Journalism & Media

"Assisted by technological innovation and years of subsidies, the cost of wind and solar power has fallen sharply — so much so that the two industries say that they can sometimes deliver cleaner electricity at prices competitive with power made from fossil fuels. At the same time, wind and solar companies are telling Congress that they cannot be truly competitive and keep creating jobs without a few more years of government support."

"A new image of the Earth has been popping up all over the Internet, dazzling us with its high-def imagery of land masses, oceans and rippled clouds."

"A Media Matters analysis shows that as a whole, news coverage of the Keystone XL pipeline between August 1 and December 31 favored pipeline proponents. Although the project would create few long-term employment opportunities, the pipeline was primarily portrayed as a jobs issue. Pro-pipeline voices were quoted more frequently than those opposed, and dubious industry estimates of job creation were uncritically repeated 5 times more often than they were questioned.

"For years, climate scientists have been assailed from many sides -- through e-mail hacking, death threats, politician’s demands for documents, Freedom of Information requests (many having the strong smell of a fishing expedition). A Climate Science Legal Defense Fund set up last fall has taken on a formal affiliation with Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, an established nonprofit group offering aid and advice to government whistleblowers and scientists working on environmental issues."

"Mike Partain didn’t believe the rumors about a place called Baby Heaven until he visited a Jacksonville, N.C., graveyard and wandered into a section where newborns were laid to rest. Surrounded by hundreds of tiny marble headstones, he started to cry."

EPA's "Documerica" photo archive, suppressed by the Reagan administration and forgotten for years, is being revived. It provides a stunning series of "before" pictures as a context in which to place the pollution control now under assault by Republicans. And it offers cash-strapped journalists a treasure-trove of copyright-free graphics.

"Prominent MIT researcher Kerry Emanuel has been receiving an unprecedented 'frenzy of hate' after a video featuring an interview with him was published recently by Climate Desk.

Emails contained 'veiled threats against my wife,' and other 'tangible threats,' Emanuel, a highly-regarded atmospheric scientist and director of MIT’s Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate program, said in an interview. 'They were vile, these emails. They were the kind of emails nobody would like to receive.'

"TOKYO — A powerful and independent panel of specialists appointed by Japan’s Parliament is challenging the government’s account of the accident at a Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, and will start its own investigation into the disaster — including an inquiry into how much the March earthquake may have damaged the plant’s reactors even before the tsunami. "