Humanity

Do You Know the Story of The First Woman to Hike the Appalachian Trail?
Women’s History Month is almost over, but we can’t let it slip by without celebrating a woman who blazed trails literally and figuratively. Long before Cheryl Strayed’s book Wild popularized the notion of a woman attempting a long solo hike, Emma Gatewood walked the entire Appalachian Trail alone, which was unheard of in the 1950s. Author Ben Montgomery used her personal diaries and trail journals to write a detailed account of her journey in his book, Grandma Gatewood’s Walk (Chicago Review Press, April 2014; out in paperback April 2016), and his biography tells a story that still resonates 61 years later.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
What I Learned From Wildfire Risk Tools
Wildfire is always on my mind: I live in a wooded rural community in southern Oregon that has been in a drought for several years. Fir trees are dying at an alarming rate, and nearby springs have slowed to a trickle. Since I moved here in 2014, at least two large wildfires have threatened our community; several smaller fires were snuffed out before blowing up.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
This Is the Decade to Reduce Emissions
As the sun rose in Glasgow, over 20,000 people—delegates from individual nations, representatives of nongovernmental organizations, and activists—gathered in Scotland for the start of the United Nations’ two-week climate conference. Known as the Conference of the Parties, or COP26, it runs from Monday, November 1, to Friday, November 12, 2021.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Plastic Is the New Coal, Says New Report
Your plastic water bottle will likely spend its golden years floating around the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, but its life began thousands of feet underground. How it got from there to you—and why it was made in the first place—has big implications for global climate goals.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
COP26: Voices From the Global South Talk Money
Aside from reducing greenhouse gas emissions, funding is a key issue at the annual United Nations climate negotiations. Money from developed nations given to developing nations is vital to fund mitigation and adaptation efforts; that is, to lessen the impacts of climate change and to protect against its future effects.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
We Don't Deserve Beavers
Tar Creek doesn’t seem like an inviting home for wildlife. For more than 70 years, miners blasted open the earth underneath the Oklahoma waterway in search of lead and zinc. Today, mountains of waste material from the mines tower above what is now classified by the EPA as a Superfund site. Groundwater that flows through the abandoned mines flushes toxic heavy metals, including cadmium and lead—both potent neurotoxins even at low concentrations—into the creek. The water runs bright orange.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Millions Breathe Dirty Air as Climate Change Makes Air Quality Worse
During a congressional hearing last week with Dr. Anthony Fauci, Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH), one of the most zealous supporters of former president Donald Trump, sought to frame COVID-19 health measures as a matter of big government versus individual freedom. As new strains of the deadly respiratory disease continue to circulate the globe, Jordan blasted Fauci for taking away our freedom to breathe without a mask on.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Menace II Anxiety
promises to teach readers how to turn their eco-anxiety into a superpower. In her introduction, she argues that many of us, herself included, are experiencing “tidal waves of grief, anxiety, pessimism, and existential dread” in response to the climate crisis. We need to learn to reckon with these difficult, often immobilizing emotions to become the eco-activists the world needs at 419 ppm and rising.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
What It Will Take to Build a Broad-Based Movement for a Just Transition
In 2020, Washington State passed the Climate Commitment Act, and when it went into effect on January 1, 2022, Rosalinda Guillen was appointed to its Environmental Justice Council. The appointment recognized her role as one of Washington's leading advocates for farmworkers and rural communities.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Can the Defense Production Act Jump-Start a Transition to Renewable Energy?
Clean energy advocates and climate activists are pumped. On June 6, President Biden invoked the Domestic Production Act (DPA) to accelerate the domestic production of five key energy technologies: solar panel parts; transformers and other grid components; heat pumps; building insulation; and the equipment needed to produce clean hydrogen fuel. In tandem, the administration is suspending the tariffs on solar panels that have stalled solar installations here in the United States.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Low-Carbon Diets Are Good for the Planet, and Your Health
For most of human history, sticking to a diet was pretty simple—you ate whatever you could get your hands on. But in this era of dietary excess, things have gotten extremely complicated. Conscious consumers need to consider the health implications of the foods they eat as well as the types of chemicals used in their production, the exploitation of farm labor, whether food animals are treated humanely, and just how much damage their afternoon snack is doing to the climate. Untangling the web of food choices is daunting, but a new study makes things a little bit easier. A paper in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition shows that low-carbon diets that are good for the climate are, as a general rule, much better for human health as well.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth
Dig Into Food-Upcycling Apps
Around 40 percent of America’s food supply winds up unsold or uneaten each year. That’s roughly 219 pounds per person rotting in fields, swirling down drains, or being shunted to incinerators and landfills that contribute to climate change. Not to mention all the resources—the water, energy, fertilizers, pesticides, land, labor, and transport—that went into producing those squandered calories. But a new crop of food-upcycling apps intends to change all that.
By lupu alexandra3 years ago in Earth