Latest Articles
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Changing Their Tuna
Ecuador unveiled a plan yesterday that could help protect marine and bird species native to the Galapagos Islands, whose unique wildlife inspired Charles Darwin to formulate his theory of natural selection. At present, Galapagos fishers are legally allowed to ply their trade in the waters around the archipelago, to the dismay of conservationists. Now the […]
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PC-beware
A female killer whale that washed up on Washington state’s Olympic Peninsula earlier this year has been found to have off-the-charts levels of PCBs in its blubber, according to tests in federal labs. The levels were so high that the first time scientists tested the orca, their machine could not read the results and the […]
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Conventional Stupidity
Almost a decade ago, 183 countries signed the Convention on Biological Diversity to guard against exploitation of their genetic resources. Now scientists say the treaty, although well intentioned, effectively prevents scientists from studying the natural bounty it is designed to protect. The many national bureaucracies spawned by the treaty do not easily distinguish between bioprospecting […]
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Greener Pastures
New Zealand is home to a staggering 45 million sheep and 8 million cattle, which together produce 90 percent of the country’s methane emissions — or about 43 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. To meet the terms of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, New Zealand has to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions […]
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Drill Team
Thought the debate over drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was (thank goodness) finally over? Think again: An inexplicable move by the Senate Democratic leadership could revive the Bush administration’s campaign to pump gas and oil out of the pristine Alaskan wilderness. When debate over the nation’s energy plan moved into a joint House-Senate […]
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Todd Paglia, ForestEthics
Todd Paglia is the founder and director of The Paper Campaign at ForestEthics. When not working to protect forests, he’s often found on his road bike, far off in the distance. Monday, 6 May 2002 SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. It’s all around you. Right now as you read this it is probably covering your desk, bulging […]
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Enron’s End Run
Here’s another victim of Enron: the Chiquitano Dry Tropical Forest, one of the two most valuable forests in Latin America and one of the 200 most endangered eco-regions in the world, according to the World Bank and the World Wildlife Fund, respectively. The forest was the largest remaining undeveloped land of its kind in South […]
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Strange Treefellows
Conservationists are probably more closely identified with the struggle to save forests from logging than with any other environmental battle, as the label “tree hugger” suggests. So it was a case of strange bedfellows when enviros and industry representatives met late last month at the Forest Leadership Forum to discuss ways to better protect the […]
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Septemberfest
Now that France has re-elected President Jacques Chirac over anti-immigrant, anti-social protection, anti-environment Jean-Marie Le Pen, the attention of the European Union has shifted toward Germany, where general elections will be held in September and an equally strong rightward lurch is feared. To help prevent that shift, Germany’s Greens spent the weekend outlining policies to […]
