The AP has a blockbuster report out this morning: US Nuke Regulators Weaken Safety Rules. (NPR is featuring the story, as are hundreds of other news outlets.) The opening sentence certainly gets your attention. “Federal regulators have been working closely with the nuclear power industry to keep the nation’s aging reactors operating within safety standards […]
Maybe, just maybe, one of the lessons learned from the economic crisis of the past few years is that folks in post-industrial societies need to live within their means better and more. Credit card debt in the US has decreased by over $167 billion since its peak of $957.5 billion in 2008. It stood at […]
The bad news keeps rolling in for the “nuclear renaissance” that has been much touted in recent years. The relentless, heedless proponents of more nuclear have tried to bull their way forward, even in the aftermath of Fukushima. Well, thankfully, and perhaps predictably, the democracies, at least, are saying no more, thank you, it’s well […]
In an op-ed last week at the NY Times, Robert Bryce of the Manhattan Institute, reiterated the same old tired and tiresome nonsense about renewable energy: It’s not good enough to get the job done. As I’ve noted here a number of times, that particular Big Lie is easily refuted. See 80% Renewable – The […]
I wrote last week about some of the ins and outs of food insecurity relative to climate change. (Forgive me, not incidentally, for not writing so much or so often in recent weeks. I’ve been finishing up a big writing project and I’ve been pretty focused on that. It’s done, finally, as of this past […]
There was a very important bit of reporting in the NY Times yesterday: A Warming Planet Struggles to Feed Itself. Among the most important things it does is illustrate quite clearly how the extremes of temperature and precipitation that are becoming the norm are negatively affecting agricultural production. Productivity losses generate higher prices which, in […]
It appears to me that President Obama has made another excellent choice for his administration for advancing the cause of clean tech and living up to the responsibility of fighting the climate crisis. He has named John Bryson, a founder of the seminal environmental organization, the Natural Resources Defense Council, as the new Secretary of […]
The PBS program, Need to Know, had an important segment recently on the implications for human health from climate change. These are, unfortunately, many and various, and include disease vectors exacerbated by warming, allergies, health impacts from too much or too little water, and heat. The show looked at a number of concerns, articulated by […]
I was talking to a fellow sustainability geek the other day. He was telling me about the new gadget, installed by his friendly, neighborhood electric utility, that very closely monitors his home energy use and gives vivid color readouts on just how much juice is being consumed. You won’t be surprised to learn that he […]
There’s a great blog on many things tech, including clean tech, called GigaOm, if you don’t know it. I dropped in for a comment the other day on the estimable Katie Fehrenbacher’s piece about the recent LinkedIn IPO and its impact on clean tech finance. She suggested that VC money would be migrating away from […]
How green are the Tories? was the question from The Independent a few years back. “Vote Blue, Go Green” said the Conservative leader, David Cameron. Now he’s the PM and he’s backing up his words with actions. His government’s announcement yesterday that it is going to halve the UK’s GHG emissions, relative to 1990 figures, […]
“Action This Day” is what Winston Churchill demanded in his World War II memos. That’s what the National Academies are calling for in their fifth and final report on America’s Climate Choices. Their press release said the report, prepared by a blue-ribbon panel of the National Research Council, “… reiterated the pressing need for substantial […]
That’s how I imagine Variety would have headlined last week’s very big news that Japan’s prime minister, Naoto Kan, is abandoning any push for new nuclear power and will make a concerted effort to promote renewables. I lauded Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel, when she made essentially the same decision in March. A panel of experts […]
Here’s a nice quick hitter on electric trash trucks in Paris, the City of Love. They’re quiet so you can run your collection routes at night thereby reducing traffic congestion considerably. What’s not to love?
The Big Lie – or tired old axiom if you want to be polite – is that renewables can’t get the job done. If you need to believe that, then you might as well believe that ignorance is strength. As I noted here, and many times at this blog, renewables are blowing the doors down […]