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What would you build on the land near the iconic Hollywood sign?

Get out your checkbooks, folks: The mountaintop property located just above the "H" in the iconic "Hollywood" sign is now for sale. The asking price? A sweet $22 million. Two years ago, Los Angeles officials and conservationists tried to purchase the land atop the 1,820-foot Cahuenga Peak to create a city park, but were unable […]

Campaign will let restaurant patrons donate to drinking-water project

Mark your calendars for the week of March 16, when diners at participating restaurants can choose to drink local tap water instead of bottled water and donate $1 to the Tap Project. Proceeds from the project benefit Unicef’s efforts to provide clean drinking water to children in developing countries. The Tap Project was started pro […]

When ‘hand wringing’ isn’t enough

If you are worried about Lake Mead drying up, think that reduced snowpack due to climate change might have something to do with it, and are looking for some answers, you could do a lot worse than listen to David Berry of the Western Resource Advocates. I always do, and he's never steered me wrong. See his timely "Clean Electric Energy Strategy for Arizona" (PDF).

Congress needs to stop flirting with the renewable energy industry

This post is by ClimateProgress guest blogger Bill Becker, executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project.

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When it comes to relationships, Congress is a big tease. Or so it must seem to the energy efficiency and renewable energy industries. Just when they think they're about to go to the altar with the federal government, Congress becomes the runaway bride.

Everyone who's anyone acknowledges that energy efficiency and renewable energy are indispensable to America's future. They promise greater energy independence, clean air, steady prices, infinite supplies, a lower trade deficit, and a way to begin minimizing the suffering that will result from global climate change.

Due to the urgency of global warming, the future must start now with rapid diffusion of the clean energy technologies that are ready for market. We must also expedite the development of new efficient and renewable energy technologies and the industries that make, sell, and service them.

To compete on the same playing field as oil, gas and coal -- our entrenched and heavily subsidized carbon fuels -- the clean energy technologies need federal help, including subsidies. For example, to help embryonic renewable energy industries reach viability, Congress implemented a Production Tax Credit (PTC) as part of the Energy Policy Act of 1992 and scheduled it to expire in 1999, seven years later. Since 1999, Congress has extended the credit for one to two years at a time and has allowed it to expire three times. It currently is scheduled to expire at the end of this year, along with a bundle of other tax benefits to encourage the use of more efficient windows, furnaces, and building insulation.

The result of this on-again, off-again subsidy has been boom-bust cycles for wind energy and the other technologies covered by the credit. Each time the PTC is renewed, renewable energy projects begin to blossom. Then, months before the next expiration date, investment stops because of uncertainty. In an analysis of the PTC's impact on the wind industry, researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory concluded:

Veganism as relationship deal breaker

Love is in the air, and according to the New York Times, it’s also served up at the dinner table. But when it comes to dueling food preferences — he loves meat, she doesn’t — sometimes dinner leaves couples, well, hungry for more. No-holds-barred carnivores, for example, may share the view of Anthony Bourdain, who […]

Sunscreen-slathered swimmers contributing to coral bleaching, says study

Photo: iStockphoto Up to 6,000 tons of sunscreen wash off of ocean swimmers each year, posing a threat to up to 10 percent of global coral reefs, according to a new study in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. Four common sunscreen chemicals can awaken dormant viruses in coral-dwelling algae, with results of horror-movie proportions: the […]

Can a ‘renewable fuel’ rely on mining a finite resource?

While scrolling through news accounts of the recent boom in the agrochemicals industry — yes, that’s how I spend my days — I came across an interesting take on biofuels and phosphate, a key element of soil fertility. The article, from Investors Business Daily, takes a standard rah-rah position on what it deems a “heyday […]

Obama lauds green jobs and clean tech in economy speech

In a speech on Wednesday at a GM auto plant in Wisconsin, Barack Obama outlined his economic agenda for the country. He described his stimulus plan, promising to boost green jobs, help the middle class, dole out tax cuts, negotiate worker and environmental protections in upcoming free-trade agreements -- and, to help pay for much of it, end the costly war in Iraq.

The environmental highlights of the speech are below (audio available here):

PVC is latest target of folks concerned about toxic toys

Photo: iStockphoto Lead-toy furor is so last year; the source du jour of parental outrage is plastic polyvinyl chloride in toys. Numerous playthings — balls, dolls, rubber duckies, tea sets, you name it — contain PVC, which is made with carcinogen vinyl chloride, often softened with phthalates, and frequently contains lead and other heavy metals. […]

CBS airs final segment of Antarctica series tonight

CBS has been televising a series this week on climate change impacts in Antarctica. Monday's broadcast spotlighted how climate change has affected Adelie penguin populations. The segment last night focused on scientific research in Antarctica and what it might mean for our understanding of global warming (see video below). You can tune in tonight at 6:30 pm EST to find out about waste and recycling issues in our least-inhabited continent.