Articles by Grist staff

Fifteen years after the Great Flood of 1993, floodplain development is booming

Once it was a cornfield; now it’s a Wal-Mart, a Taco Bell, a Target. Here along a stretch of Missouri’s Highway 40, in the Chesterfield Valley area just west of downtown St. Louis, what’s said to be the largest strip mall in the country sits on about 46 acres of Mississippi River bottomlands. Less than […]

Energy could be harvested from mixing of fresh and salt water

Through an osmotic process we don’t pretend to understand, the mixing of fresh and salt water at the world’s river mouths produces enough energy to feed 20 percent of the world’s electricity demand, say Dutch scientists. Could we start running our gadgetry on salt power? Small projects in Norway and the Netherlands are testing out […]

Rise in U.S. power plant emissions outpaced electricity demand in 2007

Carbon dioxide emissions from U.S. power plants rose 2.9 percent from 2006 to 2007, according to data analysis by the Environmental Integrity Project. That’s the largest annual increase in nine years and outpaced demand for electricity, according to the report. And the impact will last well beyond a year, warns EIP Director Eric Schaeffer: “Because […]

Japan will shorten pro baseball games to cut emissions

Japan’s professional baseball league is aiming to reduce carbon emissions by using only renewable energy recycling everything aiming to shorten games by 12 minutes. Under new rules, no more than 2 minutes and 15 seconds may lapse between innings, and pitchers must throw the ball within 15 seconds of receiving it if no runners are […]