Articles by David Roberts
David Roberts was a staff writer for Grist. You can follow him on Twitter, if you're into that sort of thing.
All Articles
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New metrics
I meant to link to this a few days ago: Over on Renewable Energy Access, Scott Sklar argues for the development of new economic metrics by which to assess the viability of renewable energy.
By accepting the traditional measures of viability (cents per kWh, for instance) PV and other renewables always come out poorly.
Another economic "metric" needs to be crafted and effort initiated to build support for it (such as dollars per immediate used, levelized cost, non-interruptable energy). When you take these modifiers in account, biomass, free-flow hydropower, geothermal, photovoltaics, solar thermal, wind, and waste heat/cogeneration along with other clean distributed generation and energy efficiency come out quite well.
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A modest proposal
According to a study by the National Wind Coordinating Committee, "Based on current projections of 3,500 operational wind turbines in the US by the end of 2001, excluding California, the total annual mortality was estimated at approximately 6,400 bird fatalities per year for all species combined." Let's say they lowballed things, they underestimated the number of turbines, underestimated the number of birds per turbine, and are sops to the wind industry. Let's double their number ... no, triple it. No, quadruple! Let's say turbines kill 25,000 birds a year.
According to the National Audubon Society, house cats kill 100,000,000 birds a year.
So, much like one can offset one's carbon use by paying to plant trees, one can offset the impact of a wind turbine by tossing one's cat into its blades.
It's the least you can do to avert global warming!
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Global warming and natural disasters
What is the relationship between global warming and the recent tsunami in the Indian Ocean (and natural disasters more generally)? Who is and is not drawing such a connection? Who is and is not trying to score political points around it? There's been a flurry of writing on the subject recently.
We begin with today's Muckraker ...
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Top environmental events of 2004
What were the big eco-events of 2004? More than 2,000 members of the Sierra Club voted. The results are here.
