Latest Articles

Why taxes can’t get us where we need to go on transportation

As of Monday, the average price of gasoline in the U.S. was down to $2.22 a gallon, brushing up against $1.50 in some places. The price of oil was under $60/bbl. When gas and oil prices fall, there are always two reactions: first, great lamentations that alternative and renewable energy investments no longer make economic […]

Will Obama create a new energy council, as recommended by the Center for American Progress?

A year ago, the policy wonks at the Center for American Progress laid out a plan for what they’d like to see the next president do on a variety of issues, including energy and climate change [PDF]. The plan includes a proposal to create a National Energy Council, headed by a national energy adviser at […]

IEA forecasts boom in renewables through 2030

The influential International Energy Agency has released its annual report on world energy demand, predicting that renewables will make big gains worldwide, increasing their overall market share 5 percent to meet 23 percent of the world’s total energy needs by 2030. However, coal consumption is also predicted to increase, eventually providing some 44 percent of […]

Japan’s emissions hit record levels

Last year, Japan’s greenhouse-gas emissions reached record levels, hitting 1.5 billion tons of CO2 equivalent — an increase of some 2.3 percent. Much of the rise was due to an earthquake shutting down the world’s largest nuclear plant in northwestern Japan, which pushed utilities to rely more on fossil fuels. But critics have also said […]

Major mass-transit initiatives did well in U.S. election

Overall, more than 70 percent of the major public-transit projects that appeared on ballots in the United States on Nov. 4 were approved, according to the mass-transit group Center for Transportation Excellence. Some of the more notable projects approved by voters were a high-speed rail network in California and $18 billion in public-transit improvements in […]

The president-elect on greening the auto industry

Since President-elect Barack Obama is talking about economic support for the flailing auto-industry, here’s a flashback (via Ezra Klein) to nearly three years ago, when he was merely Sen. Obama: Already, hundreds of fueling stations use a blend of ethanol and gasoline known as E85, and there are millions of cars on the road with […]

Obama on Grist

Just for kicks, I went and searched for the very first mention of Obama’s name on Grist. It came on 27 July 2004, the day of Obama’s fateful speech to the Democratic National Convention, in a dispatch from Mary Sullivan, a delegate. This is what she said: Most inspiring was Barack Obama, 2004 Democratic candidate […]

New report suggests that half of U.S. states could meet their energy needs with in-state resources

The New Rules Project just released a comprehensive new report containing some interesting results: The data in this report, while preliminary, suggest that at least half of the fifty states could meet all their internal energy needs from renewable energy generated inside their borders, and the vast majority could meet a significant percentage. And these […]

NBC back at the green thing

Next week throughout the broadcast world of network NBC It’s “Green Is Universal” time, so forced programs you’ll see: From Kath and Kim describing what our ignorance has lost us To musings from the Peter Pan of big-time sports, Bob Costas. A mayor will clean up a waterfront on soapy Days And PSAs will hammer […]

‘Hypermiling’ is the word of the year

Beating out such worthy contenders as “staycation” and “CarrotMob,” “hypermiling” has been crowned the 2008 Word of the Year by the New Oxford American Dictionary.