Articles by Grist staff

Federal officials claim ethanol, border fence green as can be

Well, phew. Ethanol’s not to blame for high food prices and a fence on the U.S.-Mexico border will actually benefit the environment. If we can’t believe the top federal farm official and the top federal security official, whom can we believe?

President of Nature Conservancy resigns

The subhead doth not mislead you: The president of the Nature Conservancy, Steven McCormick, has abruptly resigned.

States adopt decoupling plans to encourage energy efficiency

It’s a scheme that turns the traditional business model on its head: power companies can make more money by selling less power. Under “decoupling” plans, state regulators give incentive payments to electric utilities that encourage energy efficiency by their customers. “Before there was almost a disincentive to go hard at efficiency because we weren’t recovering […]

Fair-trade market boosted by consumer demand

An ever-greener and ever-more-caffeinated world is boosting the fair-trade market — not just for coffee, but for products such as cocoa, cotton, tea, pineapples, and flowers. The certification, which holds growers to strict standards per child labor, pesticide use, recycling, and more, is not a phenomenon specific to hippie shops: all Dunkin’ Donuts in the […]