Latest Articles

Dear John

Rhode Island Sen. John Chafee, a moderate Republican who worked to fashion bipartisan solutions to environmental problems, died unexpectedly of heart failure last night, at the age of 77. Chafee, chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, played a significant role in the passage of the 1988 law against ocean dumping, the 1989 […]

This Story Made Us Yak

The Wild Yak Brigade, a group of wildlife vigilantes working to protect the chiru, a gazelle-like animal that lives high on the Tibetan plateau, is under fire from poachers and the Chinese government. The chiru — whose fur is turned into shahtoosh wool, which is sought to make fashionable and expensive shawls — is joining […]

No Fences Make Good Neighbors

The neighboring nations of Mozambique, South Africa, and Zimbabwe yesterday agreed to create a transborder conservation area with the aim of protecting biodiversity and promoting socioeconomic development in the region. The new Transfrontier Conservation Areas will pool the management of Mozambique’s Gaza Park, South Africa’s Kruger National Park, and Zimbabwe’s Gonarezhou Park. The agreement, signed […]

Trick or Treaty?

Dissension is likely to dominate the two weeks of international negotiations on climate change that are getting underway today in Bonn, Germany. The U.S. and Europe will likely butt heads over emissions trading, which the U.S. wants to use extensively but Europe wants to limit as industrial nations work to meet commitments made in the […]

Told You So

The economy in the Northwest didn’t go into a tailspin after the feds curtailed logging in the early 1990s to protect old-growth forests and the northern spotted owl, according to a new report by three Oregon economists from ECONorthwest, an economic consulting company. Rather, the economy seems to have performed better, in part because forest […]

Can't Bear the Thought

Tension is rising in British Columbia as timber companies begin to log what many call the Great Bear Rain Forest along Canada’s western coast, a vast, largely undisturbed old-growth area comprising one quarter of the world’s remaining temperate rainforest. Arguing that the economy needed a boost, the British Columbia government recently slashed logging royalties to […]

Girl, You'll Be a Woman Sooner

A chemical used in everything from baby bottles to tin can linings seems to have caused premature puberty and increased body weight in female mice, according to new research published in the journal Nature. The chemical, bisphenol A, is thought to be an endocrine disrupter, which can upset hormone systems in humans and other animals. […]

Don't or Die

Polluting scofflaws in the United Arab Emirates could get the death penalty under a new law issued by Pres. Sheikh Zaid bin Sultan al-Nahayan. The law also allows for fines of up to $2.7 million for those who import, store, or dump nuclear wastes or other banned materials. The United Arab Emirates and other Arab […]

Gene Cuisine

Responding to Europeans’ fears about genetically modified foods, the European Union yesterday gave preliminary approval to plans that would require labeling of foods with at least one ingredient that contains more than one percent of genetically modified material. The new rules should come into effect within three months, after expected approval from the EU’s executive […]

Clinton's Ditch

Pres. Clinton signed a bill yesterday designating the nation’s 55th national park, the Black Canyon of the Gunnison River in western Colorado, the first national park created in five years. The 30,000-acre area, most of which has been a national monument since 1933, features a canyon just 40 feet across at its narrowest point and […]