Tag archives for sustainability
iLCP Photo Expedition to Document Cradle of Marine Biodiversity
Posted by International League of Conservation Photographers on March 15, 2013 
“Long term and meaningful conservation success really is only possible if NGOs and photographers work together – very often also working with scientists. If you can get those three sectors working together, you’re pretty much a non-stoppable force.” Thomas Peschak, Conservation Photographer and iLCP Fellow The International League of Conservation Photographers has pulled together an…
Posted by The annual arrival of spring chinook salmon to inland rivers makes March an eagerly anticipated time of year for fishermen and seafood lovers on the Pacific Coast. Anglers wait all year for the chance to land a hulking silvery chinook, commonly known as a king salmon, and consumers enjoy eating this tasty fish. When it…
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In his new book, The Origin of Feces, David Waltner Toews does the dirty work of showing that poop is part of our daily lives—from food to health to sustainability.
Weaker Kyoto Protocol Extended at International Climate Negotiations
Posted by Tim Profeta of Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Duke University on December 13, 2012 After weeks of deliberation among representatives of nearly 200 countries, the United Nations climate talks ended with an agreement to extend the life of the Kyoto Protocol. The only global agreement in place to curb greenhouse gas emissions from industrialized nations, it was set to expire at the end of this year. The second phase of the Kyoto Protocol still leaves…
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The remarkable variety of life’s interdependent phenomena and processes — what we call ‘diversity’ — is being eroded by the modern forces of homogenization. The rich tapestry — woven from a countless multitude of mutually reinforcing strands of biological, cultural and linguistic relationships — is wearing out. Our increasingly fatigued world is losing its…
Martha’s Legacy: The Past, Present, and Future of Species, Ecosystems, and Human Livelihoods
Posted by Wildlife Conservation Society on September 6, 2012 
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. Many of us saw this as a turning point, a time when the world adopted a new paradigm for development. We have come to realize that economic growth and social justice cannot be achieved at the expense of the environment.
Posted by It may seem counterintuitive in a world where giant urban concentrations of billions of people are snagged in traffic congestion and endless sprawl, but cities may well be the smartest way to both make our use of the planet sustainable and raise prosperity.
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The following is a guest post from Matt Miller, a writer for The Nature Conservancy. It originally appeared on Cool Green Science. This week, the journal Nature published a paper by Conservancy lead scientist Peter Kareiva, Paul Ehrlich, and Gretchen Daily titled Securing Natural Capital and Expanding Equity to Rescale Civilization. In it, the authors…
Interview with Eco-Chic Expert–Beth Doane
Posted by Jordan Carlton Schaul of University of Alaska on February 24, 2012 Contributing Editor Jordan Schaul interviews eco-chic expert Beth Doane about her consulting firm – Andira International – and her fashion brand Rain Tees. I have to admit that even though the term “greenwashing” was coined back in 1986 when I was in sixth grade I only recently became familiar with its usage. Call me naive,…
A country like Sweden can and ought to lead on issues like sustainable forestry. But is it doing so? Freelance photojournalist Erik Hoffner visited the Scandinavian country to find out.
Jordan’s first and only “true ecolodge” tries to leave a minimal footprint on its desert ecosystem, while a visionary hotelier has won international accolades for making his company’s five Jordanian resorts and hotels models of sustainability. These are two examples of how the Middle East country is trying to make its tourism industry friendly to the environment.
Cutting Oil Use Should Be Focus of U.S. Energy Research, New Roadmap Says
Posted by Mason Inman on September 29, 2011 A major study modeled after goal-setting reports from the Departments of Defense and State, the first Quadrennial Technology Review by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), called for a shift in energy research and development priorities to reduce America’s dependence on oil. “Reliance on oil is the greatest immediate threat to U.S. economic and national security…
In this video interview at the Seventh International Congress of Arctic Social Sciences (ICASS VII), held recently in Iceland, Sven Haakanson, executive director of the Alutiiq Museum, talks about how 7,500 years of history, language, and arts are being “repatriated” to Kodiak’s indigenous people.
Humans and the planet that gave rise to them are at a number of important crossroads, says writer-thinker Tim Flannery. Will we go down the road that leads to destruction of our civilization and back to an existence of brutality? Or is our destiny the spread of life from Earth into the universe? How much of our fate is up to us?
I grew up watching my dad fix stuff. I still have a scar where my thumb meets my wrist from when he dropped a hammer on me (claw-down, naturally) while installing drywall in our living room. From changing the oil in the car to putting in a patio, I would help him with whatever project…
U.S. Consumers Lag Others in Sustainable Choices
Posted by Ford Cochran on June 3, 2010 By Ford Cochran Results of the Greendex survey of sustainable consumption patterns reveal that consumers in most of the 17 countries profiled have adopted more environmentally friendly behaviors over the past year. All but one of the countries polled in both 2008 and 2010 showed improvement over the past two years. National Geographic and the…
Sustainability was fashionable way before modern-day threats of climate change and pollution, according to Azby Brown, the director of KIT Future Design Institute in Tokyo and the author of Just Enough: Lessons in Living Green From Traditional Japan. The book is about late Edo period Japan (1603-1868), before the industry of the West made its…
Can End of the Line Stem the Tide?
Posted by Ford Cochran on February 28, 2010 Must-see documentary film The End of the Line (newly-released on DVD) and British journalist Charles Clover’s book of the same name examine the imminent threat of overfishing to the world’s fisheries and marine life—and efforts to stem the tide. Among those efforts: A new website, Fish2fork, that rates restaurants on the sustainability of the seafood…
A Sustainable World: Inspiring People to Act
Posted by Ford Cochran on June 25, 2009 Thomas Culhane, Katey Walter, and Jon Waterman share their insights on co-existing with the planet at the National Geographic Explorers Symposium. Urban planner and National Geographic Emerging Explorer Thomas Culhane‘s nongovernmental organization Solar CITIES trains residents of Cairo’s poorest neighborhoods to build rooftop solar water heaters and other renewable energy, water, and waste management systems.…
