Ecology and Environment

You’re standing in line at the grocery store when you realize that you don’t have your reusable bag. You’ll have to get a plastic bag. Again. You feel bad for a moment and then think that it’s just one bag. But it isn’t … In the U.S. alone, 280 billion… »

A landmark study of Kenya’s high-elevation forests shows that the economic cost of deforestation in the East African country exceeds national gains from forestry and logging by more than four-to-one, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) reported. “Deforestation deprived Kenya’s economy of 5.8 billion shillings ($68 million) in 2010… »

Mainstream media have focussed for many days on Hurricane Sandy’s impact on the U.S.–predictions, images, surveys on who will win the presidential election on 6 November, etc. Meanwhile, very little attention has been paid to the fact that some 1.8 million Haitians have also been affected according to the… »

We speak with residents of the low-income and largely minority community of Manhattan’s Lower East Side who live in the shadow of a Consolidated Edison substation that flooded during Superstorm Sandy and has left thousands in the dark. With no sign of help from the city or the Federal Emergency… »

The massive damage Superstorm Sandy has caused to New York City and its infrastructure has not come as a surprise to everyone. We’re joined by Cynthia Rosenzweig, co-chair of the New York City Panel on Climate Change, who says the city began looking at the impact of global warming more… »

The deployment recovery efforts are in full operation after the passage of Hurricane Sandy with 12 States (CT, DE, MA, MD, ME, NC, NH, NJ, NY, PA, VA, VT) in a federally-declared state of emergency. More than 8 million people are without electricity.  Atlantic City, NJ is devastated, with  70 percent of the… »

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has acknowledged the massive Sandy storm could impact both coastal and inland nuclear power plants. At least 16 reactors are in the storm’s projected path, including North Anna and Surry in Virginia; Calvert Cliffs in Maryland; Oyster Creek, Hope Creek and Salem in New Jersey; Indian… »

David and Katharine Lowrie have a mission: running 5,000 miles in one year, from the southern tip of Chile to northern Colombia, to benefit the continent’s wildlife and wild places. The intrepid Lawries will finish running the Carretera Austral, Aysén’s wild route through the wonderful wilderness of Chilean Patagonia, this… »

By Ramesh Jaura* Much to the chagrin of several millions in Japan and beyond, who are relentlessly campaigning for a nuclear weapons-free world, the government in Tokyo has declined to join an initiative calling for efforts to outlaw nukes out of concern it would affect the country’s security arrangement under… »

The so-called ‘stress tests’ on nuclear power plants in the European Union (EU) have confirmed environmental and energy activists’ worst fears: most European nuclear facilities do not meet minimum security standards. The tests on 134 nuclear reactors operating in 14 EU member states were carried out in response to widespread… »