Posts by: adam

Are livestock responsible for 51% of greenhouse gas emissions?

Conventional wisdom has it that meat production is responsible for about 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions -- a shocking enough figure as it is. But lately a much higher number has been circulating, with some claiming that meat is responsible for an astonishing 51% of worldwide emissions. Some skepticism is in order here, so I went looking for the… read more →

New project: Crow Wing County landfill

  • November 4, 2009
  • News
  • Comments Disabled
Crow Wing County landfill is in Brainerd, Minnesota, about two hours north of Minneapolis. Despite its small size, the landfill is an innovator that has achieved extraordinarily high recycling rates. One of their most recent initiatives is a landfill gas collection and flaring operation, which TerraPass has the pleasure of presenting to you now. You know the drill. Check out… read more →

Cities: still greener than small villages

The review of Green Metropolis kicked off a discussion that illustrates some of the confusion that crops up in discussions of density. Hoisting a representative snippet up from comments: > I think people can be extremely green in either rural or urban settings, it's a matter of intent. Hard to measure the difference in impact - an urban setting allows… read more →

Parking done right

Let's talk parking. Recently I suggested that building new parking garages isn't an environmentally friendly thing to do, even if such garages are nicely landscaped and have energy-efficient lighting systems. The environmental impact of the structures themselves is minuscule in comparison to the impact of the transportation system they are part of, and the green flourishes do nothing to change… read more →

Hunters, fishers press for climate change bill

This isn't exactly a new trend -- I remember writing about it several years ago -- but it seems to be picking up some steam: > More than 13,000 hunters and anglers from across the country joined a “virtual town hall” teleconference on Tuesday to hear a discussion of the impact of climate change on fish and wildlife populations, and… read more →

Bashing environmentalists always pays

I generally don't indulge in blog rants, mostly because I'm just not very good at them. David Roberts, on the other hand, is good at them, and he puts to words some of the deep disgust I've been feeling over the foofaraw kicked up by the new book *Superfreakonomics*, the sequel to the fairly awful and inexplicably bestselling *Freakonomics*. I'm… read more →

Book review: Green Metropolis

David Owen's book Green Metropolis, an expansion of his 2004 New Yorker article on the environmental benefits of cities, puts forth two propositions: first, that urban living is inherently more resource-efficient and therefore greener than suburban or rural living; and second, that environmentalism has historically been tainted with an anti-urban bias that prevents greens from fully embracing some of the… read more →

Google Maps add bike routes and walking paths

I remember being amazed when Mapquest came out in, what, 1997? How could it possibly know where my house was? How was it able to instantly come up with a route between Anchorage and Miami? The data seemed too vast and too messy to yield to computation, sort of like the internet itself. Since then Google has redefined web-based maps,… read more →

Another trivially easy thing you can do to end climate change

Last week I wrote about how writing a letter is this easiest and most important thing you can do to protect the environment. This week, I have a follow-up suggestion: actually write the letter. Some handful of you did so last week. Good job! But the majority of you managed not to get around to it. The printer is out… read more →

Blog Action Day: How you, personally, can end climate change

The topic of this year's Blog Action Day is climate change, which is convenient for me. In keeping with the spirit of the event, I thought it might be useful to let people know how they can save the world. Personal conservation is great, but it's not nearly as great as political activism. Climate change is a global commons problem,… read more →
5 of 53
123456789