Articles by David Roberts

Hydrogen at what cost?

Hydrogen is a clean-burning fuel, but it's difficult to make in quantity. What if we could make "the equivalent of 200,000 gallons of gasoline each day" in hydrogen with a single processing plant? That would be great, eh? What if we had to do it with nuclear power?

Tough call. Green Car Congress has a mind-bendingly technical write-up of the process, if you're interested in the nuts and bolts.

Could enviros embrace nuclear to get this much clean energy? What do you think?

Charismatic carnivores

Tom Engelhardt profiles and presents an essay by Chip Ward, author of Hope's Horizon: Three Visions for Healing the American Land. It's about "charismatic carnivores," the big animals that eat us and that we are slowly and haltingly coming to love -- or at least coexist with in a reasonably non-savage manner. It's good reading.

Frankenforest

Interesting article in the Christian Science Monitor on genetically modified trees that absorb more carbon, grow faster, are pest-resistant, and other such quasi-miraculous qualities. I have mixed feelings about genetic modification, which I suppose makes me an apostate in the enviro movement, wherein one is supposed to be reflexively against any such tampering. But why? This story is a good example -- there's a lot of handwaving about the dangers, but very little empirical evidence, or even reasoned argument, about them.

Industrial freecycling

In the tradition of freecycling, NYC-based WasteMatch offers companies the ability to post their waste to a website, in case some other company has a use for, say, hundreds of cardboard boxes.  The idea is to save on waste-disposal fees -- thus the slogan, "Out of your dumpster, onto your bottom line."

Just one of many great environmentally friendly ideas that offer a genuine service, make a profit, and require no government intervention.

(via Treehugger)