State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

Environment25

  • U.S., 5 Nations to Cut Methane, Soot Emissions

    U.S., 5 Nations to Cut Methane, Soot Emissions

    The United States and five other countries agreed this week to fund an effort to cut emissions of methane, soot and other pollutants to start to slow the rate of human-induced climate change.

  • Scientists Drill 2 Miles Down to Ancient Lake Vostok

    Scientists Drill 2 Miles Down to Ancient Lake Vostok

    Russian scientists this week finished penetrating more than two miles through the Antarctic ice sheet to Lake Vostok, a huge freshwater lake that has been buried under the ice for millions of years. But they won’t know what they’ve found until next year.

  • Online Course – Environmental Markets: Business, Regulation, Sustainability

    Online Course – Environmental Markets: Business, Regulation, Sustainability

    We are excited to let you know that CERC is offering a piloted version of Environmental Markets: The Nexus of Business, Regulation and Sustainability online as part of our Executive Education Program in Conservation and Environmental Sustainability.

  • Should Universities Ban Bottled Water?

    Should Universities Ban Bottled Water?

    Recently deciding to end the sale of bottled water on its campus, the University of Vermont joins a growing group colleges and universities attempting make more environmentally friendly decisions. Although largely student driven movements, these changes are not always met by acceptance and praise by everyone in the community.

  • Seeking the Signal in the Noise of Environmental Performance Metrics

    Seeking the Signal in the Noise of Environmental Performance Metrics

    The 2012 Environmental Performance Index is a powerful tool for diagnosing trends not just across countries but over time, too. Consider what we can learn about overfishing, for example.

  • E-Waste Recycling Day

    E-Waste Recycling Day

    Join the E-Waste Recycling event on January 22, 2012 from 10:00am-4:00pm at two west side locations near Central Park.

  • Arboreally Speaking, the ‘Good Old Growth Curve Is a Delusion’

    Arboreally Speaking, the ‘Good Old Growth Curve Is a Delusion’

    In the previous post, I outlined the argument lighting up parts of the New Jersey legislature and the human elements of its ecological communities. Briefly, one reason some people are using to promote logging on public lands is the perception that old trees and forests are dying of old age. While there are other arguments…

  • Arboreally Speaking, Does Age Matter?

    Arboreally Speaking, Does Age Matter?

    “There is unrest in the forest, there is trouble with the trees“…I will mostly spare you one of the more ecologically correct, forest ecology rock tunes (the next two lines, however, “For the maples want more sunlight, and the oaks ignore their pleas,” written in 1978, seem incredibly prescient given that one of the first…

  • The Shock of the New

    The Shock of the New

    During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a host of naturalist-explorers traveled around the globe in a quest to identify new species. We interview science writer Richard Conniff, who evokes this grand age of discovery in The Species Seekers: Heroes, Fools, and the Mad Pursuit of Life on Earth, just released in paperback.

  • U.S., 5 Nations to Cut Methane, Soot Emissions

    U.S., 5 Nations to Cut Methane, Soot Emissions

    The United States and five other countries agreed this week to fund an effort to cut emissions of methane, soot and other pollutants to start to slow the rate of human-induced climate change.

  • Scientists Drill 2 Miles Down to Ancient Lake Vostok

    Scientists Drill 2 Miles Down to Ancient Lake Vostok

    Russian scientists this week finished penetrating more than two miles through the Antarctic ice sheet to Lake Vostok, a huge freshwater lake that has been buried under the ice for millions of years. But they won’t know what they’ve found until next year.

  • Online Course – Environmental Markets: Business, Regulation, Sustainability

    Online Course – Environmental Markets: Business, Regulation, Sustainability

    We are excited to let you know that CERC is offering a piloted version of Environmental Markets: The Nexus of Business, Regulation and Sustainability online as part of our Executive Education Program in Conservation and Environmental Sustainability.

  • Should Universities Ban Bottled Water?

    Should Universities Ban Bottled Water?

    Recently deciding to end the sale of bottled water on its campus, the University of Vermont joins a growing group colleges and universities attempting make more environmentally friendly decisions. Although largely student driven movements, these changes are not always met by acceptance and praise by everyone in the community.

  • Seeking the Signal in the Noise of Environmental Performance Metrics

    Seeking the Signal in the Noise of Environmental Performance Metrics

    The 2012 Environmental Performance Index is a powerful tool for diagnosing trends not just across countries but over time, too. Consider what we can learn about overfishing, for example.

  • E-Waste Recycling Day

    E-Waste Recycling Day

    Join the E-Waste Recycling event on January 22, 2012 from 10:00am-4:00pm at two west side locations near Central Park.

  • Arboreally Speaking, the ‘Good Old Growth Curve Is a Delusion’

    Arboreally Speaking, the ‘Good Old Growth Curve Is a Delusion’

    In the previous post, I outlined the argument lighting up parts of the New Jersey legislature and the human elements of its ecological communities. Briefly, one reason some people are using to promote logging on public lands is the perception that old trees and forests are dying of old age. While there are other arguments…

  • Arboreally Speaking, Does Age Matter?

    Arboreally Speaking, Does Age Matter?

    “There is unrest in the forest, there is trouble with the trees“…I will mostly spare you one of the more ecologically correct, forest ecology rock tunes (the next two lines, however, “For the maples want more sunlight, and the oaks ignore their pleas,” written in 1978, seem incredibly prescient given that one of the first…

  • The Shock of the New

    The Shock of the New

    During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a host of naturalist-explorers traveled around the globe in a quest to identify new species. We interview science writer Richard Conniff, who evokes this grand age of discovery in The Species Seekers: Heroes, Fools, and the Mad Pursuit of Life on Earth, just released in paperback.