E Magazine articles from November 2002

E Magazine archives from November 2002

Save the earth, not just souls. (E Word).
November 1, 2002... As a kid I was forced to go to Sunday school, where the second half of the hour has sometimes spent in church itself. My friends and I delighted in sitting in the balcony and making up our own silly words as we sang along to hymns like "Go Down...

Vacationing at home. (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... Your feature on ecotourism ("Taking the Natural Path," cover story, July/August 2002) should have included more about the pollution caused by related travel. Most of the places mentioned are far away and people get there by plane. The U.S....

High-speed hype? (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... I would like to comment on the positive mention of France's "ultra-fast train" in "Taking the Natural Path." This train is called the Train a Grand Vitesse (TGV), and you need to know some facts before you endorse it for "green vacations": ...

Reaching for the star(fishes)? (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... Your editorial office confirms that the girl with the starfish on the cover of your July/August 2002 issue was intended to be an ironic commentary on the way even ecotravelers can love a place to death. The articles were solid, but I'm...

Burning rubber, making money? (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... Judy Trinh's optimistic assessment of a scrap tire recovery system ("Energy From Trash Tires," In Brief, July/August 2002) needs to be read with great caution. As the editor of a recycling journal for 22 years, I've seen millions of dollars go...

A mercurial debate. (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... Your excellent and informative coverage of the dangers of mercury ("Heavy Metal Harm" cover story, May/June 2002) made me wonder something. If the "pro-lifers" are so concerned about the health of fetuses, why aren't they out in the streets...

Radiation vs. radioactivity. (Letters From Our Readers).
November 1, 2002... "Glowing in the Dark" by Joni Praded (Your Health, May/ June 2002) is an excellent article, but it made one editorial error: confusing radiation with radioactivity. Radiation is a combination of particles and light given off by radioactive...

Poisoning frogs: are people next?
November 1, 2002... Despite new findings by the University of California, Berkeley, which link the pesticide atrazine to sexual mutations in flogs, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is considering a three- to four-fold increase for atrazine standards in...

The Ford Foundation's accolades for activists.
November 1, 2002... Working with the low-income, primarily Latino population of East Austin, Texas, Susana Almanza and Sylvia Herrera of People Organized in Defense of Earth and her Resources led a successful fight to shut down a chemical tank farm and move a...

Stranded in the suburbs.
November 1, 2002... At Connecticut's Weston High School, in a small town where cars rule and pedestrians are in danger, the most important rite of passage is getting a driver's license. "Having wheels" in Weston, as in many other suburban towns, means freedom from...

Weird science.
November 1, 2002... The Mapimi Biosphere Reserve is a loosely defined 425,000-acre expanse of land in the center of Mexico's Chihuahua Desert. It's home to at least 300 vascular plants, 30 types of cacti and 249 vertebrate species, including mountain lions,...

Rich vs. poor: not much sustainability at the World Summit. (Currents).
November 1, 2002... South Africa is a country of fabulous wealth and grinding poverty, but few delegates to the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg, South Africa August 26 through September 4 saw much more of the city than the malls and...

China tailpipe tally: the world's biggest nation "modernizes" with more cars. (Currents).
November 1, 2002... The tale of China's modernization is being told along its winding dirt trails, the paved gray roads in its cities and, more recently, its ambitious network of highways. In rural Hainan, farmers still pedal to their paddy fields before dawn,...

Good grazing? Advocates say free-range cattle can have environmental benefits. (Currents).
November 1, 2002... In 1995, when Richard Sechrist took over the Texas ranch his family had owned since 1947, it looked like much of the grazed land in the West: barren. Generations of cattle had been allowed to roam freely over the 1,100-acre ranch, trampling...

World war tree. (Currents).
November 1, 2002... A tree grows in Brooklyn, New York, and federal inspectors were swarming all over it looking for the Asian longhorned beetle--a sort of vampire cockroach that punctures the arteries of hardwood trees. The beetle reportedly arrived in...

Asia's growing cloud. (Updates).
November 1, 2002... From Afghanistan to Sri Lanka, Asia is covered in a two-mile-deep cloud of pollution that is responsible for the breathing-related deaths of hundreds of thousands of people every year. The existence of the cloud was reported in E's special...

Protecting pigs--and the earth. (Updates).
November 1, 2002... The nation's energy-intensive factory farms, where routine cruelty to animals goes hand in hand with air and groundwater pollution, are being confronted with calls for new ethical standards (see "The Case Against Meat," cover story,...

Purchasing power. (Updates).
November 1, 2002... U.S. government agencies were reminded of their purchasing obligations last July, when Federal District Court Judge William Alsup found that most cabinet-level offices have violated the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (see "Buying Green," cover...

Stewards of the earth: the growing religious mission to protect the environment.
November 1, 2002... When conservative evangelical Christians call for action on global warming, Hindu holy men dedicate themselves to saving sacred rivers and Buddhist monks work with Islamic mullahs to try to halt the extinction crisis, boundaries are clearly...

John Grim: transforming religions. (Conversations).
November 1, 2002... Like his wife, Mary Evelyn Tucker, John Grim teaches in the religion department at Bucknell University. As a historian of religions, he has conducted considerable fieldwork on Native American "lifeways" and is the author of The Shaman: Patterns...

Paul Gorman: making spiritual connections. (Conversations).
November 1, 2002... Paul Gorman has been a communicator all his life, so it's not surprising that his work since 1993 as the executive director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE) involves networking among major Christian and Jewish...

Worldly wonder: religions enter an ecological phase.
November 1, 2002... Over the past century, science has begun to weave together the story of a historical cosmos that emerged some 12 billion years ago. The magnitude of this universe story is beginning to dawn on us, as we awaken to a new realization of its...

Zap! The growing controversy over food irradiation. (Your Health).
November 1, 2002... Over the past several years, a series of highly publicized recalls have sent panicky consumers running to the fridge to check for tainted meat. In 1998, Sara Lee recalled millions of pounds of hot dogs and deli meat after 21 people died in a...

Our daily bread: going with the grain for good health. (Eating Right).
November 1, 2002... When I was growing up in the 1960s, I thought the breads my grandparents served--dark, coarse pumpernickels and ryes "to sop up the sauces"--were peasant food, the last vestiges of their hard lives in Russia. Like most American children of my...

Putting pension plans to work: retirement billions can be harnessed to green the economy. (Money Matters).
November 1, 2002... The headlines are full of corporate scandals involving Enron, WorldCom, Xerox and even Martha Stewart Omnimedia, with the result that big business is under scrutiny as never before. In an effort to improve companies' social and environmental...

A breath of fresh air: home ventilation made simple. (House & Home).
November 1, 2002... On a blistering cold day, with the house tightly sealed and the heating cranked up, the air at home may pose more of a threat to human health than smoggy urban air. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) studies indicate that indoor levels...

Mad about Madagascar: mesmerized by a mini-continent. (Going Green).
November 1, 2002... Along the road in rural Madagascar, giant baobab trees sit like vegetable elephants and malnourished children dance in hopes that travelers will toss them money. Our van, lurching over the rutted Malagasy National Highway, had long passed the...

Juicing the waste stream: aseptic packages are convenient, but hard to recycle. (Consumer News).
November 1, 2002... If there's juice in your child's school backpack, it's more than likely that it's stored in a paper-and-foil aseptic package, complete with a colorful cartoon logo. Although aseptic packaging was invented to safely ship foods without...

Soy to the world. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... Most candles contain paraffin, a petroleum-based wax that produces black soot when burned. The soot can stain ceilings and walls, and it is no fun to breathe! But candle lovers can now enjoy the sweet smell of Jennifer Brown-Owan's Jenni...

Calling all environmentalists. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... The natural living website Redjellyfish has expanded to offer customers the chance to help save rainforests simply by using the phone. This Mountain View, California-based company donates eight percent of its monthly profits to The Nature...

Greener gigabytes. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... As the lights and ornaments twinkle this season, you can brighten a loved one's holiday with a gift of greener technology. As the National Safety Council reports, by 2005 at least 55 million computers are expected to end up in landfills, with...

Ornaments for orangutans. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... Kevin Francis Face Pots, manufacturer of miniature, hand-painted china collectibles, recently introduced the Endangered Species Pots Collection, featuring uniquely designed manatees, sea turtles and parrots. When its "face" is lifted, each...

P.S. I saved a tree. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... This holiday season, send cards that show you care... about the environment! Tree-Free Greetings splashes its cards and envelopes with vibrant colors, covering every inch with beautiful artwork. Tree-Free makes its exceptional cards ($2.25)...

Good clean fun. (Tools for green giving: resources for eco-awareness and action).
November 1, 2002... Parents looking to avoid toxic toys this holiday season need look no further than Childsake and Ecobaby. Childsake's dolls ($30.99) are made of natural and recycled material, and come with both a planting kit and a message about caring for the...

Plants and possibilities.
November 1, 2002... It's old news that plastics are practical and inexpensive, yet potentially damaging to the environment. But chemistry professor and author E.S. Stevens explores the material of the future--plastics made from plants--in Green Plastics (Princeton...

Reading, writing, recycling.
November 1, 2002... "Go on a weight-loss program that works," author Pam Grout writes. Um... excuse me?? But that's not an insult; it's simply one of the tips in her highly comical and informative book, Recycle This Book and 72 1/2 Even Better Ways to Save "Yo...

Flying high.
November 1, 2002... The epic flights of an albatross he named Amelia are chronicled in Carl Safina's Eye of the Albatross (Henry Holt and Company, $27.50). Albatrosses can travel as much as 5,000 miles without stopping, and Safina's book traces Amelia's journeys...

Veggie dining's ultimate guide.
November 1, 2002... Perennial holiday concerns include how to buy the right presents for everyone, and how to keep from gaining weight in the midst of all the wine-and-dine festivities. ViVa's Healthy Eating Guide (ViVa's Center for Nutrition, $14.95), by Lisa...

O walking tree.
November 1, 2002... Skarskantuana ((o-ho-lee-ab) Publishing, $21.95) is the inspirational story of a schoolteacher who, in reading her seventh graders' spring break stories, is amazed to find a tale she remembered from her own childhood about Skarskantuans, trees...

Veggie athletes, sinful salmon and sprayed insulation. (Ask E).
November 1, 2002... Are any professional athletes vegetarians?--Scott Israel, Arlington, TX Billie Jean King, who racked up 20 wins at Wimbledon, won he U.S. Open 13 times and dealt a blow to male chauvinism when she beat Bobby Riggs in a 1973 tennis match,...