Latest Articles

It Says Libby, Libby, Libby on the Label, Label, Label

After more than two years of debate over how to best clean up toxic asbestos in and around Libby, Mont., the U.S. EPA formally agreed yesterday to designate the area as a Superfund site. The U.S. EPA has been working to clean the area since late 1999, but Montana Gov. Judy Martz (R) initially opposed […]

For Pit’s Sake

Back in the Cold War era, the Soviet-owned company Wismut ran massive mining operations in the East German states of Thuringia and Saxony. Thanks to the arms race, East Germany soon became the world’s third-largest uranium producer and a crucial supplier for Moscow. But when the USSR disintegrated, so did the market for uranium; with […]

Working on Their Gulf Swing

Most of the goings-on of Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy task force are cloaked in secrecy — but one outed meeting, held a little over a year ago, sheds light on how the task force functioned. In early February 2001, Cheney met with representatives from Shell Oil and Anadarko Petroleum, who pressed the veep to […]

For Heaven’s Sake

There’s a new voice in the debate over President Bush’s energy policy: God’s. Religious groups in the United States are increasingly invoking the word of God to oppose drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, support stricter fuel-efficiency standards, and call for increased reliance on renewable energy. The National Religious Partnership for the Environment, a […]

For Peat’s Sake

As a source of fossil fuel and gardening compost, peat bogs, those eminently British landscape features, are highly in demand — so much so that some environmentalists fear they are in danger of disappearing. But that danger might be staved off for a while, thanks to a multi-million dollar plan to use taxpayer money to […]

Surf’s Up, and So’s My Dander

Dude, I thought surfing was, like, a non-motorized sport. Motorized personal watercraft (PWCs) are making waves in the surfer community — and riling environmentalists and some surfing purists. At Maverick’s, a prime surfing spot south of San Francisco, hardcore surfers use PWCs to tow themselves out to giant waves. Critics say the watercraft are noisy, […]

Pipe Dreams

Israel and Palestine struggle over water in an arid land

Oil, namely the vast reserves in Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, is the cause of many of the broad geopolitical battles plaguing the Middle East. But it is access to water, a more fundamental resource, that is at the root of much of the bitter conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Blood and Water […]

Shrimp Fried

Under pressure from the Bush administration, a federal judge yesterday revoked the protected status of several hundred thousand acres of Southern California land considered essential for the survival of two imperiled species. U.S. District Judge Stephen Wilson called on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to re-assess the economic effects of protecting the land on […]

Grim Reefer

Coral reefs are usually associated with the balmy blue waters of the tropics, but the amazing underwater kingdoms exist in cooler climes, too — at least for now. A new study by French, British, and Norwegian scientists found that 4,500-year-old reefs in the northeastern Atlantic are severely threatened by deep-sea fishing. The scientists found gouges […]