All donations doubled!
grist-georgia-psc-header-ai

Latest Articles

  • Me in CiF

    While I was vacationing, the Guardian‘s Comment Is Free site ran two pieces by yours truly, one assessing the climate issue as it manifests in the Democratic presidential field, the other doing the same for the Republican field. Check ’em out. (I continue to be mystified by the extraordinarily high level of fruitcakery in the […]

    David Roberts Politics

  • Finally, something to do with all the damn asphalt

    This sounds like a great idea! Seems like every school has a ginormous parking lot, as does every city and county building -- and think of the asphalt in residential streets.

    JMG Technology

  • Plans for new U.K. coal plant move forward

    It’s the week o’ ill-advised energy choices in Britain, where nuclear power may soon get a boost and plans for the first new coal-fired power plant in decades are inching forward. A local government authority has recommended that Business Secretary John Hutton give the go-ahead to utility E.ON’s proposal for a coal plant; concerned that […]

    Grist staff Climate & Energy

  • Cogeneration and ethanol production

    I am not the biggest fan of corn ethanol. But I am the biggest fan of cogeneration, also known as combined heat and power, or CHP (well, maybe the second-biggest fan). It is probably the single most overlooked strategy for sharply cutting greenhouse-gas emissions while reducing overall energy costs.

    chp-small.pngNow a new EPA report finds that running an ethanol plant on natural gas CHP can, with the right design, result in negative net CO2 emissions (click on figure to enlarge).

    Important caveat: "Impact of Combined Heat and Power on Energy Use and Carbon Emissions in the Dry Mill Ethanol Process" (PDF) does not examine the energy consumed (or emissions generated) from growing and harvesting the corn or from transporting the corn or ethanol. Still, with CHP, corn ethanol can actually generate significant CO2 reductions compared to gasoline.

    If Congress is serious about promoting ethanol in a manner that actually reduces GHGs, they should require all new ethanol plants to cogenerate.

    This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

    Joseph Romm Climate & Energy

  • Milan, Italy, institutes congestion charge

    In Milan, congestion pricing is the new black. (Oh, like you have a better fashion pun?) Under Milan’s new plan, which kicks off as a one-year trial, vehicles driving into the urban center on weekdays between 7:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. must pay up to $14 per day; low-polluting cars are exempt from the charge. […]

    Grist staff Cities

  • Rising hopes for 2008

    Remember how, way back in 2007, green was the new black? Watch for a new new black in 2008: green building. The press is gushing with green-building news: According to a report from the American Institute of Architects, the number of cities with green-building programs has increased 418 percent since 2003, and AIA — which […]

    Katharine Wroth Cities

  • Sea-level rise at our doorstep; puts nation at risk

    What the scientific community has failed to communicate, and the public has failed to grasp, is that the U.S. is particularly vulnerable to very small increments of sea-level rise.

    The IPCC Fourth Assessment projects a sea-level rise of 0.18 meters to 0.59 meters this century. Even though the report includes a caveat that this range does not include any significant contribution from the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets, global warming skeptics continually characterize those who mention a six-meter sea-level rise as scaremongers.

    There is also a common notion in circulation, advanced by the media and many studies on the impacts of climate change, that wealthier countries in the West will be able to adapt, while underdeveloped countries will bear the brunt of the impacts.

    It is no wonder then that global warming scarcely registers as an issue in the presidential election. Until the American public understands that the U.S. is directly threatened by impacts resulting from global warming, little meaningful action to curb our greenhouse-gas emissions will take place.

    With just one meter of sea-level rise, the U.S. will be physically under siege, with calamitous and destabilizing consequences.

    Edward Mazria Climate & Energy

  • ‘Environmentalists say’ the WaPo should learn to distinguish rhetoric from reality

    In an ongoing series about the world-historical suckage of a recent WaPo piece, we come now to the difference between rhetoric and policy. I don’t know about you, but when I see a headline like “In Bush’s Final Year, The Agenda Gets Greener,” I think, “oh, the policy agenda is getting greener.” And that’s probably […]

    David Roberts Politics

  • David Beckham has world’s biggest carbon footprint, says group

    David Beckham. Photo: Robert Mora/WireImage The member of the human race with the biggest carbon footprint is (drumroll please …) soccer football golden boy David Beckham, according to green group Carbon Trust. The hottest star in the Galaxy and wife Victoria-but-please-call-me-Posh have won the dubious honor for the second time. The duo have 15 gas […]

    Grist staff Culture

  • The Lieberman-Warner bill will … happen

    ((2008predictions_include)) The Lieberman-Warner climate bill will go to the Senate floor. After a largely uneventful committee hearing, LW is set to be introduced on the floor of the Senate in the early months of 2008, where it will face a bruising battle. Of that I feel certain. Subpredictions about which I feel only certain-ish: Inhofe […]

    David Roberts Politics