An essential guide for those dealing with the Cape Water Crisis and for general water saving in South and southern Africa, a notoriously water-scarce region.

Three provinces in South Africa have been declared national disaster zones because of drought. The way we think about water needs to change, and fast. This is especially true for those of us who have running water and flush sanitation piped into our homes. For millions of South Africans, water is already a precious resource that costs toil to collect and fuel to heat. Our middle-class expectations that water will gush steaming from our dozens of indoor taps 24/7 are going to look as bizarre to future generations as the spectacle of Cleopatra bathing in asses’ milk. Our Roman-orgy relationship with water is over.

This book will hopefully help to alleviate water panic and distress. A “can-do” compendium, it’s meant to be a guide, not prescriptive – not all solutions or tips are one-size-fits-all. Think of it as an ally in your fight to save water and part of your survival kit, along with the first-aid box; Valium for water-worriers.

After centuries of relative isolation, the Karoo – South Africa’s parched heartland – is a latecomer to the tourist industry. What was once viewed as a harsh and desolate place of limited attraction is rapidly gaining popularity with visitors who now make the Karoo their destination, keen to partake of its legendary charm, its extraordinary flora and the resurgence of wildlife that once again populates its plains.

Wild Karoo documents Mitch Reardon’s 4,000-kilometre journey of discovery through the region. The book focuses on:

• local nature conservation in all its facets
• the game, large and small – some recently reintroduced – plus birds, reptiles and invertebrates
• the unique, arid-adapted flora
• the landscape and geology
• the history and lifestyle of the people who have made a home here
• plans to combine public and private protected land to create wildlife corridors between isolated parks, re-establishing old migration routes and so reversing some of the effects of human settlement

Beautifully written, and illustrated with evocative photographs, this book is a must read for anyone interested in travel, wildlife and the environment.

From the depths of the oceans to the highest reaches of the atmosphere, the human impact on the environment is significant and undeniable. These forms of global and local environmental change collectively appear to signal the arrival of a new geological epoch: the Anthropocene. This is a geological era defined not by natural environmental fluctuations or meteorite impacts, but by collective actions of humanity. Environmental Transformations offers a concise and accessible introduction to the human practices and systems that sustain the Anthropocene. It combines accounts of the carbon cycle, global heat balances, entropy, hydrology, forest ecology and pedology, with theories of demography, war, industrial capitalism, urban development, state theory and behavioural psychology. This book charts the particular role of geography and geographers in studying environmental change and its human drivers. It provides a review of critical theories that can help to uncover the socio-economic and political factors that influence environmental change. It also explores key issues in contemporary environmental studies, such as resource use, water scarcity, climate change, industrial pollution and deforestation. These issues are `mapped' through a series of geographical case studies to illustrate the particular value of geographical notions of space, place and scale, in uncovering the complex nature of environmental change in different socio-economic, political and cultural contexts. Finally, the book considers the different ways in which nations, communities and individuals around the world are adapting to environmental change in the twenty-first century. Particular attention is given throughout to the uneven geographical opportunities that different communities have to adapt to environmental change and to the questions of social justice this situation raises. This book encourages students to engage in the scientific uncertainties that surround the study of environmental change, while also discussing both pessimistic and more optimistic views on the ability of humanity to address the environmental challenges of our current era.

You know you should be doing something to help save our planet, but it sounds hard, something that you will tackle another day.

Going green all at once is too much for almost anyone to achieve. Instead, try to make just one change, or add one new sustainable habit, each week. After one year you will be amazed at how much you have accomplished.

A Greener Tomorrow will give you tips on simple things that you can start doing straight away – be it at work, at home, and in your garden. Let’s all do our part in saving this planet – allowing our children’s grandchildren to still live in a world that is beautiful.

A Greener Tomorrow contains over 150 bite-sized chunks of greening advice from the likes of eco-friendly South Africans Arthur Goldstuck; Ashley Hayden; Barry Ronge; Brand Pretorius; Bryan Habana; Casey B. Dolan; Caspe De Vries; Damon Galgut; Gary Kirsten; Jan Braai; Jane Griffiths; Jassy Mackenzie; John van de Ruit; Marc Lottering; Max du Preez; Michiel Heyns; Paige Nick; Romy Titus; Tanit Phoenix; Tony Leon and more.

The world is overflowing with waste and it's time to take action. You can make positive changes without radically altering your lifestyle. This practical book suggests ways to reduce waste, including how to cut unnecessary packaging, patch up or recycle old household items and drastically limit food waste. With 101 simple ways to create less waste, you'll find it easy to take the first step and make a difference.

From the kings of the Indus Valley to Hannibal's Alpine cavalry, humans have been living and working with elephants for millennia. In Giants of the Monsoon Forest, Jacob Shell travels to communities that still rely on this ancient partnership. After the 2004 tsunami, Indonesian officials deployed trained Sumatran elephants to clear wreckage. Along the mountainous Indian-Burmese border, the logging industry employs several thousand elephants. They share these forests with Kachin rebels, who navigate a secret network of trails atop elephant mounts. Blending history, science and reportage, Giants of the Monsoon Forest offers a new perspective on animal intelligence and reveals an unexpected relationship between evolution in the natural world and political struggles in the human one. By working together, fugitive elephants and humans help preserve the wild spaces they both need to survive.

Thirty years ago Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about climate change. Now he broadens the warning: the entire human game, he suggests, has begun to play itself out. Bill McKibben's groundbreaking book The End of Nature -- issued in dozens of languages and long regarded as a classic -- was the first book to alert us to global warming. But the danger is broader than that: even as climate change shrinks the space where our civilization can exist, new technologies like artificial intelligence and robotics threaten to bleach away the variety of human experience. Falter tells the story of these converging trends and of the ideological fervor that keeps us from bringing them under control. And then, drawing on McKibben's experience in building 350.org, the first truly global citizens movement to combat climate change, it offers some possible ways out of the trap. We're at a bleak moment in human history -- and we'll either confront that bleakness or watch the civilization our forebears built slip away. Falter is a powerful and sobering call to arms, to save not only our planet but also our humanity.

The follow up to the New York Times bestselling An Inconvenient Truth, this timely book will publish in time for the premiere of Vice President Gore's theatrical new documentary, An Inconvenient Truth 2. This new book will be a daring call to action, exposing the reality of how humankind has aided in the destruction of our planet and groundbreaking information on what you can do now.

Vice President Al Gore, one of our environmental heroes and a leading expert in climate change, brings together cutting-edge research from top scientists around the world; approximately 200 photographs and illustrations to visually articulate the subject matter; and personal anecdotes and observations to document the fast pace and wide scope of global warming. He presents, with alarming clarity and conclusiveness - and with humor, too - that the fact of global climate change is not in question and that its consequences for the world we live in will be assuredly disastrous if left unchecked. This new book will also show an impassioned Vice President Gore traveling around the globe to tell a story of change in the making. He connects the dots of Zika, flooding, and other natural disasters weve lived through in the last 10+ years and much more.

Where Gore's first film took us through the technical aspects of climate change, the second film is a gripping, narrative journey that leaves the audience filled with hope and the urge to take action immediately. The book will capture that same essence and will be a must-have for anybody who cares deeply about our planet.

"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both." -- Yvon Chouinard For nearly 80 years, Yvon Chouinard has followed his own advice, pursuing, with equal fervor, sports adventures, business excellence, and environmental activism. Since 1950, he has captured the lessons and revelations he's learned in articles and books, personal letters and poetry, introductions and eulogies. In this fascinating inside look, Chouinard himself has selected his favorites from years of reflection, all accompanied by illustrative photos, many never published before. The results is both more of Chouinard's iconoclastic and provocative thinking, his skilled storytelling and sense of humor, and a picture of the evolution of his thoughts and philosophies. With articles on sports, from falconry to fishing and climbing to surfing, with musings on the purpose of business and the importance of environmental activism, this very personal book is like sitting on the couch with this amazing man, flipping through his photo album as he tells the stories of his life. Some Stories is an eclectic portrait of a unique life lived well. Yet the final pages of the book indicate that Chouinard will continue to challenge people, business, and the world. He presents the company's new simple but direct mission statement, revised for the first time in 27 years: "We are in business to save our home planet." With it he emphasizes the urgency of the climate crisis then entreats every person's obligation to reflect on, commit to, and act on this mission.

Environmental governance encompasses our relations to nature, spanning institutions and policies in fields such as biodiversity loss, climate change, land use and pollution. This book offers tools for the study of environmental conflicts, analyzes the current status of environmental policies and discusses why we are so far from resolving many of the issues we face. It also offers alternative directions for future environmental governance. Key features include: * an interdisciplinary and integrated approach * an overview of the field of environmental governance * a focus both on local and global challenges and policies * the positioning of environmental governance within the wider field of economic policy and development. This book will be ideal for interdisciplinary masters programs in environmental studies and environmental policy and management. It will also be of great value to practitioners in the field exploring alternative solutions for governance of environmental resources.

The environment has long been the undisputed territory of the political Left, which casts international capitalism, consumerism, and the over-exploitation of natural resources as the principle threats to the planet, and sees top-down interventions as the most effective solution.
In How to Think Seriously About the Planet, Roger Scruton rejects this view and offers a fresh approach to tackling the most important political problem of our time. The environmental movement, he contends, is philosophically confused and has unrealistic agendas. Its sights are directed at the largescale events and the confrontation between international politics and multinational business. But Scruton argues that no large-scale environmental project, however well-intentioned, will succeed if it is not rooted in small-scale practical reasoning. Seeing things on a large scale promotes top-down solutions, managed by unaccountable bureaucracies that fail to assess local conditions and are rife with unintended consequences. Scruton argues for the greater efficacy of local initiatives over global schemes, civil association over political activism, and small-scale institutions of friendship over regulatory hyper-vigilance. And he suggests that conservatism is far better suited to solving environmental problems than either liberalism or socialism. Rather than entrusting the environment to unwieldy NGOs and international committees, we must assume personal responsibility and foster local control. People must be empowered to take charge of their environment, to care for it as they would a home, and to involve themselves through the kind of local associations that have been the traditional goal of conservative politics.
Our common future is by no means assured, but as Roger Scruton clearly demonstrates in this important book, there is a path that can ensure the future safety of our planet and our species.

In the face of the failure of the traditional `command and control' model of environmental regulation to curb the devastating losses of biodiversity around the world, policymakers are increasingly seeking new approaches to deal with this complex interdisciplinary issue. The Privatisation of Biodiversity? provides a timely contribution to this debate by exploring the legal aspects and the scope to strengthen conservation through these reforms. Colin Reid and Walters Nsoh draw on literature well beyond legal sources, particularly from ecology, environmental economics and philosophy to reach a number of pragmatic conclusions on the issues discussed. The new approaches explored include payment for ecosystem services, biodiversity offsetting and conservation covenants, as well as taxation and impact fees. Such mechanisms introduce elements of a market approach as well as private sector initiative and resources. This book considers both the practical and ethical aspects of the regulatory choices available to identify the potential and limitations of an increasingly market-based regime. Bringing clarity and coherence to a complex issue, this book will act as a useful tool for environmental and public law scholars as well as other academics in a range of fields interested in biodiversity conservation. It will also provide valuable insight for policymakers, legal practitioners involved in planning, environmental and agricultural matters, public bodies with responsibility for conservation, landowners, managers and developers, individuals and NGOs dedicated to biodiversity, and students of nature conservation interested in exploring new mechanisms for achieving their objectives.

Cedric Robinson has held the historic office of `Queen's Guide to the Kent Sands of Morecambe Bay' for more than 55 years. His role has given him a unique insight into changes affecting the bay and its coastal communities. Now, as he takes on a new ambassadorial role, he passes on his experience and observations - and reveals the startling effects of climate change. Lindsay Sutton is a triple awardwinning journalist, author, and a former TV broadcaster and producer. He has plied his media trade for nearly 50 years, and has known `Ced' Robinson for much of that time. This book - "a labour of love for an old friend" - is more than a `thank you,'as Cedric moves from being the record-breaking Queen's Guide to the Sands to the position of `Ambassador of the Sands,' and adviser to his successor. `Sands of Time' examines the health and well-being of Morecambe Bay over the past 55 years of Cedric's tenure. The book looks at the bay and its surrounding communities through the prism of Cedric's keen observations and thoughts. With characteristic openness, he tells it how he sees it. His views are fearless, but also illustrate his fondness, sprinkled with his often-wicked sense of humour. Cedric Robinson has held the historic office of`Queen's Guide to the Kent Sands of Morecambe Bay' for more than 55 years. His role has given him a unique insight into changes affecting the bay and its coastal communities. Now, as he takes on a new ambassadorial role, he passes on his experience and observations - and reveals the startling effects of climate change. Following in the footsteps of Cedric Robinson on Morecambe Bay `Sands of Time' deals with today's burning issues:- * How climate change is affecting the bay dramatically. * How the channels have changed since the `Swinging Sixties.' * The effect on wildlife, in and out of the water. * Ecology and pollution threats, affecting the bay and its coast. * Technology and its impact, including future plans. Cedric likes the scope and content of the book: he hopes you do too.

Hailed as "the great nature writer of this generation" (Wall Street Journal), Robert Macfarlane is the celebrated author of books about the intersections of the human and the natural realms. In Underland, he delivers his masterpiece: an epic exploration of the Earth's underworlds as they exist in myth, literature, memory, and the land itself. In this highly anticipated sequel to his international bestseller The Old Ways, Macfarlane takes us on an extraordinary journey into our relationship with darkness, burial, and what lies beneath the surface of both place and mind. Traveling through "deep time"-the dizzying expanses of geologic time that stretch away from the present-he moves from the birth of the universe to a post-human future, from the prehistoric art of Norwegian sea caves to the blue depths of the Greenland ice cap, from Bronze Age funeral chambers to the catacomb labyrinth below Paris, and from the underground fungal networks through which trees communicate to a deep-sunk "hiding place" where nuclear waste will be stored for 100,000 years to come. "Woven through Macfarlane's own travels are the unforgettable stories of descents into the underland made across history by explorers, artists, cavers, divers, mourners, dreamers, and murderers, all of whom have been drawn for different reasons to seek what Cormac McCarthy calls "the awful darkness within the world." Global in its geography and written with great lyricism and power, Underland speaks powerfully to our present moment. Taking a deep-time view of our planet, Macfarlane here asks a vital and unsettling question: "Are we being good ancestors to the future Earth?" Underland marks a new turn in Macfarlane's long-term mapping of the relations of landscape and the human heart. From its remarkable opening pages to its deeply moving conclusion, it is a journey into wonder, loss, fear, and hope. At once ancient and urgent, this is a book that will change the way you see the world.

Wildlife agents prepare themselves for anything. In the blink of an eye, a routine arrest for hunting rabbits at night -- a crime that carries only a nominal fine -- can turn into a manhunt, with an officer's life suddenly at risk.

In Louisiana Wildlife Agents, officers tell of the unimaginable dangers lurking in their supposedly mundane tasks as they police Louisiana's bayous and backroads. The sequel to Game Warden: On Patrol in Louisiana, this book allows wardens to share their stories detailing the perils and pleasures of life behind the wildlife badge.

Jerald Horst has compiled dozens of vivid anecdotes, including, among others, accounts of the grueling training academy for wildlife agents and the real dangers in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, all told in the officers' voices. Agents' spouses also share their perspectives on the work of a wildlife guardian.

Thrilling and amusing, at times heart-wrenching, but always life-affirming, the stories of Louisiana Wildlife Agents will instill in readers a new respect and appreciation for this challenging profession.

Of all law enforcement officers, game wardens inspire the most awe in the mind of the public. Working day and night, often in challenging terrain and bad weather, game wardens typically operate alone in remote areas and must understand the natural rhythms and cycles of the creatures and ecosystems they protect, all while encountering and sometimes interacting with people who are usually armed. Outdoors writer Jerald Horst spent one year riding on patrol with game wardens in the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. In riveting episodes, he chronicles their adventures, providing an up-close view of this demanding job and the band of men who take it on.

From the piney woods of the northwestern part of the state to the soggy Mississippi River delta and beyond to the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, Horst accompanied dozens of wildlife agents, observing them, asking questions, sometimes sitting for hours with no action, and occasionally fearing for his life, as in the case of one speedboat chase. His candid observations show that the work of agents is often mentally and physically challenging, sometimes tedious, and -- more often than would be expected -- humorous, but never dull.

Whether wardens are conducting routine checks of law-abiding sportsmen or in pursuit of suspected poachers, the unanticipated is the norm. A seemingly ordinary stop can turn deadly in an instant. As one officer told Horst "complacency can get you killed." More than a job, serving as a game warden is a way of life, and Horst relates how the agents he met came to their calling.

An objective look at a heroic career, Game Warden offers an enthralling portrait of both the profession and the men behind the badge.

Contrary to the common rhetoric that being green is `easy', household sustainability is rife with contradiction and uncertainty. Households attempting to respond to the challenge to become more sustainable in everyday life face dilemmas on a daily basis when trying to make sustainable decisions. Various aspects of life such as cars, computers, food, phones and even birth and death, may all provoke uncertainty regarding the most sustainable course of action. Drawing on international scientific and cultural research, as well as innovative ethnographies, this timely book probes these wide-ranging sustainability dilemmas, assessing the avenues open to households trying to improve their sustainability. The authors engage critically, and constructively, with the proposition that households are a key scale of action on climate change. They confront dilemmas of practice and circumstance, and cultural norms of lifestyle and consumerism that are linked to troublesome environmental problems - and question whether they can be easily unsettled. The work also illuminates the informal and often unheralded work by households - frequently the poorest - in reducing their environmental burden. This important book is critical to understanding both the barriers to household sustainability and the `unsung' sustainability work carried out by householders. Containing a unique combination of science and cultural research, this fascinating book will appeal to researchers and students of environmental science, environmental studies, sustainability studies, climate change adaptation, geography, sociology, cultural studies, science and technology studies, as well as energy studies and housing research. Policy-makers in various levels of government working through sustainability problems, environmental educators, social planners and sustainability officers working for governments, will also find much to interest them in this unique book.

In the mid-nineteenth century, Thoreau recognized the importance of preserving the complex and fragile landscape of Cape Cod, with its weathered windmills, expansive beaches, dunes, wetlands, harbors, and the lives that flourished here, supported by the maritime industries and saltworks. One hundred years later, the National Park Service?working with a group of concerned locals, then-senator John F. Kennedy, and other supporters?took on the challenge of meeting the needs of a burgeoning public in this region of unique natural beauty and cultural heritage. To those who were settled in the remote wilds of the Cape, the impending development was threatening, and as the award-winning historian Ethan Carr explains, the visionary plan to create a national seashore came very close to failure. Success was achieved through unprecedented public outreach, as the National Park Service and like-minded Cape Codders worked to convince entire communities of the long-term value of a park that could accommodate millions of tourists. Years of contentious negotiations resulted in the innovative compromise between private and public interests now known as the "Cape Cod model." The Greatest Beach is essential reading for all who are concerned with protecting the nation's gradually diminishing cultural landscapes. In his final analysis of Cape Cod National Seashore, Carr poses provocative questions about how to balance the conservation of natural and cultural resources in regions threatened by increasing visitation and development.

Water has dominated images of the South throughout history, from Hernando de Soto's 1541 crossing of the Mississippi to tragic scenes of flooding throughout the Gulf South after Hurricane Katrina. But these images tell only half the story: as urban, industrial, and population growth create unprecedented demands on water in the South, the problems of pollution and water shortages grow ever more urgent. In Southern Waters: The Limits to Abundance, Craig E. Colten addresses how the South-in an environment fraught with uncertainty-can navigate the twin risks of too much water and not enough. From the arrival of the first European settlers, the South's inhabitants have pursued a course of maximum exploitation and control of the area's plentiful waters, investing widely in wetland drainage and massive flood-control projects. Disputes over southern waterways go back nearly as far: obstruction of fish migration by mill dams prompted new policies to protect aquatic life as early as the colonial era. Colten argues that such conflicts, which have heightened dramatically since the explosive urbanization of the mid-twentieth century, will only become more frequent and intense, making the shift toward sustainable use a national imperative. In tracing the evolving uses and abuses of southern waters, Colten offers crucial insights into the complex historical geography of water throughout the region. A masterful analysis of the ways in which past generations harnessed and consumed water, Southern Waters also stands as a guide to adapting our water usage to cope with the looming shortage of this once-abundant resource.

Are money and technology the core illusions of our time? In this book, Alf Hornborg offers a fresh assessment of the inequalities and environmental degradation of the world. He shows how both mainstream and radical economists are limited by a particular worldview and, as a result, do not grasp that conventional money is at the root of many of the problems that are threatening societies, not to mention planet Earth itself. Hornborg demonstrates how market prices obscure asymmetric exchanges of resources - human labor, land, energy, materials - under a veil of fictive reciprocity. Such unequal exchange, he claims, underpins the phenomenon of technological development, which is, fundamentally, a redistribution of time and space - human labor and land - in world society. Hornborg deftly illustrates how money and technology have shaped our thinking and our social and ecological relations, with disturbing consequences. He also offers solutions for their redesign in ways that will promote justice and sustainability.