Michael Lemonick, a veteran science journalist, has an intriguing op-ed in today’s LA Times. He argues that the severe weather/climate change attribution debate is too simplistic and unhelpfully framed around the wrong question. Here’s a better way to think about this issue, he suggests: An obese, middle-aged man is running to catch a bus. Suddenly,…Continue Reading…
I had just finished up a post when I came across this 2009 cartoon from USA Today at Andy Revkin’s tumblr site. I’m betting Andy posted it now because of the recent BEST news, which has inspired many headlines like this one. But for me, the cartoon perfectly illustrates the suggestion I offer at the…Continue Reading…
Steve Jobs got us attached to our gadgets. Some suggest that a similar bond needs to happen with sustainability. I explore this theme over at the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media.
There’s an intriguing new website/blog devoted to sustainability issues, which one admirer describes as thus: Planet 3.0 is attempt to do something genuinely useful and different in facilitating discussions about sustainability, and I am greatly encouraged to see it launched. Me too! Eager to learn more about this fledgling endeavor, I clicked on the “About”…Continue Reading…
One of these days, we’re going to have an adult, non-alarmist conversation about population. That would be a discussion that avoids Soylent Green imagery and talks, instead, about population in place-specific terms (which is how these guys do it). Most public debate on population, however, is conflated with a list of global concerns (peak oil,…Continue Reading…
Is Thomas Friedman, the influential, globe-trotting NYT columnist, undergoing a metamorphosis? Because I think the guy who was a champion of economic globalization a decade ago is not the same guy who wrote this column earlier in the week, which is mostly a platform for Paul Gilding, author of a new book called, “The Great…Continue Reading…
Many have noted the repetitive loop of global climate change talks. I think the global sustainability debate is suffering from the same Groundhog Day syndrome. Consider that 16 U.N.-sponsored climate summits have taken place since 1995. (The 17th is later this year in South Africa). This is rivaled by 19 annual sessions of the U.N. Committee on Sustainable…Continue Reading…
One of these days, I’m going to figure out a way to talk about “global change,” not just climate change. You know, because it’s such a catchy term that rolls off the tongue. Sarcasm aside, to lots of smart people, “global change” is where the serious action is at. Right now. As Jonathan Foley wrote…Continue Reading…
I am no fan of the mega-monster retailer, but this is a story hard to ignore.
Over at Frontier Earth, some riffing on a classic essay in Science, painted lawns in the desert, and a tiny step towards sustainability in Phoenix, Arizona.