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Ontario's 'buy local' energy program growing rapidly

In January, we released a report – Maximizing Jobs From Clean Energy: Ontario’s ‘Buy Local’ Policy – highlighting the impressive job forecast (43,000 jobs) from Ontario’s CLEAN Contract (a.k.a. feed-in tariff) program.  News from the province suggests that the program is overcoming hurdles and continuing to grow. Forecasts for 2011 indicate that Ontario could become […]

A very, very, very fine house: Ask Umbra on communal living

Send your question to Umbra! Q. Dear Umbra, How do I reduce my carbon footprint in a house full of people? Hannah HulsePort Orchard, Wash. A. Dearest Hannah, How best to keep it cool in a communal house?Photo: sheepwoolinsulation.ie You’re on one of those reality shows where they all live together, aren’t you? America’s Next […]

An underwater grid for offshore wind, funded by Google

I have a feature story in the latest issue of Popular Science: “Hundreds of Miles of Wind Farms, Networked Under the Sea.” It’s about the Atlantic Wind Connection, a new project (funded, in part, by Google) that would lay high-voltage transmission lines beneath the sea floor along the mid-Atlantic coast, opening the area up to […]

FDA agents launch covert ops against D.C.-area raw-milk buying club

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has just filed a complaint in federal court, seeking a permanent injunction against Amish farmer Dan Allgyer in Pennsylvania. It accuses him of violating a federal prohibition on interstate sales of raw milk by shipping unpasteurized milk to a Maryland buying club’s members. As part of its complaint, the […]

Grist Hackathon Hangover Report

We just completed our first news hackathon afternoon.  The purpose of the event was to give everyone at Grist the opportunity to try out new tools and ways of working together.  The specific challenge of the day:  given 4 hours, tell a relevant story with data.  That’s it!  No more guidance was given (well OK […]

Now that we’ve killed Osama bin Laden, let’s kill oil

The U.S. military’s killing of Osama bin Laden is a huge victory in the war against terror and on behalf of a safer, freer world. But if this is to be the beginning of the end for al Qaeda and repressive governments everywhere, we have to make it our national mission not just to hunt […]

Leaf or MiEV?

According to <a href=”http://www.nissanusa.com/leaf-electric-car/reservation/index”>this website</a>, Nissan is about to start taking reservations again. <blockquote>Beginning May 1, Nissan will reopen reservations to selected US customers who were registered before April 20, 2011 in states currently selling the Nissan LEAF™ (Arizona, California, Hawaii, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas and Washington). Following this early-reservation period, reservations then will open to […]

Want to save the planet? Al Gore has an app for that

An Inconvenient Truth started out as a book and became an Oscar-winning movie. Al Gore’s follow-up book, Our Choice, has now gone multimedia too, but in a whole new way, as a first-of-its-kind app complete with documentary footage and even a trailer set to swelling, melodramatic music. Watch it here: After Our Choice was published […]

Monsanto-tied scientist abruptly quits key USDA research post

Roger Beachy: back from whence he came. On a slow Friday afternoon, a surprising bit of news came down the pike: Roger Beachy, head of  National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), the main research arm of the USDA, has officially resigned his post, effective May 20. Who is Beachy? When Obama hired Beachy in […]

Chamber of Commerce and auto dealer group lose last-gasp lawsuit to stop clean cars

Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council. The federal court of appeals in Washington today rejected the last legal attack on California’s landmark greenhouse-gas standards for new cars built in model years 2012-16.  The National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sought to overturn EPA’s waiver giving California the green light […]