The environmental consequences of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” as it’s usually called, have two story lines. The industry’s is that there has never been a problem caused because of fracking. Opponents cite numerous instances of contaminated wells and other environmental violations, many of the resulting in steep fines. The Great Gas Hope Part of... Read More...
The fifth fuel is saving energy. If profligate California can bring its energy use down 40%, so can the rest of the developed world. But creating this mindset isn't easy. This article about energy use in Hong Kong is lays out why. Read More...
Part of us knows that cars drive us. We think we drive our cars, but as a nation, we are driven by our need to have and fuel our automobiles. Getting a driver’s license and owning a car is rite of American passage that is going global. More than any other single factor, this... Read More...
Making it less pleasant to drive and more pleasant to walk or ride a bike is making many European cities more pleasant to live in, with cleaner air merely one of the perks. Read More...
At a time when Florida is facing severe drought conditions and serious unemployment as well as the long-term potential of sea flooding due to climate change, its governor, Rick Scott, has managed to potentially make all three worse with one political clout to its water management system. Although the full extent of any damage... Read More...
With one typical wealthy West Palm Beach landowner managing to continue her use of an average of 10,000 gallons a day on her 2-acre property during Florida's current drought while the town does nothing but wring its hands, there's not much hope for the rest of the state's residents. Read More...
Let’s all be Californians! For several years now, California residents used 40 per cent less electricity per person than the people in the rest of the U.S. Considering that generating electricity for Americans produces one-third of all the carbon we release, simply getting the rest of the country to behave like Californians would cut... Read More...
That’s the argument: if we don’t use the kind of farming methods that produce a lot of extra bushels per acre, the next three billion people who will crowd the world by the end of this century won’t have enough to eat. But continue to use those farming methods and there won’t be enough... Read More...
This OpEd piece from the NY Times lays out things we could actually do to execute a last-minute save our Planet, but given our current lemming-like bent for fossil-fueled self-destruction, which we are unlikely to follow through on. Read More...
If the U.S. continues as the economic ideal and China and Asia follow in its consuming footsteps, the earth is toast, out of resources, out of breathable air, out of food -- but that's where the world is heading. What to do? Read More...
