Climate Technology

What's the greenest business?

From Apple to News Corp.: Here's why we need new criteria to rank truly "green" companies.

Disadvantaged teens build 160 MPG hybrid car

West Philadelphia High School has a dropout rate of more than 50 percent, and 85 percent of students are low-income. But instead of making trouble in their neighborhood, getting in one little fight, or even shooting some B-ball outside of the school, a team of 15 dedicated West Philly students built a badass hybrid car that gets 160 miles to the gallon. Then they entered it in a contest where it beat the pants off cars built by fancy Ivy League engineers.

Virgin Atlantic plans to halve jet fuel’s carbon footprint using industrial gas

Virgin Atlantic is promising that within a few years, they'll be able to make their long haul flights with half the carbon impact that their jet fuel creates now.

The key technology here captures gases from steel production and makes them into jet fuel. It's supposedly better than biofuels, in part because it doesn't raise the same land use concerns. Virgin's not making the transition on its own: the company is partnering with Boeing, Swedish Fuels, and New Zealand-based Lanza Tech.

The Washington Post's boneheaded conventional wisdom on Solyndra

The Washington Post is spouting the Very Serious Conventional Wisdom: government is a "crappy" venture capitalist that shouldn't be picking winners.

Critical List: Invasive species jump the border; Gulf sheen not BP’s fault

While U.S. border monitors were busy looking for terrorists in cargo containers, a slew of invasive species slipped unnoticed into the country.

Whatever that sheen in the Gulf is, it's not BP's fault, okay??

If carbon is a risk (and it is!), the market should adjust for that, valuing companies with high "exposure to climate change" less than those that are climate-resilient. But since markets don't seem to ever do what they should in theory, that hasn't happened yet.

How to beat the Tea Party and win on clean energy

Tea Party politics have locked the U.S. into energy-policy stalemate. With the climate clock running out, is this stalemate also checkmate for Earth?

Solyndra and the self-referential Beltway media cycle

Solyndra is being called a scandal even though there hasn't been any official wrongdoing established or charged. Blame cable news and the political press.

Talking motorbike runs on poop. That is all.

Here's a bike that runs on biogas from human poo, writes messages in the air, plays music, and features a talking toilet. Is it even worth making jokes about this? Is it even POSSIBLE?

Fake scalp, fake scandal: DOE official didn't resign ‘over Solyndra’

Politico blasted out this headline: "Silver resigns over Solyndra loan." Scandal! An administration in crisis! Dems in disarray! But it was fiction.

A day in the life of John Q. Public and his electric car

Kevin Day is just some dude who bought a Nissan Leaf and is kinda in love with it. Even with a daily 30-mile commute, he only has to charge it once every three days; he appreciates its fast pickup and ultra-quiet ride; and it saves him about $100 a month in gas. (As one commenter […]