National (U.S.)

 By BILL DAWSON

"All news, all the time" was the slogan of a once all-news radio station of my acquaintance. A quick Google search reveals that the phrase and several variations are still around.

Given the recent rise to prominence of the climate issue, even veteran reporters familiar with the often-surprising meanders of the environment beat's path may have wondered if "all climate news, all the time" could be the beat's future.

 

THE WORST HARD TIME: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THOSE WHO SURVIVED THE GREAT AMERICAN DUST BOWL
By Timothy Egan
 Houghton Mifflin, $28

Reviewed by EMMA BROWN

When I bought Timothy Egan's "Lasso the Wind" last summer in Ashland, Ore., the bookstore owner chuckled and said, "Tim Egan, lucky guy, you know he covers the West for The New York Times?" I said yeah, that's a job I'd like to have. She shook her head and said, "He can write whatever he wants and no one back East knows whether he's telling the truth."

CARBON FINANCE

Sonia Labatt and Rodney R. White

Wiley Finance, $101.99

Reviewed by CRAIG SAUNDERS

Climate change has serious financial ramifications and opportunities for business. In their new book "Carbon Finance," University of Toronto professors Sonia Labatt and Rodney White describe the economic ABCs of climate change.

 THE WILD TREES: A STORY OF PASSION AND DARING

By Richard Preston
Random House, $25.95
Reviewed by NANCY BAZILCHUK 

Tree canopy research is still a young science, partly because it's difficult to get into the canopy to see what's there, and also because until recently, scientists hadn't thought to look.

 By JOE DAVIS 

Journalists writing about climate change got some help this fall when the Yale Project on Climate Change launches a new publication aimed at helping them communicate science – and communicate with scientists.

The Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media is published online, aimed mostly at an audience of journalists, but also at scientists, policymakers, and the general public.

 

The subject line of an e-mail is an underappreciated writing task.

We knock off dozens daily with little thought. And yet they carry every bit of the challenge and impact of a newspaper headline – a terse explanation of what's to come, with perhaps the added burden of hinting at the sender's personality.

Extend that concept and maybe a case can be made that the e-mail subject lines found on a listserv say something about its members.

The bill passed by the House now goes to the Senate, which had previously failed to act on a similar bill passed by the House in 2007.

As of March 31, 2009, the Agriculture Department may keep secret the locations and phone numbers of feedlots — however much the public may complain about their smell and the pollution emanating from them.

 

 

 By CATHERINE COONEY

You can feel it the minute you step inside: the cool concrete flooring, oversized windows, neutral colors and low lighting provide a sense of open space and cleanliness. The modern-styled architecture seems out of place in Washington, D.C., especially on a hot, smoggy, July afternoon. I'm in Lake Tahoe, I thought, as I walked into the school building where my daughter's summer camp was held.

 

 By SALLY DENEEN

If you haven't covered recycling for a while, you – and your audience – might be surprised by how things have changed and the variety of new angles to explore.

The number of curbside recycling programs now surpasses 9,000. Yet, a greater percentage of recyclable plastic bottles and aluminum cans are landing in the garbage.