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The article discusses the trends of clean energy in the U.S. focusing on the potential of offshore wind energy in the Pacific coast as the next major clean energy source. Topics include the land-based wind turbine installation in the U.S. and its share in the U.S. electricity, the involvement of Alla Weinstein in renewable energy, and the feasibility of developing wind energy off the California coast by researchers from Bren School of Environmental Science and Management in Santa Barbara.

The article offers environmental news briefs in U.S. which include higher rate female turtles born green sea born in last 20 years; wildfire spread by falcons and kites of Australia; and band on killing beavers by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture's Wildlife Services.

The article offers the author's insights on the exportation of natural gas, oil and coal of the U.S. and its association to the issue of climate change. He states that the International Energy Association predicts that by 2017 the U.S. can surpass Saudi Arabia as the largest oil producer worldwide. He also challenges U.S. President Barack Obama on requiring the U.S. federal agencies to exercise their responsibility on climate change.

The article focuses on the use of solar energy on community scale in the U.S. In Minnesota, members of the Wright-Hennepin Cooperative Electric Association are allowed to own part of a 39-kilowatt array of solar panels on the roof of the co-op's headquarters, which helps them to share in the electricity just as they would with a system on their own roofs. California's Sacramento Municipal Utility District allows consumers to buy solar power from a local solar farm, receiving the same retail credit per kilowatt-hour that they would from a home system.

The article focuses on the proposals related to the expansion of Coal Hollow mine in Utah. It mentions that the mine was opened in 2011 and informs that Alton Coal Development LLC has applied for expansion of the coal mine to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to greatly expand the mine. It discusses the concerns posed in the environmental impact statement by mine opponents related to the impact of round-the-clock mining on the visibility of the southern Utah due to increase in pollution levels, affecting tourist traffic, and survival prospects for the sage grouses population.

The article focuses on the bright future of solar power in which institutional investors are willing to finance the panels for homeowners in the U.S. It cites homeowner and computer technician Jonathan Peacock who was able to reduce his electric bill when he installed solar panels in his rooftop. Meanwhile, senior researcher, John Farrell, states that only about 500 California homes had rooftop solar in 1999. It mentions the statewide programs such as Million Solar Roofs and California Solar Initiative provide crucial rebates and incentives. Also, it cites Danny Kennedy, founder of Sungevity, a solar-leasing company that runs operations in eight states, who mentions their low-overhead, highly scalable model. INSET: JOIN THE SOLAR CLUB.

The article offers information related to the oil consumption rate in the U.S. It mentions that the U.S. accounts for 42 percent of all energy related carbon dioxide emissions through burning of petroleum, contributing greatly to future worsening of climate change. It comments that alternatives are already available for most uses of oil, and adopting them will improve our lives along with the slowing of climate change. It highlights several proposed policies in the reduction of carbon emission in different carbon contributors in the U.S. including cars and light trucks, big trucks and buses, and air travel.

The article discusses global climate change, its management, and associated U.S. government policy. It contrasts the climate-change policies of the administrations of U.S. Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. It discusses the global warming effects attributable to personal vehicle use. It notes other aspects of addressing the so-called climate puzzle including controls on mountaintop-removal mining and mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants. Problematic issues are noted for otherwise touted climate-change mitigation technologies including nuclear power plants and biofuels generation.

This section features open letters from environmental activists to the 44th president of the U.S., whose election occurred in November, 2008. Contributors including Mexican ambassador to UNESCO Homero Aridjis, Elizabeth May from the Green Party of Canada, and Wen Bo from the China Green Student Forum are presented. Issues including global warming, agricultural policy and water resources development are addressed. The hope that the 44th president of the U.S. will address these issues multilaterally, unlike the policy of president George W. Bush, is expressed in each letter.

The article focuses on the action of Julie MacDonald, the deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, regarding listing of a few species as threatened or endangered. It is reported that MacDonald prevented the listing of prairie dog as endangered species. She has also been criticized for not allowing to list Gunnison sage grouse as endangered species and raising question for its separation from the greater sage grouse. Many scientists have criticized MacDonald for subverting, or even illegitimizing their findings. Details of winter and spring international trips, organized by the Sierra Club, are also presented.

The article presents information related to ranking of various Senators and representatives of the United States Congress by the League of Conservation Voters (LCV). LCV's annual scorecard is the generally accepted measure of environmental bona fides. Republican Representative from California Richard Pombo is rated LCV 6%. Republican Representative from Ohio Bob Ney is rated as LCV 11%. Republican Representative from Arizona J. D. Hayworth has been rated as LCV 6%. The members of Congress who according to LCV got every important environmental vote in 2005 absolutely wrong include Robert Aderholt, Don Young, John Campbell and Bill Thomas.

Presents the views of environmental and political observers on the condition of the U.S. if President George W. Bush wins in the 2004 election. Robert Reich, professor of social and economic policy at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts; Lois Gibbs, an executive director of the Center for Health, Environment, and Justice in Falls Church, Virginia; Robert Bullard, a professor of sociology and director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University in Georgia.

Focuses on the habitation of different states and places visited by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark during the 1800s, in line with the territorial expedition program of former U.S. President Thomas Jefferson. Discussion on ecosystem in South Dakota; Bird species found in Kentucky; Bison and grizzly population found in South Dakota; Details of habitat destruction and environmental protection.

Discusses the contaminated fish problem of United States citizens. Chief sources of the extremely high levels of mercury in arctic fish and marine mammals; Effects from even low doses of mercury; Ineffectiveness of warnings about contaminated fish.

Criticizes the energy policy imposed by United States President George W. Bush. Discussion on the California energy crisis; Discussion on the alleged fault of environmentalists on the existing energy crisis; Issues about increasing energy prices; Conservation and energy efficiency as measures to curb energy crisis.

Discusses the decline of the Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep population in California. Threat posed by mountain lions to the existence of bighorn sheeps; Reintroduction effort for the sheeps; Protection of the lions in the state of California; Options available to preserve the mountain lion and bighorn sheep populations in California; Information on the behavior of bighorn sheeps and mountain lions.

Evaluates the environmental platforms of United States presidential candidates for the 2000 elections. Environmental policies proposed by Green Party candidate Ralph Nader; Comparison between the environmental policies of Vice President Al Gore and Texas Governor George W. Bush; Different views on the elections.

Profiles United States Vice President and environmentalist, Albert Gore. Publication of the book `Earth in the Balance'; Recovery of tarnished reputation from questionable fund-raising practices; Goal to succeed Bill Clinton as president.

Reports on the mountain biking trip to the Kaiparowits Plateau in Utah, organized by the Sierra Club. Focus of the trip; Opposition to Andalex Resources' plan to dig a coal mine in the area; Utah residents' opposition to US President Bill Clinton's order declaring the area as a national monument. INSET: 5.7 million acres..

Provides insights on the 1996 presidential elections focusing on candidates President Bill Clinton and Bob Dole's agenda concerning the environment. Dole as having the worst environmental voting record; Background on Dole's proposed environmental policies; Assessment of the Clinton Administration's efforts concerning environmental protection.

Focuses on the pressure for the quick disposal of public lands in the United States. Proposals of the 104th Congress; Incarnation of the Sagebrush Rebellion; Passage of ordinances in Nye County, Nevada; Basis of Nye and other rebel western counties' claims; Closure of national parks.

Discusses the prospects for enactment of environmental laws in a Republican-dominated Congress. Absence of a political agenda for environmental protection; Revision and repeal of federal laws on the environment; Philosophy of turnover of environmental authority to states.

Focuses on the US Forest Service's stewardship of national forests through its ecosystem management approach. Dispute between Sierra Club founder John Muir and Forest Service head Gifford Pinchot over the nature of the agency's stewardship; Agency's function as an adjunct to the timber industry; Failures of the Forest Service in carrying out its mission. INSETS: Bulldogs, lawyers, and letter-writers, by Melinda Pierce.;Jack Ward Thomas: Hail to the chief?..

Focuses on chefs' use of fresh, local, natural food in season. Revolutionary prescripts of gourmet cooking; Disappearance of the social role of food; Impact of pesticides; Recipes. INSETS: Fresh starts, by P.R.;What's for dinner?..

Looks at the linkage between money and the United States government's reluctance to support environmental protection measures. Increasing cost of political campaigns; Approaches to reforming the campaign-finance reform identified by Randy Keeler of the Massachusetts-based Working Group on Electoral Democracy; Sierra Club's support for campaign-finance reform.

States that business leaders of today, working with enlightened environmentalists, have discovered a cheaper, more effective and less contentious remedy to just about any environmental ailment. `Free-market environmentalism' which promises to harness the vigor and inventiveness of capitalism to heal the earth; Environmental Defense Fund; Details.

Notes that as science plays an ever-larger part in the formation of public policy, so has politics increasingly perverted the ideal of impartial, dispassionate research. Most spectacular example `Star Wars'; Tales of doctored data, rewritten reports, and politically required results; Warning from Lorraine Mintzmyer, former director of National Park Service's Rocky Mountain Region; Government Accountability Project; Examples of suppressed scientific findings.

The article focuses on the illegal cutting of trees in the Babyfoot Lake Botanical Area in Siskiyou National Forest of Oregon through photographs of a family which went for a picnic at Babyfoot Lake. Some trees which were originally marked in orange as a protected "wildlife tree," re-marked in blue to make it part of the cut. Locals pleaded with the U.S. Forest Service to avoid logging in the vicinity, but no one ever imagined that the botanical area itself was at risk. In what the agency now terms "a serious error," its crews somehow misjudged the boundaries of the sale to include part of the preserve.

The article presents a discussion of renewable energy, adapted from an interview by Paul Rauber with former U.S. President Jimmy Carter. It explores the attempt of Carter to bring peace between Egypt and Israel, and they had oil embargos. It highlights the public commitment of Carter to have at least 20% of the energy of the nation from renewable sources, from geothermal or wind, by 2000.

The authors present ten initiatives they believe are needed to reverse the damage caused by the removal of environmental protections under U.S. president George W. Bush. The Bush Administration has banished many of our most important environmental protections to this limbo. The Clean Air Act is still on the books but is not being enforced. What we have not lost is love for the land--the same love that runs in a powerful undercurrent throughout US history. Here are ten steps to reverse the Bush initiatives and transform the nation. 1. Require auto makers to make cars, SUVs and light trucks that go farther on a gallon of gas. 2. Reindustrialize America by creating a twenty-first-century energy industry. 3. Install modern air-pollution control equipment in old power plants, refineries and factories. 4. Restore the Superfund tax. 5. Reinstate the environmental protections enjoyed by our national forests, rivers, wetlands, wildlife habitat and public lands as recently as January 21, 2001. 6. Restore rural America. 7. Retire Smokey Bear. 8. Restore our national patrimony of public lands. 9. Solve the sewage problem. 10. Rejoin the world.

Focuses on misinterpretations of regional approaches to environmental conservation in the United States. Conspiracy theories on building a natural preserve for the world's elite; Effect of international recognition of wild places on conservation policy; Interference of the United Nations with the United States land management policy.

Examines pro-environment movements sponsored by the US Republican Party. Republican-dominated 104th Congress' environmental voting record in the past 25 years; Poll results for the Superfund Reform Coalition; Formation of the Republicans for Environmental Protection; Creation of the Evangelical Environmental Network; Concerns over mining law reform.

Focuses on the importance of oysters in the preservation of the marine ecosystem in the United States. Oyster's appetite for phytoplankton; Reduced oyster population in Chesapeake Bay; Devastation brought by parasites; Threat to water quality from industry; Menace from spartina in Willapa Bay, California; Monitoring of contaminated oysters.

Reports how industry lobbyists are helping legislators in revising environment protection-related law and legislation in the United States. Abdication of legislative duties to industry lobbyists; Legislation under attack by industry interests.

Reports on various industries' efforts to have legal basis for keeping their corporate pollution reports away from public view in the United States. Legislators' reasons for granting companies the right to secrecy regarding their environmental reports; Environmentalists' reactions to industries' pollution secrecy endeavors.

Reports on the US Congress' efforts to revise the Endangered Species Act. How congressmen made the hearings in favor of anti-environmental regulations parties; Preventing scientists and government officials from joining discussion panels.

Focuses on the problems related to marketing of organically produced foods in the United States. Aesthetic sensibilities of shoppers; Change in the distribution process; Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) distribution method; CSA's features.

Focuses on the potential impact of the 1995 Farming Bill on farmers in the United States. Wetland Reserve Program of the United States Department of Agriculture; Research and education elements; Polluted runoff; Commodity subsidies; Conservation Reserve.

Considers efforts to protect the vanishing wildlands of the United States. Pat Williams' (D-Mont.) bill H.R. 2437; H.R. 2638, the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act (NREPA), sponsored by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and 40 cosponsors that would protect 16 million acres; Its scope; Objections; Results of the `ecosystem protection summit' in Missoula, Montana, December 5, 1993.

Discusses President Bill Clinton's promise to `green up' the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The aim of NAFTA; The claim that a growing economy could make Mexico greener; Report by the Economic Policy Institute; How NAFTA's operative details are blatantly anti-environmental; Comment by House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt; More; Resources.

Asserts that the public needs to realize that without significant reform of how the Congress does business, the new members of Congress are fated to repeat the sins of their predecessors. Comments by Gene Karpinski of the US Public Interest Research Group; Money equals access equals votes; Demonstration by the Johnston-Wallop energy bill; US PIRG study; Effect of money on the votes of politicians; Easier to block legislation than pass it; Array of global threats; More.

In November 1988 Oakland, California, voters passed the toughest nuclear free zone initiative in the nation by a 57-to-43 percent vote, putting themselves on a collision course with the federal government. Unlike the largely symbolic N.F.Z. measures in effect in 167 other communities across the nation, Oakland's Measure T sharply restricts the production, storage and transportation of nuclear materials; bans nuclear weapons-related work within the city limits; and prohibits the city from doing business with nuclear weapons contractors like IBM and Motorola.

The article presents news briefs related to the U.S. wildlife, including the U.S. Senate's votes to allow the killing of wolf pups and bear cubs in their dens in Alaska, designation of spiders as the top predators, and spotting of wolf in Nevada.

The article offers information on various topics related to the environment. Topics discussed include the declaration of American bison as the national mammal of the U.S., the plan of Norway to ban fossil-fuel-powered automobiles by 2025, and the plan of natural gas company Pacific Gas & Electric to close the only nuclear power plant in Diablo Canyon, California in 2025.

The article presents the author's views on the video entitled "Global Warming Is a Hoax" by Louisiana Representative Lenar Whitney. Whitney argued that the Earth has only gotten colder since the film "An Inconvenient Truth" produced by Al Gore was released in 2006. Also examined are Whitney's brand of rhetoric and her failure to cite her source that the Earth is getting colder.

The article discusses the use of a vacuum pressure transportation system from Bellevue, Washington-based Whooshh Innovations LLC to help salmons reach the upper areas of rivers. Many runs of salmon reportedly found their way upstream blocked by rocks which led to theim being listed under the Endangered Species Act. The system is being tested at the Roza Dam by the Yakama Nation Fisheries.

The article focuses on the problem of environmental voting fraud, which has been troubling the U.S. states for many years. It highlights several laws which disenfranchise green voters. It mentions that 176 bills to restrict voting rights have been introduced in 41 states since the beginning of 2011. It informs that in South Carolina, governor Nikki Haley supported voting restrictions on the grounds that she didn't want dead people voting. It reveals that many states including Alabama, Kansas, and Tennessee need would-be voters to present proof of citizenship prior to registration.

The article offers information related to miscellaneous topics. Scientists from Russia have reached Lake Vostok in Antarctia by drilling through 12,360 feet of ice and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the U.S. has forbidden cruise ships from dumping sewage near the California coast. The largest offshore wind farm of the world is in Cumbria, England.

Charts and diagrams are presented that reflect state regulations that limit coal-derived energy production and place quotas on the use of renewal energy technologies.

A map of the U.S. is presented with information on various coal ash sites, the companies that operate them, and their hazard level.