As I said on Friday, there is so much going on. Here are some more salient items for you. Jim Rogers , I quoted the Duke Energy CEO here a while back. In the Sunday "NY Times Magazine," there's a profile of the head of the nation's third-largest emitter of carbon dioxide. Why has he […]
There really are a ton of stories out there. Here’s a sampling: Cars – I’ve written recently about electric cars and other exciting initiatives. There are more developments on the automotive front. Mitsubishi and Peugeot have entered into an alliance to supply key components for electric vehicles and may build their own as well. See […]
I looked last month at the car of the future, and particularly a superb show from Nova. Zero emission cars fueled by zero emission power plants give zero emissions. That equation works for me. (See also A Little Automotive Fun – Plus Some Serious Business from a year ago, and other posts under Transportation.) There's […]
I just finished watching a truly terrific Nova special, Car of the Future, with the thoroughly irrepressible Tom and Ray Magliozzi, known to their adoring public as Click and Clack from Car Talk, the NPR supershow. Along with the laughs, you get a look at lightweight materials to revolutionize car manufacturing , the same materials […]
I headed up to Columbia University this past week to check out the Earth Institute’s State of the Planet 08 conference. As usual, I couldn’t devote as much time as I would’ve liked to the conference sessions, but I came away with a few good insights nonetheless. Thursday, I attended a press briefing with Jeffrey […]
Andrew Revkin had a sobering article in the "NY Times" on Sunday – As China Goes, So Goes Global Warming. First of all, with all of the hoopla surrounding the meetings in Bali, Revkin puts it nicely in perspective: "The Bali achievement? Two more years of talks." More to the point, though, is the fact […]
Renewable fuel compromise key to bill is the headline from A.P. and we learn, among other things, that “Democratic leaders working on an energy bill were trying to forge compromises Monday to increase the use of renewable fuels both in cars and by electric utilities after reaching a deal earlier that would raise vehicle fuel […]
Dingell v Pelosi – This is from the Center for American Progress today: “Two senior House Democrats — facing opposition from their party’s top leader, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — have abandoned their legislative effort to block California and a dozen other states from regulating greenhouse gases from cars and trucks.” Energy in the Senate […]
After working in government for 11 years (in a state environmental agency) and having been an environmental and political activist for a fair number of years before, during and after that, I have come to have a healthy skepticism — okay cynicism — about the reach of good public policy in legislation and actual real […]
The Summit started in earnest yesterday. Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London, and Chair of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, had some opening remarks, including these which are very direct indeed. (The C40 is in partnership with the Clinton Climate Initiative. I'll have more to say about President Clinton and the CCI in a later post.) In a separate […]
Since billions of people live in cities, with more coming every day, the infrastructure needed to support them needs building, rebuilding and rehabilitation, expansion and enhancement. There's power generation and transmission, the delivery of drinking water and the treatment of waste water, housing and parks, schools and hospitals, transportation, and commercial and industrial development. All […]