Robert Moses, the public official responsible for transforming much of New York City’s landscape in the 20th century, built East River Park in the 1930s. It’s a ramshackle stretch of land that sits on the other side of a six-lane highway from four mammoth public housing complexes. Until recently, it was home to basketball courts, […]
Tag: Climate
Great Barrier Reef on verge of another mass bleaching after highest temperatures on record?
This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Temperatures over the Great Barrier Reef in December were the highest on record with “alarming” levels of heat that have put the ocean jewel on the verge of another mass bleaching of corals, according to analysis from U.S. government scientists seen by […]
In blow to Biden administration, judge halts oil and gas leases in Gulf of Mexico
On Thursday, a federal judge threw out the Department of Interior’s decision to lease more than 80 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas production — the largest offshore auction in U.S. history. The sale, which came just days after Biden vowed to “lead by example” in cutting emissions during U.N. […]
Is American democracy uniquely bad at tackling climate change?
A Democratic president was in the White House. The Democratic Party held a majority of seats in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. But a single senator — a moderate Democrat from West Virginia — blocked the White House’s preferred climate plan. No, this wasn’t 2021 — the year was 1993: Jurassic Park […]
Beyond greenwashing: How chain restaurants could actually address their climate pollution
When McDonald’s opened its first net-zero restaurant in the U.K. last month, the backlash was swift. Despite a number of measures to boost the location’s sustainability — insulation made from sheep’s wool, on-site wind turbines and solar panels, and a biodiversity garden sustained by rainwater collected from the parking lot — environmental advocates cried foul, […]
To get rural Americans involved in climate crisis, see them for who they are
I like small towns. I grew up in the Hudson Valley of New York state, just beyond the reach of the commuter trains to Manhattan; spent 15 years in rural Colorado, living in a town with no traffic lights and a population well under 2,000; then moved to a similarly tiny town in southwestern Washington […]
December’s tornadoes show a country desperately in need of disaster reform
In less than a week in mid-December, two enormous storm systems plowed through the South, Midwest, and Great Plains, spawning 17 tornadoes and killing almost 100 people between them. The worst of the wreckage occurred in western Kentucky, where a tornado packing 190-mile-per-hour winds and bearing a footprint nearly a mile wide etched a 163-mile […]
As temperatures rise, crossing into the US will become even more deadly
When undocumented migrants cross the U.S.–Mexico border into southern Arizona, they face a perilous journey through the Sonoran Desert, some of the most inhospitable terrain in North America. Summer temperatures in the region routinely top 100 degrees Fahrenheit and water sources are few and far between. Hundreds of migrants die every year in the area, […]
‘Don’t Look Up’ shows how hard it is to satirize the end of the world
This review contains spoilers for Don’t Look Up. I was lucky to attend a showing of Don’t Look Up, the latest cultural satire from director Adam McKay, with my good friend and former Grist colleague Amelia Urry. Amelia is studying for her doctorate in the history of science at Cambridge, and during the car ride […]
Virginia’s governor-elect wants to get rid of cap-and-trade. There’s just one problem.
Last year, during the height of summer temperatures and under the eye of a Democratic governor, Virginia became the latest state to join a program to cut greenhouse gas emissions from coal, gas, and other power plants. Now, however, Republican Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin has vowed to yank Virginia out of the agreement by executive action, […]