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Do We Need Another Drought?
By Donella Meadows
–September 7, 1989–
On the first day of summer this year the Washington Post made a bid for the 1989 Cynicism in Media Award by running a story that began: “With summer officially debuting today, environmentalists and their allies are praying for a sizzler. A little drought wouldn’t hurt either.”
“A real cooker … will increase pressure on Congress and [...]
The Sportscar of Showerheads
By Donella Meadows
–August 31, 1989–
The best antidote to the greenhouse effect, to acid rain, to urban air pollution, nuclear wastes, and high energy bills is energy conservation. If we stopped throwing away most of the energy we use, we could get a lot more bang and a lot less blight for the buck.
Rocky Mountain Institute (known to its friends as [...]
The Planet Is Not in Danger, Our Ideas Are
By Donella Meadows
–August 24, 1989–
“Last Chance for the Planet!”
“Can the Earth Be Saved?”
“Requiem for Planet Earth.”
The language with which we describe our environmental situation throbs with the drama of lurking mega-disaster.
The threat is GLOBAL! The whole PLANET is in crisis! For the FIRST TIME IN HUMAN HISTORY we have it in our power to DESTROY THE EARTH!
Or, as Woody Allen [...]
Allergic to the Twentieth Century
By Donella Meadows
–August 17, 1989–
Until she was 26 Annie Berthold-Bond had never had a medical problem. That year her husband Daniel was a graduate student at Yale, and she had just finished art school and was working as a waitress. One day there was a gas leak at work. “Lots of people passed out. I didn’t, but now I see [...]
The Dilemna of Dursban and Dartmouth’s Elms
By Donella Meadows
–August 10, 1989–
Skeletons of elm trees still stand in the valley where I live. They have succumbed to Dutch elm disease so recently that they haven’t yet been cut down. The dead branches hold their curving V shapes, like huge elegant vases, reminders of a beauty that is now only a memory.
Only a memory, except on the Dartmouth [...]
