Climate Culture

You know what they say about enviros with big feet …

Each of these pairs of shoes represents a different (real) woman in a new feature at Marie Claire: "Whose Carbon Footprint Is the Smallest?" See if you can guess: THE URBAN HIPSTER “I eat out way too much. I drink bottled water. I do the club scene a lot. Am I busted?” –Nikea, 29, public […]

Comin’ ’round the bend

Coming to a showroom near you: a $30,000 all-electric sedan with a top speed of 80mph and a range of 120 miles per charge. Why the low price? It’s made in China, with cheap labor and advanced lithium ion batteries that came out of government-funded research. There’s competition: Phoenix Motors has a four-door utility truck […]

It Only Hertz a Little

Rental and car-share companies get hip to hybrids Fueled by consumers’ green interests, rental, car-service, and car-sharing companies are increasingly turning to hybrids. (Hear the collective sigh of relief from guilt-prone enviros who cringe with every tap on the rental accelerator.) Big renters Enterprise, Hertz, and Avis have all recently added several thousand Toyota Priuses […]

Sign me up

This is the true story of seven strangers, picked to live in an energy-efficient house, work together, and have their lives taped to find out what happens when people stop being polite and start getting green. From the press release [PDF]: The Real World house will include everything from solar energy solutions to bamboo flooring, […]

A green band that’s really green

Last week, headed to the Lanesplitter for a Tune-Up, quite by accident I ended up seeing the Ditty Bops at the Freight and Salvage.

I'm glad I did. The music was sweet and smart and catchy. But music aside, the show was eye-opening. Bono, step aside: Here's the new standard for what it means for musicians to engage in activism.

At Vote Solar, we are periodically invited to table at shows where big name acts have decided to incorporate an activism component to their tour. It's kind of them to do -- but unless the artist is willing to talk about your issue from the stage, we've found that we might as well set up in front of a supermarket. People come to shows to get drunk and have a good time -- they are not generally interested in talking about, say, the importance of net metering policies.

And not to dis themed benefit concerts like Farm Aid, Live Aid, Live Earth, Tibet Freedom Concert, etc. Raising money and awareness is a good thing, irrespective of whether the bands that participate live what they preach.

But the Ditty Bops take it to a whole new level:

A linky post

Oy vey. A “vacation” (read: four-state, four-family, Midwestern extravaganza) has left me decidedly off the ball. Prepare for heavy linkiness, and my apologies that much of this is not terribly current. There’s a Dead Meat Olympics? Who knew? Steve Nash (heart!) is opening an environmental gym in Vancouver. London Olympics 2012 update: Amphibians are being […]

And then you die

According to a new report released this week by the Natural Resources Defense Council, there were 25,000 beach closings or “swimming advisory days” in 2006. That’s 28 percent more than in 2005, and the highest number since they started keeping records on that sort of thing. Some 1,300 days of closings were attributed to sewage […]

Debunking the notion that walking is bad for the planet

Sheesh. Wouldn't you know it, the "walking is bad for the planet" meme has reared its head yet again, this time in a British newspaper:

Food production is now so energy-intensive that more carbon is emitted providing a person with enough calories to walk ... than a car would emit over the same distance. The climate could benefit if people avoided exercise, ate less and became couch potatoes.

This made its way to the top of Digg over the weekend, and it's little wonder. It's got all the characteristics of a "sticky idea": it's simple, it's memorable, it seems credible, and most of all, it's unexpected -- which makes it perfect for passing around at the water cooler.

Yet it's actually nothing new. Versions of this idea have been circulating since at least the 1980s. I blogged about a similar claim a year ago. Moreover, as I found out when I ran the numbers, there's a good reason this claim is so counterintuitive: it's false!

Leo’s new eco-flick

I saw The 11th Hour last night, a new movie produced and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio. The movie is a pastiche of interviews of about 50 different thinkers and scientists, interspersed with stock footage of obligatory mountains and seal clubbings. Here's how Leonardo describes it:

15 Green Colleges and Universities

See which colleges got top marks from Grist, then grade our effort in the comments section at the bottom of this page. Photo: Mauro Carballo College of the Atlantic This small school in Bar Harbor, Maine, has just one major: human ecology — or “the study of our relationship with our environment.” So it only […]