Featured
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.
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.
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 […]
A New Form of Beauty: Glen Canyon Beyond Climate Change
The quintessential landscape of climate change lies in on the Colorado Plateau: it’s Lake Powell, where no one can be sure what will be land, what water. Photographer Peter Goin and I collaborated on a beautiful book about a place where beauty itself is a question mark.
Generating Controversy
A story commissioned by National Parks magazine, about the impact of the Navajo Power Plant on the local people living nearby.
Star Trek: How Birds Use Electromagnetic Cues to Travel
How do migrating birds find their way at night? An overview of recent research on the topic, from Audubon magazine.
Terms of Engagement
We’ve tried denial, and now grudging acceptance. Neither has worked so well. Maybe Germany provides a better model for how to talk about–and effectively deal with–climate change. A column from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Taking Earth’s Temperature: The Film
After a long haul, production for the new film from my friends at IDEALab is complete! I did the screenwriting: Watch for the documentary Taking Earth’s Temperature: Delving into Climate’s Past, and learn how scientists are able to monitor past climates with amazing accuracy. The film will screen on PBS beginning August 16.
Phoenix Tries To Rise from the Flames
The sweltering heat island that envelops Phoenix every summer is Phoenicians’ own fault. But can clever design help lower the mercury? An assessment from a High Country News special issue.
WW II-Era Law Keeps Germany Hooked on ‘Brown Coal’ Despite Renewables Shift
Even as it continues through a huge build-out of renewable energy, Germany continues to rely on the world’s most polluting fuel for a big percentage of its electricity. A report for InsideClimate News.
Why Is Germany’s Greenest City Building a Coal-Fired Power Plant?
Germany’s Energiewende or “energy transition” is far from a smooth path. One of the speed bumps on the way is a giant new coal-fired power plant under construction in Hamburg. A site report for InsideClimate News.
Despite New Obstacles, Germans Still Aim for Future Without Nukes or Fossil Fuels
It’s a national project at least as ambitious as America’s effort to reach the moon, and fraught with obstacles. Yet Germany is serious about switching to renewable energies while switching off nuclear and fossil-fuel electricity. A progress report for InsideClimate News.
A Key Experiment to Probe the Future of Our Acidifying Oceans
In a Swedish fjord, European researchers are conducting an ambitious experiment aimed at better understanding how ocean acidification will affect marine life. A field report for Yale Environment 360.
Long Returns
Where do you put your hope for the future? I put mine in seeds, and in exuberant boyhood. A column from Orion.
The World’s Best Bad Idea
Almost everybody agrees that pumping vast quantities of carbon dioxide into the oceans is a terrible way to deal with climate change. But our current inaction on climate change means that future generations may well have to make some terrible choices. A cover story from Miller-McCune that was underwritten by a 2010 Abe Journalism Fellowship.
Earth Notes
Since 2001, Earth Notes has presented stories of people and place each week to public radio listeners in northern Arizona and New Mexico. Each week’s show is less than two minutes long, but it’s a capsule view of something that makes the Colorado Plateau region such a great place to live.
“Facing the Yuck Factor” wins reporting award from the Society of Environmental Journalists
How has the West embraced water recycling? Very (gulp) cautiously.
Blowing in the Wind
Worlds of their own, full of import, seeds are, in these astonishing images by Rob Kesseler, not unlike some new planet glimpsed through the bridge windows in a sci-fi flick. The story, with a beautiful slide show, appeared in Audubon.
