Climate Technology
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Thy Rod and Thy Staff, They Disturb Me
Bush’s EPA and Interior stocked with industry lawyers and lobbyists New York Newsday is running a series called “Erasing the Rules” about the Bush administration’s coordinated efforts to remove or weaken regulations on industry. Of particular interest to Gristians will be the third installment, about the administration’s staffing of the U.S. EPA, Interior Department, and […]
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Ford Focus
Ford develops ambitious, private plan to reduce emissions Top executives at Ford Motor Co. have set an aggressive goal to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions — a goal that would require a roughly 80 percent improvement in the fuel economy of the company’s cars and trucks by 2030. The motives behind the goal, which the company has […]
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Joel Makower, environmental business expert, answers questions
Joel Makower. With what environmental organization are you affiliated? I’ve got several affiliations, all of my own creation. I’m editor of The Green Business Letter, which I founded in 1991; founder of the nonprofit Green Business Network, which produces GreenBiz.com, ClimateBiz.com, GreenerBuildings.com, and GreenBizLeaders.com; and cofounder of Clean Edge, Inc., a research and consulting firm […]
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Hang Up and Hike
Cell towers and phones are invading national parks The swish of a breeze through the trees. The twittering of birds. The burbling of a brook. The … opening notes of “U Can’t Touch This”? Get used to it: Bleeping (and by that we mean fricking) cell phones are becoming more common in national parks, in […]
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Umbra on choosing the least evil gasoline company
Dear Umbra, Every week I scan the gasoline signs looking for the cheapest deal, while knowing that what I pay in rock-bottom prices may come at the expense of environmental integrity and social justice. I’d like to choose my brand of gas with more conscience. Would you help? I’d love to see a ranking or […]
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Gambler’s Dilemma
Investing in renewable energy can pose ethical dilemmas Over the past two years, the value of fossil-fuel companies has soared while the worldwide stock-market value of renewable-energy companies has declined from $13 billion to $10.7 billion. This, despite ever-renewing hope that a major energy transition will spark a boom in the renewables arena. Many Wall […]
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The Joy of Sachs
Exotic South American forest set aside as wilderness by … bankers? When New York investment banking and management firm Goldman Sachs acquired a logging operation in Tierra del Fuego, on an island off the southernmost tip of Chile, it did something unusual: Rather than “seek to maximize its economic value, which is what we would […]
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Labor Pains
Slave labor used to clear Brazilian rainforest The Amazon rainforest is disappearing at a precipitous pace, and as is too often the case, this environmental catastrophe is connected to equally dire human-rights abuses. To wit: Thousands of poor, illiterate Brazilian peasants work every year chopping down the forest in conditions Brazil’s Labor Ministry delicately refers […]
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Schwarzenegger at an environmental crossroads
Arnold Schwarzenegger‘s exuberant speech last Tuesday at the Republican National Convention suggested that the Governator may be less the moderate Republican than advertised. Hailed by some during the convention as the Obama of the right, the California governor came across as a devout, rock-ribbed Bush lover. Just days after Schwarzenegger’s speech, more evidence emerged to […]
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Too Many Cooks Oil the Broth
ChevronTexaco Heavily Influenced California Restructuring California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s (R) recently announced plan to comprehensively reorganize state government brought grumbles from some enviros, who were piqued by the proposed consolidation of various boards and commissions from which many of the state’s groundbreaking environmental initiatives have emerged. This latest news isn’t going to mollify them. The […]
