A miner haunts the East Lawn Cemetery in Ithaca, New York. It’s not the spirit of an interred workman, but Andrena regularis, also known as the regular miner bee. It’s black and tan and fuzzy, sometimes sporting patches of yellow as it collects pollen. The critter is at once peculiar...
Know the facts about Vibrio, a bacteria found in coastal waters and raw shellfish
What is Vibrio? Vibrio is a type of bacteria that has been around for hundreds of millions of years; researchers have identified more than 70 species. These species are mostly harmless, but some can cause infection. The bacteria thrive in warm, brackish (slightly salty) water such as estuaries and bays,...
What’s driving the catastrophic wildfires in Georgia
This coverage is made possible through a partnership between Grist and WABE, Atlanta’s NPR station. Wildfires are burning across more than 27,000 acres in south Georgia, according to the Georgia Forestry Association. Governor Brian Kemp has declared a state of emergency in 91 counties. One fire, the Brantley Highway 82...
A deadly bacteria is creeping up the Atlantic Coast. How worried should you be?
Bailey Magers and Sunil Kumar cut strange figures on Pensacola Beach. Bags of disinfectant solution surrounded them on the white sand; their gloved hands juggled test tubes while layers of rubber and plastic shielded their skin from the elements. As the two organized their seawater samples on the popular Florida...
The ‘age of electricity’ is here. No one knows what comes next.
The war launched by the United States and Israel on Iran has caused an unprecedented disruption in global energy markets, bottlenecking 20 percent of the world’s supply of oil and liquefied natural gas. We don’t yet know exactly what this means for the fight against climate change. But, thanks to...
Indigenous land defenders are being killed, AI is scraping their knowledge
Indigenous land defenders are being killed and criminalized at alarming rates, AI systems scrape traditional knowledge without consent, while Indigenous women face escalating rates of violence — crises that Indigenous leaders confronted this week at the United Nations, where they warned that the fight for health and sovereignty now extends...
War, climate change, and AI: What’s at stake at this year’s UN Indigenous forum
Hundreds of delegates are arriving at the United Nations this week for the world’s largest gathering of Indigenous peoples. But they arrive against an increasingly hostile global backdrop, facing an artificial intelligence boom driving new extraction on ancestral lands, a U.S. administration that has made it increasingly difficult for Global...
The Trump administration wants to take an ax to the East’s last great forests
When most people think about national forests, they imagine vast Western landscapes: Alaska, the Rockies, the Pacific Northwest. But millions of acres of federal woodlands dot the eastern half of the country, too. These great swaths of vibrant ecosystems have long been free of roads, protected by a policy called,...
We asked climate leaders what’s keeping them inspired. Here’s what they said.
Climate action may be facing headwinds right now. But the passion, courage, and creativity that defined the climate movement for decades have not gone anywhere. Doctors continue to care for the health of their patients on a changing planet. Grantmakers continue to reach for new pots of funding to enable...
At the UN, Indigenous leaders tackle how to enforce global climate court rulings
Indigenous communities in the Pacific are facing increasingly devastating storms worsened by warming oceans. Mining operations continue expanding on Indigenous lands in the Amazon. Oil wells in Ecuador keep pumping despite court orders. And at the United Nations this week, Indigenous leaders and advocates are asking: What will it take...