Tag Archives: environmentalism

Waste and Want

Posted on October 3, 2012 by smellincoffee

Waste and Want: A Social History of Trash© 2000 Susan Strasser368 pages      Consider your trash can. In all likelihood, you cannot imagine not using it. What else would you do all with the trash generated in the course … Continue reading →

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Conundrum

Posted on September 29, 2012 by smellincoffee

Conundrum: How Scientific Innovation, Increased Efficiency, and Good Intentions Can Make Our Energy and Climate Problems Worse© 2012 David Owen272 pages If only all big problems could be tackled with product substitution. We’re consumers at heart, and our response to … Continue reading →

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The Ghosts of Evolution

Posted on July 31, 2012 by smellincoffee

The Ghosts of Evolution: Nonsense Fruit, Missing Partners, and Other Ecological Anachronisms© 2000 Connie Barlow291 pages Grocery stores are excellent places to encounter ghosts. They lurk in the fruit section, feasting on anachronisms. The biological world is a wondrous web … Continue reading →

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The Green Metropolis

Posted on June 30, 2012 by smellincoffee

The Green Metropolis: Why Living Smaller, Living Closer, and Driving Less Are the Keys to Sustainability© 2009 David Owen357 pages Green is probably not the word that comes to mind at the mention of Manhattan, but to David Owen, few … Continue reading →

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Hot, Flat, and Crowded

Posted on June 16, 2012 by smellincoffee

Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why America Needs a Green Evolution: And How it Can Renew America© 2006 Thomas Friedman438 pages    The world is changing. Regardless of the consoling reassurances of corporations, industries, and the silk-tongued politicians who lobby on their … Continue reading →

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Cheap

Posted on June 8, 2012 by smellincoffee

Cheap: the High Cost of Discount Culture © 2009 Ellen Ruppel Shell  296 pages  A few weeks ago I read Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, which is a critical history of  the 20th-century trend in business toward cheaper … Continue reading →

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Suburban Nation

Posted on June 2, 2012 by smellincoffee

Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream© 2000, 2010 Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck294 pages Compare a modern American city to its European counterparts, or even an older American city, and the … Continue reading →

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Do One Green Thing

Posted on January 27, 2012 by smellincoffee

Do One Green Thing: Saving the Earth through Simple, Everyday Choices© 2010 Mandy Pennybacker270 pages Environmentalism, once the province of hippies and college students on the fringe in the 1970s, is finally percolating into the national consciousness. It’s never been more … Continue reading →

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