Climate Climate & Energy

A Pollan-esque energy objective in six words … and then some

Perhaps the single most important thing we can do to drive up our energy efficiency, lower energy costs, and bolster the overall reliability of our energy infrastructure is to overhaul our electric sector's regulatory model to move generation away from big, remote plants and toward local generation.

From solar to CHP, we have a panoply of technologies, fuels, and companies who would participate in such a shift. Less understood is that our regulatory model creates obstacles to all of these options, unwittingly causing us to burn too much fossil fuel and pay too much for energy.

Back in January, David challenged us all to follow Michael Pollan's lead and summarize our objectives in seven words or less. Here's mine:

Generate energy locally. Recycle whenever possible.

Like Pollan, it takes a book to explain the detail underlying that summary. This particular explanation is limited to a blog post below the fold.

E.U. plows ahead with coal

Even as it makes plans to cut greenhouse-gas emissions, the European Union is gearing up to put some 50 coal plants on line in the next five years. Europeans’ distaste for nuclear energy and the relative cheap cost of coal — even when carbon permits are factored in — have made the black rock attractive […]

For Nanosolar, the future is municipal solar power plants

The following post is by Earl Killian, guest blogger at Climate Progress.

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Traditional photovoltaic (PV) is typically installed on rooftops and competes with retail electricity. Over 40 percent of the cost of a system can be in the installation, which must be customized to every rooftop. So technologies that dramatically lower PV cost end up having a less dramatic impact on total residential system cost. So it is natural that the next generation technologies, such as thin films of copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) printed as ink on conductive substrates, need to look at non-rooftop applications, where the installation of a large solar farm is fairly turnkey.

Nanosolar, a thin-film PV startup, has just announced their vision in their blog and newsletter. They see the best fit for solar being municipal solar plants of 2-10 MW in size and suggest such plants can be done in 12 months, providing a significant advantage over coal or nuclear. Martin Roscheisen, Nanosolar's CEO, writes:

New Sundance doc tells the story of the TXU coal fight in Texas

I finally got around to watching my preview copy of Fighting Goliath: Texas Coal Wars, the new short documentary from Robert Redford’s Sundance outfit. It’s about the battle over the 12 coal plants proposed for Texas by TXU in 2007. A couple things that I thought were quite well done: Environmentalists play virtually no role […]

Environment Day? Triage Day? The holiday needs more than a new name

Affection for our planet is misdirected and unrequited. We need to focus on saving ourselves.

I have a new piece in Salon: "Let's dump 'Earth' Day." It is supposed to be mostly humorous. Or mostly serious. Anyway, the subject of renaming Earth Day has been on my mind for a while.

An excerpt:

An interview with Vinod Khosla

Adam Lashinsky interviews Vinod Khosla. I liveblog. VK’s four major investment areas: oil, coal, efficiency, and materials. AL: India finance minister called biofuels a crime against humanity. What up? VK: Food-based ethanol isn’t the big driver of food prices. Regardless, biofuels don’t have to be food-based. AL: But you’ve invested in food-based ethanol. VK: Only […]

Worldwide resistance to GMOs dwindle as food bills rise

For a while now, I’ve been cautioning people that surging prices for industrial food don’t necessarily “level the playing field” for sustainably produced fare. In fact, the few giant companies that dominate the global food system are fattening themselves on higher prices, consolidating their grip over the world’s palate. Last week, new Gristmill blogger Anna […]

Lomborg does his shtick

God knows why, but they invited Bjorn Lomborg for a short one-on-one interview. Somewhat embarrassingly for Fortune, they got about a third of the crowd that’s come to most other sessions. Apparently people are tired of his shtick. For some reason, Adam Lashinsky from Fortune is kissing Lomborg’s ass, asking him to “challenge our cozy […]

A REDtime story

Recycled Energy Development is in The Atlantic this month, as a part of a larger story by Lisa Margonelli about the potential for waste energy recycling at U.S. industrials.

Peter Barnes sprints through cap-and-dividend

Peter Barnes was given exactly five minutes (!) to explain cap-and-dividend to the audience. Everybody’s so tired and frazzled that I don’t think it sank in very much. However, I talked with Barnes for a good while outside, before the session, and I came out of it far more convinced of the wisdom of the […]