Backgrounders

Issue Backgrounder is a monthly SEJournal Online column to help journalists better cover emerging environmental issues, especially challenging or underreported topics. Each Backgrounder focuses on a specific environmental topic, offering key questions, basic answers, source contacts and other resources.

For questions and comments, or to suggest future Issue Backgrounders, email Backgrounder Editor Joseph A. Davis at sejournaleditor@sej.org.

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July 15, 2011

Enterprising Stories Stand Out in Recent Disaster Coverage — From Japan to Texas

Here's a sampling of coverage of recent extreme weather disasters, with particular focus on a few of the many enterprise stories that emanated from four clusters of events — the tsunami-caused crisis at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, drought and wildfires in Texas, death-dealing tornadoes in the Southeast and massive flooding in the Mississippi River system.

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April 15, 2011

For Climate Change Reporters, Here's an Essential Reading List

Reporters new to the climate change issue and those having to immerse themselves into it while also grappling with a range of other important environmental (and, given the nature of today’s newsrooms, also non-environmental) issues might try these "must see" resources and websites.

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January 15, 2011

Tiny Bits of Silver, Used As Bacteria-Eaters, Emerge As New Health Concern

Rae Tyson reports there may well be a connection between odor-resistant socks and an emerging health and environmental concern.

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October 15, 2010

Gulf Oil Leak Shrouds Climate Change But Still Holds Key Issues

For journalists covering major energy- and environment-related stories and natural disasters, the visually gushing BP Gulf of Mexico oil leak easily supplanted climate change and other national stories in the steadily shrinking news hole. Yet there are striking parallels between the sudden and in-your-face Gulf BP spill and the incremental and nonlinear climate change issue.

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July 15, 2010

Media Play Key, Sometimes Misleading, Role in Public's View of Climate Research

The media may play a role in misleading the public, especially when journalists attempt a "false balance" in stories, giving equal treatment to climate science skeptics who question the validity of climate science studies.

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For Reporters Roving the World, Do Your Homework and Take a Deep Breath

Freelance journalist Naomi Lubick offers tips from journalists who travel internationally to do their reporting. They all suggested that before you set off on your voyage, you have to be prepared — mentally, technically and physically.

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Can Geoengineering Technology Somehow Stave Off This Climate Mess?

SEJ has long called climate change the story of the century. Geoengineering is the new twist in this story and will be a key element — for good or bad — in decades to come.

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How the U.S. Media Fumbled "Climategate" and Other Climate Coverage

Did the American media fall short on stories about stolen/leaked scientists' emails and IPCC report errors? To gauge expert opinion on that question, SEJournal surveyed four close observers and analysts of the way that climate issues are covered.

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January 15, 2010

E-Reporting Biz: It Can Be Dangerous Being An E-Journalist in the Digital Age

The digital age of environmental journalism has brought with it an ugly underbelly characterized by increasingly bitter personal exchanges and accusations and a sucking-up of countless hours of productive reporting time and effort. How reporters handle these distractions may shape how well the American public understands, or doesn't understand, the climate challenge they and future generations will face.

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October 15, 2009

Letting the Reader See Your Editorial Judgments Might Enhance Them

For purely journalistic reasons, reporters could periodically write about those things they had decided not to cover: Their rationale and providing links, even, for those wanting to know more. They can thereby open the doors to their own internal news decision-making, let the public see in, all in the interest of their better understanding the news-making process.

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Backgrounders

July 15, 2011

Enterprising Stories Stand Out in Recent Disaster Coverage — From Japan to Texas

April 15, 2011

For Climate Change Reporters, Here's an Essential Reading List

January 15, 2011

Tiny Bits of Silver, Used As Bacteria-Eaters, Emerge As New Health Concern

October 15, 2010

Gulf Oil Leak Shrouds Climate Change But Still Holds Key Issues

July 15, 2010

Media Play Key, Sometimes Misleading, Role in Public's View of Climate Research

For Reporters Roving the World, Do Your Homework and Take a Deep Breath

Can Geoengineering Technology Somehow Stave Off This Climate Mess?

How the U.S. Media Fumbled "Climategate" and Other Climate Coverage

January 15, 2010

E-Reporting Biz: It Can Be Dangerous Being An E-Journalist in the Digital Age

October 15, 2009

Letting the Reader See Your Editorial Judgments Might Enhance Them

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