Climate Technology

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 […]

Surprise! Europe's climate policy is working

According to figures released today as part of the European Commission's annual report on its progress to meeting its Kyoto targets, E.U. greenhouse-gas emissions for 2010 were 15.5 percent below 1990 levels despite economic growth of 41 percent over the same period.

Will new LEED standards allow for clearcut timber?

Environmentalists say that proposed changes to LEED green building standards will undercut forest protection.

Rep. Cliff Stearns is against energy subsidies that aren't to oil companies

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), the Republicans' point man on Solyndra, says he's against subsidies to energy industries. What he meant was clean energy industries.

Sen. Lamar Alexander on making bipartisan energy progress

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) tells Grist why he's crossing party lines to slash energy company subsidies and pour money into cleantech research.

U.S. might meet its climate targets — by accident

How bad is the economy? So bad that we might actually meet our greenhouse gas emissions targets, laid out in 2009 at Copenhagen, by accident.