By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
One thing you can say about the politics of climate change — people are getting hotter about it.
As we approach the Copenhagen world conference (Dec. 6 – 18), those close to the negotiating progress are becoming more frustrated with the plodding pace of official change.
This week in Barcelona, where negotiators [...]

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

If you’re the lead foot in your family — or if you’re just annoyed by the lead-footed driver in your family — you’ll enjoy this video about saving gas. It’s cute, and makes a good point.

This little ditty won the video contest sponsored by the Drive Smarter Challenge, a campaign by the Alliance to Save Energy, with support from many other energy-focused groups. It’s timely, as we prepare to hit the roads for the holidays.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
Here’s a movie you never thought they’d make.
Coming to the big, or maybe small,  screen near you, a film…about…laundry!
With a short opening feature on watching paint dry.
OK, so that’s mean and I’m kidding, but not about the movie.  Drying for Freedom is really in the works, but it’s not  just about [...]

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

So often politicians obscure their message with caveats, euphemisms and wonky references to elaborately named legislation.

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) took the conversation a different direction yesterday when speaking to student activists assembled for an online teleconference Tuesday night sponsored by Consequence09.org.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

I hate confessing to these long-ago memories. But I remember marching against Apartheid. It was a time when we students knew what the term meant, though the rest of the world was still comfortably oblivious, and had become convinced that this problem in South Africa had to be fixed.

Then we marched for divestiture, which was necessary to de-fund the unjust system in South Africa.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

We had a chocolate attack at a store the other day, so we schlepped over to the cookie aisle seeking something sweet and crunchy.

Palm oil products (Image: PalmOilAction.org.)

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
In honor of blog action day, so designated by the group Change.org with partners like Greenpeace and 350.org, I found myself explaining the 350 number to my kids on the way to school. As it happens, the teenager already knew about this benchmark, thanks to AP science classes and the [...]

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
I woke up at 5 a.m. on Sunday. I wasn’t sure why. The house was quiet and there was a soundless rain outside. I was planning on snuggling back into bed for at least two more hours after checking on the old dog — assuming it was she-who -needs-to-go-out-at-exceedingly-early-times who woke me.

I decided to check on the teenagers too. And there in the in the “playroom” or Texas basement or whatever you call that room over the garage, was a nightmare of electricity consumption. The room was ablaze in light. The TV was blaring. The DVR was glowing. The 14-year-old asleep on the couch as only someone his age could be. He was sent to his room — where a light also had been conveniently left on.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

We make cows sick. Then we eat them. And they make us sick.

That’s the very short version of the industrialized beef program we’re living with right now. Has a certain terrible symmetry doesn’t it? And by abridging the story, I don’t mean to make light of the situation, only to highlight the obvious stupidity of it.

By now, if you’ve seen the movie Food, Inc., or read or viewed any of a dozen reports (here’s just one) on the problems of mass-produced beef, you know what I’m talking about. We’ve taken a grass-eating animal and, in the interest of quickly fattening it for slaughter, turned it into a grain-fed animal that is packed it into feedlots. And in so doing, we have produced beef that’s fatter than ever, full of antibiotics, pesticides and growth hormones — and created an E. coli factory.

[Read more →]

By John F. Wasik

There’s something glamorous about a couple of bright souls in an American basement or garage. They tinker around a bit, apply their imagination and creativity to a project, and voila, they’re the next Stephen Jobs or Bill Gates, reinventing the way the world works. Are those days over? Can America still foster the culture of innovation that helped it launch the second industrial revolution, land on the moon and seed the information age? Is President Obama’s “Green Deal” going to foster this kind of growth?

Durable small companies that do everything from manufacturing forklift parts to specialty contracting have been creating the bulk of new jobs in recent years. It’s these “high-impact’’ firms that have been generating employment at a surprisingly robust pace over the past decade. As defined by the U.S. Small Business Administration, these companies generally have less than 20 employees, are 25 years old or less and represent about 3 percent of all firms.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

This summer as I flew over Minneapolis, I looked down fondly at the chain of lakes that beautifies this tidy, progressive city. My second hometown.

I noticed the surrounding land was lush and green. And so were many of the lakes. Wait a minute: The lakes themselves were more green than blue, ringed in pea-soup of algae that was closing in fast on the open water at the middle. This algae-green, sickly green mess set off alarm bells.

I suspected that all those lake-dwellers residing on their hard-fought real estate were sullying the waters by collectively dumping tons of fertilizer on their neat green lawns, which created a super-rich, even toxic runoff. This was hugely ironic, because these striving homeowners had moved there so they could boat, swim and engage in the state sport, fishing fer walleye. Yet their pursuit of the picture-perfect lake house retreat was poisoning the natural environment.

[Read more →]

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

OK, this probably only strikes me as funny, but there’s a site called eNature.com.

Sounds like someone found a way to package up some grass, trees and critters and render it as virtual version of the great outdoors. Sometimes it feels like we’re heading that way, toward a day when all intelligence will be captured inside computers. (Or maybe I’ve just been inside too long today.)

[Read more →]