Climate Climate & Energy

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  • New air conditioning and furnace standards mean big savings

    The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and other efficiency groups released a negotiated agreement with manufacturers of residential air conditioners and furnaces yesterday, marking the end of a journey to come to consensus that lasted many months.  I negotiated on NRDC’s behalf and we will now take this agreement to both Congress and the Department […]

    Lane Burt Climate & Energy

  • What Bill McKibben learned from the gay rights march

    Courtesy half.apple via FlickrIf the mainstream media is going to largely ignore a mass demonstration on the national mall—such as Sunday’s National Equality March for gay rights—public demonstrations might as well be small, numerous, and spread all over, says 350.org founder Bill McKibben. Also, they should be beautiful. McKibben—writer, Grist board member, and an occasional […]

    Jonathan Hiskes Climate & Energy

  • Should DOJ investigate Big Coal bedlam?

    UPDATE: Every American–including the Army Corps of Engineers–must watch this powerful new 20-minute film by Chad Stevens on the real costs and consequences of mountaintop removal mining: Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy of Mountaintop Removal Mining Now, the good news: On behalf of their children’s future, coalfield residents and miners calmly came together in the Coal […]

    Jeff Biggers Climate & Energy

  • Stewart Brand’s nuclear enthusiasm falls short on facts and logic

    Supporting technical details and citations for this post can be found here: “Four Nuclear Myths” (PDF). Whole Earth Discipline, by Stewart Brand (Viking, 2009)I have known Stewart Brand as a friend for many years. I have admired his original and iconoclastic work, which has had significant impact. In his new book, Whole Earth Discipline: an […]

    Amory Lovins Climate & Energy

  • The U.S. military’s battle to wean itself off oil

    Don’t ask what kind of mileage it gets.In the summer of 2006, Marine Corps Major General Richard Zilmer sent the Pentagon an unusual “Priority 1” request for emergency battlefield supplies. Stationed at a temporary base in Fallujah, Zilmer was commanding a force of 30,000 troops responsible for protecting Al Anbar, the vast territory in western […]

    Amanda Little Climate & Energy

  • Lester Brown on his must-read new book “Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization”

    October 13, 2009 Notwithstanding the Superfreaks, a lot of good books on global warming and its solutions are coming out right now (see “The Invention of Lying about Climate Change“).  One of the best is Lester Brown’s “Plan B 4.0:  Mobilizing to Save Civilization.”  In his book, Brown lays out the too-little-discussed but devastating impacts […]

    Joseph Romm Climate & Energy

  • ‘SuperFreakonomics’ is ‘patent nonsense’

    Any religion, meanwhile, has its heretics, and global warming is no exception. That staggeringly anti-scientific statement (page 170) is just one of many, many pieces of outright nonsense from SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance. In fact, human-caused global warming is well-established science, far better established than any […]

    Joseph Romm Climate & Energy

  • Why solar won’t topple in Germany

    Since the new center-right coalition won the elections a few weeks ago in Germany, onlookers from the U.S. have been expecting the country to drastically cut its support for solar. Proponents of U.S.-style policies, such as tax credits and Renewable Portfolio Standards, have also been hinting that Germany will be yet another example of how […]

    Craig Morris Climate & Energy

  • Our old electric grid is no match for our new green energy plans

    The bowels of New York City’s electricity system.Often referred to as “the world’s biggest machine,” the North American electricity grid as a whole is an integrated network of generators and millions of miles of wires that crisscross the United States and Canada. It snakes across fields, over mountains, through tunnels, along highways, beneath sidewalks, under […]

    Amanda Little Climate & Energy

  • Can you taste the fuels in your food?

    Amanda Little on the farm. If you pinned a map of the United States to a dartboard, Kansas would be the bull’s-eye. Smack dab in the center of the country, the Sunflower State is one of America’s most productive agricultural hotbeds — the fifth-biggest producer of crops and livestock in the country. More than 90 […]

    Amanda Little Climate & Energy