Climate Climate & Energy
All Stories
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Ice Hassles
Antarctic glaciers rapidly melting Wanna travel to Antarctica, but worried about all that ice? Worry no more. On the Antarctic Peninsula, a 1,200-mile-long mountain chain 600 miles south of Argentina, about 212 of the 244 glaciers are retreating, fast. Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey and the British Antarctic Survey studied photos and satellite data […]
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Stats on how far we’ve come (or haven’t) since the first Earth Day
3.7 billion — world population in 19701 6.4 billion — world population in 20051 1,535 billion — kilowatt-hours of electricity used in the U.S. in 19702 3,837 billion — kilowatt-hours of electricity expected to be used in the U.S. in 20053 6.0 — percentage of electricity in U.S. consumed in 1970 produced from renewable sources4 […]
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Former journalist Stephanie Roth is battling against a gold mine in Romania
Stephanie Danielle Roth. Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize. The Apuseni Mountains of west-central Romania are rich in gold, iron, and history. The area’s gold once supplied the Roman Empire, and it is home to Rosia Montana, the country’s oldest documented mining settlement. But this past is threatened by the present: five years ago, the Romanian government […]
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Umbra on the climate-change literacy of Umbra readers
Dearest Readers, Happy Earth Day. I have mixed feelings as I look forward to the planet’s special holiday tomorrow. Happiness on the occasion of anniversaries: Grist (six years), me at Grist (three years), Earth Day (35 years). Sadness, for this column shall be my last edited by my august editor, and we are having an […]
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EIA, EIA … Oh
Greenhouse-gas limits affordable, study says; “Told ya so,” E.U. replies A new study by the Energy Information Administration, an independent arm of the U.S. Energy Department, reveals that mandatory limits on greenhouse-gas emissions would not significantly affect the country’s economic growth through 2025. Surprisingly, or perhaps not, the report contradicts the principal argument the Bush […]
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How to Win Friends and Influence People
Iran using oil, natural gas resources to find fast friends Much in the way the kid with the backyard swimming pool and the trampoline always manages to rustle up friends, Iran is turning to its oil and gas reserves to leverage alliances with influential Eastern nations — and rather urgently, as it faces the threat […]
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A Matter of Great Export
Arctic Refuge oil could be sent overseas A portentous U.S. commitment, sold with slogans about freedom and national security, that turns out to be all about the oil industry. No, not that one. We’re talking about drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Drilling proponents cite the fact that the U.S. imports most of the […]
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The Best “Science” Money Can Buy
ExxonMobil plows millions into funding for 40 climate-skeptic groups In 1998, the American Petroleum Institute outlined a strategy to sow the seeds of doubt about global-warming science “with Congress, the media, and other key audiences.” “Victory will be achieved,” read an API memo, “when … recognition of uncertainty becomes part of the ‘conventional wisdom.'” Since […]
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Platform Shoos
Abandoned oil rigs host thriving ecosystems, stir debate Discovery of thriving ecosystems on some abandoned oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico is refueling a debate over what to do with old rigs once their oil-drilling life is over. Some conservationists have been advocating a “Rigs to Reefs” program whereby old platforms are tipped over, […]
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N.Y. Times columnist says climate change makes nuclear energy a must
Inspired, no doubt, by recent lively discussion in Ask Umbra and Gristmill on nuclear power (necessary evil or pure evil?), New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has decided to join the fray with his simplistically titled (and conceived) "Nukes Are Green" column. He's of the James Lovelock school of thought, arguing that with climate change bearing down on us and renewables not yet up to full speed, nuclear is our only hope.
