Just 700 miles to the Southeast of the sybarites enjoying the Sun on Hawaii’s Waikki Beach, the Army maintains a $240 million island facility with a grim purpose. The Johnston Atoll Chemical Agent Disposal System (JACADS) exists solely for the purpose of destroying obsoete – and frightening – chemical weapons.
Bill Addington stands West Texas-tall behind the register of the general store he runs with his mother in the tiny town of Sierra Blanca. He generally speaks softly but firmly, with the politeness of a southern gentlemen ("Yes, ma’am; No, sir"). He has the self-effacing tone of someone who grew up in a small town, where those who grew up in a small town, where those who talk too big are quickly "put in their place." But when the subject of waste dumping comes up, his tone quickly shifts. Addington, president of Save Sierra Blanca, which opposes a proposed nuclear waste dump near El Paso, refers to the radioactive waste consortiums targeting his region as "the nuclear carpetbaggers," conjuring up local sentiments dating back to the Civil War.
The Siberian crane, a rare and beautiful bird, may soon become extinct because of changing habitat, uncontrolled hunting and poor controlled development.
CFC-12, better known by the trade name Freon, may become the second-largest illegally imported substance after cocaine, according to the U.S. Customs Service in Miami.
Tucked into Latin America’s northeast coast between the continent’s two greatest river systems – Venezeula’s Orinoco and the Amazon in Brazil – Guyana’s Essequibo River is easily overlooked. So it’s no surprise that last August’s spill into the river of 130 million gallons of cyanide, effluent from a waste pond at a a gold mine, was back-page news in the U.S. (Even if it conjured up unpleasant memories of the Revered Jim Jones, who effected a cynanide spill of his own while in Jonestown, Guyana back in 1978.)
Do you want to get off the grid, but need help with the first step? Learn how to harness the power of the sun at The Solar Now Project in Beverly, Massachusetts. Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, the new program uses one of the country’s largest operating solar energy field as a study center for the vast potential of renewable energy. Solar Now features field trips, conferences, teacher workshops and classes, hosts college interns during the summers and helps engineering, education and environmental students put their solar skills to work in private and nonprofit settings.
Tulsa is a town that oil built. Sweet Oklahoma crude, that’s what they called the low-sulfur ooze which literally gushed from Tulsa’s red earth, turning a small Creek Indian Village into a muddy boomtown. Generations of residents firmly believed the slogan, "What’s good for oil is good for Tulsa."
There are lots of safe herbal alternatives to common over-the-counter pain medications these days.
Surveys show that people would take public transit if it were in place and efficient. Much of the resistance to transit is due to car companies that perpetuate the private automobile’s "cool" image, and politicians and media who treat transit as bad for jobs. But according to the National Business Coalition for Rapid Transit, every $1 billion invested in public transit generates 30,000 jobs.
Living in the rugged, mountainous landscapes of the Idaho Panhandle, northeastern Washington and British Columbia, the trans-boundary caribou are the last wild examples of their species to visit the continental United States. With numbers dwindling to around 34 animals, the South Selkirk mountain caribou herd is getting close to disappearing forever.
