Latest Articles

Green building exhibition

What is the Prototype for Advanced Ready-made Amphibious Small-scale Individual Temporary Ecological dwelling (PARASITE)? Find out at "The Green House: New Directions in Sustainable Architecture and Design," a nifty exhibition at the National Building Museum. (Except, uh, it ends tomorrow. Sorry about that. Cool website, though.)

The Washington Post has a decent overview.

Can we replace oil and maintain energy supply?

This piece on EnergyBulletin is brilliant, and by that I mean it makes arguments I like to make.

Can we simply switch out oil for other fuels? No:

Nisbet on framing nuclear

Matthew Nisbet writes a short history of the framing wars around nuclear power.

He predicts, "the more time passes with no new focusing events related to the dangers of nuclear energy, and as the perceived urgency of energy independence and global warming increases, public support in the aggregate is also likely to increase, as recent poll trends suggest."

Happily, he also says ...

... if and when the decision is made to build a new nuclear power plant in a specific area, mobilized minorities of local citizens will prove decisive. Who shows up to protest, vote, or speak out at the local level will have a stronger impact on the future of nuclear energy in the U.S. than the current struggle to shape national opinion.

Got that?

Weisberg on Gore

Jacob Weisberg, Slate's editor, has a piece up about Gore and An Inconvenient Truth. Ben Adler objects to the conclusion, which is: Gore may actually be better off working to change public consciousness as a private citizen than he would as president.

Adler finds that absurd. I'm not sure I do, at least not completely. What's lacking now is bottom-up pressure on politicians to tackle global warming. As dutiful report readers know, for politicians, tackling global warming is all risk and no reward. What Gore is doing is explicitly attempting to build that kind of popular swell. I would have thought it would be an impossible task, but he's been amazingly successful so far, and nobody else is doing the job ... so why not keep him there? It's highly unlikely Democrats will win the presidency and majorities in both houses of Congress any time soon, and lacking that they won't be able to force action on global warming, even with Gore in the top slot.

What I do find obnoxious in Weisberg's piece is this 'graph:

A Segway autographed by Gore: Wacky but true

FYI:

Starting Monday, June 5, Participant Productions and Segway Inc. will auction off, on eBay, an autographed Segway Human Transporter (HT) from the L.A. premiere of "An Inconvenient Truth" to benefit the Alliance for Climate Protection, a non-profit devoted to spreading awareness of global warming. Segway, the manufacturer of the innovative, environmentally conscious Segway HT, donated the unit to help raise awareness for eco-friendly transportation alternatives and to support Participant Productions fundraising auction for the Alliance. In addition, Paramount will donate 5% of the gross to this organization. You may view the autographed Segway, as well as other items which will benefit the Alliance, at www.ebay.com/climatecrisis on Monday.

At the May 16th premiere of Participant Productions' new documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" celebrities Al Gore, Larry & Laurie David, Sharon Stone, Jessica Alba, Daryl Hannah, and many others (see below) autographed the Segway HT. "An Inconvenient Truth" explores Al Gore's plight to spread awareness of global warming. The Segway HT is an electric, zero-emissions transportation device that gives people a real world alternative to the car for short trips that are too far to walk and too close to drive. It costs only 25 cents to charge up the Segway HT and it has an energy efficiency of 450 miles per gallon.

Somebody should really proofread these press releases. "Al Gore's plight to spread awareness of global warming"?

Update [2006-6-2 14:56:35 by David Roberts]: Hm ... the ebay link does not appear to work. If it's not up by tomorrow, I'll axe the whole post.

Alt fuels comparison

Check out this incredibly thorough, fair-minded comparison of various alternative vehicle fuels from, of all places, Popular Mechanics. You can also download a comparison chart (PDF). Nice work.

From Trust Fundies to Travel Finds

Snow job College Republican chapters across the country have begun hosting “Global Cooling Day” events to debunk the myths deny the facts about global warming. There are kiddie pools, sand, girls in bikinis, even free snow cones. Ah, rich white kids — never funnier than when they’re mocking the disease and death awaiting the global […]

Holy mother of … something

CEI, the hack factory that's been releasing misleading ads bashing An Inconvenient Truth, is now defending chewing tobacco. Seriously.

An Inconvenient Truth opens today

An Inconvenient Truth opens nationwide today. Go see it. Take your friends.

The Truth Is Out There

An Inconvenient Truth opens nationwide today Having proved a hit in its limited run, An Inconvenient Truth — the documentary about Al Gore’s quest to raise public consciousness of global warming — opens in wide release today. For better or worse, the nation’s chattering classes will view the movie’s reception as a barometer of public […]