An interview with Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers

Meet Jim Rogers, a great American paradox. He’s the top gun at Duke Energy, a huge (and hugely polluting) power...

How a cookbook renaissance heated up the sustainable-food movement

In the postmodern United States, a cultural critic laments, “The pleasures of the table are rarely appreciated at face value.”...

Not every ‘environmental’ action makes sense

I spotted a freshly remodeled house in my neighborhood the other day. It had a large array of shiny new PV solar panels on the roof. Wouldn't it be great to be able to afford such things? Wouldn't it feel great to watch your electric meter spinning backwards?

You don't see many solar panels in Seattle. It piqued my curiosity, so I found a solar cost calculator to find what it would cost to replace my electricity use with panels. The answer is about $160,000 dollars (taking about half a century to break even).

It’s time for enviros to adjust to winning

I had hoped to leave my ill-tempered rant behind, since the subject obviously irritates the hell out of me, my...

The logjam is breaking

It appears that after a long period of haggling — involving the bizarre tableau of Republican Ted Stevens pushing for...

Anika Rahman, women’s- and reproductive-rights advocate, answers questions

Anika Rahman. What work do you do? What’s your job title? I’m the president of Americans for UNFPA. UNFPA, or...

Thoughts from a small farm during the midwinter lull

Before I became a farmer three growing seasons ago, I lived in Brooklyn, N.Y., and reveled in the array of...

Share your green awakening

A good friend of mine has just turned green. But it wasn't The Great Warming or An Inconvenient Truth that did the trick, but Robert F. Kennedy's Crimes Against Nature.

I bring it up because this friend is well-read, intelligent, and politically liberal; he has certainly been exposed to all the same evidence that won other people over long ago. And yet until now, the only time the word "environmentalist" issued from his mouth was when he was teasing me about being one. RFK's book -- with its contrast of political and corporate greed on one hand and democracy-driven environmental stewardship on the other -- spoke my friend's language ... and now he won't shut up about tragedies against the commons and government-subsidized pollution.

A single-issue movement won’t cut it

David Roberts has been writing about environmental talking points. But I think that skips a step. We need to examine what kind of politics the talking points are intended to contribute to.

I don't think I have to persuade anyone reading this blog to forget about informed, competent insiders trying persuasion from the inside. Romm tried that with both government and business since the early '90s. Al Gore spent decades as a Senator and Vice President of the U.S. playing insider baseball on the issue. Amory Lovins has been pursuing the "appeal to rational business self-interest" strategy since 1976!

The only thing will make change is a bunch of ordinary people getting together and exercising their democratic rights as citizens. And it is not just us dirty hippies saying that. Non-hippie former VP Al Gore says: