Climate Climate & Energy
All Stories
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Minnesota utility plans wind farm over coal reserves
Story at Wind Watch:
A Minnesota utility said it's planning its own mega wind farm in Oliver County, meaning Oliver and Morton counties could some day be home to as many as 1,000 new wind turbines across the hilltops.
At the same time the turbines are capturing mile after mile of wind, they could cover up substantial coal reserves along that southern stretch of Coal Country ... -
Can the West match the Northeast?
Next week, the Western Climate Initiative will release a proposal outlining the program's cap-and-trade design.* In the proposal, we should expect to learn what share of carbon permits will be auctioned (and will therefore generate public revenue) and what share will be given away for free to emitters.
Auctioning is important -- extremely important -- because, among other virtues, it is the best way to promote fairness for people with moderate incomes. We've had lots to say about auctioning in the past, and we'll have lots to say about it in the future. In the meantime, for comparison purposes, I thought it might be helpful to share the auctioning percentages [PDF] from the cap-and-trade program in the Northeast, called RGGI:
- Connecticut.................91 percent
- Maine........................100 percent
- Maryland.....................90 percent
- Massachusetts.............99 percent
- New Hampshire.........100 percent**
- New Jersey................100 percent**
- New York..................100 percent
- Rhode Island..............100 percent
- Vermont.....................100 percent
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The human-scale, renewable, domestic power systems reviving rural Austrian economies
Listen Play “Lonely Goatherd,” from The Sound of Music On a sunny Saturday afternoon in Salzburg, we took a field trip to a few examples of biomass in rural Austria. The country is over 40 percent forested, and over half of the forest is owned by small farmers with less than 40 hectares (just under […]
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Umbra on sea-level rise
Dear Umbra, I’m a bit confused about the possible rise in sea level that may be caused by global warming. I know that in general water expands when warmed, and that is one cause of sea level elevation with respect to global warming. The larger cause for alarm seems to be the melting or collapse […]
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Study finds that prenatal exposure to coal-plant emissions impedes neurodevelopment
A major new study by the Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health finds:Closing coal-fired power plants can have a direct, positive impact on children's cognitive development and health ...
[P]renatal exposure to coal-burning emissions was associated with significantly lower average developmental scores and reduced motor development at age two. In the second unexposed group, these adverse effects were no longer observed; and the frequency of delayed motor developmental was significantly reduced.The full study [PDF] in the July 14 Environmental Health Perspectives is available online: "Benefits of Reducing Prenatal Exposure to Coal Burning Pollutants to Children's Neurodevelopment in China." The study provides yet more evidence -- if any were needed -- that we need to ban traditional coal plants: "elimination of prenatal exposure to coal-burning emissions resulted in measurable benefits to children's development." This is a sophisticated study, which used molecular markers to directly track exposure to coal plant emissions:
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Russian researchers abandon shrinking ice floe
Russian scientists are evacuating early from their research base on a shrinking Arctic ice floe. Last April, the floe was sturdy enough to build an air strip on. In September, 21 researchers and two dogs arrived, at which point their ice abode measured 1.2 by 2.5 miles. The researchers meant to leave in late August, […]
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CBS interviews oil man Pickens on his new greenish plan
I was gone last week when T. Boone Pickens’ big energy plan came out and everyone was buzzing about it. CBS has a new interview with him, done by Katie Couric, who actually asks some reasonably tough questions: Of course what she doesn’t do is get much into the meat of the plan itself, or […]
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Plasma TVs and solar cells not so bad after all
A recent Grist article shared a bit in some of the panic about NF3 and plasma TVs. If all the NF3 manufactured were released, it warns, it would have a warming effect equivalent to that of Austria.
It turns out that is mighty big "if," one that Eli Rabett manages to blast into smithereens.
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Transportation sector lies at the root of U.S. energy problem
This is a guest essay from Jack D. Hidary, chair of SmartTransportation.org and the Freedom Prize Foundation. It was originally published on the Huffington Post and is republished here with the author's permission.
The price of oil struck an ominous chord for the U.S. economy with yesterday's record trade of $147 per barrel. At these prices we are sending more than $1 million every minute of every day to oil rich countries. As oil hits a new high the dollar has hit a record low against the euro. Our equity is draining away and flowing to foreign hands.
How can we get ourselves out of this mess? This crisis will take nothing short of a restructuring of our core industrial and transport sectors. Just as a turnaround CEO comes in to fix a troubled company, we need a retooling to rid ourselves of oil dependency. We do not need politicians looking for fake fixes such as a summer gas tax holiday.
We do not need the President of the United States of America to beg sheiks for a bit more of the black gold. Keep your dignity, Mr. President.
The problem is clear -- 55 percent of all the oil we use in the U.S. is guzzled by cars and SUVs. Not planes, not trains, not big trucks. To find the problem look no further than your driveway. Yes, the fleet of 245 million cars and SUVs that we drive in the US -- that is the main problem.
