Articles by Erik Hoffner

… before nature does it for us

Following a recent study forecasting permanent drought in the southwest U.S. in coming decades comes this news in today's Salt Lake Tribune. It's a proposal being floated to pipe some of the already dwindling Lake Powell reservoir (currently just half full) in a new direction, to three thirsty counties in southern Utah. Living Rivers' End Lake Powell Campaign says that draining Powell would actually add water to the Colorado River system, given the evaporative losses the lake suffers every day, but federal and state agencies are so far blunt to good logic, which is a shame, when restoring natural flows and water tables along the length of the river would benefit both humans and ecosystems. Seems like nature is going to drain the lake for us, so why not get on with it?

Alabama’s Bankhead forest next?

Until today I was ignorant of the spread of this nasty sort of mining. Its impact is well documented in the antelope and sage grouse country of the intermountain West, leaving a trail of ruined land and poisoned wells. But companies are also drilling and fracturing this stuff out of the ground in the East, too.

Oil diplomat or man of the people?

On the defensive after George Bush and Lula da Silva of Brazil started getting friendly over ethanol, Hugo Chavez has now backed away from plans for building a massive array of 29 ethanol plants.

His rationale tears a page from the nascent biofuel backlash movement, saying that land should be used to feed people, not to fill "rich people's cars." As with most things Chavez, this is probably largely about politics and somewhat about people: he doesn't want to be outflanked by Bush's new foothold in the region. But it's a stand that will win him points in many quarters, and he's expected to make it again later this month at a South American energy summit.

What else might we do with our time?

Every week, 30 million people tune in to at least a couple hours of American Idol. Whether this show has truly "jumped the shark" this year or not remains to be seen, but I submit that if a portion of these folks would join the ranks of the American Idealists instead, we'd all be in for a more interesting Wednesday night.

Idealist.org's brand new connections platform is already linking up 28,000+ people who are meeting up to build community in their towns and cities. It's worth a visit just to read the myriad of quirky personal profiles, and hey, you just might find a gathering to join on a Wednesday ...