Articles by Grist staff

Orange You Glad?

The District Attorney’s office in conservative Orange County, Calif., is beefing up its environmental crime division to become one of the most rigorous eco-SWAT teams in the nation. While resources for pursuing environmental criminals have been dwindling in many other areas in the state, Orange County has tripled its budget in the last three years […]

Sleep With the Fishes

At least 20,000 chinook salmon and other fish have died in Northern California’s Klamath River in the last two weeks, but federal officials are unwilling to attribute the deaths to the Bush administration’s decision to divert water away from the river this year and into an irrigation project in southern Oregon. U.S. Fish and Wildlife […]

Homeland Insecurity

Despite all the hype about guaranteeing “homeland security,” the Bush administration has scrapped plans to impose strict regulations to protect chemical plants from possible terrorist attacks. The decision, which was confirmed yesterday by U.S. EPA Administrator Christie Whitman, came after months of administration infighting and heavy lobbying efforts against new rules by the chemical industry. […]

You Can Judge a Food By Its Label

In a big step for the organic food industry, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is poised to roll out an official “USDA Organic” seal and launch a long-awaited national standard to replace the existing hodgepodge of state and private certification systems. Food will have to contain 95 percent organic ingredients to be eligible for the […]