Climate Climate & Energy

Mooney on hurricanes and climate change

Chris Mooney has a piece in the L.A. Times about the current hurricane season and the connection between hurricanes and climate change. It echoes the sensible line taken in Chris’ book. This is the crucial bit: When it comes to the hurricane-global warming relationship, neither outright alarmism nor dismissive skepticism are warranted. Rather, taking the […]

Al Gore will pen a solutions-focused sequel

Al Gore is writing another book — and you can bet that climate change is shakin’ in its boots. The Path to Survival, a solutions-focused sequel to the groundbreaking Inconvenient Truth, is slated to hit shelves on Earth Day 2008. (Where was that impeccable timing when you were campaigning, Al?) Billed as “part scientific manual, […]

Notable quotable

From a Washington Post article about the transcendent potential of switchgrass: But such efforts [to persuade farmers to grow switchgrass] have hit a snag: Scientists haven’t perfected the process that turns switchgrass into ethanol. So for today, the Crop That Could Change Virginia is just hay with better publicity.

On how electric utilities should become carbon neutral

Since my first post dissing PG&E's offset program, I've had phone calls with PG&E, NRDC, members of PG&E's ClimateSmart External Advisory Group, plus a call with a forestry expert who consults with those who oversee the van Eck forest, which is featured on the "Our Projects" page of the ClimateSmart website. I have four basic conclusions:

EPA determines coal waste raises cancer risk

The waste from burning coal — coal combustion products, or CCPs, like coal ash and boiler slag — contains toxic heavy metals like mercury and cadmium. But don’t worry, the coal industry says that the concentrations aren’t high enough to do anyone harm. Taking the coal industry’s word for it, the U.S. EPA decided in […]

New full-page ad makes the case against coal

Ah, this kicks ass! The group Architecture2030 is putting a full-page ad in the next issue of the New Yorker. You can download the PDF here. I’ve reprinted the text below: —– GLOBAL WARMING Think You’re Making a Difference? Think Again. There are 151 new conventional coal-fired power plants in various stages of development in […]

Big Oil gets OK from Australian state for multi-billion-dollar LNG project

A major energy venture on Western Australia’s Barrow Island is one step closer to reality after getting a green light from state environmental officials. Chevron, ExxonMobil, and Royal Dutch Shell propose the development of a massive liquefied natural gas field expected to generate 10 million metric tons per year (which, in non-metric terms, is “a […]

Drought predicted to spread across Australia and the United States

The story of Australia's worst dry spell in a thousand years continues to astound. Last year we learned, "One farmer takes his life every four days." This year over half of Australia's agricultural land is in a declared drought.

How bad is it? One Australian newspaper is reporting:

Drought will become a redundant term as Australia plans for a permanently drier future, according to the nation's urban water industries chief ...

"The urban water industry has decided the inflows of the past will never return," Water Services Association of Australia executive director Ross Young said. "We are trying to avoid the term 'drought' and saying this is the new reality."

Vehicles sold in the U.S. will be outfitted with fuel-economy stickers

This is spiffy: all U.S.-sold cars, trucks, and SUVs manufactured after Sept. 1 will feature a window sticker that announces the vehicle’s expected miles per gallon, estimated annual fuel cost, and fuel economy compared to similar vehicles. Which will just make it all the more apparent that performance always trumps size.

A closer look at producing ethanol from poplar trees

Oregon Public Broadcasting is reporting on the efforts of a WSU researcher to turn poplar trees into transportation fuel:

[P]oplars [are] an on demand fuel source. Trees can be chopped down year round, chipped up and then fermented to create ethanol.

According to the researcher, an acre of poplars could supply about one thousand gallons of ethanol per year -- which is about three times the per-acre yield of corn ethanol, with a lot less plowing and fertilizer consumption. Cool!

Of course, inveterate skeptic that I am, I had to run the numbers ...