March 4th, 2013

The Obama Administration released its revised environmental assessment of the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline on Friday, portraying the project as a relatively safe way to transport oil from fields in Canada and North Dakota to the US heartland and ports at Houston. The review has riled environmentalists and pleased oil interests.

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January 8th, 2013

The New Yorkers Against Fracking coalition is planning a rally in Albany to urge Gov. Andrew Cuomo to keep fracking out of the state. Opponents of fracking in the Empire State are worried that draft rules for gas wells has paved the way for gas well permits in advance of needed scientific scrutiny.

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October 16th, 2012

From Green Right Now Reports Nigeria is experiencing a gold rush, but the fallout is devastating the health of its children, exposing them to lead dust that can produce convulsions, paralysis and longterm cognitive deficits. Many children have been disabled for life, and have died from the lead contamination related to gold mining, which lures [...]

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September 20th, 2010

Americans have a waning confidence about the readiness of corporate leadership to respond to environmental issues, according to a new national survey, which shows that only 13 percent of U.S. adults are confident that corporate America has the knowledge to make decisions that consider long-term impacts on the environment.

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September 20th, 2010

Americans have a waning confidence about the readiness of corporate leadership to respond to environmental issues, according to a new national survey, which shows that only 13 percent of U.S. adults are confident that corporate America has the knowledge to make decisions that consider long-term impacts on the environment.

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October 1st, 2009

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now

Squint and you can’t see them. Try a standard microscope. They’re still not there.

And yet, they’re everywhere. Nanoparticles are in hundreds, if not thousands, of consumer products, from sunscreen to child car seats to sports socks.

So the EPA has decided to take a closer look at these eensy particles, to investigate their potential to harm humans and the environment.

Nanos, which are about 1/100,000 of the width of a human hair and have been aggregating in consumer goods faster than E coli at a feed lot, have raised concerns among environmentalists, public health officials and others. These guardians of the environment want to know more about how nanos act in water. air and soil, and also whether they can invade and damage human tissue.

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July 14th, 2009

By Barbara Kessler Green Right Now For those of us who are frustrated, daily, by the vast dispersed array of government information on environmental threats to our health, a new website assembled by the Centers for Disease Control may offer some relief. The National Environmental Health Public Tracking Network aims to help us connect to [...]

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March 23rd, 2009

By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
Discerning diners would probably not find this much of a topic for dinner discussion, but back in the fields where their broccoli is grown, fungus can stop a good crop cold. Most farmers apply fungicides to deal with the problem, but fungicides, a subset of pesticides, can kill beneficial organisms and cause environmental damage in the course of attacking the problem invader.

Fungicides, like other pesticides, also can wind up growing better fungus as the disease adapts to fend off the poison. The fungus becomes resistant to the pesticide, and creeps back ever-more resilient. Which requires more chemical treatments; which can increase resistance; requiring more treatments…

To try to break this cycle, researchers in Canada have been developing new “green” fungicides that are less environmentally damaging because they go in for a targeted kill. This surgical approach plays off the plant’s own defense strategy by attacking the fungal infection as it ramps up to break through the plants defenses. Effectively, the new eco-fungicides, called “paldoxins,” disrupt the fungus’ response to the plant.

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March 11th, 2009

By Michele Chan Santos
Green Right Now

When the students at Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter High School in Washington, D.C., learned about the environmental impact of trash, they wanted to make a change in their own school.

Thurgood Marshall, with 365 students in grades 9 through 12, is a college preparatory school with a focus on law and legal careers. But thanks to teachers like Sam Ullery, 29, who teaches 9^th grade earth science and 12^th grade environmental science, the students also are learning many hands-on ways they can reduce their impact on the earth.

Across the country, in preparation for Earth Day and in response to growing public awareness of climate change, students and teachers are not only learning about the environment but using that knowledge to change their schools.

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November 5th, 2008

By Barbara Kessler

The cork is off the champagne on the presidential election – and many environmentalists who’ve felt stifled by the Bush Administration’s indifference, hostility or lukewarm interest in ecological issues, including global warming, are giddy with new possibilities.

Frances Beinecke, head of the non-profit Natural Resources Defense Council, sounded buoyant in an address on the NRDC website: “Barack Obama’s election is a huge win for everyone exhausted from playing defense. Count us among them. It rekindles our hope that environmental protection may be restored to its rightful place as a treasured American value.”

Gene Karpinski, head of the League of Conservation Voters, was no less ebullient. “America embraced change today. And the planet will be better for it,” he announced.

Karpinski noted that, along with Obama, the nation also elected some environmental-minded senators, such as cousins Mark Udall (D-Colo.) and Tom Udall (D-N.M.), from a family with a long conservation history.

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October 23rd, 2008

By Barbara Kessler

Disturbing reports haunt the news lately, suggesting that the faltering U.S. economy could stall environmental progress or even force a digression on climate change programs.

Two U.S. wind energy companies and several corn ethanol projects have been delayed for lack of financing, The New York Times reported this week in “Alternative Energy Suddenly Faces Headwinds“.

A similarly upbeat piece “Environment will wither whoever wins US election” from The Times in London, notes that “environmental groups are already bracing themselves for delays or disappointment on action to tackle global warming”. The article postulates that post-election political leaders will face opposition to environmental programs from job-starved states in the Rust Belt reliant on coal and other heavy industry. American’s immediate need for cold green cash, it warns, could trump green growth.

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October 1st, 2008

“Let nothing be wasted.” — John 6:12, The New Testament

By Harriet Blake

Two evangelical groups are in the spotlight for their efforts to improve the environment. The most recent to join the eco-movement is a small group of Southern Baptists whose climate initiative is receiving a lot of press these days.

The Southern Baptist Environment and Climate Initiative (SBECI) got its start with a divinity student, Jonathan Merritt. As the story goes, one day in divinity class, Merritt had an epiphany.

“I was sitting in theology class at Southeastern Seminary [in Wake Forest, N.C.],” he says. “We were discussing how God reveals himself both through scripture and through nature. My professor made the statement that when we destroy God’s creation, which is a form of divine revelation, it is similar to tearing a page out of the Bible.

“That broke me,” says Merritt, “and began a shift in perspective for me.” The 26-year-old son of noted evangelist Dr. James Merritt, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, decided that his faith needed to get on board with global warming.

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