Peter
In Germany, the Energy Transition Continues
Germany’s much-vaunted Energiewende or “Energy Transition” is ambitious–and deeply challenging to implement. Here’s a progress report for the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, timed to coincide with inauguration of Joe Biden, who promised to begin a new era of climate progress on this side of the Atlantic.
Beyond Climate Breakdown
Why have we been slow to address climate change? It comes down to story–how we understand the world through story, and how when the world is telling us things we don’t want to know we desperately look for stories that will help us through our mental discomfort. That’s the subject of Beyond Climate Breakdown: Envisioning New Stories of Radical Hope, my new book from MIT Press.
Parched
When COVID-19 threatened to scuttle the in-person Parched art exhibit, the planning team pivoted quickly. Filmmaker Nick Geib interviewed the artists and the scientists and crafted an hour-long film that tells the story.
Climate Change in The American Leader
A dramatic change in presidential leadership means it’s time to rethink how the United States deals with climate change. What’s to be expected of the new Biden administration?
Wildsam’s Grand Canyon
A pocket-sized field guide to one of the deepest places on Earth! I contributed about twenty pages to this sweet and practical anthology of history, lore, and practical tips. It’s a true insider’s guide to a place that doesn’t really come alive until you are, well, inside it.
Letters from Home
Since 2015 I’ve been proud to be part of the stable of writers contributing to the Letters from Home column in the weekly Flagstaff Live. Collectively we explore experiences of life and home, in Flagstaff and elsewhere.
Vanishing River
A student project from NAU’s Advanced Media Lab, this aerial documentary takes a trip along the Colorado River to record how climate change is shaping Arizona’s water future.
The Ends of the Earth
An essay on our often-perverse desires for the end, from the great journal Dark Mountain.
Parched
The Flagstaff Arts Council commissioned eight Arizona artists to explore the landscape of water in the arid Southwest in Parched, an exhibit on display at the Coconino Center for the Arts from August 2020 through January 2021. It’s now on display at the Amerind Foundation in Dragoon, Arizona. I wrote a sequence of four essays […]
Hope and Trauma in a Poisoned Land
In 2017 I oversaw a team of students who conducted research into the lasting legacy of uranium contamination in northern Arizona. They interviewed oldtime miners and environmental scientists, water managers and Downwinders. The documentary panels they produced formed part of the Hope and Trauma art exhibit at the Coconino Center for the Arts.
A New Form of Beauty: Glen Canyon Beyond Climate Change
The collaborative exploration of Glen Canyon/Lake Powell that photographer Peter Goin and I carried out in our book A New Form of Beauty went on display at the Museum of Northern Arizona in late 2017. It was on view through April 2018.
Earth Notes: Birds and Noise
It’s well known that extracting natural gas for fuel contributes to global warming. But animals that live where these resources are mined face another problem: excessive noise.
Living with Fire in the Grand Canyon
With my NAU colleague Kurt Lancaster, I researched and produced a short film about the role that wildfire plays in the ecology of Grand Canyon forests and woodlands. Commissioned by the National Park Service.
Taking Earth’s Temperature
How do scientists know how climate has changed in the past? By using a variety of complex tools as windows into the past, they take Earth’s temperature. This hour-long documentary, screened on PBS, shows how they do it.
Dislocated: Stories from the Navajo New Lands
In the 1970s the federal government relocated numerous Navajo families from their longtime homes to a faraway tract of ranchland. I oversaw a team of NAU students who went to the Nahata Dziil Chapter to gather stories.
Private Memories of Public Precipitation: Gathering and Assessing Ecological Oral Histories in an Era of Climate Change
I contributed a chapter about how Hopi oral histories of change connect to western climate science to this 2017 anthology, published by Oxford University Press.
The Most Beautiful Climate Change Adaptation Project in the World
In 2019 I worked with colleagues at NAU to develop a new online journal dedicated to artistic and literary responses to climate change. For the first issue I interviewed a German engineer whose job it is to protect the city of Hamburg from sea level rise.
In Paraguay, rural communities facing deforestation see power – and profit – in a beloved drink
In Paraguay, yerba mate is a beloved drink. And if it’s grown sustainably, it just might provide a means for struggling rural communities to provide for their future. A report from The Conversation.
A new use for old produce
What do you do when the systems we use to bring food into the country are wasteful? If you’re Yolanda Soto in Nogales, Arizona, you get to work and share.
9 Things I Can’t Look Away From
You know how you catch yourself looking at the same sorts of things time and again? What’s your list? Here’s mine.
