energy

Why carrots and sticks are not interchangeable

David Roberts challenges carbon tax advocates. He says GHG policy should “penalize the emission of GHGs and reward the prevention of GHG emissions. Sticks and carrots.” As someone who thinks neither a carbon tax nor cap-and-trade can be the primary means to solve global warming, I’ll take on Roberts’ challenge just because it offers an […]

CNN on energy efficiency and waste-energy recycling

The coolest thing about this story? They called us. The word is getting out there!

Cellulosic ethanol ranks dead last

Mark Jacobson (associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, Stanford University) has just published a paper in the journal of the Royal Society of Chemistry. You can read the entire article here (PDF). BEV = battery electric vehicle HFCV = hydrogen fuel cell vehicle CSP = concentrated solar panels PV = photovoltaic CCS = carbon […]

Scaling back our energy-hungry lifestyles means more of what matters, not less

The work of recent Nobel Peace Prize winners Al Gore and the IPCC, along with a veritable mountain of other evidence, clearly lays out the reality and potential costs of human-induced climate change. Most analyses have concluded that we can and must keep our economies growing while addressing the climate challenge; we need only reduce the amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases we produce. We can do this, they say, by using more efficient light bulbs, driving more fuel-efficient cars, better insulating our homes, buying windmills and solar panels, etc. While we agree that these things need to happen (and the sooner the better), it is clear that they will not be enough to solve the big problems the world faces.

The inconvenient truth is that to ensure quality of life for future generations, the world's wealthiest societies cannot continue our current lifestyles and patterns of economic growth. Further, the large proportion of humanity living in poverty must be able to satisfy basic human needs without aspiring to an overly materialistic lifestyle.

Does this inconvenient truth mean doom and despair? Absolutely not. Indeed, we think this seemingly inconvenient truth is actually a blessing in disguise, for our high-consuming lifestyles and western patterns of economic growth are not actually improving our well-being: they are not only unsustainable, they are undesirable.

Scientists are discovering a convenient truth: our happiness does not depend on the consumption of conventional economic goods and services, but instead is enhanced when we have more time and space for socializing, for nature, for learning, and for really living instead of just consuming.

With love

Dear Tom Vilsack, Why did you tempt us with your progressive energy plan (PDF) and then turn your back on us so quickly? Sure, you had no chance of winning, but you could have at least pushed your energy agenda and greenhouse-gas reduction strategies a little longer, driving the debate among candidates who might actually […]

The Endesa Nigh

Indigenous Activists Give Up Fight Over Chilean Dam After a six-year protest, four elderly Pehuenche women have agreed to end their opposition to a $570 million hydroelectric dam to be built on their ancestral land in Southern Chile. After lengthy negotiations with the Chilean government and Endesa, the Spanish-owned power company building the dam, the […]

Humans are gobbling up too much of the sun’s energy

The energy of the sun, captured by plants and passed on to animals, powers everything in our world — dolphins leaping out of the ocean, geese moving across the sky, people stirring their morning oatmeal. Set in our ways. Photo: Art Wolfe, Inc. This truth contains beautiful poetry: It teaches us that in our children’s […]

Fuel for the City

Seeking to control sky-high summertime fuel prices, the U.S. EPA proposed new regulations for anti-smog gasoline yesterday. The EPA has been gradually phasing in a plan to combat summer smog in densely populated areas by mandating the use of cleaner-burning reformulated gasoline (RFG). The oil industry blames that plan for high prices at the pumps […]

Electric Boogie

12,133 — per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the U.S. in 1997 1,381 — per capita annual electricity consumption (kilowatt-hours) in the rest of the world in 1997 21.5 — percentage increase in U.S. electricity consumption from 1990 to 1999 43 — percentage decrease in utility funding for energy efficiency from 1993 to 1998 […]