ColumnFrom tuna to turtles, some cultural food traditions create such egregious ethical and environmental consequences, they can never be justified.

When is a cultural tradition a legitimate reason to continue to consume something that’s environmentally problematic? When is it just a convenient excuse to keep eating whatever we want or to keep a lucrative trade going? The examples that follow may not answer that question, but they will certainly get you thinking about the issue.

A Big Beef

At a deli referendum last year, the discussion around the sustainability and history of Jewish food traditions centered on the giant pastrami sandwiches served at Jewish delis. Panelists like Michael Pollan reflected on the fact that what people think of as a long-standing food tradition is really a relatively new tradition borne out of post-war prosperity and abundance. The panel discussed the wisdom of serving and eating smaller sandwiches made from more responsibility raised beef less often. Such a practice would not only be better for the environment and our health but would be more in line with older Jewish food traditions that treated meat as a special occasion food.

Fin Free

California legislators are in the midst of considering AB 376, a bill that would ban the sale, possession, and trade of shark fins in the state. The opposition has spent millions to convince legislators and voters that banning the trade in shark fins would be racist. Shark fin soup is a traditional dish served at Chinese banquets, but it’s only relatively recently that a wide swath of middle class population has enjoyed the dish. The popularity of shark fins today is causing the decimation of the shark population. This is not only a tragedy in itself, but the practice of ripping the fins off of sharks and tossing the live sharks back in the water to die is cruel. Whether or not you care about sharks, as top predators, they are crucial to the health of the ocean ecosystem, and by extension, our survival.

Sushi Shame

Despite the fact that the Blue Fin tuna population has declined nearly 90% since the 1970s and is considered endangered by most ocean advocacy groups, if not the US Government, it still appears on the menus of most sushi bars. Why? Because it’s one of the traditional fish used in sushi, it’s delicious, and people will pay a lot of money for it. Is that enough reason to decimate an entire population of a majestic top ocean predator?

Turtle Trade

Some questions of food traditions vs. environmental conservation are a little more complicated. Sea turtle meat and eggs are important culinary traditions in many parts of Latin America. Most species are protected, but there are some indigenous communities who have the right to hunt turtles in their territory for their own consumption. In Costa Rica, residents who have few other income opportunities, are allowed to harvest a small proportion of sea turtle eggs to sell. Unfortunately, both of the above types of arrangements often lead to illegal poaching and high black market prices, which just feeds the problem.

Are there any situations in which cultural food traditions should trump environmental concerns?

This is the latest installment in Vanessa Barrington’s weekly column, The Green Plate, on the environmental, social, and political issues related to what and how we eat.

Images: cephalopodcast, divekarma, sly06, Pink Sherbert Photography, Ingrid Taylar, istolethetv

Get child, put child outside, let child run around – why is this so difficult?

Near where I live in Brighton, England, there’s a country park called Seven Sisters. It’s magnificent. Seven arching, white-chalk cliffs elegantly crumbling into the sea with no regard for their own brilliance. When you stand up close to the cliff face from the pebbly beaches below, you can see the layers of sediment laid down over millions and millions of years, the subtly changing colors and composition chronicling times when sea levels were higher or lower or filled with tiny and abundant and now non-existent creatures. Take a group of inner city school children to see it, though, and the reaction is less awe and more ick.

The Sussex Wildlife Trust, a local conservation charity, runs school trips to various spots around the Seven Sisters. Volunteers with the organization regularly report students who don’t want to sit on the grass, who are distressed by the mud, who wobble along the cliff path trying desperately to avoid the sheep scat until they realize that this is impossible. One child from London, on being asked what he thought a pole-mounted kestrel nesting box was, replied that it was a speed camera.

They are funny stories useful for eye rolling and lamenting the youth of today, and of course someone who grows up in a dense urban area will have points of reference that are predominantly urban. But the routine for how we interact with the outside seems so instinctive and simple – get child, put child outside, let child run around – that its malfunction is deeply uncomfortable.

Widely reported problems with our increasing penchant for urbanization expand well beyond the economic and environmental, and issues ranging from increasing obesity to widespread depression and stress disorders have been pinned on our proliferation of concrete. Richard Louv’s best selling book Last Child in the Woods even attempted to link attention deficit disorders to what he calls nature deficit disorder.

On top of that, it leaves us with something of a conundrum. The future is supposed to be awesome and filled with energy efficient airships and lush urban farms, yet the present is filled with kids who are scared of grass. How can we convince these young people – tomorrow’s older people – to protect something they aren’t even engaged with, to suddenly wake up one morning and construct a vertical farm on the side of their concrete high rise? The path to the future may have been asphalted for easy access, but it seems we’re not tripping enough on the weeds that are breaking through.

“It’s not just children and young people. Obviously it comes from a society that’s increasingly city based and it’s adults as well who aren’t used to the great outdoors. And it’s not all, it’s a proportion,” says Nigel Flynn, head of education at the Sussex Wildlife Trust.

He points to the work they are doing to combat this phenomenon, such as promoting the innovative Forest Schools program and says just a little bit of contact with the outside world is all it takes.

“There was one particular village where the Parish woodland had become a dumping ground and was getting trashed. Several people got together and won a grant to clean it up and start activity groups. One weekend they would run a fathers and son group, another it would be mothers and toddlers, and it made a real difference. The respect came from contact.”

With more people now living in cities than not, the problems of urbanization are not going to go away any time soon (though there are equally abundant and promising opportunities for urban innovation), and it is perhaps this rigorous segregation that’s the problem; urban versus suburban versus rural. If we want to live in that green utopian future, then at some point they all have to meet and mingle. The young people of today are, in some respects, the most environmentally aware generation there has ever been. We can’t judge them for the cities they find themselves living in and their unfamiliarity with strange green places. We can help them out though and it starts with something very simple, a walk outside.

Image: Todd Baker

Editor’s note: This is Sarah Lewis-Hammond’s first article for EcoSalon. She reports from Brighton, UK.

QuoteDaily quotes at EcoSalon.

“However fragmented the world, however intense the national rivalries, it is an inexorable fact that we become more interdependent every day. I believe that national sovereignties will shrink in the face of universal interdependence. The sea, the great unifier, is man’s only hope. Now, as never before, the old phrase has a literal meaning: We are all in the same boat.”

- Jacques Cousteau

image: Jesper Hauge

QuoteDaily quotes at EcoSalon.

Increasingly, the world around us looks as if we hated it. – Alan Watts
Image: Lucente Designs

They’re building national parks, protecting endangered species, revealing environmental injustice and making crucial decisions that will affect the future of our planet. Or, maybe they’re just making it cool to be vegan. But in all their varied contributions, these 20 women – from global environmental leaders to community activists – are using their power, fame or sheer will to make the world a greener place.

Vandana Shiva

Perhaps no woman alive fights harder for the rights of female farmers than Vandana Shiva, an Indian philosopher, physicist, ecofeminist and environmental activist. Shiva is an outspoken critic of industrialized globalized agriculture and proponent of traditional, sustainable farming methods, and has written about the impacts of corporate international trade agreements in books like Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution and Profit as well as Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply. She founded the Navdanya movement to counter corporate seed control in 1991.

Lois Gibbs

In 1978, Lois Gibbs’s picture-perfect suburban life in Love Canal, New York turned into a nightmare when she realized that her neighborhood was built on top of a toxic dump, making residents sick and causing birth defects. Outraged, Gibbs organized a community effort against local, state and federal governments, leading to the evacuation of Love Canal and the creation of the EPA’s Superfund program, which locates and cleans up toxic sites around the nation. Gibbs later founded the Center for Health, Environment and Justice and wrote several books about the effects of toxic waste.

Daryl Hannah

No Hollywood armchair activist, Daryl Hannah isn’t afraid to get dirty – or arrested – for environmental and social causes. She was jailed for chaining herself to a walnut tree to protest the demolition of the nation’s largest urban farm in South Central Los Angeles, drank biofuel to prove its safety, got arrested again for her role in a protest against mountaintop removal mining and dipped her hands in oil-contaminated water in Ecuador. Hannah, who lives on a sustainable farm in Colorado, vlogs about sustainability weekly at her website DHlovelife.com.

Simran Sethi

Simran Sethi is a familiar face in the world of environmental journalism, appearing to give green tips and discuss sustainability on programs like The Oprah Winfrey Show, the Today Show and The Ellen DeGeneres Show. She’s also a contributing environmental correspondent at NBC News, co-host and writer for the Sundance Channel’s The Green, creator of Sundance web series The Good Fight and co-writer of Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy.

Wangari Maathai

The first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Dr. Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, a grassroots environmental organization advocating for human rights, good governance and peaceful democratic change through environmental stewardship. The Green Belt has assisted women in planting over 20 million trees on farms, school properties and church compounds and spurred a tree-planting initiative across Africa. The former Kenya Parliament member has gained much-deserved worldwide recognition for all of her hard work.

Frances Beinecke

Frances Beinecke might not be a household name, but she’s more influential than you realize: she’s the president of the National Resources Defense Council, and has been involved with the organization for three decades. Beinecke has helmed some of the NRDC’s most ambitious and successful campaigns, fighting to protect polar bears, preserve our offshore environment and safeguard the health of children.

Majora Carter

Not so long ago, Hunt’s Point Riverside Park in South Bronx was an illegal dumping ground. Now, it’s a beautiful place along the Bronx River for local residents to enjoy green space and fresh air – thanks to Majora Carter, an environmental justice advocate and writer, producer and co-host of several radio and television programs. Carter founded Sustainable South Bronx (SSBx), a non-profit organization that spearheaded a number of Bronx cleanup initiatives and started a green collar job training program. She’s now an environmental consultant.

Sylvia Earle

She’s been called “Guardian of the Sea”, and says she’s happier in a wetsuit than on land. Legendary oceanographer Sylvia Earle is 74 and still actively exploring the oceans, recently getting an up-close-and-personal view of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence has led more than 400 undersea research expeditions and was named Time Magazine’s very first ‘hero for the planet’ in 1998. Author of a cornucopia of books on the sea, Earle is also executive director for a number of environmental organizations including The Conservation Fund and Ocean Conservancy.

Jane Goodall

Nobody in the world knows more about chimpanzees than Jane Goodall, who spent 45 years in the jungles of Tanzania’s Gombe Stream National Park observing their lives and challenging conventional notions about their diet and behavior. Goodall pioneered the belief that chimps were capable of rational thought and emotions and has since become a global leader in the effort to protect them and their habitats.

Laurie David

A longtime trustee on the Natural Resources Defense Council, Laurie David is most renowned for producing the Academy Award-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth, which played a big role in focusing America’s attention on global warming. David also produced the HBO documentary Too Hot to Handle, and regularly plays a large role in environmental projects like the Stop Global Warming Virtual March.

Mei Ng

“What kind of world will we leave to coming generations?” That was the question that led Hong-Kong born Mei Ng to enter the world of environmental activism, a path that has led to her current position as director of Friends of the Earth. Ng’s volunteer work as a housewife in the 1970s brought her into contact with victims of childhood cancer, sparking a passion to protect children from environmental toxins. Her work earned her a spot among the United Nation’s Global 500 Roll of Honor in 2000.

Julia Butterfly Hill

Can you imagine caring so much about a single tree, that you’d spend two years of your life among its branches, your feet rarely touching the earth below? Julia Butterfly Hill did just that in 1998 and ’99 for the love of “Luna,” a 200-foot redwood tree that was in danger of being felled by loggers. She didn’t come down until an agreement was reached with the logging companies to give Luna a 600-foot buffer to protect her from destruction. Hill’s dedication brought nationwide attention to the problem of deforestation.

Alicia Silverstone

The lovely Alicia Silverstone – perhaps best known for her role in iconic ’90s flick Clueless – is much more than just a model and actress. This animal lover, who lives in an eco-friendly solar-powered home in Los Angeles, is an avid animal rights activist and appeared in a memorable 2007 ad for PETA. But these days, Silverstone has been winning a lot of converts to the vegan lifestyle: her book, The Kind Diet, topped the New York Times bestseller list.

Marina Silva

She was the 2010 Green Party candidate for President of Brazil, gaining an impressive 19.4 percent of the votes cast. She was a colleague of renowned environmental activist Chico Mendes, who was assassinated for defending the Amazon Rainforest. But Marina Silva’s work for the environment is what really makes her stand out, earning her a place among the United Nations’ Champions of the Earth in 2007. Silva, a native Amazonian, fought for environmental protection of the Amazon during her time as a senator and as Brazil’s Environment Minister and remains one of the country’s top activists.

Carol Browner

Few people have more say in some of America’s most crucial decisions about the environment than Carol Browner, current Director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy and former head of the EPA. Her pragmatic approach to environmental issues has won both praise and criticism from environmentalists, but there’s no doubt that she has and will continue to make a big impact. As EPA administrator, Browner started the Brownfields Program which cleans up contaminated land and facilities and brings them back into productive use.

Alice Waters

Crusader for organic and local foods, chef Alice Waters pioneered the fresh style of California Cuisine and has been hailed as a ‘foodie hero’. Owner of Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse, Waters successfully launched the bid to start a food garden on the White House lawn and created the Edible Schoolyard Project, a hands-on educational initiative teaching kids to raise, grow and prepare their own food using fresh ingredients. Waters is often credited as a major driving force in the current popularity of pesticide-free, fresh, healthy foods.

Habiba Sarabi

In 2005, Habiba Sarabi made history when she became Afghanistan’s first female governor, appointed by President Karzai to run the province of Bamiyan. It was a bold move, but Sarabi had no intention of meekly maintaining the status quo despite her country’s views on women in power. Knowing that Bamiyan is one of Afghanistan’s most beautiful areas, known for the massive Buddha statues that were destroyed by the Taliban, Sarabi has campaigned to turn the natural charm of her home into a money-making tourist attraction. Her work includes the establishment of the Band-e-Amir National Park.

Lisa Jackson

Fighting against the big businesses that pollute our air, waterways and communities is no easy task, especially when they’ve got billions of lobbying dollars on their side.  And whether you agree with her even-handed approach or wish she would take a bolder stance, Lisa P. Jackson, the current head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, is one of our most important allies. With nearly 25 years of environmental leadership under her belt, Jackson looks for ways to compromise with corporations and is without a doubt one of the leading female influencers in our nation.

Sangduen Chailert

Known as Thailand’s Elephant Queen, Sangduen ‘Lek’ Chailert developed a deep love for endangered Asian elephants as a child when her grandfather adopted a baby elephant named Tongkum, or ‘Golden One’. So it’s no surprise that she is now one of the most prominent advocates for the animals, which are threatened by poaching and habitat encroachment. Lek’s conservation work has been highlighted in documentaries by National Geographic, Animal Planet and the BBC.

Images: wikimedia commons,  ohio citizen, dhlovelife.com,  simransethi.com,  center for neighborhood technology, treehugger, mospeaks,  noaa.gov,  wikimedia commons,  lauriedavid.com, women of china,  juliabutterfly.com, peta, wikimedia commons, wikimedia commons, david sifry, white house archives, wikimedia commons, mikka22

I was sitting in traffic recently, when I noticed that the license plate in front of me featured a majestic bald eagle, its wings spread in flight above a caption that instructed me to “Conserve Wildlife.” Clearly this is a worthwhile sentiment, although I was surprised to see it on a license plate from New Jersey (a state better known for grand-scale corporate polluting than for saving the wetland habitats of nesting ospreys). But the real surprise of the conservation license plate was that it was attached to the back of an enormous white stretch limousine – a vehicle one does not immediately associate with conservation, wildlife, or any other earth-friendly concern.

The fact is, limos are really only known for two things: one is for transporting totally hammered young adults to and from bars, clubs, and bachelorette parties –  the other is for crapping on the planet by using an obscene and unnecessary amount of gasoline. Either way, it’s hard to see the limousine as a friend to bog turtles, when it is more commonly associated with inebriated meatheads who insist on popping up through the moon roof, fist-pumping and woo-hooing their way through residential neighborhoods.

I have to admit to a certain prejudice against limos. For one thing, whenever you see a young man in a powder blue tuxedo, he is almost always coming out of a limousine – as far as I’m concerned, this alone should be grounds for outlawing them. Limos used to be the vehicle of choice for prime ministers, brides, and captains of industry – they evoked an image of class and gracious living. Now they are likely to come with a “vomit deposit,” in case the backseat mini bar leads to an unpleasant, yet not entirely unpredictable conclusion.

Of course, limos are not the only fuel-inefficient cars sporting conservation license plates – the state of New Jersey will issue one to anybody willing to fork over $50.00 (most of which does actually go towards protecting endangered wildlife).

Promoted with the tag line of “Drive Conservation Home” these plates are intended to “let everyone know you believe in conservation, and let them know you’re doing something about it.” A noble sentiment, but the message is somewhat diluted when it’s attached to a car that’s bigger than my first apartment”¦a car with disco lights and a plasma T.V. …a car that is charged a “gas guzzler” tax to compensate for the pollution it creates.

Perhaps 33-foot party-bus limos should be charged $100 for conservation plates – or even $1,000. The extra money would go a long way towards helping the smog-choked peregrine falcons of Jersey City.

You have to wonder if encouraging citizens to take public transportation might not be a better way to protect animal habitats. But then we’d have to live without the unintended hilarity of having wildlife conservation promoted on the back of Hummers, SUVs and stretch limousines. Those license plates should really read: New Jersey: The delicious irony state.

Image: Gene Hunt

Can you imagine your grandchildren visiting a museum to look at the mere bones of animals that are alive today? We all expect to see a T-Rex in ancient, skeletal form, but an orangutan? When we were kids and we heard about animals becoming extinct in science class, the finality seemed grave but distant, like there was still hope and time, and their impending doom was so far off into the future we didn’t really need to worry about it.

Cut to twenty-five years later, and these endangered species are truly on the brink of being wiped off the planet. So let your kids get a good look at that polar bear at your local zoo, because they may not be around for another generation to see in the flesh. Here are five animals that will probably become extinct in your child’s lifetime.

Sumatran Orangutan

The Sumatran Orangutan seen above is threatened due to poaching and habitat destruction of the rainforests in Indonesia, where this species makes their home. Only about 6,500 remain in the wild, and they are poised to become the first great ape species to become extinct. Visit the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program website or Sumatran Orangutan Society to learn more.

Black Rhinoceros

During the 1970s half of the world’s rhino population disappeared. There are fewer than 2,500 Black Rhinos left on the earth. Considered the world’s most endangered mammal, the Black Rhinoceros faces severe endangerment due to poaching for his horn, which can fetch up to $24,000 in the Far East. The rhino’s horn is used in folk medicine in India and China as it is believed to cure headaches, and as a weapon and status symbol among men in North Yemen. Learn how you can help save rhinos in the wild.

Bactrian Camel

The Bactrian Camel is critically endangered due to habitat loss and drought. There are approximately only 950 Bactrian Camels left in the wild, struggling to survive in their native desert habitat in northwest China and Mongolia, which used to be used as a Chinese nuclear test range. These animals are also hunted for sport and killed because they are competition to domestic livestock for food and water resources. Learn more at the Wild Camel Protection Foundation.

Polar Bear

Iconic images of the polar bear swimming and sometimes drowning between melting patches of ice in his dwindling habitat have become synonymous with the case for global warming. Currently, between 20-25,000 polar bears still roam the wild, but if climate change trends continue, scientists predict that polar bears will be extinct within the next 100 years. Visit Polar Bears International to learn more.

Mountain Gorilla

Forest clearing and degradation are main contributing factors to the Mountain Gorilla’s pending extinction, and only 720 animals of this species remain on the planet. Additionally, in 2007, there were 10 Mountain Gorilla killings in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which severely threatened the conservation progress that had been made on their behalf. Visit the International Gorilla Conservation Program to learn more.

Images: Kabie Bakie, Matthew Field, Jeff Kubina, ltshears, Zouavman Le Zouave, and d_proffer

“It is difficult to realize how great a part of all that is cheerful and delightful in the recollections of our own life is associated with trees.” – Wilson Flagg, Naturalist

There’s a sadly familiar pattern that comes with environmental news stories about the world’s great forests. “Here’s why they’re too precious to squander. Here’s why we’re squandering them. Go see them while you still can.” But take heart – because on Thursday, the trees won.

The boreal forest of Canada is a natural marvel on a staggering scale. Covering well over half of the entire country and storing twice as much carbon per acre as tropical forests, it’s – you guessed it – way too precious an environmental resource for us to squander. Yet that’s exactly what some people have been trying to do – with oil and gas exploitation, hydroelectric development and loosely regulated logging galore. Thankfully, these efforts have to date been too puny to make much of a dent in this 1.3-billion acre behemoth. Given time, this story might change for the worse.

For any unscrupulous developers casting an avaricious eye over all this natural wealth – time may have just have ran out. On Thursday, members of the Forest Products Association of Canada and nine environmental organizations, including ForestEthics and Greenpeace, announced their backing for the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement. First up – the suspension of 29 million hectares of logging to protect caribou habitats (and as a trade-off, environmental groups are dropping a number of “Do Not Buy” campaigns.)

So yes, go see the stunningly beautiful boreal forests of Canada. But don’t feel in any great hurry. Because thankfully, they’ll still be here tomorrow.

Images: pentaboxes and axiepics.

A view of Portland on 350 Day, October 24th, 2009

I’ve been away from my home in Portland, Oregon for 75 percent of 2010. I’ve become used to a gypsy eco-adventure life on the road or at sea – I’ve got a good tan and my hair is going blonde, and I’m centered and focused. At home, I have a mortgage (and an actual bed). Living in a van is heaven on wheels. It’s life distilled, pure and simple: camera, computer, books, surfboard, dog and a sense of eco-traveling purpose.

For work, I study pollution in marine environments, so by nature I spend a lot of time at the beach. As part of my recently completed synthetic sojourn to better understand how plastic pollution enters our watersheds, I looked at how different cities function on a municipal level. At each new place, I was guaranteed to see parts of a city’s underbelly that few knew about – even longtime residents. I met plenty of characters along the way, all whom shared stories and suggested other people to talk with to better understand the journey of garbage from source to sea.

But what if you can’t live in a van? Or better, you don’t want to live in a van? Or you just can’t get away? I hear you, gentle reader. I’ve been home for a week and already I’m antsy as all hell to get back on the road.

But yesterday I remembered the last time I felt away from home while at home. It was last year, during the 350.org international day of action. Several activists got together on the Willamette River to make a giant 350 and as I photographed, I was astonished by my vantage: I was looking at my hometown through new, eco-tourist eyes.

Portland rests at the Willamette River, which dumps into the Columbia River. The Columbia is one of the largest per volume watersheds in the world. Just like other cities, whatever we litter on the streets here makes its way to the sewer systems, then into our watersheds. Remembering my trip, I realized that I should make an effort to look at my own city with the same inspired eyes that lead me to explore.

So here’s my project: I’ll start at the dump and look at its geography in relation to the catch basins for rain. I’ll arrange to tour my sewer system (gross and spooky, yes), just to see what’s down there and what is ultimately coming out of the pipe into the river. Then I’m going to paddle part of the river to see where garbage washes up. Then I’m going to visit some wetland biologists downstream to see firsthand what effects our pollution has on the surrounding ecosystems. I’m excited, because I’m bound to see new faces of this city that will enrich and inspire my sense of home.

What about you? Sewers aren’t for everyone, but maybe it’s a green architecture tour? Find a firm, make an inquiry. Maybe it’s community gardens?  Find them, and start asking questions. Or what about looking at solar output?  Living buildings? The list goes on and on – all you need is to get out and explore your immediate world. All it will cost is time.

Where do you live? We’d love to here some ideas about your city in the comment section.

“Mountains are not fair or unfair – they are just dangerous.” - Reinhold Messner

Mount Everest, our planet’s highest mountain, has never been welcoming. Its aptly-named “death zone” (the height where the air is too thin to breathe) and has been claiming lives for the last half-century, including during the 1996 disaster described in Jon Krakauer’s harrowing Into Thin Air. Some of those victims are still up there, their bodies too frozen to be broken down by bacteria and often visible to modern climbers on their way to the summit.

From a distance, Everest looks pristine. Up close, it’s a graveyard littered with tons of garbage that is exposed by global warming. This week, a team of Nepalise climbers are heading into the death zone to attempt to remove some of the many tons of rubbish littering the slopes, and to recover at least two bodies including that of a Swiss climber killed just two years ago. We wish them luck on their difficult, dangerous journey.

Further reading:

“Everest ice forest melting due to global warming, says Greenpeace” – The Guardian

“Global warming reaches Mount Everest” – Physorg.com

Images: mckaysavage and Kappa Wayfarer