If you aren’t attending WILD9–the weeklong World Wilderness Congress (November 6-13) that will bring together many of the world’s leading conservationists and wilderness experts to debate and take action on critical environmental issues–you can still pull up a chair and join in through a variety of social networking tools that The WILD Foundation is using to broaden global participation in the event. The WILD Foundation started the World Wilderness Congress in 1977, and over the past 32 years it has become a respected international forum that fosters thoughtful debate on a range of important environmental issues and leads to practical conservation measures that get results. The World Wilderness Congress convenes every three or four years and attracts experts and interested parties worldwide–from leaders in government and the private sector to native peoples, academics and artists.

The United Nations has named Tinker Bell–a leading citizen of both Disneyland and Neverland–as its “Honorary Ambassador of Green” to help promote environmental awareness among children. Kermit the Frog once observed in song that “it’s not easy being green,” but he was talking about skin color, not lifestyle

The Senate plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow global warming would increase energy costs by about $100 annually (actually $80-$111) for a typical U.S. household, according to an analysis by the Environmental Protection Agency. That’s roughly the same figure the EPA calculated for similar legislation that the U.S

The Obama administration today announced a new plan to designate more than 200,000 square miles of Alaskan territory as “critical habitat” for polar bears, a threatened species that has become to global warming what canaries once were to coal mines: the visible early warning of pending disaster.

The Environmental Protection Agency on Friday halted the largest mountaintop coal mining operation in Appalachia ever to receive a federal permit–the first time in the EPA’s 37-year history that the agency has used its regulatory power to stop an already approved project.

The next time you’re shopping for a new car, you may want to check out not only the vehicle’s fuel economy and safety rating but also its bear appeal , especially if you plan to spend much time visiting national parks. Here’s a tip: forget the minivan and go for the sports car. Year after year, minivans have been among the top choices of black bears in Yosemite National Park, according to a study reported in the October 2009 issue of the Journal of Mammalogy .

Pittsburgh will be the North American host city for World Environment Day in 2010, according to an announcement made today by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The United Nations founded World Environment Day in 1972 to stimulate environmental awareness and action. The theme for World Environment Day 2010 is “Biodiversity: Connecting with Nature.” If Pittsburgh strikes you as an odd choice to host a high-profile environmental event, perhaps you still associate Pittsburgh with steel factories belching smoke or, later, as the de facto capital of the Rust Belt when those factories started to close.

Late last week, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar countered the “drill, baby, drill” mantra of many energy executives and congressional Republicans with the equivalent of “chill, baby, chill” when he…