solar power
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Critical List: Crowdsourcing carbon solutions; New Yorkers regret drilling leases
The Maldives are going to crowdsource their carbon-cutting plan. (They’re asking international experts, not just letting any citizen drive policy. Not sure how that would work in the Maldives, but in the U.S. you’d get a lot of “shine lamps on solar panels for infinite energy!”)
Should the new poster child for global warming be the city mayor who has to deal with unexpected weather extremes?
Usually you hear about buyer's remorse, but New Yorkers are having sellers' remorse about turning over drilling rights to natural gas companies. -
Biomass an important contribution, but not a magic bullet
There is a growing enthusiasm for biomass, as pundits like Arne Jungjohann look at small towns in Europe that are able to get 100% of their energy by burning wood and other biomass. But when these cases are presented out of context, I’m afraid some may draw unwarrantedly optimistic conclusions. Biomass power is not, in itself, […]
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Critical List: Britain’s new shale gas bonanza; 48 hours in a box, with plants
British people now have a greater stake in fighting against hydrofracking: turns out their country has a lot of shale gas.
Luckily, though, they live in Europe, where gas executives admit that, at the very least, drilling should become safer.
The U.S. could be the biggest market for solar power in the world. -
Overcoming the roadblocks to democratizing the electricity system – part 5 of 5
A serialized version of ILSR‘s new report, Democratizing the Electricity System, Part 4 of 5. Click for Part 1 or Part 2 or Part 3 or Part 4. Overcoming the Roadblocks to Democratizing the Electricity System The electricity grid system has become host to a distributed generation phenomenon that has developed in a largely hostile […]
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Keeping Up with the Solar (and Wind) Joneses
Earlier this year, my husband and I put up solar panels at our home – the first solar project in our historic West Virginia town. Well, just last week, inspired by our project, our neighbor installed a solar system three times bigger than ours. He expects it will generate the vast majority of the electricity […]
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It's not just the U.S. — China is also eating Germany's solar lunch
Germany has more installed solar capacity than any other country on the planet, despite having a population of only 80 million people. You'd think that would be enough to drive a market for domestic solar production, but only if you lived under a globalization-proof rock and ate steaming bowls of naivete for breakfast.
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New York City's Solar Windfall Illuminates America's Clean Energy Future
This post adapted from Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project. A recently released solar map of New York City found enough room on building rooftops for solar panels to power half the city during hours of peak electricity use. Taking advantage of this solar windfall could allow […]
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Critical List: Solar installations increasing; giant snails invade Miami
The number of non-residential solar panel installations is growing.
Disasters connected to weather or climate made more than 30 million people in Asia refugees last year, the Asian Development Bank reports.
Oil industry consultant Daniel Yergin wrote a new book about energy. It'll probably annoy you.
A professor in Canada made a machine that could suck carbon out of the air.