On September 10th, the Arctic hit its annual summertime ice minimum. According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, it was the second lowest summertime low since satellite record-keeping began. And as a series of new visualizations show, this trend is not going anywhere. The Arctic is the fastest-warming […]
Tag: environment
Newmont (US) mine workers may be behind brutal attack on Máxima Acuña
This weekend, Máxima Acuña, winner of the 2016 Goldman Environmental Prize, was assaulted on her property in Peru. Since 2011, Acuña has resisted the development of the Conga gold mine by U.S.-based Newmont Mining by refusing to vacate her home — and, for that, has faced both legal prosecution and […]
Lamar Smith: Guardian of Exxon’s Secrets
U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) called this week’s hearing of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology in the hopes of rounding up support. The defender of all things oily wanted to hear legal justification for his campaign to compel testimony from New York and Massachusetts states attorneys general […]
Saving ‘natural resources’ won’t save us
For most of middle America—or most of America, actually—protests of any sort demonstrate questionable behavior. People are suddenly “out of their place,” different kinds of people, people made strange by their willingness to do unfamiliar and possibly illegal things to advance their message. They draw attention to themselves, and thereby, […]
Beyond Doomsday
How environmental activism can eradicate the power of bad news Greg Harman Never before has the doomsday prophet been so closely in line with mainstream science. Every major environmental messenger these days—including virtually all scientists who study climate change—is reading from the same script. What they have to say is […]
On the morality of extinction: A Q&A with Kathleen Dean Moore
Or: Why the climate movement needs a crash course in philosophy Greg Harman The environmental community has long illustrated the seriousness of climate change with intimidating facts and figures. The now-infamous hockey stick graph twining rising heat with rising greenhouse gases defined Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth. And though the science […]
Technology Is Ready For Synthetic Foods. Are You?
Driverless cars? Half of all Americans would climb aboard. Brain implants? Nearly 30% are open-minded. In-vitro meat grown in a laboratory? Hold the burger. Only two out of 10 Americans are willing to give lab meat – animal tissue grown without a living host – a go, according to a […]
Questions for San Antonio’s Calumet Refinery
Ugly, dirty history of spills at San Antonio Refinery seem far from over. Greg Harman Consider this my spring cleaning, late as it is. The subject: the mangle of flares and flanges known as the Calumet (or NuStar, or AGE) refinery in South SA. While some media are keeping up on […]