Articles by Grist staff

Watt's Up?

NASA is exploring the possibility of building space-based solar power stations that would produce electricity for use on Earth. A “Sun Tower” design being considered might stretch 22 miles in length with solar collectors 100 to 200 meters in diameter. Each station might beam up to 1.2 billion watts of electricity to ground stations via […]

Melissa Kirkby, student at Sterling College

Melissa Kirkby is a senior at Sterling College in Craftsbury Common, Vt., majoring in sustainable agriculture. Monday, 12 Jul 1999 Craftsbury Common, Vt. Last week, I wrote a letter to a friend describing the new culture, new landscape, new rhythm of life I have discovered in the six weeks since my move to Sterling College […]

Heard It through the Pipeline

An environmental disaster far worse than the Exxon Valdez spill could happen at any moment, according to six senior employees of Alyeska, which operates the 800-mile Alaskan oil pipeline. The six whistleblowers wrote to three U.S. reps and Sir John Browne, chief executive of BP Amoco, which owns 50 percent of Alyeska, providing evidence of […]

Good Morning, Vietnam

Vietnam has quietly assumed a spot as the world’s third-largest coffee bean producer and exporter, behind Brazil and Columbia, but although success with the new crop has lifted many farmers out of poverty, it’s also taking a toll on the land. Forestland is being cleared for coffee production at such a quick pace that the […]