Climate Technology
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Hazardous substances still a mainstay for Big Chemical
The good news: some companies are moving toward nontoxic chemicals and products. The bad news: many aren’t. In a 2007 report, consultants hired by Big Chemical concluded that the industry’s eco-initiatives are “reactive, not proactive,” and that it “has a very short-term focus and discounts long-term issues.” There is, wrote the consultants, “a lack of […]
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A weak economy brings a diminished appetite for curbs on carbon emissions
The Freakonomics blog offers up a long-ish but lucid discussion of the ongoing financial crisis. I recommend the whole thing, but in a nutshell: Financial institutions borrow money all the time to fund their investments. When the real estate bubble burst, a lot of those investments lost value rapidly, leaving banks such as Bear Stearns […]
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From the mouths of oil executives …
“There is certainly some potential. But to me the biggest potential in America that is not exploited is energy savings. There is such an immense opportunity.” — Paolo Scaroni, chief executive of Italian oil giant ENI, on offshore drilling
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Wired: Two top Obama science advisors are tied to Monsanto and Amgen
I hope the executive branch’s "war on science" era ends in January. Heading into a period of climate change, tight fossil energy supplies, growing trouble with food-borne illnesses, declining health metrics, etc, we clearly don’t need a bunch of creationists and climate-change deniers knocking about the White House. At the same time, I hope we […]
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Natural Hydration Council: drink more bottled water … please?
Bottled water sales growth may be "drying up," but the bottled-water industry is veritably gushing on the PR front. Here it is investing in a high-dollar sponsorship of the upcoming presidential campaigns, joining Anheuser-Busch, EDS (which specializes in "information technology outsourcing), BBH, a big U.K. advertising firm, and others. And over here, you’ve got water […]
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Google, GE team up to tout ‘smart grid,’ clean energy initiatives
General Electric and Google announced on Wednesday they’re teaming up to promote renewable energy, specifically geothermal energy and plug-in hybrids, and spur better investment and swifter government action to create “smart,” more efficient electrical grids. In recent years, both enormous companies have announced big green investments: GE launched its Ecomagination initiative in 2005 to expand […]
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California air agency says cutting emissions will boost economy
California’s 2006 law requiring the state to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 would help boost its economy and save residents more money in the long term than doing nothing, according to a report by the influential California Air Resources Board. The state’s draft plan for reducing emissions focuses on requiring utilities to […]
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Touting the Volt, GM exec denies anthropogenic climate change
GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz was on the “Colbert Report” last night to talk about the new Chevy Volt, but a lot of the conversation ended up being about whether or not Lutz believes in anthropogenic climate change. Colbert, on the Volt: “This is tantamount to admitting that we have to do something about global […]
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Truth in advertising
Check out this pearl from commenter David Ahlport (found in the comments of David Roberts’ Cost Tic post). I’m a proponent of using ads to spread ideas. The problem with most ads is that they are at best half-truths. This one has it all. They draw a gentle and humorous line between themselves and negative […]
