For over half a century, Big Oil and the plastics industry, through their trade associations and front groups, have sold the public the false idea that plastics are recyclable. Recycling became the mantra of good ecological stewardship, promoted by the likes of city governments, school children, and environmental groups. Davis Allen lays out the mass-marketing … Continued
Fossil fuels lie at the center of contemporary life — powering, despoiling, and altering everything around us. And that includes environmentalism itself, according to anthropologist David Bond. He discusses how concepts like toxic thresholds and environmental impact assessments are an accommodation to the continued existence of the oil and petro-chemical industries, rather than ways to … Continued
The urgency of the climate crisis can’t be overstated. Yet the impediments to a rapid shift to a carbon-free future are numerous. These include not just the obvious problem of the entrenched political power of the fossil fuel industry, but according to Holly Jean Buck, national revenues derived from fossil fuels and the elimination of … Continued
The global crisis of our times — the climate emergency — has been temporary slowed by another worldwide disaster: the coronavirus pandemic. As industrial production, transport, and consumption have plummeted, so has the demand for fossil fuels. Environmental historian Troy Vettese places the fortunes of fossil fuels within a larger context over time, with an … Continued
Two historic global economic contractions almost within a decade of each other would have been hard to fathom, if we weren’t living through them. Marxist geographer Richard Walker examines the shape of the United States and world economies during the coronavirus. He also discusses the effects of the crisis on the fossil fuel industry and … Continued
