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François Houtart argues that the green potential of agrofuels has been wasted by businesses that put profits above environmental protection. This has led to an absurd situation where an energy source that should be sustainable actually increases human and ecological damage, simply due to the (...)

Access to cheap energy made us rich, wrecked our climate and left us lonely, explains Bill McKibben. Read more

The Bhopal mega-crime trial is over. The barbarity has ended in a light sentence, although the victims are countless. Eight officials of the erstwhile Union Carbide India Limited have been convicted and sentenced to two years’ rigorous imprisonment. There is still no bar on trying the corporate (...)

In a State where more than two-thirds of rural families live below the poverty line and other social indicators are as dismal, the process of industrialisation that began at the turn of the century ought to have been a cause for optimism. But, of late, people have been fighting tooth and nail (...)

Yes, the oil spewing up from the floor of the Gulf of Mexico in staggering quantities could prove one of the great ecological disasters of human history. Think of it, though, as just the prelude to the Age of Tough Oil, a time of ever increasing reliance on problematic, hard-to-reach energy (...)

India is on a mission. To drastically ramp up its solar power production to 22,000 MW by 2022. From steel makers and automobile manufacturers to diamond merchants and realtors everyone sees the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission as their chance to strike gold. But it is not so easy. The (...)

South African companies are increasingly looking for investment opportunities in the wider SADC region in a bid to benefit from favourable international markets for minerals, in competition with western and Asian companies. These investments have social and environmental impacts on people (...)

Lack of mechanisms to monitor the import of hazardous waste and the unchecked waste industry are making India a dump yard. The recent radiological accident in New Delhi’s Mayapuri scrap metal market has raised many questions about the level of monitoring of hazardous waste in India. That India (...)

If the developing world today is the locus of climate change mitigation, including reductions in emissions, then there surely must exist a picture of how Indian industry does and will perform. Analysing the 6 energy- and emissions-intensive sectors of Indian industry, Chandra Bhushan finds that (...)

MEDHA PATKAR, the 56-year-old leader of the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), is fighting what she calls the “final battle”. After close to three decades of protests against the damming of the Narmada river, she is battling against the Gujarat government’s attempt to raise the height of the Sardar (...)

Revival of millet cultivation in Medak of Andhra shows how a variety of millets can fight hunger even during drought, keep farmers debt-free, and provide the much-needed nutrition without using pesticides. The seeds of this silent revolution were sown 16 years ago by 32 women farmers who formed (...)

A 200-km oil pipeline that Franco-British oil group Perenco aims to build in the heart of Peru’s Amazon jungle region is at the centre of a controversy because of the reported existence of uncontacted native groups in the area.
In early 2008, Perenco acquired the exploration and production (...)

Solutions to global warming based on the logic of the market are a threat to the rights and way of life of indigenous peoples, the Latin American Indigenous Forum on Climate Change concluded this week in Costa Rica.
Solutions to global warming based on the logic of the market are a threat to (...)

The river of Gulf oil welling up from BP’s hole in the bottom of the sea will be the great test of the Obama presidency—but not for the reasons people are starting to suggest. Can the president seize this moment to move boldly on the biggest question facing the world: our endless addiction to (...)

There is growing recognition that water is the "key medium through which climate change impacts will be felt." Climate impacts on water will directly affect agriculture. And, of course, agricultural practices can both impact and mitigate climate change. Yet, all three—climate, agriculture and (...)

These are decisive days for the Yasuní National Park, one of the world’s most biodiverse areas, because of the danger that its wealth of underground oil poses to this unique and fragile ecosystem in Ecuador’s Amazon jungle region.
Final efforts are under way on a text agreeing to a trust fund of (...)

There is a lot of news about nuclearism these days. But to cut through the verbiage of treaties and agreements and summits, and move people from fear to action, we need to focus on three concepts. The United States is the biggest problem when it comes to nuclear weapons. We need a new treaty to (...)

With this 40-page reportage published in Outlook India, Arundhati Roy becomes the first journalist to meet the Maoist rebels, or the Maoist Gonds, who are at war with the Indian state in the heart of India. Roy describes in depth how she fought her way through the forests with the rebels. She (...)

The survivors of the devastating earthquakes in Haiti and Chile are still scrambling to deal with the damage. Here, however, pundits are still scrambling to explain the dramatic difference in impact. Haiti’s quake on January 12 came in at 7.0 on the Richter scale, leveled the capital city, and (...)

This week, California will host the Asilomar International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies. The conference follows hearings last week in the US House of Representatives and a report from the UK Committee on Science and Technology, as well as a recent report from the Government (...)