Articles by Sarah Laskow

Critical List: Captain Planet movie in the works; the U.N. considering climate peacekeeping force

The producer of Transformers is backing a live-action Captain Planet movie, which will teach children about environmentalism and green mullets and the periodic table of elements (earth, air, fire, water, and heart!). Next can we do a live-action G.I. Joe Knowing is Half the Battle movie? Because it will be just as fun.

Climate change could lead to conflicts so contentious the U.N. might need a separate peacekeeping force to deal with them.

Is it meaningless to talk about ‘sustainable’ food?

How sustainable is your jar of Ragu tomato sauce? That is an insane question, says self-described “anti-foodie” Frederick Kaufman in his TED Talk.

Sustainability, Kaufman suggests, can be sort of like porn: you know it when you see it. But people really want it to be quantifiable. Kaufman describes efforts by a grand consortium of scientists, farmers, agribusiness, and environmentalists to track all the inputs into a product and mush those into one number that would reflect its overall sustainability.

Critical List: Mitt Romney doesn’t believe in carbon; Halliburton’s profits are up

Mitt Romney doesn't think carbon is a pollutant and doesn't think the EPA should regulate it. But he has said that we should reduce our emissions of greenhouse gases. May he doesn't understand what those words mean?

The hybrid electric flying car! (Brought to you by the military-industrial complex.)

Climate change could wipe out whitebark pine trees in the West, but the Fish and Wildlife Service can't be bothered to list the trees as endangered, or even threatened.

How a company you've never heard of could destroy the ocean ecosystem

Omega Protein, Inc. (a company you've never heard of) is quickly overfishing the Atlantic menhaden (a species you've never heard of). As a result, a number of fish that you have heard of -- striped bass, bluefish, tuna, dolphin, seatrout, and mackerel -- as well as the ocean ecosystem as a whole, the Chesapeake Bay, and the Long Island Sound (which you’ve heard of) are suffering.

Menhaden are tiny, bony, oily fish that humans can't eat, but which, according to marine scientists, are "the most important fish in the sea." Menhaden are the main consumers of phytoplankton, and without them, areas like the Chesapeake Bay and Long Island Sound are clogged with algae. They are also a staple food for bigger, tastier fish, who, deprived of menhaden, are growing sad and malnourished.

In the past 25 years, the menhaden population has shrunk from 160 billion to about 20 billion.