Articles by Grist staff

EPA chief won’t back down on unpopular California auto-emissions decision

U.S. EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson appeared before Senate Democrats today to defend his decision to deny California’s auto-emissions waiver. Johnson stood his ground while senators assailed his decision as in the pocket of special interests, logic-defying, “shameful,” “outrageous,” “irresponsible,” and “unconscionable.” Responded Johnson, “I evaluated all the data, I made the decision, it’s the right […]

Dennis Kucinich drops presidential bid

Dennis Kucinich, perhaps the most truly green of the presidential candidates — and a vegan! — has abandoned his bid for the White House. Take a last look at Grist’s interview with Kucinich and fact sheet on his policies, and shed a tear for what might have been — were the U.S. political landscape entirely […]

Ag practices are mucking with the Mississippi River, says research

The Mississippi River has been dramatically changed by agricultural practices, says new research in the journal Nature. In the past 50 years or so, carbon levels in the river have jumped 40 percent, while the actual amount of water flowing through the riverbed has increased 9 percent — the equivalent of five Connecticut Rivers. “Agricultural […]

Tom Konrad on cellulosic electricity

The following is a guest essay by Tom Konrad, a financial analyst specializing in renewable energy and energy efficiency companies, a freelance writer, and a contributor to AltEnergyStocks.com.

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Romm v. Khosla

In a persuasive series of articles entitled "Pragmatists vs. Environmentalists" (Parts I, II, and III), Vinod Khosla has provided the reasoning behind his "dissing" of plug-in hybrids, which drew the ire of Joseph Romm. Neither seems to think the argument is settled, and Romm returned fire here.

To summarize, Khosla argues that cellulosic ethanol shows more promise for reducing carbon emissions than plug-in hybrids, because the barriers to plug-ins (the need to improve batteries and clean up the grid) are harder to surmount than the barriers to cellulosic ethanol (the improvement of conversion technology). In his words,

I consider replacing coal-based electricity plants (50-year typical life) a much longer, tougher slog than replacing oil with biofuels (15-year car life).

Romm blasts back, reiterating the multiple problems of corn ethanol in response to the first of Khosla's series, but has not yet responded to his point about cellulosic. I thought I'd tackle the point myself.

There isn't enough biomass

According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's From Biomass to Biofuels (PDF) study, given all the available biomass in the United States, we will only be able to displace a little less than 2 billion barrels of oil equivalent a year. But we currently use about 7 billion barrels of oil a year, so to displace all our oil usage, we would need nearly a 4x increase in fuel efficiency (not the 1.5x increase in internal combustion engines Khosla talks about).