Mark Waltermire squints in the winter sunlight, craning his neck to take in the view from his vegetable farm in Hotchkiss, Colo. He jabs his finger toward a mesa: “There,” he says. “And up in there.” Palm to the sky, he makes a sweeping gesture, encompassing the flat-bottomed valley, the staggered mesas; the patchwork of […]
BLM considers grassroots land use plan that would limit drilling in western Colorado
Posted inArticles
Community responds to a film on its own ill-fated uranium mill
Residents from Montrose County, Colorado’s West End recently gathered for a screening of “Uranium Drive-In,” a documentary that tells the story of the ill-fated Piñon Ridge Uranium Mill, and a tight-knit community desperate for jobs and some hint of a brighter economy. KVNF Radio’s Travis Bubenik was on hand for the screening at the New […]
Posted inWotr
Don’t forget what the Exxon Valdez taught us
On the regulatory laxness that led to the spilling of 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound 25 years ago.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
A (very small) room with a view
Microhousing catches on in Seattle and other Western cities.
Posted inGoat
In a new study, megafauna more likely to feel climate impacts than smaller species
Climate change has always picked winners and losers from the animal world. Some, like unbearably cute, mountain-dwelling pikas are already retreating from lower, warmer elevations in places like Yosemite National Park, and heading for cooler heights. Beyond existing research on how climate change is responsible for certain species, like pikas or polar bears, shifting elevation, […]
Posted inGoat
Vegas’ new water czar has a tough row to hoe
John Entsminger has his work cut out for him, to put it mildly. He will soon be responsible for keeping Las Vegas and its associated sprawl from drying up and evaporating back into the desert. Current Southern Nevada Water Authority director Pat Mulroy, notorious throughout the West for her water-grabbing ways, hand-picked Entsminger to be […]
Posted inGoat
Final EPA report is the latest in a series of blows to Alaska’s Pebble Mine
Last summer, the excavation of some of the world’s richest mineral deposits – and the degradation of some of the world’s richest salmon habitat – seemed well within the grasp of global mining interests. But with the release of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s long-awaited environmental assessment on Jan. 15, the development of Pebble Mine […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Brave new L.A.
Los Angeles is an unlikely model of urban sustainability for the West and the world.
Posted inGoat
From bison to birds, the National Park Service rethinks its approach to migratory species
Imagine, if you will, that you’re a Kittlitz’s Murrelet – a tiny seabird, feathered in salt-and-pepper. It’s summer, or what passes for summer in a field of Alaskan glaciers, and you’re relaxing in the lap of luxury: Kenai Fjords National Park, where nobody can shoot you, set their dog after you, or lay a finger […]
Posted inGoat
Dust-on-snow update: 2013 moisture could mean a dusty spring
Dust has become a major concern for climatologists – and anyone who drinks water that comes from mountain runoff – in recent years. Yet while dust storms are cropping up in the eastern parts of the state this winter, the Colorado Dust-on-Snow Program (CODOS) on the Western Slope has yet to report any dust-on-snow events […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
The Vegas Paradox
In Sin City, excess and efficiency walk hand-in-hand.
Posted inWotr
An Iraq War veteran fights for public lands
Finding much-needed solace in Colorado’s Browns Canyon and hoping it becomes a national monument.
Posted inGoat
Ocean acidification is already driving changes in Northwestern marine ecology
For a time, Pseudolithophyllum muricatum was king of the kelp forest understory around Tatoosh Island, a rocky blip of land off the northwestern tip of the Olympic Peninsula. In experimental “bouts” staged there by famed ecologist Bob Paine that pitted the crusty, milky red algae against other species of coralline algae it lived amongst, P. muricatum […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Is basic solar technology the key to an energy revolution?
Plain old photovoltaic panels and innovations in energy storage and distributed generation could remake our electricity system.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Phoenix tries to rise from the flames
The Sunbelt city is one of the nation’s most sweltering urban heat islands. But simple solutions to help cool it are at hand.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Will an apple a day keep the food desert away?
Reinventing the Garden of Eden in the Emerald City.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
Oakland transforms waste to renewable energy
More than 100 semi trucks enter the back gate of the Oakland, Calif., wastewater treatment plant every day, carrying tons of unusual and often disgusting freight: tons of cheese whey, chicken blood and heads, used cooking oil. And yet wastewater director Bennett Horenstein enthusiastically welcomes it. It is, after all, free fuel. Machines pulverize the […]
Posted inGoat
Bakken oil trucks can kick up carcinogenic dust similar to asbestos
Since the oil boom in western North Dakota began several years ago, the roads in this sparsely-populated corner of the state have been taking a beating. A typical shale oil well requires 2,300 truck trips in its lifetime, driven mostly over gravel roads. With nearly 6,800 wells currently operating in the Bakken oil field, that’s a […]
Posted inWotr
Between a rock and a dry place
How the “mega-drought” facing the region got its start.
Posted inJanuary 20, 2014: Building a More Sustainable West, One City at a Time
L.A. is here to stay
Paul set his mug of wine down and glowered at me over his glasses. Los Angeles? Why would any magazine editor include Los Angeles in a special issue on environmental sustainability? My friend and former professor had good reason to ask. The camper Paul calls home, where I had stopped for dinner that October night, […]