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Issues: Health and the Environment

Streets for seniors: a video look at issues and remedies

July 1, 2009

Posted by Kaid Benfield in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably

Tags:
community, completestreets, neighborhood, pedestrians, safety, smartercities, smartgrowth, traffic, walking

Streetfilms has released a great short video about how our streets and traffic patterns pose particular challenges to senior citizens on foot.  With the assistance of New York City's Transportation Alternatives, that city's impressive DOT has begun an earnest look...continued

EPA Discloses Location of 44 Hazardous Coal Ash Sites

June 29, 2009

Posted by Rob Perks in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment , Solving Global Warming

Tags:
coal, coalash, dirtycoal, simplesteps, tennessee

After pressure by NRDC and others, today the Environmental Protection Agency just released the list of 44 "high hazard" coal ash disposal sites around the nation.  At the behest of the Department of Homeland Security, the EPA had initially refused to reveal the...continued

Great principles for “smart growth schools”

June 29, 2009

Posted by Kaid Benfield in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably

Tags:
community, neighborhood, schools, schoolsprawl, simplesteps, smartgrowth, walkable

    Last fall, I posted a two-part photo essay on school sprawl and the alternatives.  As I wrote then (in Part 1), "schools used to be the heart of a neighborhood or community.  Children and not a few teachers...continued

Learning from Frogs

June 28, 2009

Posted by Phil Gutis in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably , The Media and the Environment

Tags:
endocrinedisruptors, kristof, newyorktimes, onearth, simplesteps

Three and a half years ago, the editors of NRDC's quarterly magazine OnEarth published a particularly arresting cover image of a chubby baby boy. The special report he illustrated was also particularly arresting: "Hundreds of man-made chemicals are interfering with...continued

We're All At Risk From Air Toxics

June 26, 2009

Posted by David Pettit in Curbing Pollution , Environmental Justice , Health and the Environment

Tags:
airpollution, cancer, diesel, EPA, particulatematter, simplesteps

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday released some very disturbing results of its analysis of air toxics data from 2002. EPA found that every U.S. resident has a higher cancer risk of greater than 10 in a...continued

Chemical Manufacturers and the Food Industry: Protecting the Public from Unsafe Chemicals or Protecting Market Share?

June 25, 2009

Posted by Daniel Rosenberg in Health and the Environment

Tags:
BPA, chemicals, food, simplesteps

Recently, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and the Washington Post wrote stories about a leaked memo summarizing a meeting of chemical and food industry leaders, in which they discussed their strategy for a media offensive to defend the chemical Bisphenol-A (BPA)...continued

The DC Metro Crash and Transit Safety

June 24, 2009

Posted by Justin Horner in Health and the Environment , Moving Beyond Oil , Solving Global Warming

Tags:
metro, publictransportation, transit, transportation, washingtonmetro

Like many of you, when I learned of the tragic Metro crash in Washington earlier this week, I was deeply disturbed.  When you think about it, there’s something uniquely unsettling about being a passenger on something so big and powerful. ...continued

Farmland worth saving (photo essay)

June 24, 2009

Posted by Kaid Benfield in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably , Saving Wildlife and Wild Places

Tags:
agriculture, conservation, farmland, maryland, openspace, preservation, smartgrowth

  These wonderful photographs of Frederick County, Maryland, are all by my friend Kai Hagen, writer, photographer, conservationist, entrepeneur, and County Commissioner.  Kai is concerned that development is sprawling out onto prime soils even while there are ample sites within...continued

Counting Up to a Climate Disaster

June 19, 2009

Posted by Andy Stevenson in Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably , Moving Beyond Oil , Solving Global Warming , The Media and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy

Tags:
carboncounter, carbonregulation, carbonrisk, cleanenergy, climateandenergy2009, climatechange, costofinaction, dbam, knowthenumber, markettransformation, mit, simplesteps

At 70 feet across, Deutsche Bank Asset Management's new "carbon counter" billboard is advertised as the world's first real-time calculator of global greenhouse gas emissions. This billboard, together with its web-based counterpart, were created as a way to not only bring...continued

Beijing's High-Polluting Vehicle Phase-Out Plan Seems to be Working

June 19, 2009

Posted by Kevin Mo in Curbing Pollution , Greening China , Health and the Environment , Moving Beyond Oil

Tags:
airpollutionindex, beijing, chinaairquality, greentransportation, highpollutingvehicle, phaseoutplan, vehicleemissiontest

Air quality of Beijing was a focal point both before and during the Olympic Games. After the Olympics, the topic faded out of the media, but Beijing is still working hard to keep the sky blue. According to the Beijing...continued

OnEarth: NRDC's award-winning magazine

Citizen journalism from the OnEarth magazine website

What's Happening: USDA Organic Called Out, and more
by Ben Jervey
No Room For Tigers, and People
by Charles Annenberg Weingarten
NYC Looks Forward With the Help of a New Generation of Urban Planners
by Kris French

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