It is technically and economically feasible to run the US economy entirely on renewable energy, and to do so by 2050. That is the conclusion of a new study in the journal Energy & Environmental Science, authored by Stanford scholar Mark Z. Jacobson and nine colleagues. Jacobson is well-known for his ambitious and controversial work on renewable energy. In 2001 he...
Learn MoreHaven’t explored Georgia outside of the metro Atlanta area? There’s a whole lot more to Georgia than you’d think. Georgia’s landscapes are beautiful and staggering in variety, from southern sandy Atlantic coast to lush, green, rolling Appalachian Mountains in the north. Moss and fern-filled forests, breezy mountaintops with stunning views, barrier islands where wild...
Learn MoreHere’s something rare in climate reporting: a bit of good news. Or, more accurately, not disastrous news. China has long exerted an outsize role in global climate change, not simply because it’s by far the world’s leading emitter of greenhouse gas, due largely to its enormous population, its rapid growth, and its reliance on dirty coal — but also because of China’s...
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Hot Springs, NC is an Appalachian Trail Community that sits along the French Broad River in the Appalachian Ranger District of Pisgah National Forest. The Appalachian Trail was built through Hot Springs more than seven decades ago, and today white blazes still mark the path through town and over the bridge across the river, before heading north up to the vista, Lover’s...
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Well known Smoky Mountains author and off-trail hiker Jenny Bennett is missing. She was scheduled to move to Vermont on June 1, 2015, but has not been seen. She evidently went for one last hike in the Smokies on Saturday, May 30 or Sunday, May 31 and did not return. The movers arrived at her house on Monday, June 1 and she was not there. She has not been seen or heard...
Learn MoreSeveral trails have been closed today, June 7, 2015, in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park after a bear attack. The trails are closed in the Hazel Creek section of the park. Park officials say last night at about 10:30 p.m. a 16-year-old male from Ohio was pulled from his hammock by a bear. The incident happened at campsite 84 approximately four and a half miles...
Learn MoreA gnarled old oak tree sits atop Bly Gap at 3,800 feet on the Appalachian Trail, famously marking the boundary between Georgia and North Carolina. The Tar Heel State, the second on the northbound thru-hiker’s agenda, wastes no time with fancy introductions, putting a couple of brutally steep 4,000-footers directly ahead: Courthouse Bald and the aptly named Sharp Top....
Learn MoreMore people are visiting Arches National Park every year, and the park superintendent is proposing a reservation system during the busy season to ensure they don’t have to turn people away. But the idea is fiercely opposed by the business community in nearby Moab, Utah, who rely on tourists and fear the system would be confusing and lead to fewer impromptu visits....
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The UK has lost almost all its native wildlife, especially its forests and big animals. Rewilding would bring back everything from beavers to bears. Britain once looked very different. In place of sheep-strewn fields and treeless uplands, there were vast natural forests, glades and wild spaces. Within them, wolves, bears and lynx roamed the land. The first Britons lived...
Learn MoreChinese miners last year dug up 3.87bn tons of coal, more than enough to keep all four of the next largest users – the United States, India, the European Union and Russia – supplied for a year. The country is grappling with the direct costs of that coal, in miners’ lives, crippling air pollution, expanding deserts and “environmental refugees”. Desire for change...
Learn MoreThe Environmental Protection Agency released a draft assessment of its long-awaited study on the impact of hydraulic fracturing — also known as fracking — on drinking water resources in the United States. The report found that although fracking has, to date, been carried out in a way that has not led to widespread and systematic impacts on the country’s drinking water,...
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Established in 1972, Buffalo National River flows freely for 135 miles in Arkansas and is one of the few remaining undammed rivers in the lower 48 states. Once you arrive, prepare to journey from running rapids to quiet pools while surrounded by massive bluffs as you cruise through the Ozark Mountains. At a large curve in the river known as Horseshoe Bend, you can access...
Learn MoreJocelyn Hebert needs no encouragement from Hollywood to hit the hiking trail all by herself. For years, she’s ventured deep into the woods with only her backpack for company. Animals, accidents and creepy strangers aren’t worries for her, although occasionally the whisper of the wind gives her the shivers. “Seriously, the wind can be eerie,”...
Learn MoreVandalism on federal lands isn’t limited to hoodlums and miscreants these days, it’s becoming commonplace, according to information provided by the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest of northeast Oregon. Recently, an outraged visitor on the Deschutes National Forest watched as a family of three etched their names into a railing at Tumalo Falls. A photo of the...
Learn MoreKatherine Gividen greets most people wearing hiking clothes and a big smile. Her passion is hiking, which she promotes as an instructor of the LSU leisure backpacking class, president of the Louisiana Hiking Club and through her job as an outdoor specialist at a local retail store. But it wasn’t hiking trails that brought her to Louisiana. It was food. Following her...
Learn MoreTaxpayers are propping up wildly-inflated coastal property values. At some point, we’ll stop doing that, and coastal property values will crash. Unless they have already crashed because Miami gets hit by its equivalent of Superstorm Sandy. Or because the smart money pulls out of coastal real estate ahead of time after realizing that our climate inaction has made the...
Learn MorePeople interested in getting outdoors in Vermont this summer are now able to check a website for detailed information about hundreds of trails across the state that are open for public use. Officials from the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation and the Upper Valley Trails Alliance unveiled the “Trail Finder” website to help people learn more...
Learn MoreMaybe not everyone believes in Sasquatch (or Bigfoot), but it’s still a good thing to look over your shoulder when you hike in southern Oregon. At least that’s the opinion of the authors of a revolutionary new hiking book, “Hiking Sasquatch Country,” by Wendy and Gary Swanson of Grants Pass. The book covers 39 hikes and 37 historical points of...
Learn MoreThree members of the Denton Drilling Awareness Group were arrested when they refused to move away from the entrance to a fracking site where work began June 2, 2015. Before arresting them, however, Sergeant Jenkins, a 30-year veteran of the Denton police department, thanked the three — Adam Briggle, a professor at the University of North Texas, and Denton residents...
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The Appalachian Trail Conservancy seeks volunteers, 18 and over, to help maintain the Appalachian Trail in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park as part of the Smokies Wilderness Elite Appalachian Trail Crew for the 2015 season. A position on the S.W.E.A.T. Crew is physically demanding and is designed for experienced hikers who love to work hard, live in the...
Learn MoreA hike in the high desert followed by a soak at Ojo Caliente Mineral Springs is one of New Mexico’s true pleasures. The plateau above Ojo Caliente offers gentle hikes through the desert landscape and views of mesas, cliffs, and mountains. The hot mineral waters soothe muscles tired from hiking and provide a feeling of deep relaxation. There are several trails that begin...
Learn MoreChaco Canyon and the greater Chaco landscape of northwest New Mexico draw people together in a unique and enduring way. These lands provide an opportunity to experience the Southwest as it once was – a vast open landscape rich in cultural history. Currently, this landscape beyond the national park’s boundaries is threatenedn. To the Pueblo people, Chaco Canyon is the...
Learn More“Nur die harten kommen in den garten” (only tough guys get into the garden). With this Teutonic exhortation the guide leads us – a group of “soft Scottish mens” – up into the mountains of the South Tirol for a week-long trek around the Sarntal (or Sarentino) Valley. Our collective mountaineering level amounts, approximately, to the endurance required to huff and puff up...
Learn MoreThe Obama administration says a new federal rule regulating small streams and wetlands will protect the drinking water of more than 117 million people in the country. Not so, insist Republicans. They say the rule is a massive government overreach that could even subject puddles and ditches to regulation. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-West Virginia, is promising to...
Learn MoreThe Scandinavian mountain range, running through most of Sweden and Norway, is one of the most underrated hiking locations on the planet. With its vast valleys and low, snow-capped mountains, this northern mountain chain presents a unique landscape filled to the brink with natural treasures to be discovered. Everyone’s heard of the magical fjords of Norway, but few...
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Hiking through the woods is one of the best ways to exercise, but those in Pennsylvania over the next week will be in for a treat as the state celebrates Hiking Week 2015 starting on Saturday, May 30. According to the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and the Keystone Trails Association, there will be almost 100 organized hikes that will make...
Learn MoreCoal-bed methane was going to be the answer to Wyoming’s slumping oil-based economy. Companies flocked to the Powder River Basin in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when the promise of big money was available to anyone with a dream and ability to work hard. Thousands of wells popped up. The BLM oversees 15,662 coal-bed methane wells in the Powder River Basin alone, said...
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Shareholders of ExxonMobil and Chevron — the United States’ top two oil companies — voted down proposals aimed at getting the companies to focus a little more on climate change this week. One of the proposals would have added an independent director with experience in climate change to the boards of both companies. That proposal got about 20 percent of the shareholders’...
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I am Jeff Clark, founder of Internet Brothers, producer of this blog, and passionate about hiking. I live in Western NC near the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky Mountains. Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests are just out my door, so the content will focus on these areas, but let me know what you would like to see on the site. 
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