic hurricane season officially ended yesterday (at which point we emerged from basement bunker, blinking), having racked up a record-breaking 26 named storms. Thirteen of these became hurricanes, and three reached Category 5 strength, including Katrina. And over half the past two […]

A Current Despair

Waning of Atlantic currents could chill Europe Remember that movie The Day After Tomorrow? With the shifting ocean currents that cause sudden, catastrophic climate changes? Crazy stuff! Michael Moore territory! Well … funny story. Turns out the Atlantic Ocean currents that move warm tropical waters northward and cooler waters south have in fact slowed dramatically […]

Cause sometimes nature isn’t enough

Have y'all heard about this Grand Canyon Skywalk? WTF?