Latest Articles

Scientific American’s special issue on the environment

Now available on newsstands (and the Internets) is Scientific American's special issue titled "Crossroads for Planet Earth." In it you'll find: George Musser setting the stage, Joel E. Cohen on population, Jeffrey D. Sachs on extreme poverty, Stuart L. Pimm and Clinton Jenkins on endangered species, Amory B. Lovins on energy, Paul Polak on agriculture, Barry R. Bloom on public health, Herman E. Daly on economic growth and sustainability, and W. Wayt Gibbs on setting priorities.

Here's an excerpt from Musser's intro:

The 21st century feels like a letdown. We were promised flying cars, space colonies and 15-hour workweeks. Robots were supposed to do our chores, except when they were organizing rebellions; children were supposed to learn about disease from history books; portable fusion reactors were supposed to be on sale at the Home Depot. Even dystopian visions of the future predicted leaps of technology and social organization that leave our era in the dust.

Looking beyond the blinking lights and whirring gizmos, though, the new century is shaping up as one of the most amazing periods in human history. Three great transitions set in motion by the Industrial Revolution are reaching their culmination. After several centuries of faster-than-exponential growth, the world's population is stabilizing. Judging from current trends, it will plateau at around nine billion people toward the middle of this century. Meanwhile extreme poverty is receding both as a percentage of population and in absolute numbers. If China and India continue to follow in the economic footsteps of Japan and South Korea, by 2050 the average Chinese will be as rich as the average Swiss is today; the average Indian, as rich as today's Israeli. As humanity grows in size and wealth, however, it increasingly presses against the limits of the planet. Already we pump out carbon dioxide three times as fast as the oceans and land can absorb it; midcentury is when climatologists think global warming will really begin to bite. At the rate things are going, the world's forests and fisheries will be exhausted even sooner.

I personally enjoyed the Paul Polak piece titled "The Big Potential of Small Farms" which introduced me to the treadle pump and gave some great examples of how drip irrigation systems that use cheap rubber hoses can make a huge difference for poor families.

[editor's note, by Chris Schults] When I wrote "Internets" I really meant the Scientific American website, where only some of the content is freely available.

Pielke Jr. responds

Roger Pielke Jr. has made something of a career out of studying societal response to hurricanes (see him quoted liberally here). He's made something of a side career out of arguing that greens should -- as a matter of ethics, science, and policy -- refrain from using severe weather events like hurricanes to raise alarm over global warming and (thereby) advance their preferred energy policies.

I happen to disagree with him on that, but his position, being somewhat infuriating to greens, tends to get caricatured and vilified a lot. So, let's let him speak for himself.

He responded to my post on hurricanes and global warming with a post on his blog. I responded in turn with the following email:

Are fuel-efficiency standards a smart way to reduce oil consumption?

Fareed Zakaria has a nice rundown of the many ways our hunger for oil distorts our foreign policy and makes a mockery of our efforts to fight terrorism and spread democracy. At the end, he briefly mentions solutions:

It's true that there is no silver bullet that will entirely solve America's energy problem, but there is one that goes a long way: more-efficient cars. If American cars averaged 40 miles per gallon, we would soon reduce consumption by 2 million to 3 million barrels of oil a day. That could translate into a sustained price drop of more than $20 a barrel. ... I would start by raising fuel-efficiency standards, providing incentives for hybrids and making gasoline somewhat more expensive (yes, that means raising taxes).

Matt Yglesias thinks that fuel-efficiency (CAFE) standards -- however beloved by greens and progressives -- are a bit of a red herring:

Petal Pusher

Entrepreneur sees vast potential for organic flower industry Gerald Prolman is a man with an organic-flower plan. The California entrepreneur is not only after a significant chunk of the $20 billion-a-year cut-flower industry in the U.S. — he’s hopeful that cultivating demand for organic bouquets will transform grower practices in Latin America and Africa, where […]

Bombay Watch

Bombay bans plastic bags, saying they can clog drains and cause flooding Plastic bags are maddeningly ubiquitous and ugly as sin, but did you know they can cause flooding? According to India’s Maharashtra state government, millions of bags clogged up drains in Bombay’s slums during monsoon season, dramatically worsening the epic late-July flooding that killed […]

Tastes Like Chicken

Hong Kong becomes major outlet for trade in rare species Hong Kong has become a linchpin location for smuggling rare species into China, according to some opponents of the trade, who fear that huge demand may wipe out many animal and plant species. In just one notable raid, police discovered that numerous boxes of alleged […]

What the Tuck?

Governator appoints industry flacks as state eco-regulators California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) earned green esteem early in his tenure, but as important regulatory appointments take on an increasingly pro-industry tinge, his cred is starting to fade. The latest is Cindy Tuck, chosen to chair the state’s Air Resources Board after working for more than 15 […]

The Sum of Squall Fears

What’s the link between hurricanes and global warming? The devastation wreaked on the Gulf Coast this week by Hurricane Katrina is sure to reignite debate over hurricanes and global warming. The science linking the two is ambiguous and complex, but the need to spur action on climate change is urgent. Would activists be justified in […]

Worldchanging editor discusses optimism and technology

[editor's note, by Dave Roberts] This is part one of a three-part interview. Part two is here and part three is here.

In April, I sat down for a long, wide-ranging conversation with Alex Steffen, executive editor of the (now newly incorporated and redesigned) Worldchanging.com. Gristmill readers likely need no introduction to Worldchanging, an online salon of activists and thinkers dedicated to the proposition that "another world is here" -- that the tools and techniques we need to reverse the global malaise already exist and await only our imagination and willpower. If it isn't on your daily reading list, it should be.

Originally, I was going to run this interview alongside a rather ambitious long-form piece of my own, but as time has passed -- and I really can't believe how much time has passed -- it's become clear that said piece is indefinitely postponed. Since I have a baby due [checks calendar] three days ago, it's unlikely I'll soon have time to return to it.

Lest it get even older, I'm going to go ahead and run it here. There's lots of good stuff in it, but it's very long, so I've broken it into three parts -- I'll publish the first today and the others in coming days.

In part one, we discuss optimism, technology, and the open-source movement.

Indian movies need to take up the plastic-bag fight

Plastic bags may be banned in the Indian state of Maharashtra due to concerns that by clogging the city's drains they contributed to the floods that swept the coast last month and brought life to a halt in buzzing Bombay. There are protests from the predictable quarters; apparently, 20,000 people in the state are employed to painstakingly manufacture thin bags that are good for carrying one coconut for ten yards before stretching out and leaving you with a bag with a hole in it but no coconut.