Articles by Christopher Mims
Christopher Mims's dystopian non-fiction is sought after by an ever-growing roster of publications.
All Articles
-
Surprise! Developed world uses less energy per person than it did 20 years ago
If you're the sort who wakes up every morning to a media diet that can only be delivered via a Wolf Blitzer situation room-style array of glowing screens and buzzing whatsits, you probably suspect that you're using more energy than the mid-90's you, the one who warmed herself over a kerosene lamp and ate hardtack […]
-
What if the $152 billion to clean up Fukushima were spent on geothermal instead?
Here's a crazy idea: why not use the enormous geothermal resource under Japan — which is after all sitting on a "ring" made of "fire" — as a source of nearly always-on baseload power? I asked Alex Richter, an Icelandic financier of geothermal energy projects, how much geothermal energy $152 billion would buy. (That's the […]
-
Physics breakthrough could mean solar panels made of nothing but glass
Exploiting an effect previously thought too small to be worth anyone's time, a bunch of researchers at the University of Michigan have figured out how to exploit the magnetic properties of light in a way that could ultimately lead to solar panels made entirely of glass or transparent ceramics. "We've all been taught that this […]
-
CFLs are not a significant source of mercury, says EPA
If you've heard that CFLs are lousy with mercury, you've heard wrong. In the past 10 years, "reductions in the most used types of fluorescent lighting have decreased [mercury] content over the last decade by 60 – 80 percent," says Melissa Klein of the EPA. Plus, Americans are recycling more of them than previously reported. […]