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Policy fixes to unleash clean energy, part 8

U.S. energy and environmental policy sucks. We burn too much fuel, we emit too much pollution and we do so under a set of rules that cause us to spend far too much on energy, even as we use it in volumes that poison our planet, our geopolitics and our economy. We deserve better. That […]

Bill Barrett Corporation deploys lobbyists to protect sweet drilling deal in the Rockies

Drilling companies seeking to exploit unconventional energy resources in the Rocky Mountain wilderness and elsewhere are running into all kinds of obstacles these days, thanks to lawsuits, regulations, and pesky citizens who would rather ensure their drinking water remains, well, drinkable, preferably without fear of ingesting toxic chemicals or lighting themselves on fire when they […]

Policy fixes to unleash clean energy, part 7

Having noted in part 2 that all barriers to clean energy deployment can be lumped into utility policy, environmental policy, and out-of-date policy — and having outlined the necessary fixes for the first two in parts 5 and 6 — we now address out-of-date policies. This is perhaps the hardest to address, because it is […]

Gold, silver, bronze, & green

What do the Vancouver Olympics have to do with Sir Richard Branson’s “Carbon War Room” and solar power? We hear from venture capitalist Jack Hidary on this Planet Forward webisode. Hidary and Branson aren’t just enjoying the sporting events at the Vancouver Olympics. They’ve started a “Carbon War Room” which is looking for market-driven solutions […]

From staple to superfood: açaí goes industrial

“The fruit was traditionally collected from wild palms. Now companies have açaí plantations, and collectors are raising more açaí palms on their land, according to Antônio Cordeiro de Santana, an agricultural economist at the Rural Federal University of the Amazon. With cultivation more concentrated, resistance to disease and productivity have decreased, he said, even as […]

Smithfield tries to weave a silk purse from a sow’s ear

“Just this week I promoted somebody–and I can’t even believe I’m saying this word here, folks–to a chief sustainability officer.”—Larry Pope, CEO of Smithfield Foods, speaking before the North Carolina Agribusiness Council. Smithfield’s environmental record was nicely documented in the classic 2006 Rolling Stone article “Boss Hog.”

Obama’s Partnership for Sustainable Communities will put the feds’ weight behind smart growth

The word “silos” is most often used to talk about grain or coal, not the federal government. But in the case of transportation and housing — two sectors that accounted for more than 43 percent of the nation’s carbon emissions in 2008 — Washington’s siloed approach of divided, blindered policymaking could put wheat farmers to […]

Modeling corporate climate action

It’s easy to get the impression that there is no hope for climate action. Perhaps you’ve heard that the recent DC snowstorms buried any chance to pass a comprehensive energy and climate bill. Or that hacked emails have set the climate movement back a decade. We have a completely ineffectual Senate, a gun-shy EPA, and […]

The time has come to make delicious and easy bread at home

Fifteen minutes wrestling with dough–who kneads it? A little more than two years ago, Mark Bittman and Jim Lahey got together and transformed home bread making for all time. In the kitchen of Lahey’s Sullivan Street Bakery, they shot a video illustrating Lahey’s simple method for making a top-quality loaf with no special equipment–and no […]

Van Jones is back

Van Jones.Center for American ProgressVan Jones, who resigned from the White House Council on Environmental Quality last fall in the face of a coordinated smear campaign by conservative activists, has emerged from his self-imposed semi-exile with a bang. He’ll be teaching a policy seminar at Princeton next year. He’s accepted a senior fellowship at the […]