Latest Articles
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Peak Oil, not Libya, is the reason you’re paying more at the pump
The further into the post-carbon age we grind, the more mainstream the notion of peak oil becomes. Long derided because it runs contrary to the only two things more American than football and corn syrup — that would be endless economic expansion and our right to commute 90 minutes a day, should we so choose […]
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Is Obama’s weak-sauce energy policy just savvy political Kung-Fu?
For the next couple of years, Obama is playing defense on climate change, and that could explain the fairly tame energy policy he announced yesterday, says Ezra Klein of The Washington Post. Like the Kung-Fu masters of yore, he knows that he cannot hope to defeat his opponents in a frontal assault. These are, after […]
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Senator from Louisiana wants to drill for oil in Alaska
David Vitter (R-La.) has 28 cosponsors on a bill in the Senate that would block EPA climate regulations (par for the course), expand offshore oil exploration (how soon we forget), and … open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling. It's the political football that just won't go away. If this country is around […]
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Watch a Robot swap out batteries from this electric vehicle [VIDEO]
Electric cars are the only kind that anyone will be able to afford after we run the eff out of oil, but charging them is a pain. Better Place has a Better Idea™ — when your batteries run low, pull into one of their stations and wait a mere three minutes while a robot swaps […]
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Reversing roles, farmers sue Monsanto over GMO seeds
Genetically modified seed giant Monsanto is notorious for suing farmers [PDF] in defense of its patent claims. But now, a group of dozens of organic farmers and food activists have, with the help of the not-for-profit law center The Public Patent Foundation, sued Monsanto in a case that could forever alter the way genetically modified […]
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White House scuttles rumors it will torpedo EPA regulations
Yesterday, we repeated an Associated Press report which said that President Obama was banding with the GOP to force the EPA to walk the plank — or, well, looking to compromise with the GOP by curtailing EPA's regulatory powers as part of budget negotiations. Shows what we get for trusting the AP. The White House […]
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Solar could save Minnesota schools millions
This post originally appeared on Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project. Currently, Minnesota’s public schools spend approximately $84 million per year on electricity costs, money diverted from the classroom. But a bill to make clean, local energy accessible now (CLEAN) could help the state’s public schools use […]
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Internationally linking carbon trading systems is the wave of the future
The latest rage in Washington policy discussions these days (that’s relevant to climate change) is renewed interest in renewable electricity standards, this time in the form of so-called “clean energy standards.” I’ve written about this policy approach recently and will do so again in the near future, but for today I want to turn to […]
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U.K. guv takes threat of bee-killing pesticides seriously. Why doesn’t the U.S.?
Remember neonicotinoids? They’re the widely used class of pesticides that an increasing body of evidence — including from USDA researchers — implicates in the collapse of honeybee populations. Neonicotinoids are marketed by the agrichemical giant Bayer, which reels in about $800 million in sales from them each year. Germany (Bayer’s home country), France, and Slovenia […]
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Me, on TV, talking Obama’s energy plan [VIDEO]
Yesterday I appeared on The Alonya Show, a political talk show on the RT (previously Russia Today) global news network, talking about Obama’s new energy plan: If I’d known I was going to be on TV, I might have showered. And put on a decent shirt. And shrunk my enormous head. One thing I’d add: […]
