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Environment

The planet, the pressure it's under, and what's genuinely working.

The Largest Oil Spill in History Was Not an Accident

Deepwater Horizon leaked about four million barrels and became the most famous spill on earth. NOAA's estimate for the Persian Gulf in 1991 starts at six million, and almost nobody can tell you the date it happened.

A Jury Told Exxon to Pay $5 Billion for Poisoning Alaska. Nineteen Years Later, the Court Cut It by 90%

The 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster fouled 1,300 miles of Alaskan coast and killed a quarter-million seabirds. A jury tried to make Exxon pay $5 billion. What happened to that penalty over 19 years tells you how accountability really works.

For 87 Days, Oil Poured Into the Gulf. The Record $20 Billion Settlement Still Didn't Cover the Damage

The 2010 Deepwater Horizon blowout killed 11 workers and poured millions of barrels into the Gulf. It produced the largest environmental settlement in US history, and a decade of damage no cheque could price.

A Well Bled Into the Gulf of Mexico for 294 Days, Three Times Longer Than Deepwater Horizon. The Total Ever Paid to America Was $4 Million

Thirty years before Deepwater Horizon, an almost identical blowout happened in almost the same sea, and ran more than three times as long. Then Pemex said one word, immunity, and the bill never came.

The Ozone Layer Is Healing: the Environmental Disaster We Actually Fixed

In the 1980s a hole in the sky threatened everything alive. Then the whole world did something it has never quite managed since: it agreed, acted fast, and fixed it.