Latest Articles

This Gives Me the Shakes

The use of pesticides in homes and gardens may lead to increased risk of contracting Parkinson’s disease, according to a study presented on Friday at a meeting of the American Academy of Neurology. Lorene Nelson of the Stanford University School of Medicine and colleagues found that people who had been exposed to pesticides in the […]

The Smoky Gun

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the biggest wholesale power producer in the U.S., filed suit last week to stop the EPA from requiring more pollution controls on its coal-fired power plants. The EPA says that TVA improperly upgraded seven old coal-fired plants without bringing them into compliance with current Clean Air Act standards. Even as […]

How the U.S. government could push solar power into the big time

The environmental movement has displayed remarkable strength since the first Earth Day in 1970. It has battled heroically to safeguard the world's health, diversity, and beauty, and it has been astonishingly successful. However, as the Earth's odometer rolls over into a new century, the Earth is facing a new threat -- global warming -- that dwarfs earlier perils.

Zen and the Art of Fuel Efficiency

This column is not a Honda ad, though it will start off sounding like one. This is an ad for feedback. I’ve had a Honda Insight, a gas-electric hybrid car, for less than a month. It has taught me a whole new way of driving, thanks to feedback from its instrument panel. An Insight instrument […]

Hail the Cabs!

Nearly 300 taxi, bus, and truck drivers clogged traffic by driving slowly through downtown Hong Kong yesterday to demand government action to combat air pollution, then marched to government headquarters carrying signs that read, “The industry wants to protect the environment.” The protesters are calling for the government to help them convert their vehicles from […]

Brad Guy, Center for Construction and Environment

Brad Guy is interim director of the Center for Construction and Environment at the University of Florida. His work focuses on “green” architecture and sustainable community development. Monday, 8 May 2000 GAINESVILLE, Fla. My day started off with a doctor’s appointment. Then I submitted drawings for a permit to build a shelter on the urban […]

Home Is Where the Recycled Drywall Is

A growing number of Americans are opting to use eco-friendly materials when remodeling or building homes, and some suppliers are meeting their demand with new green products. Trex Co. in Winchester, Va., combines waste wood and recycled plastic shopping bags to make a material for building decks. Later this year, USG Corp. in Chicago plans […]

Sound's Good

British Columbia’s Clayoquot Sound, an area of old-growth forest, was designated a United Nations biosphere reserve on Friday, perhaps ushering in a new era for a region that has been home to some of North America’s most bitter logging battles over the last 20 years. The 850,000-acre reserve, which has the support of the Canadian […]

Waiter, There's a Fly Gene in My Soup

Kickin' Asthma, Taking Names

Air pollution from two coal-burning power plants in Massachusetts can be linked to more than 43,000 asthma attacks and an estimated 159 premature deaths each year, according to a study released yesterday by the Harvard School of Public Health. Locals and enviros say the study gives Massachusetts Gov. Paul Cellucci (R) the evidence he needs […]