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Statistical Analysis Shows 2 Degree Temperature Rise Zones in North America
Climate scientists have made it easy for skeptics to poke holes in theories about global warming. Every model includes slightly different assumptions, conditions, calculations, or other parameters — leading to differing results. Skeptics point at the differences to justify their conclusion that nothing is known with certainty.
A new advanced...
Marlo Thomas: A Letter To The President
Dear President Obama,
Before midday, Wednesday, May 8th, America was a different place. Millions of our people in all states were living in torment. They’d not only spent their young lives hiding who they were, they’d grown up to discover they had to hide who they loved.
How could that have ever fit the promise of “the pursuit of...
Garbology: How our everyday trash eventually becomes our food
You’ve probably heard the saying, “you are what you eat.” Soon it may have to be rephrased as, “you are what you throw away.”
That’s one eerie consequence of our modern-day culture of waste. Not only do Americans generate more trash than any other society in the history of Earth, but growing evidence now suggests...
Rick Steves: Small-Town Grudges And Mother Nature’s Nudges In Cinque Terre
I woke to the sound of miniature cement trucks and jackhammers. These were happy sounds to me: Monterosso and Vernazza are being put back together after the recent devastating flood.
Socially, too, it’s been a time of reconstruction for both communities. Being small towns, they were rife with cliques and ancient grudges. With the challenge presented...
Fracking Did Contaminate Wyoming Town’s Wells, Independent Review Confirms
Remember that EPA report that said fracking was likely responsible for the contamination of wells in Pavillion, Wyoming? Well, a new review, commissioned by NRDC, the Wyoming Outdoor Council, Sierra Club and the Oil & Gas Accountability Project, concurs and confirms what the EPA report found.
NRDC sums up the findings of hydrologist Tom Myers:
Chemical...
The Indispensable Social Entrepreneurship Skill
Being a social entrepreneur is tough work. Money hard to come by. Most before you have failed. Even your own family doubts your mental health.
The bracing happy talk at social investment conferences and cheerleading predictions about social investment capital poised to flood into the developing world begs for a reality check. Meet Liberia-born...
Rick Steves: A Traveler’s Take On Europe’s Economic Crisis
As I update my “Europe Through the Back Door” guidebook for next year, I’m trying to distill Europe’s economic problems into layman’s terms. I want to help travelers get their minds around the struggles there-giving their visit a little more context. It’s dangerous to simplify these things, but for a guidebook, it...
The Bluefin Tuna: What’s to Be Done?
The other day, a ninth-grade student e-mailed me to ask about the plight of the bluefin tuna. What, he wanted to know, should the government be doing to help keep those endangered fish alive?
As a journalist with an interest in marine conservation, I’ve written extensively on the (mostly unsuccessful) international negotiations to protect the bluefin....
Camels to Chomp Down Runaway Mangroves
Dubai is considering biological control: camels to dine in Dubai’s Ras al Khor wildlife sanctuary overrun by mangrove trees
Too many mangroves is not a good thing – at least not at the Ras Al Khor Wildlife Sanctuary in Dubai, where they were introduced in 1990. So an ecologist at Dubai’s Wildlife Protection office has proposed using camels...
Climate change: How to cope with salty soil
In some coastal areas climate change means a rise in sea levels, leading to an increase in water salinity, which in turn means a high salt content in soil.
Increasing salinity in fresh water and soil poses problems for agriculture and fish farming. This is a particularly tricky aspect of climate change adaptation, but coastal communities as well as...
