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An Economist Gets Lunch: New Rules for Everyday Foodies by Tyler Cowen

On April 11, 2012, in Book Reviews, Business & Investing, Health, Mind & Body, Nonfiction, by Editor

Food snobbery is killing entrepreneurship and innovation, says economist, preeminent social commentator, and maverick dining guide blogger Tyler Cowen. Americans are becoming angry that our agricultural practices have led to global warming-but while food snobs are right that local food tastes better, they’re wrong that it is better for the environment, and they are wrong that cheap food is bad food.

Isaac’s Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History by Erik Larson

On August 17, 2011, in Book Reviews, History, Nonfiction, by Editor

September 8, 1900, began innocently in the seaside town of Galveston, Texas. Even Isaac Cline, resident meteorologist for the U.S. Weather Bureau failed to grasp the true meaning of the strange deep-sea swells and peculiar winds that greeted the city that morning. Mere hours later, Galveston found itself submerged in a monster hurricane that completely destroyed the town and killed over six thousand people in what remains the greatest natural disaster in American history–and Isaac Cline found himself the victim of a devestating personal tragedy.

The Great Disruption: Why the Climate Crisis Will Bring On the End of Shopping and the Birth of a New World by Paul Gilding

On June 27, 2011, in Book Reviews, Nonfiction, Science, by Editor

Gilding, former director of Greenpeace International and now on the faculty at Cambridge University™s Program for Sustainable Leadership, proposes that global warming is just one piece of an impending planetary collapse caused by our overuse of resources. According to the Global Footprint Network, we surpassed Earth™s capacity in 1988, and by 2009, we needed the resources of 1.4 planets to sustain our economy—and any increases in efficiencies that some claim will solve the problem are likely only to encourage us to use more.

What’s Gotten into Us?: Staying Healthy in a Toxic World by Mckay Jenkins

On May 14, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Editor

Do you know what chemicals are in your shampoo? How about your cosmetics? Do you know what’s in the plastic water bottles you drink from, or the weed killer in your garage, or your children’s pajamas? If you’re like most of us, the answer is probably no. But you also probably figured that most of these products were safe, and that someone—the manufacturers, the government—was looking out for you. The truth might surprise you.

A Sea in Flames: The Deepwater Horizon Oil Blowout by Carl Safina

On April 23, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Editor

MacArthur “Genius” Award–winning oceanographer and conservationist Safina offers an impassioned, on the ground chronicle of the 2010 Gulf oil blowout that surpassed Exxon-Valdez to rank as the worst in history. He breaks down the political and corporate causes and the environmental effects of the spill.

Plastic: A Toxic Love Story by Susan Freinkel

On April 20, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Editor

“What is plastic, really? Where does it come from? How did my life become so permeated by synthetics without my even trying?” Surrounded by plastic and depressed by the political, environmental, and medical consequences of our dependence on it, Freinkel (The American Chestnut) chronicles our history with plastic, “from enraptured embrace to deep disenchantment,” through eight household items including the comb, credit card, and soda bottle (celluloid, one of the first synthetics, transformed the comb from a luxury item to an affordable commodity and was once heralded for relieving the pressure on elephants and tortoises for their ivory and shells).

The Big Thirst: The Secret Life and Turbulent Future of Water by Charles Fishman

On April 13, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Editor

For the past 100 years, the developed world has enjoyed a cheap, safe, and abundant water supply, but Fishman (The Wal-Mart Effect) warns that everything about water is about to change—how we use it, how we share it, and how we value it. In an engrossing, globe-trotting narrative, he introduces the reader to people already grappling with water shortages—Patricia Mulroy, Las Vegas’s no-nonsense water czar known as the best water manager in the country; the inhabitants of a neighborhood in Delhi who line up twice a day for water they must carry home.

A Hole at the Bottom of the Sea: The Race to Kill the BP Oil Gusher by Joel Achenbach

On April 2, 2011, in Book Reviews, by Editor

The Deepwater Horizon disaster was an environmental 9/11. The government did not have the means to solve the problem; only the private sector had the tools, and it didn’t have the right ones as the country became haunted by Macondo’s black plume, which was omnipresent on TV and the Internet. Remotely operated vehicles, the spaceships of the deep, had to perform the challenging technical ma-neuvers on the seafloor. Engineers choreographed this robotic ballet and crammed years of innovation into a single summer. As he describes the drama in Houston, Achenbach probes the government investigation into what went wrong in the deep sea. This was a confounding mystery, an engineering whodunit. The lessons of this tragedy can be applied broadly to all complex enterprises and should make us look more closely at the highly engineered society that surrounds us.

Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station – License Renewal Application

On March 13, 2011, in Nuclear Meltdown, by Editor

The U.S. NRC (United States Nuclear Regulation Commission) maintains information on their website regarding the license renewal application for the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station.

NRC Clears Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant For License Extension

On March 13, 2011, in Nuclear Meltdown, by Editor

Federal regulators say the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon is fit to be open for another 20 years. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has voted to extend the license after rejecting an objection filed by an anti-nuclear group.