Photo: Marcellus Protest
There are some indications that America may be experiencing a bit of a natural gas “boom” right now. Last year the country produced 22.6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, up 3.1 trillion from 2005. Natural gas is seen as a better alternative to coal (which is used to generate half the country’s electricity) and is cheaper and more abundant than wind and solar. In 2009 the U.S. recorded the lowest amount of emissions since 1995. This is due in part to the lame economy, sure, but renewable energy and increased use of natural gas played a role as well. Read more…
Photo: Sauter Carbon Offset Design
As you may have heard me say before, it’s hip to be green. Well that has taken on new meaning with the emergence of more eco-friendly yachts. Finally, you don’t have to feel guilty while cruising around in your oceanic palace that costs more than Central America’s collective GDP. Even a medium-sized yacht (so weak) can rip through several hundred liters of diesel hourly. Not to mention the electricity needed to power the jacuzzi(s) and sauna(s) would be enough to light up Mozambique for weeks. Read more…
Photo: Pure3d
So the sun puts out enough energy in one second to power the United States for 9,000 years. Please take a moment to appreciate that independently researched statistic. I do it cuz I love you. It seems like for some time now humans have been trying to efficiently harness some of that energy, and I’m not talking about maladjusted kids lighting ants on fire or stoner nerds find a butane-free alternative to spark their bingers. BrightSource, a company based in Oakland, announced on April 11th that they had secured a $1.6 billion loan from Uncle Sam on top of the $168 million gave them for the Ivanpah power solar power plant in the Southern California desert. Read more…
Photo: jurvetson
The political rhetoric about eliminating, or at least diminishing, our dependence on foreign oil is nothing new. Seriously tackling this elusive issue was something that President Obama got behind on the campaign trail under his slogan of ‘change.’ Remember that? Cute, huh? Unfortunately it seems that like many of the President’s ideological visions, the implementation of an energy plan that sees our importation of oil decrease and our use of alternative energy increase has been equalized by political stagnation from the right. Read more…
Photo: nblumhardt
The nuclear meltdown in Japan has given cause to revaluate the state of our own facilities. Hanford, in southeast Washington, was the location for the most plutonium production in America during the Cold War. 20 years later, it’s a mess consisting of 53 million gallons of toxic waste. It will have to endure until 2019 when largest and most expensive nuclear clean up in history is set to commence. The plan is to spend $74 billion over those next 25 years, more than the annual budget of the Department of Education. Read more…
Photo: Mercedes-Benz
Hybrid cars are nothing new. In fact, Toyota has now sold more than 2 million models of its revolutionarily Prius since 1997-its best seller in Japan. Toyota’s luxury division, Lexus, recently unveiled a fleet of seven new hybrid models and the company expects hybrids to account for a fifth of it’s sales in Europe. The demand for lower emissions vehicles has other luxury brands scrambling to get their own models into production. Ian Robertson, marketing director of BMW notes “society and governments want to move towards zero emissions from cars.” Read more…
Photo: ggalice
Ecuador’s president Rafael Corea calls Chevron a “multinational monster.” Many celebrities have also taken to bashing Chevron, not wanting to miss the next hip environmental bandwagon. On February 14th an Ecuadorian court lowered the boom on the American oil giant; a fine of $9.47 billion. Perhaps the best part, if Chevron doesn’t apologize within 15 days then the fine jumps to 17.2 billion, o snap! If the original fine were to be assessed it would go down as the greatest amount of damages ever awarded in an environmental case. Read more…
Photo: Tambako the Jaguar
Trash, garbage, rubbish, what happens to all of it? In the developed world especially it’s usually out of sight out of mind. As long as it ain’t stankin up my kitchen, who knows/cares where it goes? But as humans go on repopulating exponentially, so does their garbage. The traditional remedy has been to bury it. This solution causes pollution, and what’s more, we can’t just keep stuffing the earth full of our trash forever, right? So, do we launch it into orbit for some alien race in another galaxy to deal with-tempting, but costly. What if we could just kind of vaporize it, reduced it to near nothingness, like a superhero vanquishing his filthy nemesis. Read more…
Photo: lkiller123
The “bathtub ring” that encircles Lake Mead, America’s largest reservoir, is a vivid, if not painful reminder of the sinking water levels all along the Colorado River. Only 40% full, the reservoir has been feeling the effects of a decade-long drought. Whether this is due to weather cycles or global warming is debatable. Not quite as debatable is that global warming will diminish flows in the Colorado River 10-30% over the next 50 years. Read more…
Photo: Patrick Emerson
There seems to be this instinctive human compulsion to drain wetlands. The Neanderthal probably looked upon prehistoric swamps and grunted amongst his peers about how to make the useless land dry. The people of Russia recent learned the importance of wetlands the hard way. Their peatlands were scorched by a summer so hot it defied modern precedent. The peat-bog caught fire and engulfed Moscow in smog and carbon monoxide. Russia’s daily death rate doubled to 700 people. Read more…
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