Both major candidates for president are effusive in their praise of alternative ways of producing energy, and their lists of how to go green usually include nuclear power. John McCain’s energy plan calls for 45 new nuclear power plants. Barack Obama is less enthused; he says he’d go forward only if the problems of nuclear […]
Climate change
Posted inOctober 13, 2008: Back to the future
Acidifying oceans
James Zachos fishes around his desk and pulls out a plastic bag filled with chunks of deep-sea sediments. The sediments, wrested from the South Atlantic in 2003, are 55.5 million years old and ‘deep red in color because they are almost entirely clay. Missing is the abundance of shelly residue that gives abyssal sediments their typically […]
Posted inOctober 13, 2008: Back to the future
Back to the future
The earth warmed considerably some 55 million years ago. What does that tell us about our current climate dilemma?
Posted inOctober 13, 2008: Back to the future
“1,000 messy facts”
Riparian systems are varied and dynamic; riparian models are human constructs particular to individuals. Cleo Woelfe-Erskine’s article, “Riparian Repair,” failed to capture a fundamental of reclamation and even restoration: We practitioners don’t deliver a perfect facsimile of nature full-blown at the inception but rather advance the recovery process, which continues if we have been successful […]
Posted inGoat
Late aspen, early melting
Despite the best efforts of many concerned friends, I remain something of an agnostic on whether climate change is caused by humans or is part of a natural cycle. After all, on my daily walks with the dog along the Arkansas River, I can gaze across our wide valley and stare up the narrow valley […]
Posted inAugust 25, 2008: Hot Wheels
All along the watchtower
A weekend shift with Washington’s Fire Gatekeeper
Posted inAugust 4, 2008: Hostile Takeover
The wandering lepidopterist
It’s a sadly typical spring day in Seattle, all scudding clouds and spitting rain even though the forecast promised sun. On top of that, Dr. Robert Michael Pyle has some bad news. “Marsha won’t be joining us,” he says. I’m sorry to hear it. Marsha has been at Pyle’s side for more than 30 years, […]
Posted inGoat
Agricultural water pollution on the line
The Bush Administration has been trying since 2005 to change Clean Water Act rules so that agricultural interests can dump polluted water into public lakes and streams without obtaining a permit. Each step of the way, Florida environmentalists represented by Earthjustice lawyers have filed lawsuits to block the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) from implementing the […]
Posted inArticles
We thought we were safe
Editor’s note: On July 9, Gordon Gregory reports that he and his family were forced to move again. The house they’d found to rent after wildfire destroyed their home on the southern edge of Paradise turned out to be in the path of a new advancing fire. I live close to tall trees in Northern […]
Posted inGoat
Of parks and particulates
In yet another goodwill gesture to the energy industry, the feds are proposing to loosen air quality restrictions in some national parks and wilderness areas. The EPA’s new rule would change the way in which emissions are reported, allowing power plants to substitute an annual average in place of averages for shorter periods, such as […]
Posted inJune 23, 2008: Peace on the Klamath
Shifting sands in Navajoland
TEESTO, ARIZONA In the dry heart of the Navajo Reservation, at the end of a solitary, sand-choked dirt road, geologist Margaret Hiza Redsteer climbs out of her dark blue government Jeep, taps lightly on a door, and waits. And waits. When Mary Biggambler finally pokes her head around the door, it’s with a hearty […]
Posted inMay 26, 2008: On Cancer’s Trail
Climate cash-in
Western farmers and ranchers use crops – and cows – to tap into the carbon market
Posted inMay 12, 2008: Boom! Boom!
Climate Revolutionary
Creating a legal framework for saving our planet
Posted inMay 12, 2008: Boom! Boom!
The mysticism of mud
Mud season just ended on the sage-covered mesa north of Taos that I call home. During the last few months, you could tell who lives on dirt roads by the perpetual stripe of mud on their lower pant legs. That’s normal. But I have never seen as much mud as I saw this spring. On […]
Posted inMay 12, 2008: Boom! Boom!
The West’s wacky weather
In December of last year, High Country News ran a news report about the severe drought then plaguing the West. Ski slopes were brown, wildfires were still burning in California and New Mexico, and weather forecasters were calling for an ultra-dry Western winter. By the time the issue hit the streets, those streets and everything […]
Posted inArticles
Up in FLAME
Last year, over 6 million acres of wildlands burned in Western states. Since 2000, wildfires have burned larger and hotter than ever, thanks to drought and a century of fire suppression. And they’ve caused millions of dollars in damage as more people build homes in or near wildlands. That’s left officials trying to figure out […]
Posted inApril 14, 2008: Taking to the Trees
A hard winter makes you think
After more than a decade of mild winters, we residents of this high-altitude town in southern Colorado finally got a dose of the genuine article. Not since “Remember December,” when it snowed every day in December 1983, had anyone seen this much snow. But stories told by old-timers, those former miners who stayed on here […]
Posted inWotr
A hard winter makes you think
After more than a decade of mild winters, we residents of this high-altitude town in southern Colorado got a dose of the genuine article. Not since “Remember December,” when it snowed every day in December 1983, had anyone seen this much snow. But stories from old-timers, those remnant miners who stayed on here long after […]
Posted inMarch 17, 2008: Seeking the Water Jackpot
Two weeks in the West
Tired of smog-ridden suburban sprawl and strip malls? Perhaps it’s time to escape to one of the West’s national forests, parks or other sundry public lands for a deep, calming breath of fresh air. But even that Western staple is becoming as hard to find as affordable real estate in a ski town. The federal […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Unnatural Preservation
In the age of global warming, public-land managers face a stark choice: They can let national parks and other wildlands lose their most cherished wildlife. Or they can become gardeners and zookeepers.