Articles by Grist staff

All Features Great, and Small

Teensy fuel cells offer greener power sources for small gadgets Yes, yes, your new iPod nano is very cool. But wouldn’t it be just that much cooler if you could recharge it with a small bottle of clear liquid? It might happen: Toshiba and other Japanese electronics firms are developing itty-bitty fuel cells to juice […]

EI, EI, No

Bush admin waives environmental assessments in public-lands energy rush This past summer’s energy bill contained provisions making it easier to drill on public lands — and for the Bush administration, that’s like waving a red flag in front of a bull. The Bureau of Land Management recently told field managers to omit environmental reviews and […]

You Picked a Bovine Time to Peeve Me

USDA loophole lets penned cows get certified organic The U.S. Department of Agriculture may be caving to owners of factory dairy farms by failing to revise some rules on organic milk. At issue is how the agency defines an organic bovine. One requirement is that the cows have “access to pasture,” but another provision allows […]

Covert Ploperations

CIA investing in “plug and play” clean power generator Warning: this blurb will self-destruct in five seconds. It seems clean energy has a spooky new backer. The CIA is investing, via a venture capital firm, in a Virginia start-up called SkyBuilt, which has developed a clean electricity generator for use in the field. The Mobile […]