Explainers

The true costs of coal, natural gas, and other fossil fuels aren’t always obvious—but their impacts can be disastrous.

Attribution science shows us precisely how much climate change is shaping and changing our world.

Assessing the key different types of justice (distributive, procedural, and restorative) within the climate and energy movements can be challenging.

If you’ve encountered these concepts and aren’t totally sure what they mean—we got you.

In the real world, no one is exposed to one pollutant from one source at a time. Cumulative impacts policies seek to address multiple exposures to pollutants and sources of pollution.

Radiation is absorbed by humans in many ways, and can harm the human body in the short and long term.

Radiation is associated with a wide range of adverse health outcomes, including acute radiation sickness, burns, cancer, cardiovascular disease, or even death.

Human-made sources of radiation have increased since the 1940s in the environments people live in and near.

Radioactive materials are elements that spontaneously break apart, or “decay,” into lighter elements over time. Radiation is energy that’s released during that process—and it’s can be dangerous.