Articles by Grist staff

How to green your funeral

Not dead yet? There’s still hope for a green funeral. There’s no getting around it: One day, we’re all gonna die. And while most of us won’t have much control over the circumstances of our deaths, there are things you can do before you go to ensure that your funeral and earthly remains are as […]

No government disaster assistance for alternative farmers in Iowa

In "Dispatches From the Fields," Ariane Lotti and Stephanie Ogburn, who are working on small farms in Iowa and Colorado this season, share their thoughts on producing real food in the midst of America's agro-industrial landscape.

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Now that Iowa has started to dry out from record flooding, farmers are looking to their fields and feeling the uncertainty of this year's crop. For conventional commodity crop farmers, that feeling is fleeting; they can breathe a sigh of relief knowing that government-backed crop insurance and disaster assistance programs [PDF] will cover their losses. For Iowa's alternative farmers, government-backed crop insurance is a pipe dream that requires them to be innovative in their risk management strategies.

Skeptical climate-change documentary found unfair, but not misleading

A British documentary that declared climate change to be a willful and conspiratorial hoax broke impartiality rules and misrepresented the views of some participants, British broadcasting regulator Ofcom said Monday. The not-so-subtly named The Great Global Warming Swindle, which aired on Britain’s Channel 4 in March 2007, said at one point in its narration, “Everywhere, […]

Bush admin proposes rules for domestic oil-shale development

The Bush administration today will propose rules for tapping the U.S.’s vast oil-shale deposits, estimated to hold up to 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil. Oil shale development is enormously expensive and spectacularly polluting, but the U.S. Department of the Interior is expected to frame the debate in terms of high fuel prices and domestic […]