Environment
Need some good news about the environment? The Optimist Daily is your go-to herald of positive environmental news, highlighting eco-friendly solutions and scientific progress around climate action, circularity, conservation, and more. Learn about everything eco in our Environment section.
Tahlequah, the grieving orca, is pregnant once more
Nearly two years ago, a tragic story surfaced in the news about a mother orca named Tahlequah who carried her dead calf 17 days and more than 1,000 miles. It is heartbreaking to think about, but we have good news: Tahlequah is pregnant again. Tahlequah is a member of the endangered population of Read More...
Future of food: The world’s biggest rooftop urban farm is now bearing fruit
In the summer of 2019, we published a story about a rooftop urban farm being constructed in Paris that was set to be the biggest in the world. Now, nearly a year later, the world’s largest urban rooftop farm has started to bear fruit. Strawberries, to be precise: small, intensely flavored and Read More...
This all-female expedition team is diving into ocean plastics research
We recently shared a story about Ocean Voyage Institute completing the largest ocean clean up to date. Now, another crew is exploring the ocean’s five garbage-collecting gyres to learn more about plastic pollution and its impact. Even more unique, the crew is made up entirely of women. The Read More...
The case for relocating small businesses back to residential areas
If you walk around some 1920s-era neighborhoods, it’s not unusual to see a tiny grocery store inhabiting the street corner. This used to be normal in residential areas, but as cars became more widespread, businesses relocated to more centrally-located commercial centers such as malls. The Read More...
Giant retailers like Walmart and Target unite to take on plastic bags
Single-use plastic shopping bags are a real problem. They take decades to break down but nearly 100 billion of them are used in the United States every year to cart away goods from retailers. Fewer than 10 percent of those are recycled — often winding up in landfills and waterways because many Read More...
Thought Leader Series: Renée Lertzman and the psychology of climate action
We are often talking about technical solutions to help us over come the climate crisis, but what we don’t talk about so much is how the climate crisis makes us feel. Renée Lertzman is a psychologist and environmentalist who understands that it’s completely normal to feel overwhelmed, Read More...
It turns out all that shed dog fur is great for cleaning up oil spills
If you have a dog or cat, all that fur you’re constantly sweeping up around the house could be more useful than you thought! Researchers at the University of Technology Sydney have found that fur and hair products are more effective than synthetics at cleaning up oil spills on land. The Read More...
Research shows turtles get lost for miles, but still find way home
When female sea turtles come ashore to lay their eggs, they return to the very spot where they once hatched and scuttled towards the sea. Traveling thousands of miles before coming back to their roots demonstrates their complex navigational abilities. New research shows these turtles are even more Read More...
Don’t throw away that greasy pizza box! Recycle it
If you’ve long tossed your pizza boxes into the trash, figuring—along with many other Americans—that the grease and cheese leftover on the cardboard meant it couldn’t be recycled, Domino’s wants you to think again. It turns out that nearly three-quarters of US residents have a recycling Read More...
This is how trees make urban areas cooler
You might consider urban areas to be the epitome of cool, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, buildings, cars, pollution, and lack of soil, all contribute to an urban heat island effect, making cities considerably warmer than surrounding rural areas. Luckily, there is a Read More...