Thursday, 30 Mar 2006

The good news is that hulking SUVs like the Hummer H2 and Chevy Suburban will for the first time have to meet gas-mileage standards. The not-so-good news: those standards are, to put it charitably, not terribly ambitious. The new fuel-economy plan formally released by the Bush administration yesterday would also raise mileage standards for other SUVs, plus minivans and many pickup trucks, but not by a lot. Muckraker gauges reaction from industry and enviros.

Southern Land Do Need You Around, Anyhow

Big conservation deal will protect 218,000 acres of forest in the South

Conservationists are celebrating the biggest sale of private land for preservation in the South's history. The Nature Conservancy and the Conservation Fund have put up a combined $300 million for 218,000 acres of forestland owned by International Paper in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. Most of the acreage will continue to be worked for timber, but the most eco-sensitive areas will be put off-limits to loggers, and all of the land will be kept out of the hands of real-estate developers. Green groups are pleased that the deal will preserve contiguous forest and shoreline wildlife habitat. Meanwhile, up in Wisconsin, the Nature Conservancy has gone in with the state on a purchase of more than 64,000 IP acres worth about $83.7 million.


For tens of thousands of years, says journalist and author Richard Louv in his new book Last Child in the Woods, children spent much of their time outside, developing a sense of wonder in response to the natural world. In the space of two generations, that experience has changed almost entirely, and Louv warns that the consequences will be broad and dire, not only for kids' physical and mental health, but for the green movement. David Roberts chats with Louv about youth and environmentalism, and Naomi Schalit reviews his book.

Meet the New Boss, Slightly Less Irascible Than the Old Boss

New Exxon chair mouths same old wheeze in a breezier style

Watch for new ExxonMobil Chair Rex Tillerson to lighten up the company's communication style, but don't expect any substantial changes in how the world's largest publicly traded petro-corp responds to global warming. "We recognize that climate change is a serious issue," Tillerson told The New York Times, going on to defend the company's record on energy alternatives. But he added that there is "still significant uncertainty around all of the factors that affect climate change." Oil, for instance! And he said President Bush's "addicted to oil" phrase was "an unfortunate choice of words." Enviros call Exxon's culture "prehistoric" and a serious barrier to action on climate disruption. "They have too much money; they are too powerful," said Greenpeace's Kert Davies. "Without Exxon pulling with the rest of the world, it will take longer to solve global warming."

Left Behind

Pentagon aims to avoid cleanup costs by attacking EPA science

Confused over who they're supposed to be killing -- their enemies? themselves? -- the Defense Department in recent years has often defied U.S. EPA recommendations for environmental cleanups and toxicity standards. Case in point: A 2001 EPA draft report estimated that the chemical trichloroethylene (TCE) -- a widespread water pollutant found on more than 1,000 military properties -- is up to 40 times more likely to cause cancer then previously believed. Skeptical of what they claim is left-leaning science -- "If you go down two or three levels in EPA, you have an awful lot of people that came onboard during the Clinton administration," grumbles a former deputy undersecretary of defense -- the Pentagon managed to run recommendations for cleaning up TCE through a bureaucratic maze of White House committees until, in 2003, the matter was cast aside. Have thousands of birth defects and cancers been related to TCE since then? Hundreds of studies suggest so. But they're not the right studies -- if you know what we mean.

Bay City Tollers

San Francisco looks into congestion charging

If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear ... a money clip. The city creatively known as "The City" plans to study the possibility of "congestion charges" -- making drivers pay to enter downtown during business hours. Critics include some stores in high-traffic areas, which fear that disincentives for downtown motor travel would hurt business. In London, which pioneered the concept three years ago, congestion charges have reduced downtown traffic by 30 percent and brought in about $350 million for the government. They take it very seriously there: London mayor Ken Livingstone this week lashed out at the U.S. ambassador to Britain for refusing to pay the charge, saying he shouldn't "skive out of it like some chiseling little crook." You can expect to see the phrase "chiseling little crook" in Daily Grist regularly in coming weeks.