LA Times Writers Win Top Environmental Prize

Two reporters with the Los Angeles Times received the top prize for environmental reporting today, according to news from the Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment.

The winning journalists were honored during a Monday morning ceremony at the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Oceanography's Metcalf Institute for Marine and Environmental Reporting.

Los Angeles Times reporters Kenneth R. Weiss and Usha Lee McFarling received the Grantham's grand prize -- $75,000 -- for their work on "Altered Oceans," a five-part series about dramatic ecological changes taking place in the world's seas. The award is the world's largest cash prize for journalism.

Grantham Prize jurors said Weiss and McFarling "did more than simply research the literature and talk to the best minds. They went to the scene to make the case. This extraordinary series gives life to all those generalities about the decline of the oceans in a way that should grab the imaginations not only of politicians responsible for taking corrective steps but also of ordinary readers."

Members of the bipartisan House Oceans Caucus distributed copies of the Times series to every member of the U.S. House of Representatives. The cover letter included with the article warned that the ocean changes described by Weiss and McFarling represent a threat to national security and the economy as well as to the environment.

Three other winners were each honored with a $5,000 Award of Special Merit: Eugene Linden, for his book, "The Winds of Change"; the team that produced the NOVA Television program, "Dimming the Sun"; and writers with the East Oregonian Publishing Company, for a series titled, "Our Climate is Changing ... Ready or Not."

The winners were each scheduled to give a presentation describing how they researched their stories, and to lead a question-and-answer session following their talks. Their discussions were scheduled to be followed by a keynote address by Benjamin D. Santer, a physicist and atmospheric scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. Santer, who conducts statistical analyses of climate data to detect climate change and check climate models, has been a contributor and lead author with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Established in 2005, the Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment recognizes outstanding environmental reporting by journalists, writers or media producers in the U.S. and Canada. The prize is funded by The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment, which supports conservation programs around the world.

The deadline for the 2008 Grantham awards is Jan. 14, 2008, for books, and Feb. 4, 2008, for all other entries.

The Grantham Prize, "Leading Climate Scientist, IPCC Contributor, Dr. Ben Santer to Address 2007 Grantham Prize Journalists." URL: (http://www.granthamprize.org/news/nr091807.htm)