The Goodnewspaper The Environment Edition

Hey! Welcome to The Environment Edition of the Goodnewspaper! While every edition of the newspaper always includes climate-related good news, once a year we love to create an entire issue focused on the planet. I wanted to use this opening letter to share the why behind the print Goodnewspaper. I know it can feel counterintuitive to print and ship a physical newspaper that talks about how to fight climate change. The sustainability of the Goodnewspaper has been a top priority to me since I first started researching what it would look like to create a print newspaper in 2016. I committed early on to finding a way to do it sustainably and responsibly — or to not do it at all. Here are the ways we fight to make each…

Instead of birthday gifts in 2021, 13-year-old Jordan Morris told her parents that she wanted to raise money for the global nonprofit charity: water. Her goal was to raise $500, but she surpassed it ten times over, raising $10,000 to bring clean and safe drinking water to an entire community in Nepal. “Clean water is an essential resource to live,” Morris said. “It was heartbreaking to me that so many people were dying due to their lack of access to something that most people take for granted every single day.” According to UNICEF, over four billion people face water scarcity worldwide. With ongoing water pollution and drought due to climate change, half the world's population could be living in areas without adequate access to water by 2025. Water is a…

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma has played what most of us would consider some of the biggest stages in the world, but it wasn't until he parked his cello in nature that the full vastness of his work could be comprehended. Through his performance series, Our Common Nature, Ma toured the country, partnering with state and national parks, nature conservancies, and communities, to “heal and enrich our relationship with the world around us.” He shared meals with a coal mining community in the Appalachians; sight-read compositions from students on a remote trail at the Grand Canyon; and let the fates of nature bring him his audience as he performed in Acadia National Park, as some 20 people stumbled across the most famous cellist in the world playing along with the birds. “We…

In recent years, Hawaii has seen a decrease in recycling collections, as a lack of local recycling facilities leads to at-capacity landfills. Recyclables are sent thousands of miles to Asia, leaving a large carbon footprint in their wake. Enter: Circle Pack. This grassroots cardboard shredding and upcycling organization works with the local community and Hawaii County to use cardboard in making soil for farmers, provide compostable packaging supplies for businesses, and share knowledge with the community to transform the culture of waste and recycling. Circle Pack was founded by Evan Lam, who created the initiative after learning about the packaging issues his mothers faced as owners of a non-toxic nail polish business. He did some research and learned how to localize and embrace materials that already existed in the community…

GOOD Learn more about the global water crisis. Read “When The Rivers Run Dry: Water — The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century” by Fred Pearce for more insights and expert knowledge on the subject. BETTER Set up a recurring donation to an organization bringing clean water to communities in need: charity: water (charitywater.org), Splash (splash.org), Tribal Water Center (tribalwater.org) BEST Demand better infrastructure from your elected officials — especially in historically marginalized communities long neglected by or intentionally excluded from access to necessary resources like water.…

Researchers at Lancaster University in the UK have collected evidence that suggests selective planting of vegetation between roads and playgrounds can substantially reduce the air pollution that reaches children. The study tracked four Manchester primary schools with various vegetation installations and found that specific plants (western red cedars, to be exact) were the best at capturing particulate pollution and stopping it from circulating in the atmosphere. “Our findings show that we can protect school playgrounds with carefully chosen and managed ‘tredges,’ which capture air pollution particulates on their leaves,” lead researcher Barbara Maher said. It's one of those studies that seem intuitive — but has a major impact on city planning and public health. In fact, exposure to air pollution is reportedly the largest environmental risk factor linked to cardiovascular…