Attacking climate change one bank at a time—starting with Chase
It’s time to stop the biggest lenders to the fossil fuel industry.
Why climate activist Bill McKibben is concerned about AI and genetic engineering
“It comes down to human solidarity. Another name for solidarity is love.”
Which new books deserve a spot under the Christmas tree?
We asked our contributing editors to each pick two.
The political power of a local carrot
By some estimates, three quarters of Americans don't really know their next-door neighbor.
Playing offense: It’s time to divest from the oil industry
As generations of coaches have delighted in pointing out, defense wins games. But we’re very far behind in the global warming game.
Love your neighbor as yourself
This always seemed like hard moral advice that very few of us were really able to follow. But in recent times its meaning seems clearer.
Pipeline to disaster: Obama and the Alberta tar sands
When news came out that Obama would get to
approve or block a pipeline linking Texas
refineries to the tar sands of Alberta, it was clear that it was time for
more than words.
Disobedience: Direct action on global warming
Global warming is dry science, an entirely rational question that should be addressed by experts working on our behalf and with our thanks. But it's not happening.
It's about the carbon: What's worse than the gulf oil leak?
The sudden, hideous explosion of oil in the Gulf of Mexico is the latest reminder of who we really are. By we, I mean:British Petroleum: Broken Pipe? Bigtime Pollution?Our government: The Bush administration's constant deregulation is a factor, but Barack Obama avoids offending the big oil and coal companies. We as in us: Every politician in America notices that Americans scream any time the price of oil begins to rise.
Engine trouble
The book Two Billion Cars arrives in stores at the close of a quarter that has seen auto sales plummet 30, 40, even 50 perc...
A place that makes sense: On not living too large
Hammarby Sjostad used to be an industrial brownfield, toxic and unpopulated. It was slated to become part of the Olympic Village in 2004; the bid failed, but the momentum for a new neighborhood was enormous, and a town was built. It was designed to be an ecological gem, a place where the average person would live half again as lightly as the average Swede, who is already among the most ecologically minded citizens of the developed world.
Cutting carbon: A strategy to stabilize the atmosphere
In the last year or so, the data about climate change has grown steadily darker. The scale and the pace of global warming seem larger and faster than we realized even a few years ago....
Meltdown: Running out of time on global warming
A decade ago most experts thought of global warming as the largest challenge civilization faced—but one that would happen relatively gradually. That cautious optimism has faded as one study after another has proved that the earth was more finely balanced than we’d understood. The climate crisis is bearing down on us much faster than most people realize. The temperature rise has started melting every frozen thing on earth. In the Arctic Ocean, white ice that reflected the sun’s rays is quickly turning into water that absorbs more of the sun’s heat. And, as the ice melts, there’s the very real chance of a catastrophic rise in sea levels.
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De-creation
If there is one sure curse in this world, it’s mineral wealth. Is there gold or diamonds or oil beneath the surface of your land? Then count on poverty, gross inequality and autocracy above. Of all the possibilities, coal is the worst, dirty in every way. When it’s burned, it fills the air with carbon, powering the global warming now unhinging the planet. But before that silent tragedy can take place, there’s a noisy horror—the kaboom of exploding mountains across the southern Appalachians.
Hot and bothered: Facing up to global warming
As I write these words, the season’s first named storm—Alberto—is developing in the Caribbean. We’re now in what everyone refers to as hurricane season, which is joining winter, spring, summer, autumn, Christmas and football as a fixture on the calendar. (It probably has a brighter future than winter.)A few years ago, words like these would have been scoffed at by most mainstream Americans, treated as the unlikely emanations of radical greens. (Trust me on that.) But within the past year or so the tide has turned. Katrina had something to do with that. So did Al Gore.