Climate Climate & Energy

The coal industry’s rush to build new plants is bumping up against reality

One thing the coal industry seems to get, but that isn’t yet common public knowledge, is how fragile it is. It’s a filthy relic of the 19th century and a rational society with a free and open energy market would have ditched it already. It has survived almost purely based on inertia — its stranglehold […]

Strict safety guidelines cause construction delays at nuclear plants in Finland and Taiwan

Bloomberg has a very long article on the troubles plaguing Finland's Olkiluoto-3, "the first nuclear plant ordered in Western Europe since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster."

The plant has been delayed two years thanks to "flawed welds for the reactor's steel liner, unusable water-coolant pipes and suspect concrete in the foundation." It is also more than 25 percent over its 3 billion euro ($4 billion) budget. The article notes:

If Finland's experience is any guide, the "nuclear renaissance" touted by the global atomic power industry as an economically viable alternative to coal and natural gas may not offer much progress from a generation ago, when schedule and budgetary overruns for new reactors cost investors billions of dollars.

The U.K.'s Sizewell-B plant, which took nearly 15 years from the application to build it to completion, opened in 1995 and cost about 2.5 billion pounds ($5.1 billion), up from a 1987 estimate of 1.7 billion pounds.

Nuclear power's costs balloon partly because plants must be built to more exacting safety standards and stand up to more stringent oversight, leading to lost time and extra expense.

Indeed, the oversight is needed because so many plants have safety-related construction problems:

It’s time to stop accepting the claim that we ‘can’t’ switch to renewable energy

This started as a response to Michael Tobis in this thread, but seemed worthy of moving to its own post. Photo: pcesarperez Michael said: "I started by defending sequestration on the grounds of the conventional wisdom that renewables do not seem adequate for the whole energy picture …" This is a common refrain. You frequently […]

Penguin populations in trouble, climate cited as one cause

Photo: iStockphoto First, the good news: there’s an International Penguin Conference! Who knew? Now, the bad news: at said conference, taking place this week in Tasmania, a team of researchers has reported that the world’s penguins are in trouble. The 17 species “face serious population decreases throughout their range,” the team wrote, adding that officials, […]

Japan offers Micky D’s as reward for climate change promises

Today, in Japan: A Japanese government website crashed Wednesday as people raced to take up an offer of a half-price McDonald’s hamburger in exchange for pledging to fight global warming. … People were asked to check up to 39 boxes on a form they could download from the environment ministry’s website, each listing a way […]

A guest essay from Jan Lundberg

This is a guest essay from Jan Lundberg, who is, at press time, on the Climate Emergency Fast promoted by Mike Tidwell’s organization. It is a response to Tidwell’s recent piece in Grist, "Consider Using the N-Word Less." Jan publishes Culturechange.org and participates in campaigns to have cities ban plastic bags and water bottles. His […]

Rate of global warming predicted 35 years ago in Nature

Nature just published this remarkable letter by Neville Nicholls of Australia's Monash University:

Greenpeace ad on climate change

I have mixed feelings about this powerful ad. I'm curious to know how it strikes others.

Atlas makes significant changes to maps due to human activity

The editors of the Times Atlas made significant changes to their newest edition to reflect altered coastlines and shrinking lakes affected by climate change and unregulated irrigation. The last edition of the Atlas, which is published in Britain, came out in 2003; the newest edition contains “half a dozen major examples of how human activities […]

Doctors suggest global warming could lead to more heart problems

Does global warming make you heartsick? Oh wait, we mistyped. Retry: Does global warming make your heart sick? Some doctors think it might.