solar energy
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Spray-on batteries could turn your coffee cup into an energy collecting device
A team of engineers have figured out how to make spray-on, rechargeable batteries that could transform any surface, anywhere, into a device for collecting and storing energy.
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Singapore’s giant supertrees: The ultimate vertical gardens
Singapore is in the middle of a project that looks like a Miyazaki movie come to life. The city’s 18 “supertrees” do everything that normal trees do, only better. They will stretch up to 164 feet tall, grow 200 species of flowers, ferns, and epiphytes, collect solar energy, harvest rainwater, and work as a natural […]
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Solar ‘scandal’ upshot: China is dominating global solar market, for better or worse
Conservatives are going nuts about yet another "new Solyndra," but it's the same old story: cheap Chinese solar panels. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
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Chinese cheaters? U.S. slaps modest tariffs on solar panels from China
American solar-panel manufacturers have complained that the Chinese are crushing them with underpriced, over-subsidized panels -- and now the U.S. Commerce Department officially agrees.
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Rooftop revolution: How to get solar to 100 million Americans
Nearly 100 million Americans could install over 60,000 megawatts of solar at less than grid prices – without subsidies – by 2021. That's the takeaway from a new report by John Farrell of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.
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In Germany, solar will be as cheap as conventional electricity by 2013
"Grid parity" has arrived in parts of sunny California and Hawaii, and it's coming to (not-so-sunny) Germany by 2013.
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Critical List: Big trees suffer more from deforestation; Japan’s version of Al Gore
Deforestation is disproportionately killing off the world’s largest trees. Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif., a.k.a. the Mustache of Justice) wants to subpoena Koch Industries executives to force them to testify about the company’s connection to Keystone XL. The National Academy of Sciences wants to find out more about nanomaterials and their effects on humans, since the […]
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Critical List: Military could produce 7 GW of solar; British survey hedgehogs
Solar projects at desert military bases could produce 7,000 megawatts of solar energy — a huge amount. EVs have more than enough range to make 95 percent of the trips we take by car. Scotland aims to source 100 percent of its power from renewables by 2020, but to reach that goal, it needs the […]
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Solar grid parity 101 — and why you should care
We're rapidly approaching solar grid parity, the tipping point when installing solar power will cost less than buying electricity from the grid.