Carbon Dioxide Emissions From Plug In Hybrids.
No self-respecting liberal can help but have sympathy with the famous and much hyped "Occupy Wall Street" movement, although my own suspicion is that at the end of the day it will mean very little...
View ArticleWe Froze For Our Country and We Liked It...
...NOT! Reading about President Obama's energy saving initiative got me thinking about another one. I was a newbie federal employee during the Carter administration, and Jimmuh would not let us turn...
View ArticleReinventing Fire
Reinventing Fire: Bold Business Solutions for the New Energy Era Amory B Lovins and Rocky Mountain Institute White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2011 ISBN 978-1-603583718...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Republican Congressman Gleeful About Wasting Taxpayer Money
At the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Representative Steve King (R-IA-5) made it very clearnot just that he purposefully wastes taxpayers' money but that he takes joy in doing so....
View ArticleWith New Models, Truckers Mull Switch to Natural Gas
As domestic natural gas output reaches record levels, low prices are driving the purchase of CNG vehicles: In a time when natural gas is relatively cheap, but manufacturers build mostly gasoline and...
View ArticleBigger Government or Smaller Government ... or Smarter Government?
I heard it put recently, the argument shouldn't be about whether we need Bigger Government or Smaller Government, as it is too often framed by those in Congress -- but whether we can somehow achieve...
View ArticleMassachusetts Clean Energy Economy
The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center has released their 2012 Massachusetts Clean Industry Report (http://www.masscec.com/...) There are 4,995 clean energy firms and 71,523 clean energy jobs in the...
View ArticleThe efficiency of private sector
Romney in the debate, and Republicans all the time, chant this mantra, "Private sector is a lot more efficient than Government will ever be". I think it is time we deconstruct this, and blow it out of...
View ArticleCreating a Majority Coalition for a Progressive Agenda by Changing Political...
Many Diaries here have made a compelling case that Governor Romney is unqualified to be President. Yet here he is trailing by less than the margin of error in the national polls. How did this come...
View ArticleQwerty: quirky or proper?
Property comes first, on the top line of the qwerty keyboard and almost everywhere else in these United States. The "official" explantation for the apparently irrational placement of the letters of the...
View ArticleCrippled Crystal River 3 nuclear power plant permanently closed — time for...
Yesterday, Duke Energy announced that it was permanently closing the Crystal River 3 nuclear power plant located in Crystal River, Florida (on the west coast between Tampa and Gailnesville). The 860 MW...
View ArticleWhen is CT not CT? An alternative explanation for changes in productivity vs....
If a conspiracy suggestion is on the Front Page, does it still count? If it's a hint, a whisper, an intimation, rather than a direct call-out, does that exempt it?A note: this is my first real 'it's...
View ArticleLooking for advice on how to buy a car responsibly
I will soon be getting my first car. I want something that is environmentally responsible, safe, reliable, and built by a company that respects its workers. Ideally I would want it to be union made and...
View ArticleWater Conservation Part 2
In the last diary entry, I mentioned how glaciers that form the source of freshwater rivers and groundwater are both dwindling, how millions of people can depend on a single such source of freshwater,...
View ArticleRound-up Of Save The Environment Diary
I just wanted to take a minute to let those who might have missed it know about the Save The Environment Diary. In the first entry, I introduced the diary, gave the text of a letter published by a...
View ArticleHey man, why don't we just get everybody the adjustable flapper?
I just wanted to write to highlight this idea from my diary today:There are ways you can turn your regular toilet into a low-flow. Some toilets use a rubber part called a flapper to control flushing....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Seeing the Light UPDATED - 3 Stories of Energy Efficient Lighting Making a...
The incandescent light bulb has seen its day; guzzler of electricity, producer of waste heat, short of life, it is slowly but surely being supplanted by CFLs (Compact Fluorescent Lights) and LEDs...
View ArticleHow "Free Trade" Destroys Freedom
American history has been married to the history of money since its founding, albeit what began as an experiment, a revolution or rebellion to overthrow an economic system predicated upon exploitation...
View ArticleMethane Management: Crowdfunding Natural Gas Leak Monitoring
HEET [Home Energy Efficiency Team http://www.heetma.com ], a Cambridge, MA nonprofit which organizes public weatherization parties and barnraisings, is crowd funding a natural gas leak monitoring...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Gallup: Americans Overwhelmingly Favor Clean Energy, Efficiency Over Fossil...
Cross posted from Scaling GreenThe fossil fuel industry can (and does) spend millions of dollars trying to persuade people that their product's great, that renewable energy isn't, and that climate...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Defending Clean Energy in Ohio and Beyond
If you watched this week's episode of Showtime's climate series Years of Living Dangerously, you saw a fantastic piece by America Ferrera called "Against the Wind" that pierced the veil of the fossil...
View ArticleIt Ain't How Much Energy We Generate, It's How Much We "Reject" (for the USA...
Every year, I look at the US annual energy budget chart and figure out a rough percentage of how energy efficient our economy is, the percentages of "useful" and "rejected" energy (the terms Lawrence...
View ArticleClik here to view.
New solar, efficiency programs will curb millions of tons of emissions and...
Proposed efficiency rule on new commercial air-conditioning units will cut their energy usage in half. The Obama administration took several small steps in the right direction on energy policy Thursday...
View ArticleClik here to view.
'Here Comes the Sun': a solar energy update
Whenever I need a burst of feel good energy I google solar or wind energy for a pick-me-up. Here are five short articles of small news that keeps adding up to big changes in our energy generation...
View ArticleGermany's Biggest Utility Changes Its Business Model
"In a strategy approved by the utility's advisory board yesterday, E.ON [Germany's biggest utility] is preparing to split into two separate companies sometime next year. The new (as-yet-unnamed)...
View ArticleDo It Yourself Solar: Austrian Self-Build Coops
In 1983, a couple of years after the second of the 1970s oil shocks and at a time when petroleum prices were relatively low, in a village near Graz, Austria, in the province of Styria, a farmer and an...
View ArticlePopulation and Climate - Go North Young Man
At the present rate of US population growth (~0.7%/year), our population would double in about 100 years. However, in my lifetime, (which included the baby boom) the US population has nearly tripled....
View ArticleThe Energy Context I See
According the Lawrence Livermore National Labs annual US Energy flowchart (flowcharts.llnl.gov/...) since 2000 the USA has produced between 95 and 100 quadrillion btu’s of energy every year. Of that...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - April 20, 2016
Shanghai Tower: World’s Foremost Eco-Friendly Skyscraper?cleantechnica.com/...Greening the Empire State Building - report from 2011www.dailykos.com/...Net Zero Habitat for Humanity...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - August 1, 2016
I’m noticing a cross-over now between zero net energy building and city agriculture, two subjects I follow and publish links lists on. The archive of the city agriculture links list is at...
View ArticleWhat is wrong with watering plants?
What’s wrong with watering plants? Tom A. Reynolds, Professional Irrigation AdvisorI design large irrigation systems as an independent irrigation advisor now; I am professionally liable. From 1997 to...
View ArticleOfficial resistance: Nine states and DC intervene in lawsuit over enhanced...
In the wake of Pr*sident Donald Trump’s unsurprising announcement Wednesday in Detroit that he is ordering a review of enhanced fuel economy standards established by the Obama administration, nine...
View ArticleMemo to legislators: Virginia is not a low-cost energy state
Anyone who has attended the annual meeting of the House Energy Subcommittee has watched the Republican majority vote down all manner of legislation designed to improve Virginia’s poor ranking on energy...
View ArticleSuperman should not be stopping any bullets
The outrage generated by a comic of Superman protecting immigrants further reveals the racist face of thoseoutraged. Pardon me while I make a little light of the situation.If Superman is going to fight...
View Article"How free enterprise can solve climate change"
How free enterprise can solve climate change Tuesday, April 25 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm MIT, Building E14-633, 75 Amherst Street, Cambridge Speaker: Bob Inglis Former Congressman Bob Inglis (R-SC) traveled to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Why America Just Doesn't Get Trains Anymore
For reasons I may get to in a subsequent diary, I am more than a little pissed at the state of railroading in America. Once upon a time, America’s rail system was an example for the rest of the world....
View ArticleThe traveling salesman problem
There’s a mathematical problem in which the goal is to optimize the route among multiple locations that often goes by the name of “the traveling salesman problem.” It can be tough. Interestingly...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - January 13, 2019
Building Off the Grid - DIY Network TV show with 34 episodes as of December 2018https://www.diynetwork.com/shows/building-off-the-grid Trondheim, Norway’s net energy positive building, Powerhouse...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - July 18, 2019
Zero-energy demonstration project in Beijing made from pre-fab timber...
View ArticleCalifornia and four major automakers stick it to Trump on fuel-efficiency...
In an agreement announced Wednesday, California and four major automobile manufacturers have undermined the Trump regime’s effort to roll back automobile fuel-efficiency requirements that had been...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Trump's failing Coronavirus response. Running public health for-profit or...
Why are we failingIt’s simple, we believe everything, including public goods like healthcare, must be run like a business. I worked for a non-profit for 12 years and I came to realize we were hamstrung...
View Article“Efficiency,” the Myths of Markets, Minimum Wages, and a Universal Basic Income
For brief descriptions of and links to recent posts, click here. For an inverse-chronological list with links to all posts after January 23, 2017, click here. For a subject-matter index to posts before...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - March 24, 2021
Making a wooden solar insolation visualizationhttps://youtu.be/PvcvY4ToFaQhttps://www.makingdatatangible.com/solar/ - program to help you make your ownhttps://pysolar.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ - a...
View ArticleGlobalization and Ukraine
For over half a decade, the Western world has grappled with the discontents of modern, globalized civilization. The notions of “free trade” and “maximizing productive efficiency” had led the West to...
View ArticleZero Net Energy - March 12, 2022
No waste, no carbon, net zero homehttps://www.acsarchitect.com/baboolal-residencehttps://inhabitat.com/no-waste-no-carbon-no-wonder-this-net-zero-home-breaks-the-mold/Singapore plans a “forest...
View ArticleGrid Enhancing Technologies
This Brattle Group study (https://www.brattle.com/insights-events/publications/grid-enhancing-technologies-shown-to-double-regional-renewable-energy-capacity-according-to-study-by-brattle-consultants/)...
View ArticleInsulate Britain Was a Bargain
Insulate Britain (https://insulatebritain.com) is an offshoot of Extinction Rebellion which demanded that the British government fund insulation for all public housing by 2025, and, by the end of 2021,...
View ArticleEarth Matters: EPA's proposed standards push EVs; bird apocalypse; Colorado...
Last year, more than 807,000 electric cars were sold in the United States, 5.8% of the nation’s new car total, compared with 3.2% in 2021. In the first quarter of 2023, that portion hit 7.2%. Despite...
View ArticleFirst Utility-Run Networked Geothermal System In USAmerica
From my friends at Home Energy Efficiency Team [HEET http://heet.org ] who have been working toward this for years. They started by doing weatherization parties at homes and offices, proceeded to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
What our family has been doing to fight climate change and help Mother Nature...
NOTE: This is approximately a 15-minute read. **Also, feel free to print this article up and use it as a guide!** Many of the stories that I have been reading on Daily Kos lately about climate change...
View Article
