Read the full story in the New Republic.
In his new book, “Junk Raft,” Marcus Eriksen discovers a sea filled with tiny particles of harmful plastic.
Category: Books
New book: Headwinds of Opportunity: A Compass for Sustainable Innovation
My former colleague at ISTC, Tim Lindsey, has a new book out which may be of interest to ENB readers. Headwinds of Opportunity A Compass for Sustainable Innovation approaches sustainability as an innovation.
The book is informed by the principles of diffusion of innovation and includes case studies that show how companies can use these principles to increase their efficiency.
Nor Any Drop to Drink?: Why the Great Lakes Face a Murky Future
Read the full piece in the New York Times Book Review.
And so it came as a revelation to me to read Dan Egan’s deeply researched and sharply written “The Death and Life of the Great Lakes.” Dipping into this book was like opening the secret diary of a mercurial and mysterious parent. I learned that the reason the lake had become so clear was that it had been invaded by a dastardly pair of bivalves — the zebra and quagga mussels — which had hitched a ride on a shipping barge from either the Black or Caspian Seas and then quietly but ceaselessly colonized the lake. They set about cleaning up the water with hyperactive single-mindedness, eventually sucking up 90 percent of the lake’s phytoplankton. The water is now three times clearer than it was in the 1980s. But “this is not the sign of a healthy lake,” Egan warns. “It’s the sign of a lake having the life sucked out of it.” Since the Great Lakes are essentially “one giant, slow-motion river,” the mussels have since spread to every one of the Great Lakes, proliferating “like cancer cells in a bloodstream.”
‘Where The Water Goes’ Is Effortlessly Engaging — And Also Scary
Read the full review from NPR.
Water availability is a primary environmental concern of our age. It was a determining factor in development of the American West, from the forced displacement of Native American nations to the establishment of the Colorado River Compact across seven states and Mexico. That “Law of the River” has shaped the policy and practicalities of the West, and Where the Water Goes traces all 1,400 miles of it, trying to understand how fragile a web we’ve woven.
2016 Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature
“New environmental literature” refers to literary works that focus on the environment, animal protection, ecology, and wildlife.
The organizers are looking for work that redefines notions of environmentalism and sustainability, particularly when it comes to animal protection. They are not seeking books about hunting, fishing, or eating animals—unless they are analogous to a good anti-war novel being all about war. Under these basic guidelines, however, they’re open to reading a wide range of fiction and nonfiction with environmental and animal themes.
The winner will receive:
- A cash award of $1,000
- A four-week residency at PLAYA
The contest is open to published or unpublished full-length prose manuscripts, including novels, memoirs, short story collections, and essay collections.
Manuscripts should be approximately 40,000 to 90,000 words (i.e., please do not send novellas or individual essays or stories; please also note the contest is not open to poetry or children’s books).
Published books eligible for the prize must have been published within the past five (5) years; books published in the year 2010 or earlier are not eligible.
Manuscripts must be received between September 1, 2016 and December 31, 2016.
The Afterlife of Cheap Clothes
Read the excerpt from Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion in Slate. Reduce your consumption and find the book at a library near you.
Where do your Target bargains go when you get tired of them? The Salvation Army. Rag bins. And Africa.
A very late book review: John D. MacDonald’s Condominium
Read the full review in Treehugger.
While writing about the Porsche Design Tower tower nearing completion in Sunny Isle Beach, a post about real estate and climate in Florida, I remembered a great old book about real estate and climate in Florida, Condominium, by John D MacDonald, published in 1977.
