Paris When It Sizzles: The City of Light Aims to Get Smart on Heat
There’s a long tradition in France of taking August off for holiday. Paris virtually shuts down as the temperature drifts around in the seventies, and people go to the beach…
How Floating Wetlands Are Helping to Clean Up Urban Waters
Five small islands roughly the size of backyard swimming pools float next to the concrete riverbank of Bubbly Creek, a stretch of the Chicago River named for the gas that…
As Bird Kills from Buildings Mount, Cities Look for Solutions
Most early mornings in the spring and fall, as he has done for more than four decades, David Willard goes out to gather the dead. A retired curator of birds…
‘Green Roads’ Are Plowing Ahead, Buffering Drought and Floods
Makueni County, a corner of southern Kenya that’s home to nearly a million people, is a land of extremes. Nine months a year, Makueni is a hardened, sun-scorched place where…
A Quiet Revolution: Southwest Cities Learn to Thrive Amid Drought
In the rolling hills around San Diego and its suburbs, the rumble of bulldozers and the whine of power saws fill the air as a slew of new homes and…
How Indigenous People Are Restoring Brazil’s Atlantic Forest
It was 2016 when Jurandir Jekupe noticed the bees were gone. Their nests were once common in Yvy Porã, the Guarani Mbya village where Jekupe grew up and still lives.…
Ecosystems as Infrastructure: A New Way of Looking at Climate Resilience
When people think of landscape architecture, small-scale recreational spaces like urban parks, gardens, and golf courses may come to mind. MacArthur “Genius Award” winner Kate Orff has a grander and…
The Clean Water Act at 50: Big Successes, More to Be Done
When Steve Meserve’s great-grandfather, Bill Lewis, started the Lewis Fishery in 1888, it was one of dozens of commercial outfits scattered up and down the Delaware River that seined for…
From Lab to Market: Bio-Based Products Are Gaining Momentum
In the 1930s, the DuPont company created the world’s first nylon, a synthetic polymer made from petroleum. The product first appeared in bristles for toothbrushes, but eventually it would be…
Uncounted Emissions: The Hidden Cost of Fossil Fuel Exports
When the world convenes in the United Arab Emirates later this month for the next round of the endless climate slog, much attention will be paid to the pledges of…