The really big difference between air quality in Salt Lake City and Beijing — indeed, any city of size that lies north of the Yangtze River — stems from particulates and other emissions in the exhaust from many widely dispersed furnaces whose associated boilers feed into district heating systems, which are the primary means for […]
Climate change
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Locally-grown climate conversations
After reporting on climate change and natural disasters in Australia, South America, the U.S., and Mongolia, science journalist Julia Kumari Drapkin grew frustrated with the failure of traditional media to convey how climate impacts our daily lives. Part of the problem is scientific. Climate models, and the climate itself, work over large expanses of space […]
Posted inMarch 4, 2013: Uncertain Landing
A new direction for Big Green
Judith Lewis Mernit hints at a recent past that needs resurrection and a hidden present that needs exposure if we are to have a sustainable future for our planet (HCN, 2/18/13, “Taking it to the streets“). In his book Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run, David Brower asks what has happened to boldness […]
Posted inMarch 4, 2013: Uncertain Landing
Global warming’s reluctant poster child
When a report warning of global warming’s disastrous impacts on skiing garnered national headlines in December, activists hoped the news would encourage a serious response both at home and in Washington, D.C. But the ski industry itself, where bad press means all the difference between a banner year and a bust, greeted the headlines with […]
Posted inMarch 4, 2013: Uncertain Landing
Greg Hanscom on ski towns and climate change
KDNK, a public radio station in Carbondale, Colo., regularly interviews High Country News writers and editors, in a feature they call “Sounds of the High Country.” Here, KDNK’s Nelson Harvey talks with HCN contributor Greg Hanscom about his story “Climate change turns an already troubled ski industry on its head.” Thumbnail photo courtesy Flickr user slworking2
Posted inMarch 4, 2013: Uncertain Landing
(Manmade) snow is for fighting over
Sipapu Ski and Summer Resort is tucked into a narrow valley above the northern New Mexico village of Peñasco. As ski areas go, it’s minuscule, with less than 5 percent of the skiable acreage of Vail. Yet Sipapu has built a reputation by consistently being the first resort in New Mexico to open for the […]
Posted inMarch 4, 2013: Uncertain Landing
Climate change turns an already troubled ski industry on its head
George Shirk sits in his office at the Mammoth Times on a Saturday afternoon, with his dog, Fido, who writes his own weekly column for the paper, curled up underneath the desk. Early December is the quiet time between the Thanksgiving and Christmas rushes at Mammoth Mountain Ski Area, and Shirk, a 60-year-old news veteran […]
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How much would you pay for clean water?
Would you be willing to pay up to $10 per month to have your drinking water free of a suspected carcinogen? That’s the question that city councilors in Woods Cross, Utah, are asking residents to answer. In the late 1980s, residents of this Salt Lake City suburb learned that a chemical called tetrachloroethylene (or PCE) […]
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Want to put Western weather on the map?
Some of the earliest weather forecasts began with people scattered across the country who regularly telegraphed observations back to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. as part of a mid-1800s program to solve “the problem of American storms.” Though scientific tools have advanced far beyond the telegraph, the challenge of forecasting small-scale, fast-acting weather events, […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2013: Farming on the Fringe
China v. Utah: Whose air is worse?
Quiz: Utah’s Wasatch Front or Beijing? 1. Which area had the worst air quality in its respective nation during January 2013? 2. Which place prepared for hosting the Olympic games by expanding the public transit network? 3. Which region has real-time air quality data, frequently updated on Twitter? For answers, see the bottom of this page. […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2013: Farming on the Fringe
Sierra Club fights Keystone XL with civil disobedience
In 2004, Carl Pope, then-director of the Sierra Club, tangled publicly with Capt. Paul Watson, head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Pope was steering the club towards cooperative solutions to environmental problems, collaborating with large corporations instead of fighting them. Watson, an advocate of direct action whose group blocked environmental despoilers with living bodies […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2013: Making Good on the Badlands
A new normal for snow
Idaho hydrologist Phil Morrisey has been fielding some complaints lately. Although the Natural Resources Conservation Service — the federal agency he works for — reports normal snowpack, skiers say they’re schussing through thin powder. And they have a point, Morrissey says: The agency just started using a new standard for measuring average snowfall — and […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2013: Making Good on the Badlands
Tree tales
I read Brendon Bosworth’s article on Fallen Leaf Lake with great interest (“The forest at the bottom of the lake,” HCN, 12/24/12). With my dive partner, John Foster, a retired California state archaeologist, I sampled sunken trees from nearby Tahoe and Donner Lake, mainly in the 1980s. In South Lake Tahoe, 16 rooted snags in ancient underwater […]
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Public pollution data make for a less-filthy West
At the end of last year, the Environmental Protection Agency finalized a long-stalled Clean Air Act standard to limit air pollution from cement kilns, which spew massive quantities of toxic mercury into the air — though the agency is drawing the ire of environmental groups for delaying implementation until 2015. One reason the public and […]
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Get used to the new normal
There’s fine dust in the tire ruts now Along the old feed road They’re workin’ on a six year drought Just so you know -James McMurtry, “Six Year Drought” If it seems like there’s less snow on the ground than there used to be, it’s not your imagination. This year, the folks at the Natural […]
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Reorganization or regression?
The New York Times made news last week when InsideClimate News reported it was dismantling its nine-person environmental news team. The reporters and editors on the environment desk, which has been around since 2009 and has its own section heading on the Times’ website, will not be laid off, but shuffled to other areas of […]
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The climate conversation
You are a High Country News reader, and thus, unlikely to be a subscriber to People magazine. But try as you might to stay above the pop culture fray, you’ve probably heard by now: Princess Kate is pregnant. She craves lavender shortbread. She is not, it turns out, too thin to be pregnant, though the […]
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A bridge to nowhere?
Early into the new year, researchers measuring methane leaks from natural gas fields in Utah found that far more of the climate-forcing gas was being emitted than they thought (methane is 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide in trapping heat). Preliminary results from that research, in the Uinta Basin, show that 9 percent of […]
Posted inDecember 24, 2012: The new Wild, Wild West
An underwater forest reveals the story of a historic megadrought
A curved tree saw in his gloved hand, a scuba tank on his back, Phil Caterino worked quickly to slice through a pine branch 100 feet below the surface of a small tarn south of Lake Tahoe. Bubbles streamed from the regulator in his mouth, rising through the blue alpine water and green flecks of […]
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The future of our forests
I recently got an email from a reader who was considering moving to Flagstaff. With its excellent bike trails, university, and a populace full of outdoor nuts, it sounded like a pretty nice spot. So he paid a visit, and while there, sought out the answer to a big question: “I needed to know when 100 […]