Host Steve Curwood talks with Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai about the legacy of colonialism in Africa and her continued efforts to restore and preserve the world’s forests. Maathai recently released a memoir called “Unbowed.”

Maggie Pipkins is a self-employed octogenarian in an unusual line of work. Her business? Growing and selling garden worms. Producer Ian Gray has our portrait.

Will new technology allow us to keep coal power from warming the planet with its greenhouse gas emissions? Living on Earth's Jeff Young visits two very different coal-powered plants to feel the burn.

Host Steve Curwood speaks with singer-songwriter, Kathy Mattea, about her album "Coal.” Mattea plays some songs and talks about growing up in West Virginia coal country, her relationship with the 'black gold', and how mining and burning coal is affecting the environment and the people in her native state.

A recent study finds levels of dioxane, a chemical that causes cancer in mice and rats, in several name brand soaps and shampoos for kids. Dioxane is banned from cosmetics in the European Union but the U.S. federal government has not set limits for dioxane in consumer products. Living on Earth’s Ashley Ahearn reports.