At the start of the fall, greens were not happy with President Obama. There was lingering disappointment about the failure of climate legislation a year before—a failure that many environmentalists blamed on insufficient action …
Health
“By cutting emissions that are linked to developmental disorders and respiratory illnesses like asthma, these standards represent a major victory for clean air and public health– and especially for the health of our children. The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will protect millions of families and children from harmful and costly air pollution and provide the American people with health benefits that far outweigh the costs of compliance.”
The E-Waste Blight Grows More Dangerous Than Ever
There’s nothing that thrills tech-lovers more than the latest Shiny New Thing. In the first three quarters of 2011 alone, 55 million iPhones were sold—and that was before the release of the 4s this month. That’s a lot of Shiny New Things.
The problem is, Shiny New Things quickly become Familiar Old Things, and nothing seems so …
How Chinese Babies Pay the Price for Chinese Pollution
It’s a very good thing that neural tube defects are relatively rare in the U.S., because they are very cruel conditions for a newborn to suffer. The two most common types of such birth defects are spina bifida – in which the backbone and spinal canal do not close properly — and anencephaly, in which a large portion of the brain …
Climate Change Caused Crises Half A Millennium Ago, Too
Al Gore’s televised, 24-hour PowerPoint extravaganza last month predictably sparked some hot debate – much of it not about the science itself, but about Gore as its mouthpiece (common themes: he’s a hero, he’s become irrelevant, he’s a hypocritical capitalist). But a key message within Gore’s Climate Reality Project was …
Moneyball for HIV
Bjorn Lomborg’s middle name is not actually “controversial,” but maybe it should be. The Danish economist—and TIME 100 selection—gained notoriety for books like The Skeptical Environmentalist and Cool It that called into question the basic green assumptions that the world is getting worse and that climate change is an existential …
Organic Farms May Keep Bacteria at Bay
Given how the cracks in our food system have recently expanded into troubling chasms – remember the ground turkey Salmonella scare, and the emergence of an antibiotic-resistant Salmonella strain – health experts are once again fretting about farms and the drugs used in them. And with good reason. Antibiotics may be some of the …
Do I Dare to Eat a Peach? Fukushima Citizens and Farmers Struggle with Food Safety
Call it slipper security. To get clearance into the food radiation testing center at Fukushima Agricultural Technology Center, you have to change shoes three times. The first time, you get a black pair. The second time, after your heels are scanned by a Geiger counter and deemed radiation-free, you change into a pair of plastic house …
How Meat and Dairy are Hiking Your Carbon Footprint
It’s tough enough dealing with all the hectoring we get about eating less salt, using bigger forks, and making sure that this or that food group makes up only this or that percentage of our diet. All that, however, is only when it’s the nutritionists talking. Things get even harder when the environmentalists enter the picture, with …
Will Exxon’s Yellowstone Oil Leak Doom the Chances for a Tar Sands Pipeline?
ExxonMobil has been under a harsh spotlight over the last few days, facing accusations that the company has deliberately downplayed the severity of the Yellowstone River oil spill with misleading information and vague claims about what actually happened. It’s an object lesson in the political risks of owning a pipeline. So the energy …