Latest Articles

Blood Is Thicker Than Water

It was a family affair, but the significance was national: President Bush and his brother Jeb, the governor of Florida, signed an agreement yesterday to guarantee that water captured by a $7.8 billion Florida Everglades restoration effort will indeed go toward reviving the national park. Because the state and federal governments have potentially competing interests […]

Tank You Very Much

A technique invented to reduce corrosion of steel components on ships could also prevent exotic species from stowing away in the ballast water of cargo ships. The technique, which was designed by Mario Tamburri of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in collaboration with Japanese scientists, involves pumping nitrogen gas into ballast tanks, thereby virtually […]

Lord of the Wrings

Lord Peter Melchett, the former head of Greenpeace U.K., has accepted a position with the public relations company Burson-Marsteller, which numbers among its clients the pesticide and food company Monsanto. Long a leading target for green groups, Monsanto is currently drawing fire for its production and promotion of genetically modified (GM) foods. Melchett, who led […]

Coal bed methane extraction threatens Wyoming’s Red Desert

OREGON BUTTES, Wyo. Tom Bell remembers how plush the carpet was in Interior Secretary Stewart Udall’s Washington, D.C., office. Bell spent time on his hands and knees there during the 1960s, poring over a large map while making the case for preserving Wyoming’s Red Desert as a national pronghorn antelope refuge. The Pinnacles in the […]

Rey of Sunshine

A controversial Bush administration plan to log trees harmed in fires that raged in the Bitterroot National Forest in 2000 was halted yesterday by a federal judge in Montana. U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy also excoriated Mark Rey, natural resources and environment undersecretary for the Agriculture Department, for bypassing a 45-day public appeals process and […]

Taps

Drinking chlorinated tap water puts pregnant women at a higher risk for miscarrying or bearing children with birth defects, according to a new study by two environmental organizations. The Washington, D.C.-based Environmental Working Group and U.S. Public Interest Research Group studied water quality data from thousands of water utilities before publishing their findings yesterday. Chlorine […]

Retirement Party

Utah Republican Jim Hansen, who has served 11 terms in the U.S. House, most recently as chair of the Resources Committee, announced yesterday that he will not seek reelection this year. The announcement came as a surprise to even some of his closest staff members — and a welcome one to environmentalists. Hansen started off […]

Freedom Riders

In a new partnership to be announced tomorrow at the 2002 North American International Auto Show, the U.S. government will work with the nation’s top automakers to replace internal combustion engines with fuel cells. Dubbed Freedom CAR, the partnership replaces former Vice President Al Gore’s Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles. By focusing specifically […]

Take Me to the River, Don’t Drop Me in the Water

The City of Brotherly Love is also the City of Terrible Water, according to a U.S. EPA analysis of the nation’s watersheds. Four of Philadelphia’s watersheds earned a six, the worst score doled out by the EPA, a distinction shared with just 28 other watersheds nationwide out of more than 2,200. The ratings reflect the […]

Airing Their Grievances

Nine attorneys general from Northeastern states are holding a press conference today in Washington, D.C., to warn the Bush administration not to weaken the Clean Air Act. Last week, the administration suggested that it would not adhere to strict Clinton-era standards for New Source Review rules, which require energy companies to install pollution controls when […]