Entries by Keith Schneider

Earth Pushes Back

Era of indifference greets droughts, floods, storms, tsunamis. Photo © Keith Schneider / Circle of Blue India’s policy of free water and free energy to farmers is draining groundwater reserves, polluting air and rivers, and generating economy-weakening brownouts with millions of electric water pumps that irrigate rice and wheat crops so big they rot in […]

Showing Off Circle of Blue Colleagues and Reporting in Traverse City

World-changing reporting fresh from northern Michigan. Photo © Keith Schneider / Circle of Blue Circle of Blue’s Choke Point: China project showed how China’s massive energy-consuming urban construction program, like this development in Xian, is producing an urgent a confrontation over water in the dry north, where much of China’s energy is produced. Click image […]

Matt Black’s California Drought Photographs Featured in New Yorker

Circle of Blue photographer documents Central Valley water shortage. Photo © Matt Black / Circle of Blue A man passes water vending machines in the small farmworker community of Stratford in California’s Central Valley. Click image to enlarge. Matt Black, the California photographer who documented the deepening drought in his home state earlier this year […]

Despite Delays and Billions in Overruns, Olmsted Locks and Dam Project Rolls On

Ohio River project is departure for funds-starved U.S. water infrastructure installations. Photo © Keith Schneider / Circle of Blue The Olmsted Locks and Dam project, the largest and most expensive inland water navigation installation ever built in the United States, is either an outstanding example of American technical excellence and persistence, or a folly of […]

World Water Week Offers Answers To Scarcity, Pollution, and Security

Stockholm hosts largest-ever international conference on global contest for water and energy. Photo © Keith Schneider / Circle of Blue The 24th annual World Water Week in Stockholm attracted 3,000 participants from 130 countries to discuss the ties between energy and water. Click image to enlarge. STOCKHOLM — Of all the world’s developed nations, none […]

Circle of Blue Wins Society of Environmental Journalists Awards for Reporting and Photojournalism

Coverage of “the world’s quest for water” is timely, intimate, and dramatic.

India’s Faltering Energy Production and Damaged Water Resources Demand Modi’s Close Attention

India’s new Prime Minister Narendra Modi swept into office in May on a message of aspiration, and a reputation for action.

Growth in Lima, Peru’s Capital, Served Without Water

Ubiquitous water trucks are a guide to Peru’s swelling metropolis. Photo © J. Carl Ganter / Circle of Blue Lima’s water trucks provide guides to understanding the circumstances affecting 21st century Peru, and to a larger extent the other fast-growing cities of Latin America. Municipal governments and taxpayers are not anxious to invest in water […]

India’s Treacherous Coal Mines in Meghalaya

National court orders end to feudal labor conditions, wanton water pollution, and deadly accidents. By Keith Schneider, Circle of Blue SHILLONG, India – In the coalfields of Meghalaya, a wild and rural state in Northeast India, income and social standing are, quite literally, correlated on a perpendicular scale. In This Series Uttarakhand’s Furious Himalayan Flood […]