Elizabeth Shogren
Elizabeth Shogren is an NPR News Science Desk correspondent focused on covering environment and energy issues and news.
Since she came to NPR in 2005, Shogren's reporting has covered everything from the damage caused by the BP oil spill on the ecology of the Gulf Coast, to the persistence of industrial toxic air pollution as seen by the legacy of Tonawanda Coke near Buffalo, to the impact of climate change on American icons like grizzly bears.
Prior to NPR, Shogren spent 14 years as a reporter on a variety of beats at The Los Angeles Times, including four years reporting on environmental issues in Washington, D.C., and across the country. While working from the paper's Washington bureau, from 1993-2000, Shogren covered the White House, Congress, social policy, money and politics, and presidential campaigns. During that time, Shogren was given the opportunity to travel abroad on short-term foreign reporting assignments, including the Kosovo crisis in 1999, the Bosnian war in 1996, and Russian elections in 1993 and 1996. Before joining the Washington bureau, Shogren was based in Moscow where she covered the breakup of the Soviet Union and the rise of democracy in Russia for the newspaper.
Beginning in 1988, Shogren worked as a freelance reporter based in Moscow, publishing in a variety of newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, The Dallas Morning News, the San Francisco Chronicle, and The Washington Post. During that time, she covered the fall of the Berlin Wall and the peaceful revolution in Prague.
Shogren's career in journalism began in the wire services. She worked for the Associated Press in Chicago and at United Press International in Albany, NY.
Throughout Shogren's career she has received numerous awards and honors including as a finalist for the 2011 Goldsmith Prize for investigative reporting, the National Wildlife Federation National Conservation Achievement Award, the Meade Prize for coverage of air pollution and she was an IRE finalist. She is a member of Sigma Delta Chi and the Society of Professional Journalist.
After earning a Bachelor of Arts in Russian studies at the University of Virginia, Shogren went on to receive a Master of Science in journalism from Columbia University.
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The system Congress set up to clean up poisonous air pollution still leaves many communities exposed to risky concentrations of benzene, formaldehyde, mercury and many other hazardous chemicals. -
After Tonawanda's residents got sick, they vowed to fight high levels of hazardous chemicals emitting from a dilapidated plant. In doing so, they found weaknesses in how EPA regulates air pollution.
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Wind and solar get lots of attention, but another kind of renewable power creates more energy in the U.S. — wood. Massachusetts decided these plants aren't green enough to get some special breaks.
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To withstand their 9,300-mile migration, red knots feast on eggs from horseshoe crabs each spring in Delaware Bay. Scientists worry many crabs are starting to lay eggs before the birds can get there. -
A new U.S. government report tells an unambiguous story: The planet is warming, climate change is driven primarily by people and it's already affecting Americans, through more frequent or intense heat waves, downpours and, in some regions, floods or droughts.
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The Supreme Court is upholding a major EPA air pollution rule. The rule seeks to rein in pollution from power plant smoke stacks which can make the air in downwind states unhealthy. Researchers say the rule finally addresses a disconnect between the science of air pollution and the laws that had tried to clean it up.
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Environmental groups that have mired the Keystone XL pipeline in delays now are focusing on LNG export terminals. They say opening up exports of natural gas will hasten domestic hydraulic fracturing.
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The Justice Department wants the settlement with mining company Kerr-McGee to send a powerful message: corporations can't shirk their responsibility to clean up the toxic legacies of their operations. -
Since the world community banned whaling, Japan has continued to permit its fleet to kill whales under the guise of scientific research. The International Court of Justice in the Hague Monday ordered Japan to stop whaling in the Antarctic Ocean. Japan says it will abide by the ruling.
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In the aftermath of the 1989 oil spill off the Alaskan coast, scientists expected the worst damage to be short-lived. Instead, the spill shattered conventional wisdom about oil's affect on wildlife.
