Climate Cities

Search and You Shall Find

New Google philanthropy aims to build super-efficient hybrid car If you’re tired of waiting for bold innovation from big automakers, help is on the way from, of all places, iconic search firm Google. The company’s founders have established a controversial for-profit philanthropy, Google.org, which will focus on poverty, disease, and global warming. One of its […]

Hydrogen Hopes

BMW to put a few hydrogen cars on the road next year The cars of the future are here! Sorta. BMW announced yesterday that it will distribute about 100 hydrogen-powered 7-Series sedans to select drivers in the U.S. and E.U. in early 2007. The cars, which can travel about 125 miles before switching to gasoline, […]

Huston Eubank, director of the World Green Building Council, answers questions

Huston Eubank. What work do you do? I’m executive director of the World Green Building Council. What does your organization do? The World Green Building Council is a union of green building councils from around the world who are working to encourage development of green-building rating systems and accelerate the transformation of the global property […]

Keepin’ It Real Estate

Portland’s real-estate database makes it easy to search for green homes Realtors in and around Portland, Ore., will soon be able to search more easily for homes that have met national green-building standards. Starting in 2007, houses certified by LEED, Energy Star, and other such programs will be searchable in Portland’s authoritative Regional Multiple Listing […]

How Ultra-Low Can You Go?

California makes the jump to ultra-low sulfur diesel Starting today, on-road and off-road diesel vehicles in California will fill up with ultra-low sulfur fuel. California is leading the pack on this issue (natch); the rest of the U.S. will require on-road diesel vehicles to go ultra-low starting Oct. 15, but won’t require off-road vehicles to […]

A new exhibit lets New Orleans residents tell their own stories

In the beginning of July, I arrived in New Orleans for an internship at the Louisiana Bucket Brigade. I met with Anne Rolfes, the coordinator and one of the founders of the nonprofit health and environmental-justice organization, and we discussed the work I would be doing. I was to organize a photo exhibit displaying images […]

Umbra on electric cars

Dearest Umbra, Why are electric cars considered so great? They don’t pollute the air where they are driven. But certainly when they are plugged in they use energy from a power plant, which does pollute and also contributes to global warming. Doesn’t this just move the pollution from one area to another? Then you have […]

Are people smart enough to abandon the ‘burbs?

A fairly speculative piece on MSN yesterday asks the question, "Could rising gas prices kill the suburbs?" Its talk of infill and vertical cities may be the stuff of urban planners' dreams, but how will it resonate with real people?

Someone I know read the piece and took away this message: Housing prices in the suburbs are about to drop because everyone's going to leave! Sweet!

And if last night's House Hunters -- in which a couple with a baby upgraded from a 2,800-foot house in the 'burbs to an even bigger one because there "wasn't enough room" -- is any indication, it's gonna take a lot more than $3 gas to move us forward.

Engineers Gone Wild

Automakers combine forces to develop new hybrid transmission Tired of getting their rear ends handed to them by the Prius, GM, BMW, and DaimlerChrysler plan to invest over $1 billion in R&D toward a new hybrid transmission that, boosters say, will leave Toyota’s market-leading hybrid in the dust. “Dual-mode” hybrid technology includes an onboard fuel-optimization […]

Umbra on carpooling to a reunion

Dear Umbra, You have told us, in no uncertain terms, that traveling by train is better ecologically than traveling by car. Several members of my family plan to carpool to an upcoming family reunion 600 miles away. I have considered trying to talk them into taking the train instead, but face the following problem: It […]