By Sid Perkins, Science News | Reported in WIRED | March 4, 2010 Prodigious plumes of planet-warming methane are bubbling from sediments across a broad region of Arctic seafloor previously thought to be sealed by permafrost, new analyses indicate. The resulting increase of methane gas in the atmosphere may accelerate climate warming, scientists say. Read [...]
Oxygen-deprived areas in the world’s oceans usually found in deeper water are moving up to offshore areas and threatening coastal marine ecosystems by spurring the die-off of some species and overpopulation of others By Michael Tennesen | Scientific American | February 23, 2010 A plague of oxygen-deprived waters from the deep ocean is creeping up [...]
Will Walmart, not Whole Foods, save the small farm and make America healthy? by Corby Kummer | Atlantic Monthly | March 2010 BUY MY FOOD at Walmart? No thanks. Until recently, I had been to exactly one Walmart in my life, at the insistence of a friend I was visiting in Natchez, Mississippi, about 10 [...]
A European idea is catching on in Washington’s wine country: reusable bottles. It saves money and is kind to the environment. By Harris Meyer | Crosscut.com | February 18, 2010 Wine drinkers in many Pacific Northwest towns get frustrated that there’s no place to recycle the heavy glass bottles that hold their beloved vino. In Europe, [...]
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL | The New York Times | February 16, 2010 It took more than a month for the container ship Ebba Maersk to steam from Germany to Guangdong, China, where it unloaded cargo on a recent Friday — a week longer than it did two years ago. But for the owner, the Danish [...]
By Tia Ghose | Wired Science | February 15, 2010 The California coast has seen fewer foggy days in the last century, threatening the health of the region’s majestic redwood trees. Over the last century, new research suggests the average daily fog has decreased more than three hours, causing the coast redwoods to lose more [...]
By Timothy Egan | The New York Times | February 12, 2010 LATHROP, Calif. — Drive along foreclosure alley, through new planned communities that look like tile-roofed versions of a 21st century ghost town, and you see what happens when people gamble with houses instead of casino chips. Dirty flags advertise rock-bottom discounts on empty [...]
By Greg Lindsay | FAST COMPANY | February 1, 2010 The world is bracing for an influx of billions of new urbanites in the coming decades, and tech companies are rushing to build new green cities to house them. Are these companies creating a smarter metropolis — or just making money? Stan Gale is exultant. [...]
by Robert McClure in Dateline Earth/InvestigateWEST | February 8, 2010 I’ve always been just a hair skeptical about all those admonitions to consumers to save the world — you know, the “Live simply, that others may simply live”-type instructions. They felt a little too much like guilt-tripping to me, with perhaps not enough corresponding actual [...]
Carbon offsets reflect the tendency of environmentalism to act like a new religion. Remember European history about the buying and selling of indulgences? But there can be good sense in donating to atone for our offenses against the environment. By Anthony B. Robinson | Crosscut.com | February 5, 2010 The other day I, half-joking, told [...]