It’s harvest season in much of America, and the nation’s houses of worship are filled with prayers of thanksgiving for nature’s bounty. Calls for commitments to honor God’s creation are highly appropriate. How can we best accomplish this rewarding but difficult environmental mission? A good beginning is to separate pious but unrealistic pronouncements from prudent…
American Prairie Reserve: Free Market Environmentalism or “Political Land”?
It’s a spectacularly romantic idea—returning a large swathe of western grazing land to prairie land, with bison, elk, cougars, prairie dogs, grouse, and other wildlife. That’s the goal of the American Prairie Reserve, whose owners hope to create open prairie and wildlife range extending over 3.2 million acres in northeastern Montana. “We want to restore…
The Throwaway Society: Thank Goodness!
“The throwaway society is healthier, cleaner, more economical, less wasteful, less environmentally damaging—and yes, more ‘sustainable’ than the green vision of utopia.” Not many people other than John Tierney are willing to say this, as he did in the summer edition of City Journal. Nearly 25 years ago (in 1996) Tierney wrote an article for…
Wind Power vs. Birds . . . Maybe We Should Give in to Fires? . . . When Faith Turns to Policy . . .
HEADLINES: Wind power vs. birds: environmentalists split over renewable energy. A RealClear Investigation by Vince Bielski… Randal O’Toole on the forest fires: “All the prescribed burning in the world won’t save your home if a burning ember from a lightning‐caused fire 8 miles away lands on your lovely cedar‐shake roof.” On Cato’s site… When faith…
NPR Attacks David Legates. Heartland Issues Point-by-Point Rebuttal
Whatever one’s views about climate change, nothing can justify National Public Radio’s recent brutal and uninformed attack on David Legates, a professor at the University of Delaware and former Delaware state climatologist. Legates has just been appointed to a high position at NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and that was enough to bring…
Hurricane Trends Steady . . . Charleston S.C. Sues Oil Producers . . . Germany Resists Climate-Change Targets
HEADLINES: The real story on hurricane trends. On CO2 Science . . . Another city (Charleston) sues fossil fuel producers for keeping climate change a secret. In the Charlotte Observer. . . European Union combines coronavirus relief and climate change funding, reports Reuters. . . . . . but Germany is resisting the EU climate-change…