Has it come to this already? Time to Eat the Dog: The real guide to sustainable living is the name of a new book written by two Victoria University professors, Brenda and Robert Vale. The couple — both architects who specialize in sustainable living — have computed the carbon emissions created by pets, taking into […]
Eco-pawprints
Posted inHeard Around the West
Sit down and shut up
Paul Rolly seems a jolly fellow, at least judging by the picture that accompanies his column in the Salt Lake Tribune. On second thought, that amused look might mask a certain fed-upness. Here’s what’s bugging him lately: A state legislator who professed to be an expert on the U.S. Constitution proposed a bill saying “any […]
Posted inNovember 23, 2009: After the Floods
Avalanche education for all
Janet Kellam tackles an “urban” snow problem
Posted inGoat
Cold War clean-up
Stimulus funds are now being used to tackle one of the West’s biggest nuclear messes: The 65-year old atomic dump in Los Alamos, N.M. is finally getting some much-needed attention. On Thursday the New York Times reported that a team of workers using $212 million in federal stimulus money will clean up the site on […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Conservation for the adrenaline crowd
Can the Red Bull generation go green?
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Refugees unsettle the West
Meatpacking, Ramadan and other cultural collisions in Colorado
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
The diplomacy of water
Water and the West: The Colorado River Compact and the Politics of Water in the American West (Second Edition)Norris Hundley Jr.433 pages, softcover: $24.95; hardcover: $60.University of California Press, 2009. Norris Hundley’s book Water and the West has long stood as the classic account of the epic negotiations to divide up the Colorado River’s water. […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Still riding the edge
Riding the Edge of an Era: Growing Up Cowboy on the Outlaw TrailDiana Allen Kouris254 pages, softcover: $17.95.High Plains Press, 2009. Diana Allen Kouris grew up on a ranch, riding horseback with her siblings in untamed country surrounded by the ghosts of Indians, mountain men and outlaws. “It could have been a hard way of […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Green delusions
Audubon’s equivocations in Arizona are just the tip of the iceberg (HCN, 10/12/09). In the last decade, mainstream environmental groups have been co-opted, again and again, by wealthy entrepreneurial “benefactors.” Often these benefactors leverage their massive donations into a seat on the group’s board of directors, where policy is set. Even as human-caused climate change […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Fish stories
Regarding your story “The Most Cooked-up Catch,” I was there when the 200-mile limit was, in fact, first imposed (HCN, 8/03/09). (Editor’s note: Congress enacted the 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone in 1976.) I was a freshly minted Coast Guard airman sent to Kodiak, Alaska, in 1967 to commence fisheries enforcement for the new 200-mile limit. […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Buddy, can ya spare a subscription?
An HCN subscriber who owns an energy corporation in California got in touch with us earlier this summer. He wanted to do more than renew his subscription, he said — he wanted to send seven-month gift subscriptions anonymously to 20 former readers who had not renewed because of personal hardship (job losses, etc.). A huge, […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Our national parks: Another idea
In 1912, James Bryce, the British ambassador to the United States, proclaimed that the national parks are “America’s best idea.” Others have called the parks “America’s best places.” But if the parks are our “best” places, what about all those other places where we live and work and go about our daily rounds? Don’t they […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
When cows are outlawed …
In a letter to the editor, rancher John Marble writes, “I doubt many items in the organic produce aisle are grown with as little environmental impact as our beef” (HCN, 9/14 & 9/28/09). A while back, I discovered a remarkable statistic: Making a pound of beef creates 36 times the greenhouse gas emissions that creating […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
The newest Westerners
See end of story for a complete package of refugee stories in this issue. It was right about the time that my teeth sank into the Basque BLT (marinated pork loin, bacon, the works) that I had my epiphany. OK, maybe the timing wasn’t quite that serendipitous, and maybe it was less an epiphany than […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Seeking a vocation in no-man’s land
Iraq to Berkeley
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
Refugees, by the numbers
See end of article for a complete package of refugee stories in this issue. 16 million Number of refugees worldwide in 2008 60,193 Number of refugees who settled in the U.S. that year 19,264 Number who settled in Western states 0 Number who settled in Wyoming and Montana• • •2.6 million Minimum number of refugees […]
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
More than English
At a Denver school, refugees learn American ways as well as language
Posted inOctober 26, 2009: The newest Westerners
A hard-fought immigration victory
Russia to Seattle