Palm oil is ubiquitous at the supermarket today, as it’s found in everything from margarine to cereal to potato chips. Palm oil imports have ramped up 485% over the last decade or so, according to the Rainforest Action Network’s palm oil factsheet. The consequence of this increased production is rampant...
An annual growth rate of 41% is highly impressive for any business or industry. Would you believe that fair trade and eco-friendly products are currently seeing just such an explosion? The good news comes in a report called The State of Sustainability Initiatives Review 2014, compiled by a coalition of...
The United States is forging ahead with the natural oil and gas boom that defines its energy policy, even as the significance of this boom flies under the radar. The average person has rarely heard about the explosive growth, except perhaps from stories about fracking controversies. But the global community...
Frustrated with a lack of progress from negotiators, activists groups made a dramatic exit just before the close of this year’s world climate change meetings by walking out en masse from Warsaw’s National Stadium, where the meetings were held. The 19th Conference of the Parties (COP19) to the United Nations...
Newly updated eco-friendly building standards made their debut at the 2013 Greenbuild International Conference and Expo, held in Philadelphia from November 20–22. The U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) well-established LEED program (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) has reached its fourth version. LEED v4 is more user-friendly, and the LEED...
As the first U.S. government shutdown since 1995 began on the morning of October 1, 2013, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was forced to put into action a contingency plan it hoped never to use. Like nearly every other government agency and service, the effects on daily activities were set...
In a copy of the fifth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) obtained by Reuters, scientists upped the likelihood that human activities are causing global warming to 95%. The United Nations report was due to be officially released sometime in September 2013. The 95% figure is...
A new study published in Environmental Research Letters examines the relationship between attempts to improve global food security and to mitigate climate change. The findings revealed that these two efforts can potentially form a virtuous circle, where improvements in agricultural yields may cut down greenhouse gas emissions, on top of...
In a lengthy speech laying out his administration’s current vision for climate change policy and the urgency with which it needs to be approached, President Barack Obama may have set an ambitious course for the United States as a global leader in the cause. “When President Kennedy said we’d go...
If you are looking for examples of large-scale eco-friendly initiatives, you’ll want to pay attention to supermarket giant Kroger over the next few months. The company, which owns the most conventional grocery stores in the country, will begin funneling some of its food waste to its distribution center in Compton,...
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