Today, we may be playing a real-life game of Truth or Consequences. In this version, we have to tell the truth about how we are collectively harming the environment or face the unpredictable consequences.

Food is becoming scarcer and more expensive on a worldwide scale, due to increased consumption in growing countries such as China and India and rising fuel costs.

Lee, 33, sees clotheslines as the solution. But a growing number of housing complexes and communities, viewing them as eyesores that lower property values, have gone so far as to ban them.

The colossal mismanagement of water in Georgia has produced an urban crisis with no clear solution other than a return to smart government.

In his fleece vest and green fedora, the small, middle-aged Irishman looks simultaneously rugged and elfin. A plastic tray of fruit salad vibrates beneath his seat, a gift for locals who are used to subsisting on moose, pickerel, and muskrat.

The scientists hope to take a 100-acre section of the University of Michigan Biological Station research forest closer to the state it was in before logging, when it was dominated by different species of trees instead of the present-day aspens.

The Portal, Ariz., scientist said he turned the job down for fear it might prevent him from objectively evaluating the plan and, if he disagreed, from testifying against it in court. He has since decided the project could significantly harm the condor.

The calls at a meeting of environment ministers from the Group of Eight industrialized nations in Japan coincided with rising concern that momentum is draining from U.N.-led efforts to force a new climate change agreement by a December 2009 deadline.

"We're here to defend our river," said Moxia Parakana, a chief who uses his tribe's name for his last name. "If the dam is built, where are we going to live? The fish will go away."

Breault cut her driving time in half. She switched to a diet of locally grown foods near her upstate New York home and lost 70 pounds. She sliced up her credit cards, banished her television and swore off plane travel.