Climate Culture

Revisiting the 1970s eco-cult classic that gripped a nation

In the afterword to the 30th-anniversary edition of his 1975 novel, Ernest Callenbach writes, "Looking back, it seems clear that Ecotopia was the first attempt to portray a sustainable society, and that this, more than its modest literary merit, explains its durability." Sadly, there is no false humility in that statement.

Wired reports on the new power generation

We Americans sure do like labels don't we? (And I'm not talking about food labels.) That's right, in addition to soccer moms cruising around town in hybrids and flexitarians buying their food stuffs at Whole Foods and the like, we now have "hygridders."

What's a hygridder? According to a Wired article:

... people who are both middle of the road and off the grid. Across the US some 185,000 households have switched from the local power company to their own homegrown, renewable energy. The fastest-growing segment of this population - their ranks are doubling each year - isn't doing a full Kaczynski. Sure, these folks are slapping solar panels on the roof and erecting the occasional wind turbine, but they're staying connected to the grid, just to be safe. And in many cases, they're operating as mini-utilities, selling excess electricity back to the power company. Just as their cars aren't kludgy and their food isn't flavorless, their homes aren't drafty or dimly lit. Call them hygridders. And look for them soon in a neighborhood near you. Because - trendmeisters, take note - hygrid is the new Prius.

Learn about this new breed by reading the article. And if you feel so inclined, let us know what you think or tell us about your foray into hygridding.

John Francis, a ‘planetwalker’ who lived car-free and silent for 17 years, chats with Grist

How long could you survive without your car? For the many Americans who think nothing of driving 10 blocks to buy a gallon of milk, the answer is obvious. But before any of you dedicated pedestrians and die-hard cyclists start feeling smug, try this question: How long could you survive without talking? John Francis. Photo: […]

Are greens overlooking a key constituency?

On a snowy winter morning five years ago, after four days of cocooning in the hospital, I walked home carrying my newborn daughter. I knew I was crossing the threshold into life as a mother, caregiver, and working parent. What I didn’t know was that I was about to become a different kind of environmentalist. […]

Doom and Bloom

Most Mother’s Day flowers are far from green Oodles of Americans will buy flowers for their moms for Mother’s Day (that’s this Sunday, you slackers), but not many will consider the environmental impacts. Conventionally grown flowers “are such a high-value crop that it takes a huge amount of pesticides to make them perfect,” said Pesticide […]

The World Less Traveled

Greens shun cheap air travel, point to impacts of industry A small but growing number of eco-conscious Brits are turning away from cheap airfares and looking to other means of transport or forgoing planned vacations altogether in hopes of reducing their personal environmental footprints. Overall, aircraft-related carbon-dioxide emissions make up some 5 percent of Britain’s […]

Umbra on channeling gray water to the garden

Dear Umbra, As part of my water-conservation strategy, I’d like to reuse the rinse water from my laundry machine to water the native plants, many of them edible, in my yard. I’ve heard concerns about the soap (biodegradable) damaging the plants. There are also potentially some regulatory hurdles involved. Can you shed some light on […]

An interview with actor and solar advocate Edward Norton

Edward Norton. Photo: WGBH. The world has known Edward Norton as a neo-Nazi skinhead, a lusty priest, a warbling romantic, Larry Flynt’s attorney, and Nelson Rockefeller. There is also a far less publicized role that Norton plays every day: a dyed-in-the-wool eco-devotee on the front lines of the renewable-energy movement. In 2003, Norton teamed up […]

Guppy Love

Young urban professionals hip to green-building scene The trend now has a name. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you Guppys: Green urban professionals who are young. (Yeah, we didn’t say it was a clever name.) Portland, Ore., has become the epicenter of a movement by the storied “creative class” to find, build, or remodel eco-friendly […]

Next: Clay Aiken Draws a Line In the Sands of Tuvalu

Hollywood celebs travel to Arctic to raise global-warming awareness Matt Petersen of Global Green spends his time pondering this weighty question: “[I]n an age and culture that’s celebrity-obsessed, how do you in a smart and savvy way use the celebrity to shine the light on the science, on the facts, and on the solution?” When […]