Twenty years ago, a 12-year-old rocked the Earth Summit in Rio with a plea to world leaders to get serious about saving the planet. Her name was Severn Suzuki, and today, she hands the torch to another young ‘un, Brittany Trilford,... 

UPDATE: Sometimes, America, sometimes in the heat of our excitement about coming up with a lot of California jokes, we read things wrong. In this case: the diagram below. So, basically the whole post. I’ve corrected it below.... 

Oil-coated birds from Michigan. In 2010, a rupture in an Enbridge Energy pipeline dumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil sands crude into a tributary of the Kalamazoo River. When the spill was first reported, Enbridge estimated... 

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon stood at a podium outside the U.N. on Friday wearing a dashing bike helmet — only to break my heart. A promise had been made to me that I would get to ride bikes with the secretary general. To be fair,... 

Photo (of a store in NYC) by sodapop on Flickr. Thirty-two-point-six percent of the residents of Philadelphia are obese — a staggering figure, and a higher percentage than any other large city in America. To address the issue,... 

Photo of Beijing smog by jaaron on Flickr. Last week, the Chinese government demanded that foreign embassies stop reporting independent air pollution measurements . The U.S. Embassy in Beijing, for example, has a monitor on its roof... 

Shell Oil wants to build an ethane processing plant in Western Pennsylvania. But: can a massive fossil fuels conglomerate possibly turn a profit on something as risky as a natural gas derivative? Under the deal, taxpayers would foot... 

This afternoon, the United Nations had an event to promote urban bicycling in advance of Rio+20. Full story is coming on Monday, but, for now, please relive the excitement — nay! the grandeur! — of a six block bike ride... 

This is a map of light pollution in the area around Austin, Texas. Those purple markers (which are clickable at the map’s website ) indicate how much or how little night sky is visible. For the ones near the city core, the emphasis... 

If you enjoyed the reasoned debate over opening Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to fossil fuel extraction, you’ll likely be happy to learn that a similar debate may be coming to your own neighborhood .... 

Photo by tarsandsaction. Here’s a multiple choice question for you. Please circle the correct answer on your screen with a permanent marker, using a Sharpie™-brand pen in blue or black, for our system to read it properly.... 

Economics 101: supply and demand. The more supply in the market, the price of a product drops. The more demand, prices rise. Demand leads to sales, which reduces supply and forces prices higher and higher until either 1) supply runs... 

At least, if you’re a man living in America. [T]he average American man, weighing 175 pounds, produces his weight in trash every three months. This quote comes from The Atlantic ‘s Derek Thompson, who wrote a  simple... 

Photo by 7 July. Well, anyway, here’s a huge chart from NOAA of all of the cities that saw record-setting heat in May . It is way too big to include here. If you’re more of a rural enthusiast, here’s what the temperature... 

Our beautiful, garbage-infested oceans. Tomorrow is World Oceans Day, in which we pause for a moment to remember that the existence of any habitable land is basically an aberration and that we’re completely surrounded by a fascinating... 

Photo by Jay Mallin. In an opinion piece for  U.S. News and World Report , Michael Lynch of Strategic Energy & Economic Research writes: Recent references to “Big Oil” reminded me of a talk show where someone mentioned... 

The modern Dillinger’s main target. (Photo by roadsidepictures.) From The Atlantic Cities : a new rash of grease heists. The latest report of grease theft comes from Quincy, Massachusetts, just south of Boston. In a down and... 

Photo by dok1. Bill Griffin manages a call center in Pittsburgh. He’d planned on expanding his business, adding 150 jobs. Original post: Jobs taking the last bus out of Pittsburgh  Read More →

Both a representative image and a metaphor. Three years ago, Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig wrote an essay for The New Republic , “ Against Transparency .” His argument was an uncommon one: Political transparency... 

Photo by jluster. First, the good news: The world has made some progress on its climate goals! Or, as the headline of the U.N.’s press release about the fifth edition of its Global Environmental Outlook puts it:  World Remains...