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  • The Wicked Switch

    Automakers Rapped for Pollution From Mercury Switches With recent revelations that just about all freshwater fish in the U.S. are contaminated with mercury, concern over the heavy-metal pollutant has regulators carefully examining every source. The fourth largest, as it happens, is automobiles, specifically the mercury switches in auto lights and brakes. Last year a record […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Sunflower Power

    Scientists Create Hydrogen Fuel from Sunflower Oil British scientists have discovered a way to power cars with sunflower oil. While biodiesel cars that directly burn cooking oil are fairly common, researcher Valerie Dupont and her colleagues have something else in mind, as they reported this week at an American Chemical Society conference. They’ve figured out […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • The Problem, My Friend, Is Blowin’ in the Wind

    Blowing Desert Dust Is Growing Environmental Problem Dust blowing up from the Sahara Desert has increased tenfold in the last 50 years and represents a growing environmental threat, warned Oxford geography professor Andrew Goudie today. And SUVs are at least partly to blame. The replacement of camels with four-wheel-drive vehicles such as Toyota Land Cruisers […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Mort Utility Vehicles

    SUV Occupants More Likely to Die in Accidents You surely already know that SUVs pollute the air, contribute to global warming, boost demand for oil, and shackle our security and economic fate to volatile, politically regressive Middle Eastern states. You might even know that SUVs raise the total number of traffic fatalities and squash drivers […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Just Yabba Dabba Do It

    Suzy Becker Cities

  • Ken You Dig It?

    London Mayor Considers Expanding Downtown Congestion Charging London Mayor Ken Livingstone boasts that the year-old, eight-square-mile pay zone in the center of the city — where motorists are charged $9.40 to enter between 7:00 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. on weekdays — has worked to reduce congestion and increase the use of public transportation. He promises […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • It’s a Sprawl World After All

    Two Anti-Sprawl Initiatives Fail in California In other, less eco-friendly initiative news, two separate measures intended to limit sprawl were defeated in California yesterday. In San Diego County, voters bucked statewide trends by rejecting the Rural Lands Initiative, which would have put a 20-year ban on development in 1,000 acres of the county’s “backcountry.” And […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Missouri Loves Company

    New Missouri River Management Plan Sparks Protest A massive new plan to manage the Missouri River, released by the Army Corps of Engineers on Friday, managed to please exactly nobody, in keeping with the tenor of 15 years of debate over the future of the “Big Muddy.” Conservation groups immediately protested and filed lawsuits, saying […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Umbra on SUVs

    Dear Umbra, Please help; my friend Kathryn Schulz, Grist’s managing editor, is sick of hearing about my guilt. I own an SUV. In my defense, I got it almost six years ago, when I was moving to the mountains and needed a big car with four-wheel drive to support my rugged, transient lifestyle, and it’s […]

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  • Wheeze and No Thank You

    Pollution a Likely Contributor to Rising Asthma Rates Asthma rates are climbing around the world, and though scientists can’t say precisely what’s causing the increase, pollution is thought to be a serious contributor. The respiratory disease has become a particular problem in Asia, where terrible air quality, rapid urbanization, and poor medical treatment have contributed […]

    Grist staff Cities