Climate Technology

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  • Sen. Alexander calls for 100 new nuke plants, won’t work with Dems on climate bill

    Lamar Alexander unveils his plan.Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) on Monday called for 100 new nuclear power plants over the next 20 years as the central element of a climate and energy plan that Republicans intend to introduce in the Senate. In presenting the plan, he shot down the possibility that he would work with Democrats […]

    Kate Sheppard Technology

  • What the heck is CCS and can it really help fight climate change? An expert explains

    Artist’s rendering of a power plant with CCS technology.Image: Prosjektlab/BellonaIt is conventional wisdom among People Who Matter that burning coal is going to continue, even accelerate, no matter what kind of legislation is passed or international agreements are forged. That’s why carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) — technology that buries power-plant carbon dioxide emissions underground […]

    David Roberts Technology

  • San Francisco solar energy incentive program shines bright in first year

    Last July, the City and County of San Francisco launched the first local solar energy incentive program in the nation. The results are in, and the program is an unequivocal success. In the year since our solar energy incentive program GoSolarSF launched, we have seen a 450% increase in applications for solar installations in San […]

    Gavin Newsom Technology

  • Green jobs: debunking the debunkers

    Energy markets are neither free nor efficient, so traditional economic arguments against regulation and other government interventions do not apply.  In response to my recent article digging into green jobs, a reader sent me a copy of a March paper by Andrew Morriss et al at University of Illinois that attempts to debunk green jobs […]

    Tom Konrad Technology

  • Intersolar gathering

    Fifteen thousand solar devotees from around the world are expected to meet in San Francisco this week in an event that organizers hope will “create strong global relationships.” Actually, the sun worshippers will be fully-clothed (many in suits, no doubt). These movers and shakers, metaphorically speaking, will be attending the continent’s largest business-to-business solar trade […]

    Osha Gray Davidson Technology

  • Washington state may soon be home to world’s largest PV solar project

    About four miles from the town of Cle Elum, Wash., there is a large, flat piece of land surrounded by a ring of 50-foot-tall Ponderosa Pines. The area has been repeatedly logged over the last few decades and is now relatively treeless. But it may soon be home to an entirely different sort of renewable […]

    Sarah van Schagen Technology

  • Energy industry sways Congress with misleading data

    This story was written by ProPublica’s Adam Lustgarten. The two key arguments that the oil and gas industry is using to fight federal regulation of the natural gas drilling process called hydraulic fracturing — that the costs would cripple their business and that state regulations are already strong — are challenged by the same data […]

    ProPublica Technology

  • Carbon trading: Worthy of Feinstein’s ire?

    “Deregulation shifts the major burden of consumer protection to the competitive market, and therefore, in important measure, to the enforcement of antitrust laws.” – Alfred E. Kahn, Lessons for Deregulation: Telecommunications and Airlines after the Crunch. I’ve always found the above to be one of the wiser quotes about deregulation. (Kahn, for those who don’t […]

    Sean Casten Technology

  • Climate talks should not focus on China and India at Africa’s expense

    The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) has already failed Africa, some observers believe, so why bother post-2012 when the existing CDM framework established under the Kyoto Protocol expires? But as the international community prepares to negotiate a new climate pact, we should care about extending the CDM, and care a great deal. After all, the CDM […]

    Sonia Medina Technology

  • Coal-nundrum and Ex-gas-peration

    Recently, I met with the CEO of a utility to discuss how to get at carbon reduction goals. He asked two insightful questions. The first was, “Why doesn’t the natural gas industry support climate legislation?” One of the key points turned up in the utility’s analysis of future supply is that we’re going to have […]

    Auden Schendler Technology