At a session called Sustainability and Growth: How Can a City Develop Sustainably When its Identity is Built on Growth? this Monday morning at the American Meteorological Society convention a development expert named Grady Grammage colorfully dispelled some myths and revealed some little-known truths about Phoenix. One myth: Phoenix is unsustainable because it imports water.Continue reading “Phoenix: What Happens When a City Built on Growth Begins to Shrink?”
Author Archives: Kit Stolz
How Air Pollution Reduces Rainfall in Phoenix…and maybe L.A.
A grad student at Arizona State University, Bohumil Svoma, yesterday gave a fascinating talk at the American Meteorological Society convention on new research showing that tiny particles of air pollution, mostly from car tailpipes, work to reduce the amount of winter rainfall in the Phoenix area. It's a very clever study. Svoma and his advisor,Continue reading “How Air Pollution Reduces Rainfall in Phoenix…and maybe L.A.”
How to Make Money and Lose Water, Arizona Style
Kathy Jacobs, who managed water for twenty-three years in Arizona, is now leading an innovative thinktank drawing on three universities. The Arizona Water Institute just published a paper on the amount of water it takes to generate power in Arizona. A couple of interesting quotes: On a national basis, the water withdrawn from rivers andContinue reading “How to Make Money and Lose Water, Arizona Style”
Going to Phoenix
Moonrise on the I-10 just past Blythe. Going to Phoenix for the annual American Meteorological Society convention. More soon on resilience and the future of the American Southwest.
Trees, by M.S. Merwin
Tree people (you know who you are) should be aware of a book published this year by Nalini Nadkarni, about our intimate connection to trees, called Between Earth and Sky. Nadkarni is an unusual and interesting figure. As a girl growing up in suburbia she loved to climb trees. As a young woman, after a brief tourContinue reading “Trees, by M.S. Merwin”
Hard Times and a Little Coffee
Here's an image from a brilliant young, um, graphic artist. (Cartoonist isn't quite the right word.) Lotta truth there, I can attest. But as Patti Smith, mulling over the suicide of a hedge fund manager points out, hard times may mean fear, but don't have to mean despair. How wonderful it is to be alive.Continue reading “Hard Times and a Little Coffee”
Barack Obama is Not a Hippie
Which is probably why he won't go for this "White House organic farm" idea. Barack Obama is a liberal Democrat but not a hippie. He prefers jet planes to busses, cuts his hair about as short as a politician can, dresses immaculately but simply, and speaks admiringly of traditions such as faith, hard work, andContinue reading “Barack Obama is Not a Hippie”
Science vs. a Love-Sick Astronaut
Short version: science doesn't stand a chance. In the course of reviewing a couple of recent global warming books, Chris Mooney explains why we're falling to face the facts of "A Really Long Heat Wave." He writes with reason, not sweetness, but just enough piquancy to make his review enticing, despite the grimness of theContinue reading “Science vs. a Love-Sick Astronaut”
Clark Kent in the 21st Century
This comes from a site called Shortpacked that I am too old to understand, but I still think this panel is freaking hilarious.
Poetry at the Presidential Inauguration: A Bad Idea?
Seemingly the only way to be noticed as a poet in America today is to have an enormous personality, and then to go on and inflate it to a size suitable for mass media spectaculars. (I'm thinking of the likes of Allen Ginsberg or Patti Smith, both of whom — by the way — areContinue reading “Poetry at the Presidential Inauguration: A Bad Idea?”
Kit Stolz 