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  • Is this the natural gas industry’s fib-filled high pressure sales strategy?

    As reported by Brian Merchant at Treehugger, a tipster has offered up an internal oil and natural gas company document called "Talking Points for Selling Oil and Gas Lease Rights." If this is genuine, it’s basically a “How To Lie To Get Drilling Rights For Fun and Profit” guide. One thing the document tells us […]

    Christopher Mims Health

  • Goldman Environmental Prize winners give the rest of us a kick in the pants

    It’s like the Oscars for the Patagonia set. Every April, just before Earth Day, San Francisco’s environmental community comes together at the city’s Opera House to laud six grassroots activists from around the globe, whose stories enrage and inspire. The prize offers recipients $150,000 to use as they see fit and international recognition that confers […]

    Erica Gies Health

  • Are Canada’s disastrous tar sands coming your way?

    Alberta’s scenic tar sands.Photo: Suncor EnergyThis essay was originally published on TomDispatch and is republished here with Tom’s kind permission. For years, “not in my backyard” has been the battle cry of residents in Cape Cod who stand opposed to an offshore wind farm in Nantucket Sound. The giant turbines will forever mar the beauty […]

    Ellen Cantarow Health

  • Seven ways a government shutdown will hurt the environment

    During a government shutdown, federal law enforcement agents continue to work, but what about the people tasked with protecting the environment? Yeah, they all go home. Here's how things will go down if our leaders can't come to an agreement over the nation's uteruses:

    Christopher Mims Health

  • 350.org and 1Sky merge into one mass climate movement

    Let’s get together — yeah, yeah, yeah.We environmentalists hear this periodically from friends and family and other concerned citizens: “I wish there weren’t so many groups. It’s confusing. I don’t know who to volunteer for. Wouldn’t it work better if you all got together?” This isn’t quite as obvious as it sounds. Different groups have […]

    Bill McKibben & Betsy Taylor Health

  • Fukushima in a decade: Bucolic beach resort or Road Warrior-esque hellscape?

    Technology Review's Kevin Bullis points us to a package at Nature, on the long-term impacts of the Fukushima disaster. It's kind of a nice antidote to all the hysterical day-to-day coverage (the leak's stopped, by the way) as viewed through the cold, dispassionate eye of science. That doesn't mean it's rosy: Fully decommissioning the plant […]

    Christopher Mims Health

  • Do environmental justice groups have a legitimate beef with California’s cap-and-trade program?

    Photo: ItzaFineDayAn environmental justice coalition called the Association of Irritated Residents (not making that up) has sued to stop implementation of California’s AB 32 climate program, and it looks like they’ve won the first round. A judge has ruled that the state’s Air Resources Board didn’t fully consider alternatives to the cap-and-trade portion of the […]

    David Roberts Health

  • Environmentalists stand up to Obama, win big

    Under intense pressure from green groups and their members, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) announced Friday that Republican proposals to gut the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act were off the table in budget negotiations. “Neither the White House nor Senate Leaders is going to accept any EPA riders,” Reid said. Reid’s pledge […]

    Glenn Hurowitz Health

  • The nuts were right — airplane contrails WILL kill you

    Wow, Fortean Times was right about something: Airplane contrails really are dangerous. The carbon emissions from air travel are profound, but the water vapor planes emit is just as bad, or worse. And airplane-spawned water vapor is what makes up the high, thin clouds known as contrails. Michele Bachmann would surely object — water vapor […]

    Jess Zimmerman Health

  • Sen. Stabenow jumps on climate denial train

    Debbie Stabenow says no to M!ch!gan!Cross-posted from the Wonk Room. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) has joined the pro-polluter frenzy sweeping the U.S. Senate, introducing legislation to permanently cripple Clean Air Act rules on global warming pollution. The small business legislation, the SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2011 (S. 493), introduced by Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), is […]

    Brad Johnson Health