West
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How much has drought screwed the West Coast?
The West is hot, bothered, and adapting.
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Ultimate tiny house is suspended 40 feet in the air
Via the Dish, this art installation in downtown San Francisco is the ultimate tiny house. It’s seven by eight by 11 feet, and it’s suspended 40 feet in the air. Plus, it’s recycled AND green: It’s made of 100-year-old reclaimed barn wood, and powered by off-grid solar. Among other ideas, the project is meant to […]
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The Obama admin opens up the best lands in the west for solar development
The Obama administration is putting forward 285,000 acres of public land in the West as prime territory for solar development. About half of the land is in California; the rest is spread over five states, including Nevada and Utah. These sites, the administration says, have no looming environmental or cultural conflicts, and they're close to […]
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Why your money can’t protect you from climate change
It’s hard to see how the West will benefit from, say, more floods.Photo: NZRicoIn a recent article in Newsweek, Nobel laureate economist Thomas Schelling argues that one of the greatest obstacles to addressing climate change is persuading the non-poor in the developed world to take the problem seriously. As he states: Estimates of lost world […]
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Beware the water cowboys
The water wars are usually about supply and demand. But across the country, financially challenged communities are being aggressively courted -- including by Goldman Sachs! -- to sell or lease their drinking water and wastewater utilities to private companies.
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The end of welfare water and the drying of the West
This essay was originally published on TomDispatch and is republished here with Tom’s kind permission. Pink snow is turning red in Colorado. Here on the Great American Desert — specifically Utah’s slickrock portion of it where I live — hot ‘n’ dry means dust. When frequent high winds sweep across our increasingly arid landscape, redrock […]
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Climate change expected to increase Western wildfire burn area as much as 175% by the 2050s
A major new study, “Impacts of climate change from 2000 to 2050 on wildfire activity and carbonaceous aerosol concentrations in the western United States” finds a staggering increase in “wildfire activity and carbonaceous aerosol concentrations in the western United States” by mid-century under a moderate warming scenario: We show that increases in temperature cause annual […]
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What climate scientists have learned from Western wildfires
Many wildland firefighters carry an instrument called a sling psychrometer. It consists of two encased thermometers, and is swung above the head on a short rope — making the firefighters appear not unlike David readying to slay Goliath. The instrument gives a quick field reading of relative humidity, one of the most important factors in […]
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Land-rich regions’ residents tell hungry politicians to back off
It is difficult to recognize change while living through it. However, two recent decisions involving the use of the public’s lands signal a historic political and policy transition, particularly here in the Rocky Mountain West. The first of those two is the almost unanimous rejection by Western governors of the Bush administration’s multiyear attempt to […]