For all the complaints about government gridlock, the 111th Congress proved to be incredibly productive, passing health care legislation, an unprecedented stimulus, major tax cuts, allowing gays in the military and vindicating a landmark arms control treaty. When President Obama addressed the press before Christmas, he celebrated those …
What Australia’s Floods Mean for the Great Barrier Reef
As New York shovels out of the snow and LA digs out of the mud, Australians are facing their own onslaught of extreme weather. The worst floods in half a century have hit the central and southern parts of Queensland, forcing at least 1000 residents to evacuate their homes with warnings that the worst may be yet to come as rivers in the …
Global Warming: Farmers Will Need to Adapt to Changing Climates—But They’ve Done So in the Past
Of all the projected impacts of climate change, the scariest one in a world is the effect warming could have on our ability to feed ourselves. Scientists have looked at the impact of major heat waves in the past, and have found that such abnormally hot weather tends to hurt agriculture, with maize productivity levels falling by more …
Oil Spill: Providing Clean Energy for the Victims of Deepwater Horizon
Last week I wrote a column asking the question: whatever happened to the Gulf oil spill? Thanks to presidential commissions and great investigative reporting, we know a great deal about why the spill happened and what impact it might have on the land and the water of the Gulf. In the news, though, the spill seems largely gone.
But …
Climate: The EPA Begins the Process of Regulating Greenhouse Gases
With the failure of carbon cap-and-trade legislation this year, and a passel of Republicans taking over the House who seem to doubt that global warming exists, Congress has become a dead-end for fighting greenhouse gas emissions. But the Supreme Court has given the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the power to regulate …
Food: Why the Just Passed Food Safety Bill Is Only a First Step
The troubled but important food safety bill finally passed Congress yesterday, and should be signed by President Obama today. I have a post over at Healthland explaining why the bill may not be worth much without more funding.
Electronics: Why Your Mac May Not Be as Clean As You Think
If, like me, you’ve contracted an unbreakable addiction to Apple products, then this really is the most wonderful time of the year. As always, Steve Jobs has timed the release of some new products for the holiday season, including the ultra-light MacBook Air which—full disclosure—I’m typing this blog post on right now. Add that to …
A Happier Year in Store for America’s Sharks?
Sharks caught a break yesterday after the Senate passed a piece of important legislation aimed at reducing the number of sharks finned in U.S. waters. The Shark Conservation Act of 2009 passed the Senate on Monday, strengthening existing legislation by closing a few gaping loopholes in the law, and is now due to move to the House.
The …
New Mistletoe Species Discovered: Yet Another Excuse to Celebrate This Holiday Season
Among the various natural disasters and man-made catastrophes that unfolded during 2010, it’s nice to take a moment to consider the happier crumbs of environmental news that came out of the year. The UN’s International Year of Biodiversity yielded the discovery and naming of hundreds of new species, many of which can be credited to the …
Climate: California Approves Carbon Cap-and-Trade
OK, so a national carbon cap-and-trade program is, as we’ve said many times before, extremely dead. And at this point, no one has any idea what form energy and climate legislation might take over the next couple of years, or whether anything’s really possible. Climate change hasn’t gone away, even if many people are pretending that …