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Falling commodity prices unlikely to reduce power costs

I find this E&E story on the costs of building power plants troubling ($ub. req’d). The lead is accurate, but dangerously and deeply misleading: The cost of building power plants and transmission lines have begun falling after years of steep increases, promising to temper electricity rate spikes for consumers, according to a new report. Are […]

It was inevitable

Santa Goes Green. It’s a kids book about a little boy who, instead of toys, wants Santa to spread awareness of global warming because the boy is friends with a polar bear. Two thoughts come to mind: A kid who doesn’t want toys? Srsly? I bet the polar bear eats the boy before the end […]

An ‘eco-friendly’ product that hits home

Sketchy “eco-friendly product” news: Restroom Guardian, a water-soluble packet containing “common granular chemicals,” creates a layer of foam in public toilets to protect your tush. Today’s Best Sentence Ever comes from Dental Economics: “Restroom Guardian helps eliminate unsanitary and unhealthy toilet micro splatter bacterial cross-contamination while greatly lessening unwanted restroom sounds.” You heard it here […]

Over 2 trillion tons of land ice melted in Arctic since 2003

Over 2 trillion tons of land ice melted in the Arctic in the past five years, according to the space agency NASA, together raising global sea levels by one-fifth of an inch. “The best estimates are that sea levels will rise about 18 to 36 inches by the end of the century, but because of […]

The ‘invisible hand’ is blind to climate externalities and the value of natural resources

When Nicholas Stern, former chief economist at the World Bank, released his ground-breaking study in late 2006 on the future costs of climate change, he talked about a massive market failure. He was referring to the failure of the market to incorporate the climate change costs of burning fossil fuels. The costs, he said, would […]

Attempting to un-vex the vexing subject of cap-and-dividend

I was on a conference call earlier this week focused on cap-and-dividend. (You can download the MP3.) C&D, if you don’t recall, is a kind of hybrid cap-and-trade/carbon tax developed by Peter Barnes. A fee would be levied on fossil fuels; the revenue would be refunded to citizens on an equal per capita basis. (Imagine […]

Southwest faces ‘permanent drying’ by 2050

A major new report warns that on our current emissions path, we face the severe risk of abrupt climate change impacts. The basic conclusions themselves are nothing new. But what is stunning is that these warnings come from the United States Geological Survey — the Bush Administration (!). This new science-based report, Abrupt Climate Change, […]

NOAA: U.S. had another record hurricane and tornado season

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s annual climate report tells the warming tale: “For November alone, the month is fourth warmest all-time globally.” This comes on the heels of last month’s report of the second warmest October on record. Since the deniers have become overly fond of 60-day trend lines (see here), one can safely […]

NASA: Another brutally hot year for the Siberian tundra

Unfortunately, the greatest warming in 2008 came in the worst possible place for humanity — the Siberian tundra. That’s clear from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies report on the meteorological year, December 2007 through November 2008: The remarkably widespread warming in the land of the permafrost permamelt should be the big global warming story […]

What green products would you like to see Grist review?

Used to be you had to trek out to your nearest natural-foods hippie-mart to find any sort of organic/natural/ecofriendly product. But now, green products are starting to show up on shelves near and far — at Targets, Wal-Marts, drug stores, and major grocery chains. Trouble is, no matter whether you’re standing in the aisles of […]