Category: Environment

In the spring of 1998, a remarkable document surfaced. The eight-page “action plan” detailed plans by the American energy industry — notably oil companies and a large electricity producer — to derail the Kyoto Protocol, the landmark treaty aimed at slashing greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. At the time, then-President Bill Clinton and his deputies were […]

The Competitive Enterprise Institute is one of the organizations most heavily funded by ExxonMobil and other industry leaders as part of a campaign to spread doubt about global warming. Watch two TV ads CEI has produced. “We Call it Life” The Competitive Enterprise Institute is one of the organizations most heavily funded by ExxonMobil and […]

Go behind the scenes of Eric Nalder’s unsettling investigation into the oil transport industry.

AIR, the new weekly documentary series, produced by Thirteen/WNET in New York in association with CIR, premieres Friday, September 1 at 9 p.m. (ET) on PBS (check local listings). * * * Long before Hurricane Katrina made its deadly landfall in August 2005, most journalists who had reported on New Orleans’ storm-readiness knew the city […]

With Mark Schapiro’s investigative report, “The Middleman,” FRONTLINE/World begins an ongoing series about the frightening world of nuclear smuggling. In a rare moment of agreement during last year’s presidential debates, George Bush and John Kerry both declared nuclear proliferation as the single most serious threat the United States faces. Their bipartisan concern followed revelations that the […]

New European Union environmental legislation impacting the production of computers, video cameras, cellular phones, and other electrical items will force the global electronics industry to reduce the amount of toxic substance it uses and to take back and recycle its products. The laws are compelling U.S. companies to change they way they do business at […]

For many island states, the tsunami hit like a fast-action version of what they have long feared would be the result of global warming. CIR’s editorial director talks with the diplomatic mission from the Indian Ocean nation of the Maldives, long at the forefront of the campaign against global warming, about the ominous parallels from […]

During the 2000 presidential campaign, George W. Bush offered clues as to how he would deal with the environment. In his speeches he said nice things about cleaning up pollution and protecting wildlife and supporting parks, even going so far as to make some specific promises. But people who looked beneath his words and heeded […]

Is Big Biotech waging an international campaign to discredit researchers who study the dangers of genetically modified organisms? Tyrone Hayes is one among many scientists now inquiring into the long-term impacts of chemicals and biotechnological products being produced, mostly, by huge multinational conglomerates and released, increasingly, throughout the world environment. Proponents of these chemicals and […]

For years, California has led the nation in the war on air pollution. The state’s emission standards for cars and trucks are among the toughest in the country. But the large commercial ships that travel up and down the California coast pose a growing threat to air quality. In this radio report, heard on 23 […]