Latest Articles

A guest essay from Peter Montague analyzes the nuclear ‘renaissance’

The following is a guest essay from Peter Montague, executive director of the Environmental Research Foundation. —– The long-awaited and much-advertised "nuclear renaissance" actually got under way this week. NRG Energy, a New Jersey company recently emerged from bankruptcy, applied for a license to build two new nuclear power plants at an existing facility in […]

U.S. ethanol boom slowing due to market glut

The ethanol boom in the United States, the political darling of presidential candidates, farm-state lawmakers, and others, has recently been showing signs of slowing due to a market glut that’s exacerbated by infrastructure troubles. It seems everyone and their farmer have been constructing ethanol refineries to turn corn into fuel, but the means to get […]

The real story behind the Bush administration’s climate claims

In preparation for the Major Economies Meeting, the Bush administration distributed a matrix to invited countries, to assist them in documenting their national and international efforts on climate change. The U.S. government circulated a draft documenting activities in the U.S., trying to give the impression that the U.S. is taking meaningful action on climate change. […]

It doesn’t make sense — and that’s the point

More than a few people were taken in by a guy peddling a coal/solar hybrid system at Solar Power 2007. "But, smokestacks on the roof -- that just doesn't make sense," said a government bureaucrat, who shall remain unnamed pending resolution of my grant proposal.

Indeed, it doesn't. As the less credulous might have predicted, it was a marketing spoof by Sharp Solar:

Ted Nordhaus responds to NRDC’s Dave Hawkins

The following post is from Ted Nordhaus, responding to an essay from David Hawkins of the NRDC. —– David, You and I have always maintained a respectful relationship so I’ll pass on the name calling and just respond to the content of your response. You say, "the authors are wrong in their claim that we […]

McKibben’s clarion call

Bill McKibben has a clarion call of an op-ed in yesterday’s Washington Post. The reality of climate change is moving much more quickly than politics: The Democratic majority is finally beginning to move legislation that would commit the United States to long-term reductions in carbon dioxide emissions — the first law Congress might actually pass […]

The RTID package doesn’t give Seattle voters a fair choice

Those of us who live in and around Seattle will vote this November on a huge package that's being sold as "roads and transit." Stay with me -- it's complicated but important, and it could have implications for transit projects around the US.

Of the $18 billion in the package, about $10 billion will pay for 50 miles of new light rail; the rest will pay for roads projects, including 152 new miles of general-purpose highways (and 74 miles of HOV). Because our state legislature, in its infinite wisdom, tied the two unrelated proposals together, rejecting roads means rejecting transit, and vice versa. Pro-transit supporters of the package (and there are lots of them) pretty much stop there. How, they argue, could we turn down the first opportunity we've had in a generation to more than double the region's light rail system? Yes, there are roads in the package -- including bad roads, like the four-lane widening of a major suburban freeway -- but a lot of those will actually help transit. Expanding SR-520 from Seattle to Bellevue, for  example, will create two new HOV lanes. And look at all that light rail! Shiny, shiny light rail. How could you say no to all that light rail?

Well, let's look at what happens if this region does pass the joint roads and transit package. That will be our last chance to make a truly ambitious investment in transportation for a generation. It is, in other words, our last chance to do it right. As local Sierra Club chapter chairman Mike O'Brien told me, "It's not like we have pools of $18 billion just sitting around." If we pass this package, we'll have light rail, but we'll also be stuck paying for, and building, all those new roads -- roads that will just fill up, as roads do; roads that will contribute more to global warming than light rail takes away; roads that certainly won't be much help in easing congestion without a much larger investment in transit than the one in this package. And we'll send a message to transportation planners around the country: "It's OK to have transit, as long as you throw some new roads in there too."

A better message would be: "People want transit, so why do you keep giving us *$%! roads?"

Expect bicycle deaths in Seattle to climb

Not good. I happened upon this accident scene a few days ago. Apparently, a right turning truck hit a young bicyclist, killing him instantly. He had been in Seattle for only a few weeks and was the same age as my daughter, who rides a bike on a distant college campus. The sight truly unsettled me and made my bike trip through the heart of downtown more nerve racking than usual.

I want to use this tragedy to send a message to our amiable yet bumbling local politicians who have pledged to do their share to fight global warming. Your diversion of tax dollars into biodiesel has been a complete waste of funds and your bike plan is woefully inadequate to protect the burgeoning numbers of Seattle cyclists. Seattle's Burke-Gilman trail began life as a recreational park. It has become a dangerous, heavily traveled bike commute arterial. Just the other day a pedestrian leaped out from behind a bush a few feet in front of me. I missed him, but it is only a matter of time. As the number of bikers climb, so will deaths, unless steps are taken that will prevent them. Plastering signs all over the place may be inexpensive, but it is also largely ineffective.

Bicycles, and the rapidly rising numbers of electric assisted bikes, hold far more promise for reduced emissions than any other idea on the table, bar none. The loudmouths trapped in their steel 200 horsepower wheelchairs screaming that funds should be diverted from bike to car infrastructure need to be ignored. If you were smart you would turn Seattle into a model, world-class example of how to accommodate bikes, instead forcing your well-meaning citizens to play a bicycle version of Russian roulette every day.

Boxer vs Inhofe, round 2: The Rumble in Rayburn

If you will recall, the first round of their schoolyard squabble, on the occasion of Inhofe's filibustering of Gore's attempts to answer his questions, ended with a crushing uppercut by Boxer:

Committee chairwoman Barbara Boxer (D-CA) finally intervened. "Would you agree to let the Vice President answer your questions?" Inhofe said Gore could respond when he was done talking, but Boxer wouldn't have it: "No, that isn't the rule. You're not making the rules. You used to when you did this. Elections have consequences. So I make the rules." The hearing audience applauded loudly.

Politico has the details of the next round. This time, Boxer taps out and its Senator Mikulski that delivers the TKO, capping an Inhofe rant with:

"It's more than the icecaps that are facing meltdown," begins Mikulski...

Snap. Could it be that Inhofe is worrying about the title fight?

Rush Limbaugh calls climatologist James Hansen a ‘double agent’

Earlier this week, the notorious Rush Limbaugh got in trouble for calling soldiers in Iraq opposed to the war "phony."

Thursday he called the science of ozone depletion "phony" and the science of climate change "fraudulent." Limbaugh went on to accuse Dr. James Hansen, America's top climatologist, of being "dishonest," compared him to a "CIA double agent," and said he should be "drummed out of NASA."

Does anyone take Limbaugh seriously anymore? Apparently, the answer is yes. Here are facts and links for the open-minded: