L Prize: LED Bulb Competition

On the NPR show, Science Friday, it dedicated a whole show to the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Bright Tomorrow Lighting Prizes (L Prize) Competition and how Phillips Electronics is the first company to enter.  The guest speaker for this show was Jim Brodrick, Lighting Program Manager for the Building Technologies Program (with DOE).  Brodrick [...]

US China Joint Statement on energy cooperation

Check out the full text of the U.S. China Joint Statement at CBS The joint statement issued tonight from beijing has a remarkable number of agreements in it.  But I only want to discuss the implications of the climate and energy agreements.  (Well, first, I want to note that the Yuan isn’t budging yet, but [...]

Copenhagen posturing

The last round of negotiations prior to the Copenhagen Summit in Barcelona fizzled to a message of decreased expectations.  This has set the table for rapid political posturing from the US.  On Tuesday the Wall Street Journal quoted several key Senators, including climate bill sponsor Sen. Kerry, with various statements postponing the possibility of US [...]

Metrobus in Mexico City Wins Harvard University Award for Sustainable Transit Project.

Mexico City’s Metrobus project received the 2009 Roy Family Award for Environmental Partnership from Harvard University. Metrobus is a sustainable transit project in one of the world’s most populated and congested cities. “Metrobus, which focuses on massive transport systems and better vehicle fuel efficiency, has shown to be a viable and economically efficient way to [...]

Salty or Sweet? Harnessing the Sun for Desalination

Here is one for all of the science buffs! Two Canadian engineers recently unveiled a cheaper desalination method that harnesses the sun to power the desalination process, which in turn could lower the cost of desalination by almost 80%. This process requires a bit more ingenuity than the typical prototype, but if it does work [...]

Mutually Assured Destruction Gives Way To Monetizing Atomic Derelicts

We were utterly fascinated to read this article in the New York Times revealing that a full 50% of the nuclear fuel used in reactors in the United States comes from recycled nuclear bombs, primarily from Russia. Which pretty much explains why disarmament has been happening! And it has a nice swords-to-plowshares narrative, to boot. [...]

“Water is the new carbon”

Increasingly climate change scientists and policy makers are recognizing that water resources and availability will be the largest resource to be impacted by climate change. In a recent webcast published by the UN, several world water experts gather to discuss the difficulties ahead regarding water. These experts make a call to policy-makers to bring the [...]

Manure to Electricity

There is concrete evidence that climate change is mainly due to anthropogenic actions. We are emerging into a world where consumers are becoming more concerned on where their food is coming from and the impacts that food production has on the environment.  Recently, cattle farmers are targeted in terms of rearing practices and amount of [...]

Warming Causes a Freeze

Sad news everyone: due to the rate at which coral reefs are dying off, researchers are considering take existing ones and freezing them for preservation. The main reason, as we all know, for the quicker and quicker disappearance of coral reefs is due to the slowly increasing temperatures as a result of climate change. As [...]

Losing Battles but Winning the War

Last Monday a lot of planning finally fell through to the dismay of a future coal-fired power plant. However, this meant good news for citizens in Minnesota and South Dakota and furthermore, for the general population at large. Five years of developing plans went down the tubes as plans for the Big Stone II Project [...]