Originally posted at The New York Times, by Jack Healy. Seeking to head off a costly election-year fight over oil and gas drilling that could threaten vulnerable Colorado Democrats, Gov. John W. Hickenlooper said Monday that he had reached a deal to keep two antifracking measures off November’s ballots. The…

Originally posted at YES! Magazine, by Sarah van Gelder. Photo Credit: Phil Dunn. On the morning of December 19, 2008, Tim DeChristopher woke up knowing he would somehow protest an auction of oil and gas leases on federal lands in Utah’s red rock country. How he would make his views…

A major book about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes. Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on earth suddenly…

Originally posted at YES! Magazine Forty-three years after co-founding The Farm, one of the first “hippie communes” in the United States, Stephen Gaskin died on July 1 at the age of 79. What started in 1971 as an experiment in collective living for free thinkers, spiritual students from San Francisco,…

Explosion Green tells the twenty-year story of the global green building movement, through the eyes of David Gottfried, the man who helped start it all. Explosion Green reveals the inner workings of the building industry as it comes to grips with the imperative for environmentally friendly practices. It describes how the industry has…

YAHOO NEWS/(AP) Groundwater losses from the Colorado River basin appear massive enough to challenge long-term water supplies for the seven states and parts of Mexico that it serves, according to a new study released Thursday that used NASA satellites.  Researchers from NASA and the University of California, Irvine say their…

FROM TAKEPART.COM Scientists on Thursday released the results of a first-of-its-kind study that finds the seven states of the drought-stricken Colorado River Basin are depleting groundwater reserves at a rapid rate. That threatens the future of a river that supplies water to 40 million people and irrigates 4 million acres…

FROM EARTHJUSTICE.ORG An upstate New York town is fighting to preserve its way of life in a lawsuit pitting a small town’s rights against an out-of-state oil and gas company’s wishes. More than a hundred towns in New York have enacted local bans or moratoriums on gas drilling, including the…

Original piece featured at the New York Times by Kenneth Chang On an average day, some 100 million tons of carbon dioxide is liberated from oil and coal by combustion, wafting into the air. The gas traps heat in the atmosphere, resulting in the gradual warming that has alarmed scientists…

Originally posted at the International Business Times by Maria Gallucci Australia is already feeling the effects of man-made climate change, new research confirms, but the country is quickly losing the political will to fight back. The parliament, under a conservative coalition elected last year, this week repealed a two-year-old tax…