Climate & Energy

The Climate Post: Reality is the toughest wedge issue

First Things First: Research continues apace to find definitions of “clean tech” and “green jobs” that sound more meaningful than campaign rhetoric. In a new report [pdf], the Pew Charitable Trusts pinned down its working description of “clean energy economy” and analyzed 10 years of jobs data, through the 50 states, looking for trends. Analysts […]

Eric Roston Climate & Energy

Who are the faces behind FACES of Coal?

Yet another pro-coal group has popped up to rally folks against climate action. The Federation for American Coal, Energy and Security — or FACES of Coal — joins a growing list of “grassroots” groups formed to support fossil fuels. The “faces” shown on the group’s website include a smiling flower vender, a child playing golf, […]

Kate Sheppard Climate & Energy

Hotter summers will pose public health challenges

In the dog days of August, you can be forgiven for not wanting to think about how it could get hotter, much hotter, in summers to come. Nevertheless, Climate Central, a nonprofit focused on communicating climate science, released a study today forecasting what summers might look like in 21 American cities in 2050. Climate Central’s […]

Richard Graves Climate & Energy

Global warming set to intensify August heat, Climate Central study finds

Climate Central’s analysis found that New York City will see a three-fold increase in the number of 90-degree-plus days in August by midcentury.Photo illustration by Tom Twigg / Grist By some measures, the Chicago and New York of tomorrow are likely to be hotter than the Atlanta of today — at least in August. Climate […]

Grist staff Climate & Energy

Neighborhood stores: An overlooked strategy for fighting global warming

Our new neighborhood fresh food market.What I find most striking about my mother-in-law’s memories of the neighborhood where I live, and where she spent her childhood in the 1940s, is how many businesses our little residential section of town once boasted. Back then, there was a grocery store, hardware store, barber shop, two drugstores, a […]

Stacy Mitchell Cities

India says: Take this mine and shove it

Last fall, Tom Zeller at the New York Times Green Inc. blog wrote an eye-opening piece on a possible Indian government and corporate venture in Appalachia’s coal mines. And as the Sierra Club’s Carl Pope pointed out, an even bigger coal story took place this week in India. Members of parliament from various political parties […]

Jeff Biggers Climate & Energy

The top 10 sources for energy

Jacobson the power-ful.stanford.eduI was disappointed when I discovered that the list of experts at last week’s Clean Energy Summit would not include Stanford University’s Mark Jacobson. Of course, no individual is indispensable at such a summit. But as the day went by I felt his absence more and more keenly. That’s because Jacobson is one […]

Osha Gray Davidson Climate & Energy

Of car crashes and Snickers bars

As my high school physics teacher once explained to me, energy comes in all sorts of different forms: heat, light, motion, electricity, and even the “potential” energy in chemical bonds and bowling balls perched on top of a downward sloping ramp. And yet, somehow, all of those different forms of energy were really all the […]

Clark Williams-Derry Climate & Energy

Yvo de Boer of U.N. climate convention says 350 ppm is pipe dream

“I don’t think there is a hope in hell that people will agree to 350 in Copenhagen. I think we’ll get 2 degrees.” — Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, speaking at a recent meeting with NGO officials. “350” refers to the goal of reducing the concentration […]