Bio-fuel is coming out of the woodworks, literally! An up and comer in natural energy resources, the jartropha plant is sprouting in the field.

Corn-based ethanol is an environmentally friendly solution to our reliance on oil, right? Not if it creates food shortages in the world's poorest countries.

Wars rage in the Middle East. Gas prices are astronomical. There's a hole in the Alaskan pipeline, and another in the ozone layer. So is now the time to cultivate the youngest generation of SUV-lovers? McDonald's thinks so. Pick up any Hummer Happy Meal and inside you'll find a tiny replica of the gas-guzzling giant.

"This marketing ploy says more about how desperate General Motors has become than anything else," said National Resources Defense Council spokesman Jon Coifman. "Management in Detroit ignored all the signs and bet the farm on big gas guzzlers. Now sales of the huge SUVs and pickups have tanked. Unfortunately, they've taken thousands of good jobs with them."

What to do with all those SUV drivers? Should they be shamed? Mocked? Ostracized? Forced to wear a scarlet SUV across their chest? Greenpeace UK seems to think so.

Where would you want to be living if the price of gas shot up to $5, $6, even $8 a gallon as a result of a terrorist attack on energy supplies or a massive hurricane that wiped out gulf coast refineries? Not Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Houston, Texas, or other unsustainably designed cities, according to a report by the environmental website, SustainLane.com. The study evaluated the top ten cities in the country to live in the event of an oil shock, judging them according to their public transportation systems, access to wireless networks for telecommuting, low level of sprawl, and the availability of locally grown organic produce.

President Bush has selected his nominee to head the Department of Interior, which manages about one-fifth of all the land in the United States and determines which portions of it should be available for resource extraction. As promised, he “looked to the West” and plucked Republican governor of Idaho and former Senator Dirk Kempthorne. The nominee is somewhat less controversial than others who were in the running for this position, and widely expected to be swiftly confirmed. But greens are hardly jumping for joy: Kempthorne is also widely expected to stay the course of the agency's industry-friendly policies under Bush.