This morning the Obama administration announced the formation of a new “climate service,” an agency “aimed at providing long-term forecasts to assist fisheries managers, farmers, state governments, renewable energy developers, water managers and others,” according to Greenwire. The new agency will fall under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric... Read & Discuss 
Every year I tune into coverage of the Greener Gadgets conference in New York City (sometimes I’ll attend), but I had no idea that there was a competition running alongside the event until I read Treehugger’s piece about it today. Turns out the Consumer Electronics Association has kicked off an online contest to determine the best–and... Read & Discuss 
We’re not entirely sure, it turns out. For a long time now, climatologists have believed that the contrails–those white vapor trails left by airplanes you see criss-crossing the sky–had a net warming effect.They believed that the amount of heat the makeshift clouds trapped down towards the Earth’s surface was greater than the amount of warming... Read & Discuss 
Astronauts-in-training are sure to be disappointed by the White House’s budget plans for NASA, but the rest of us terra-bound Earthlings should be relieved. President Obama’s new budget is cutting funding for the Constellation program that was set to return the U.S.A. to the moon by 2020. But, as the Orlando Sentinel reports, “In the meantime,... Read & Discuss 
For decades now, one very high hurdle has blocked the path to upgrading a home to solar: that huge upfront investment. It’s this front end cost that most solar-salivating greens cite when asked why they aren’t yet capturing and converting the sun’s rays.
But that barrier has vanished for some lucky residents in a handful of Western states.... Read & Discuss 
A biannual ranking of the world’s nations by environmental performance has revealed the United States to be lagging far behind most of the developed world. And while this isn’t exactly breaking news to anyone paying any attention to our nation’s environmental and climate policies for the past couple decades, our rank–61st globally–is... Read & Discuss 
If you haven’t heard already, the Great Lakes are under assault by a “missile with fins,” an invasive species otherwise known as the Asian Carp. They’re out-breeding and out-competing pretty much every native species in the Mississippi River and biologists fear that they could decimate the Great Lakes ecosystem.
One solution that’s been... Read & Discuss 
In the dark, tragic aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, most of the electricity in Port-au-Prince was cut. The lack of power continues to compound the devastation there, shutting down basic communication systems like cell phones and walkie talkies, and leaving lighting and water purification systems dependent on diesel generators. By all... Read & Discuss 
At the ripe old age of 9, Dylan Mahalingam formed a non-profit organization to engage children to help meet the UN’s Millennium Development Goals. Through his Lil’MDGs website, on every social network you can imagine, and, recently, as an official Change Agent on Changents.com, Dylan “leverages the power of the internet to educate, engage,... Read & Discuss 
Over and over again we hear that we can’t afford to take action on climate change, that our economy can’t handle it, that it’ll kill businesses off and strip America of even more jobs. Not so! says, well, big business itself!
This week we saw a couple of pleas from two completely different business coalitions, both calling for immediate and... Read & Discuss 
Following up on Andrew's post yesterday, I want to drill down on what impact this decision will have specifically on environmental issues and our hopes for passing a climate and energy bill this year. In short—it means bad things.
In case you missed it, the Supreme Court yesterday decided 5 to 4 to roll back campaign finance laws that limit... Read & Discuss 
He's getting killed from all sides, but Obama's first-year environmental record is unprecedented.
Perhaps you've heard—Obama's first year has been a big flop. Guantanamo is still open, public health care ain't happening, Don't Ask-Don't Tell still has soldiers closeted, and he's sat and fiddled while the world burns. Well I'm... Read & Discuss 
Colbert was clearly speaking to us last night. (Morgan already wrote about his interview with Emily Pilloton of Project H.) He took some time early in the show to talk about—as only Colbert can—a recent study published in Science that highlights the human impacts of mountaintop removal coal mining. He interviews Margaret Palmer, one of the... Read & Discuss 
Wondering where to direct your anger at the lack of climate legislation? Look no further than Rolling Stone's list of "the 17 polluters and deniers who are derailing efforts to curb global warming." Some of these "climate killers" are obvious, like Oklahoma Senator James "global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American... Read & Discuss 
Did Obama kill the UNFCCC with the Copenhagen Accord? Is that a good thing?
Flopenhagen...worse than useless...an elaborate sham...a suicide pact...a failure...
A meaningful agreement...an important first step...better than nothing...a breakthrough...
Reactions from Copenhagen have, to say the least, been all over the... Read & Discuss 
Nice breakdown...I'd like to suggest that we consider any geo-engineering schemes a ripcord, last resort, lifeboat-type of plan. Not saying we shouldn't be researching them--we'll need the best lifeboats if worst comes to worst and we don't quickly transition to a clean energy economy. But it's important to recognize that even Ken Caldeira, a climatologist who is studying aerosol shading, said that "Geoengineering is not an alternative to carbon emissionsreductions...If emissions keep going up and up, and you usegeoengineering as a way to deal with it, it’s pretty clear the endgameof that process is pretty ugly.”