Peter Dykstra dedicated his life to telling the untold stories of the environment. He did it in a way that was informative and clever but also funny, frequently pointing out the absurdities of the political landscape that makes progress on the environment so difficult. I knew Peter well from my time as co-host and editor of the public radio program Living on Earth. Peter was a weekly contributor to the show. Most weeks, I recorded a segment with him that should have taken 15 minutes, but I’d always budget at least 30. The first half of the call I could look forward to a chat that would wander from poking fun at his home state of New Jersey in the U.S., to an update on the pollen situation in his new home in Georgia. Peter was always good for a story, “Bobby, have you ever wondered what happened to the solar panels Jimmy Carter had on the roof of the White House? Well….” While he was at Greenpeace, Peter filed a Freedom of Information Act request and tracked down Carter’s solar panels to a Raiders of the Lost Ark-like government warehouse, and a small college in Maine. Peter got started with environmental work with Greenpeace where he created the organization’s U.S. media program. He went on to work as the executive producer of CNN’s science, tech and weather unit. He was the deputy director at Pew Charitable Trusts for a bit and then became the publisher of Environmental Health News…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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