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It Ain’t Easy Selling Green
When Morgan Poor gave birth to her son, she and her husband shopped around for the perfect diaper, hoping to find one that was both effective and environmentally friendly. They tried a few so-called “niche” brands, like Seventh Generation and Honest Company, which tout their green bona fides, but the diapers Poor liked best came fromREAD MORE
The Dutch Are Building a Barricade Against Climate Change (PHOTOS)
The inhabitants of the Netherlands have been fighting floods for thousands of years. Eight-hundred years ago, they began to create local councils called “waterschappen” that were tasked with preventing floods. The rich provided the money and the poor provided their labor to build and maintain levees. Those councils still exist today, and they have a newREAD MORE
Pioneering Black Scientist to Win Nobel Prize of Climate Change
Warren Washington can trace at least one of the origins of his extraordinary scientific career —more than half a century of groundbreaking advances in computer climate modeling — to a youthful curiosity about the color of egg yolks. “I had some wonderful teachers in high school, including a chemistry teacher who really got me started,” he said. “OneREAD MORE
Native Sámi People Face Perils of Climate Change (PHOTOS)
One of the key findings of the most recent UN report on the mounting perils of climate change is that rising temperatures pose a distinct risk to indigenous people, who are often small farmers, fishers or herders. The report noted that punishing storms, lasting drought and stifling heat threaten the lives and livelihoods of aboriginal groupsREAD MORE
Plastic Pollution Has Increased a Hundredfold in the South Atlantic
Thirty years ago, the ocean waters surrounding British islands in the South Atlantic were near-pristine. But plastic waste has increased a hundredfold since then, and is ten times greater than it was a decade ago. These islands — part of the British Overseas Territories, which includes established or proposed Marine Protection Areas — are among the most remote on theREAD MORE
This Map Shows Which Communities Need the Most Help in a Disaster
Armed with howling winds and punishing rain, Hurricane Florence laid siege to Lumberton, North Carolina earlier this month. To a town where more than a third of residents live below the poverty line, the storm brought all manner of mayhem. It made quick work of a temporary dam, sending floodwaters rushing into the poorest neighborhoods, low-lyingREAD MORE
Too Little Power Can Be a Dangerous Thing
In Port Arthur, Texas, where most residents are black or Hispanic and close to a third live below the poverty line, influence is a difficult thing to come by. It is not the families who live and work in Port Arthur who hold sway over public policy, it seems, but rather the owners of the sprawlingREAD MORE
Climate Change Is Creating an Affordable Housing Crisis in Miami (VIDEO)
Miami ranks among the most valuable real estate markets in the country. Palatial homes astride warm, teal waters sell for millions. But it’s not Miami’s ocean-front neighborhoods where property values are rising fastest. Housing costs are climbing more rapidly in neighborhoods that lie a little higher up along a ridge that runs parallel to the shore.READ MORE
Fish Are Losing Their Sense of Smell
There have been numerous wake-up calls about the effects of climate change on marine life. As ocean waters heat up, they are bleaching corals. Growing levels of carbon dioxide are acidifying seawater, which is degrading the shells and skeletons of sea organisms. The rising temperatures are prompting fish to migrate to colder waters, even causing themREAD MORE
Televised Sports Capture Climate Change Along the Course
Pieter De Frenne is a big cycling fan who likes to watch coverage of the Tour of Flanders, a one-day bicycle race held every spring in Belgium. He is also the consummate scientist. So it’s not surprising that he noticed startling changes in the trees and shrubs framing many of the cobbled streets that have beenREAD MORE
Your Favorite Disney Princesses Reimagined as Scientists
Baby boomers grew up on Cinderella, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. These Disney movie favorites always face peril, but they get their man in the end — after being rescued by him, of course. Millennials grew up on Disney princesses who were made of stronger stuff. They are warriors and adventurers, and — while happy to have a man inREAD MORE
Scientists Engineer Cleaner Pig Poop
Scientists have been tinkering with the genes of plants and animals for years to cure diseases, make fruits and vegetables heartier and tastier, produce crops that are resistant to pests, drought and other scourges, or prompt fish to grow faster. In recent years, however, thanks in part to the ravages of climate change, some researchers whoREAD MORE
Birds Are Changing Their Tune
Mike McGrann has a good ear. He can identify a bird just by listening to it sing. He also can tell from its song if it’s bragging about its territory, about to migrate, or seeking a mate. McGrann shrugs off his skill — he can recognize the sounds of more than 200 species — saying other ornithologists can do it,READ MORE
Blockchain: Secret Weapon in the Fight Against Climate Change
Bitcoin, the much-hyped cryptocurrency, made headlines recently for driving a surge in power use. Around the globe, digital entrepreneurs are ‘mining’ Bitcoins by solving complex math problems, using supercomputers to get the job done. Those supercomputers use a ton of power, which largely comes form coal- and gas-fired power plants spewing gobs of carbon pollution. But,READ MORE
Good News for Cows: Scientists Unlock Hidden Energy In Grass
Look to the dawn of human civilization and, on the horizon, you will see a field of grass. The first plant humans domesticated was likely corn or rice, both types of grass. We eat grass. We feed it to livestock. And, sometimes, we turn it into ethanol and use it to run our cars. We’ve builtREAD MORE
Carbon Fiber Made From Plants Instead of Petroleum
Carbon fiber is the Superman of materials. Five times stronger than steel and a fraction of the weight, it is used in everything from tennis rackets to golf clubs to bicycles to wind turbine blades to passenger airplanes to Formula One race cars. There’s just one catch: Carbon fiber is made from oil and other costlyREAD MORE
Why Are There No Good Movies About Climate Change?
It’s Oscar season, and Hollywood is abuzz with chatter about the year’s best flicks, which include films about poverty, racism and war. Not mentioned by prognosticators is 2017's one big movie about climate change, Geostorm, a sci-fi thriller so thin on story, drama and spectacle, it earned a rating of just 13 percent on Rotten Tomatoes.READ MORE
Scientists Are Speed Breeding Plants In a Race to Beat Climate Change
Some years ago, NASA bred wheat in space with the goal of providing an unending food supply for astronauts. To help the plant along, astronauts shined light on the plant continuously. As far as the crop was concerned, the sun never set. It was always noon on a cloudless day. The extra light fueled its rapidREAD MORE
Is the Term “Bomb Cyclone” Anxious Clickbait or Actual Science?
This week a powerful winter storm covered the East Coast in a thick layer of snow. It also delivered frigid temperatures, record tides fueling monster floods, and winds close to 80 mph, leading several governors to declare states of emergency. The dangerous snowstorm is what’s known as a “bomb cyclone.” It’s what happens when cold terrestrialREAD MORE
We’re Living Better but at What Cost?
People who live in developed nations are, by many measures, healthier than ever before. Yet the planet has borne an onslaught of environmental insults — climate change chief among them — unlike any in human history. This alone threatens everyone’s well-being, a conundrum that scientists call the “ecological paradox.” They believe humans are forfeiting the health of future generations inREAD MORE
Power for a Population Boom
Since 2000, Washington, DC’s population has surged, but its power grid has not. Instead of generators, the city added renewables and upgraded aged structures — including many federal office buildings, the city’s largest energy consumers — keeping the lights on while keeping costs down for the city’s poorest residents. Ted Trabue, Managing Director of the District of Columbia Sustainable EnergyREAD MORE
Reading by Plant Light
Someday in the near future you could be reading by the light of your favorite plant — no cord or electrical outlet needed. This could be a real energy-saver, not to mention great during a power failure. And it’s not as far-fetched as it seems. Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have successfully engineered plants to glow,READ MORE
Healthcare Institutions Across U.S. Treating Climate Change as a Top Priority
The Cleveland Clinic started thinking “green” more than a decade ago, as sustainability and energy efficiency were just starting to gain traction in serious conversations about climate change. Since then, the Ohio medical center’s environmentally conscious practices have become part of its culture, with everyone getting involved. They are recycling, turning off lights and computers, plantingREAD MORE
Nature Inspires Climate-Friendly Architecture
Scientists who invent things often look to nature for inspiration. Their goal is to mimic biological systems in order to create new consumer products, or improve existing ones. The 1941 introduction of Velcro, for example, grew out of a Swiss engineer’s curiosity about why Burdock seeds clung to his coat — and that of his dog — when they wereREAD MORE
Making the Perfect Ice Storm
Lindsey Rustad is an ice sculptor. But she doesn’t make the swans you see at weddings or corporate events. She makes ice storms in forests. Her designs, like those in nature, glisten and evoke wonder. But they also foretell danger. With increasing evidence that climate change is driving more frequent and severe weather events, likely includingREAD MORE
U.S. Hospitals Generate a Ton of Waste. They Don’t Have To.
We know climate change is bad for our health. Heat waves, drought and superstorms, all driven by rising temperatures, already are causing sickness and death. But we know much less about the carbon cost of the care needed to heal the sick and injured. In fact, the medical industry produces plenty of waste from treatments, tossingREAD MORE
Five Ways Cities Can Slash Carbon Pollution Right Now
It’s been a banner year for cities in the fight against climate change. This week, more than 50 mayors gathered in Chicago this week for North American Climate Summit. Each signed a charter calling on mayors to make specific plans to cut carbon pollution in line with national commitments under the Paris Agreement. Over the lastREAD MORE
Can You Put a Price on a Forest?
Forests don’t get a lot of credit in the fight against climate change. Left alone, they soak up a huge volume of carbon from the atmosphere. They are what scientists call a “carbon sink.” But, when people burn down forests to clear land for farming or grazing, those trees become a liability, bleeding their vast storesREAD MORE
Would Humanity Survive on a Frozen Planet?
What would happen in the future if, after centuries of warming, the climate suddenly shifted to the opposite extreme? Could humanity survive in an icy wasteland? That’s the premise of Above the Timberline, a fantasy adventure written and illustrated by Gregory Manchess. In a conversation with Nexus Media, Manchess revealed what inspired the story and sharedREAD MORE
Clean Power from Turkey Poop
Israeli scientists have found a new use for turkey leftovers. But don’t pull those Thanksgiving scraps out of the freezer just yet, because it’s not what you think. It’s not about the meat — it’s about the poop. Researchers believe turkey and other poultry waste hold promise as a renewable fuel for heat and electricity. “Poultry litter mightREAD MORE
Rising Seas Could Erase Chunks of History
Extreme weather events powered by climate change already have shown how rising seas threaten coastal communities: flooding and destruction of homes followed by widespread migration and resettlement. That’s horrible enough. But sobering new research suggests that many iconic symbols of the nation’s history also could be wiped out by rising waters. An estimated 13,000 archeological andREAD MORE
Connecting with Nature Improves Minds and Moods
Twentieth Century German social psychologist Erich Fromm first advanced the notion that humans hold an inborn connection to nature. Later, it was popularized by biologist E.O. Wilson as “the urge to affiliate with other forms of life.” In the ensuing years, support for the positive effects of nature has gained considerable traction, grounded in a growingREAD MORE
Climate Action 101 (VIDEO)
More than 300 U.S. colleges and universities have committed to major carbon reduction targets and climate resiliency plans as part of Second Nature’s Climate Action Network. The goal is to make college campuses climate neutral in the span of just a few years. Leaders of the movement gathered in Bonn, Germany this week during the COP23READ MORE
Everything Old Is New Again (VIDEO)
The River Beech Tower, a conceptual design for a wood skyscraper in downtown Chicago. Source: Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat The home of the future won’t look like The Jetsons. It won’t come equipped with a flying car or a robot maid. While it will deploy a slate of clean-energy technologies that the cartoon’s creatorsREAD MORE
With Conservation Burials, Death Gives New Life
Natural burials — where bodies are buried in the soil to allow for a hasty decomposition — have already caught on. But an Australian scientist has proposed that the concept of “dust-unto-dust” go even further. He suggests that natural burials become “conservation” burials, that is, that people use the costs of interring bodies to buy, manage and preserve new landREAD MORE
Meet Eleanor, the Stormproof Sea Turtle
Eleanor the sea turtle is one tough lady. Not only did she ride out a powerful tropical storm, but she did it in style. “Eleanor’s ‘sea turtle tale’ is a sunshine story about how wonderful nature is,” said Maria Wilson, a biologist at the University of Southern Denmark. “Sea turtles have been around for millions ofREAD MORE
Policing Pollution Plumes After Disasters
Climate change is fueling devastating storms like Hurricane Harvey that are mangling critical infrastructure and industrial facilities, causing dangerous pollutants to leak into the air. Physicist Tony Miller and his team at Entanglement Technologies have developed an air pollution detector that alerts people if the air is unsafe to breathe, and they were on the groundREAD MORE
Three Graphs Show How Climate Change Threatens Your Health Today
A new report released this week by the Lancet medical journal details “unequivocal and potentially irreversible” growing threats to public health from climate change. The report finds that the delayed action on climate change worldwide has jeopardized human life and livelihoods over the past 25 years, with harms “far worse than previously understood.” A related briefingREAD MORE
Oil Sands Workers Look to New Jobs In Renewables (VIDEO)
In a town hall earlier this year, Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau said that Canada needs to phase out tar sands development. Trudeau’s comment angered politicians from Alberta, which is home to nearly 500,000 oil workers. Many workers themselves, however, hold a more nuanced view. They understand that tar sands extraction is costly and destructive. AmidREAD MORE
The Little Snail That Could
The fate of aquatic ecosystems in a warming climate may well rest upon the appetite of a tiny snail-like herbivore you’ve probably never heard of: the limpet. The behavior of the little limpet, in fact, is a perfect model for what scientists see as a defense strategy against the pressures imposed upon the environment by increasingREAD MORE