Bay Area state parks to close

05/16/2011
By Victoria Schlesinger

The long-awaited list of the California state parks slated for closure, due to a $33 million budget shortfall through the 2013 fiscal year, was finally released last Friday. Officials announced that 70 parks out of 278 will be closed, and among them are some of the Bay Area’s most well-known campgrounds. If the park’s...
Read more »

The news at Way Out West

04/28/2011
By Victoria Schlesinger

Way Out West will be offline for the next week. We’re taking a little break for some journalism training through a California Endowment Health Reporting Fellowship that we received this winter. The fellowship will help us produce what we hope will be an in-depth and interesting package of stories about California’s green chemistry laws....
Read more »

Goldman Prize Ceremony: A Kick in the Pants

04/13/2011
By Erica Gies
Goldman Prize Ceremony: A Kick in the Pants

EDITORIAL – It’s like the Oscars for the Patagonia set. Every April, just before Earth Day, San Francisco’s environmental community comes together at the city’s Opera House to laud six grassroots activists from around the globe, whose stories enrage and inspire. The Goldman Environmental Prize offers recipients $150,000 to use as they see fit...
Read more »

French radiation organization says exposure risks are no longer negligible

04/12/2011
By Victoria Schlesinger

Just as farmers markets are swinging into full bloom, there’s very disturbing news about radiation from Japan reaching new levels in Europe. And if it’s high there, it’s significantly higher along the West Coast. A French research organization that monitors radiation, CRIIRAD, says the risk of exposure to the radioisotope iodine-131 has risen from...
Read more »

PG&E proposes charging customers to opt out of Smart Meter program

03/24/2011
By Alison Hawkes

PG&E has proposed charging residential customers to opt out of having wireless transmission of electric meters turned off at their homes. The proposal announced Thursday would allow the utility to recoup the expenses it says are associated with running an opt-out program by charging participating customers. The utility has come up with a rate...
Read more »

EPA says trace amounts of radioactive materials reaching West Coast

03/22/2011
By Alison Hawkes

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced on Tuesday that trace amounts of radiation from Japanese nuclear reactors continue to be found in West Coast monitors. Results from RadNet filters in San Francisco, Anaheim, Riverside, and Seattle show three new types of radioactive isotopes previously unreported to the public. They include Cesium-137, Tellurium-132, Iodine-132, and...
Read more »

New Muni crash comes as agency defends safety record

New Muni crash comes as agency defends safety record

A Muni light-rail vehicle was struck by a big rig Monday morning, injuring six people, according to San Francisco Fire Department spokeswoman Lieutenant Mindy Talmadge, in an incident that highlights the rancorous debate happening right now at the state level concerning the city’s transport safety. The California Public Utilities Commission is weighing a decision...
Read more »

Super graph on normal and abnormal radiation exposures

03/21/2011
By Alison Hawkes

Did you know that sleeping next to someone blitzes you with 0.05 millionth of a sievert of radiation per night? That eating a banana gives you 0.1 millionth, and that a day’s dose at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant would give you .0036 sieverts? For some great perspective on the doses of radiation and...
Read more »

Infinitesimal increase in Bay Area radiation detected in EPA’s publically available data

03/18/2011
By Victoria Schlesinger
Infinitesimal increase in Bay Area radiation detected in EPA’s publically available data

As the public searches for answers about radiation from Japan’s growing nuclear crisis reaching the United States, they are turning to the Environmental Protection Agency’s RadNet Central Data Exchange, which makes nationwide radiation levels available multiple times a day. But the data requires expert interpretation and could further confuse and worry novices trying to...
Read more »

California officials say radiation “plume” from Japan won’t increase state’s levels above normal

03/17/2011
By Alison Hawkes

California health and emergency officials said a “plume” of radiation coming from the Japanese nuclear crisis that’s expected to hit the West Coast as early as tomorrow will bring radiation levels to no higher than normal background levels. The officials from the California Department of Public Health and the California Emergency Management Agency said...
Read more »

Radiation levels difficult for public to obtain, understand

03/17/2011
By Alison Hawkes
Radiation levels difficult for public to obtain, understand

Federal and state officials have been staunchly insistent that radioactive fallout from Japan’s nuclear reactor crisis will not reach California and the rest of the West Coast. But there’s been little ability for the public to gain more detailed information on airborne radiation levels because data from federal monitoring stations are difficult to obtain and...
Read more »

EPA to add more radiation monitors along West Coast

03/16/2011
By Victoria Schlesinger

The Environmental Protection Agency currently operates 12 radiation monitors in California and two in Hawaii, but announced yesterday that it will deploy an undisclosed number of additional monitors. The EPA’s silence on where and how many of the monitors will be added, riled the Sierra Club, which asked for more information. Public concern over...
Read more »

Featured Video

"It's gettin' real in the Whole Foods parking lot" by Smog and Fog Films.

Follow Us!

Recent Comments

Jerry: The statement that the SF Public Utilities Commission is developing local w...
Tree Removal Brisbane: We all love trees!...
Howard Wong: The high risk to the City's finances is a real concern---because the Federa...
MROSD: Thank you for taking an interest in the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space Di...
Mark: If we're financially responsible for the trees fronting our property, I sur...
Anon: So they didn't consider to include non-business owners? What gives?...
Ultra-Humanite: I believe it's called survival of the fittest for a reason....
Mark: Just leave mother nature alone and if that means the demise of the spotted ...
Michelle Burke: If property owners are fined $500 per tree because they failed to give near...
Chris: Reduce City workers benefits to reasonable standards and the City will sudd...

Field Notes Blog

Report: San Francisco faces water-related dangers

San Francisco  has been identified as one of the most vulnerable cities in the nation when it comes to water-related impacts of climate change....
Read more »

Builders cheer demise of California environmental law

Upon attending the West Coast Green events at the Moscone Center in San Francisco this week, I was thrilled to find out that Governor...
Read more »

Recycling carpets in California will save landfill space

Of the myriad of things cramming California landfills, discarded carpets are taking up lots of space. About 400 million pounds are tossed each year,...
Read more »

Got News?

Send story tips or news items for The Daily Catch:

[email protected]

We want to hear from you!

Who we are

Way Out West is a news site for the Bay Area dedicated to daily coverage of local green news.

We're camping out at public meetings, traipsing through parks, and sticking our noses into green tech research to bring you relevant local stories that matter.

WOW is produced by two local environmental journalists for you, our eco-savvy readers. We'd love to hear what you want from this site.