Latest Articles

New nukes? A fair shot, not a free ride

If I began this column with “some advice for my friends in the nuclear industry,” you’d probably brace for a big fat cream pie in the industry’s face. I’ve been a vocal critic of the industry that presided over what Forbes Magazine called “the largest managerial failure in American history.” So before offering my advice, […]

SolarReserve’s 24/7 solar power plant

Photo: SolarReserveAt Rocketdyne’s San Fernando Valley headquarters outside Los Angeles there’s a whiff of the right stuff — of crew-cut guys in short-sleeve white shirts and skinny black ties — in a vast room that holds the massive rocket engines that propelled John Glenn and the Apollo 11 crew into space. In one corner of […]

Mark Warner (D-Va.)

Mark Warner Sen. Mark Warner recognizes the need to take action on climate change, but wants to ensure that legislation will not negatively impact the economy. Warner seems a safe bet to support the Kerry-Boxer climate bill. In recent months, he has underlined the severity of the climate crisis and the steps necessary to solve […]

Can EPA regulations on CO2 be blocked?

It’s widely assumed that if Congress fails to pass a clean energy bill, the EPA will step in with regulations on CO2 under the Clean Air Act. The Supreme Court ruled in 2007’s Mass. v EPA that it must do so if it finds CO2 to be a dangerous air pollutant — and sure enough, […]

Random Monday thoughts inspired by a throwaway line from Mark Bittman

Yes, he occasionally gets on my nerves. But when the great Mark Bittman says stuff like this, all is forgiven (if not forgotten): I am the least impressive cook you will ever see. I am completely without knife skills, I screw things up all the time. When I’m in the kitchen I’m not obsessively trying […]

Hungering for climate justice

In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit. — Albert Schweitzer Six months ago, I went through a period of depression that was probably the lowest […]

Solar power when the sun goes down — with help from United Technologies

Concentrated solar thermal with storage (aka solar baseload) remains “The technology that will save humanity.”  And we are seeing more and more plants in various phases of construction (see “World’s largest solar plant with thermal storage to be built in Arizona — total of 8500 MW of this core climate solution planned for 2014 in […]

David Frum says ‘Conservatives Heart Nuke Power.’

I always thought it was conservatives who accused progressives of being driven by their heart and not their brain.  A painfully uninformed David Frum wades into the debate over nuclear power with a post headlined, “Conservatives Heart Nuke Power“: First Brad Plumer in the New Republic, then Matt Yglesias on his site have marveled at […]

Graham, Kerry, ‘will be working closely with the White House’

In a mid-day press conference with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) that followed a meeting with Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said: We think we have a good team here to help create a dual track which we want to emphasize is done with the full consent and support […]

Newsweek partners with oil lobby to raise ad cash

In September, I wrote a post “Newsweek gets duped by Big Oil — for real — in worst Big Media story of the year.”   The Newsweek piece by Rana Foroohar was titled “Big Oil Goes Green for Real” with greenwashing lines like “So how should we take the spate of new green announcements from […]