Climate Culture

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  • Should I suck it up and buy vinyl windows?

    Not my window. But this is how they feel sometimes.TottoBG via flickrOnce upon a time, I was full of unswayable romantic notions about old houses. Then I bought one. I’ll refrain from going into too much detail about the quirks of our house, and of course I’m grateful to have a roof over our heads. […]

    Katharine Wroth Culture

  • Ask Umbra on bubble wrap

    Send your question to Umbra! Q. Dear Umbra, I just got married and received a lot of presents in the mail. I recycled/reused all the boxes, but I’m still stuck with a LOT of bubble wrap and sealed air. Is there a place where I can take these rolls of plastic to be recycled? JohnnyWashington, […]

    Ask Umbra® Culture

  • Your greenest Ramadan

    Islam is green by nature, and Ramadan offers a chance to make a big impact.Shawna AyoubAfter my grandfather had a stroke, the doctor said he might not walk again. He also said that getting him to challenge himself — to give walking a true try — was critical to his physical and emotional recovery. My […]

    Shawna Ayoub Culture

  • A tasting of five organic olive oils

    Yummy, with a chance of drizzles.Homer (the Greek scribe, not the cartoon dork) is supposed to have declared extra-virgin olive oil “liquid gold.” If by that he meant something to treat as if precious, things have changed considerably three millennia later and half a world away from the Mediterranean. TV cooking gurus evoke Homer’s gold […]

    Tom Philpott Culture

  • Meet the star of ‘No Impact Man’: No Impact Woman

    In November 2006, Michelle Conlin began a year-long experiment in extreme sustainability, resolving to burn no fossil fuels, produce no trash, and eat only food grown within 250 miles of her Greenwich Village home. She gave up nearly all shopping and learned to use cloth diapers for her 2-year-old daughter. She took up bicycling and […]

    Jonathan Hiskes Culture

  • More on No Impact Man and personal eco-behavior

    The other day I highlighted a new piece from Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker, which was critical of No Impact Man and other “stunts” in hyper-green living. Mainly I used it as an excuse to point to my old piece on the civic sphere, which, ahem, you should read. I should have made it […]

    David Roberts Culture

  • Hollywood’s next green generation

    We know. There’s nothing green about owning a 20,000-square foot house, or flying in a private jet, or stocking a wardrobe the size of a studio apartment. Famous actors indisputably leave a much larger carbon footprint than the average citizen. But their celebrity gives them a far greater ability to influence others, so their efforts […]

    Grist staff Culture

  • Is it time to get rid of phone books?

    When was the last time you looked up something in the phone book? What did you do the last time you got a free phone book dropped off on your doorstep–did you recycle it? If you’re like most people these days, your answers to those questions are probably “I don’t remember” and “No.” WhitePages, an […]

    Claire Thompson Culture

  • No Impact Man, Elizabeth Kolbert, and the civic sphere

    Elizabeth Kolbert’s latest essay for The New Yorker is another triumph, a perfectly pitched marriage of style and substance. It’s about Colin Beavan’s blog-turned-book-turned-movie No Impact Man, Vanessa Farquharson’s Sleeping Naked Is Green: How an Eco-Cynic Unplugged Her Fridge, Sold Her Car, and Found Love in 366 Days, and other recent experiments in (well-to-do, white, […]

    David Roberts Culture

  • Ask Umbra on green cleaning

    Send your question to Umbra! Editor’s Note: It being the dog days of August and all, Umbra Fisk has trotted off for a well deserved vacation. In her absence, we’ve decided to dust off some oldies but goodies from the archives. And since we were dusting, we thought we’d start with this timeless green cleaning […]

    Ask Umbra® Culture