Who says climate policy is dead in the U.S.? By a vote of four to one, the New Mexico Environmental Improvement Board (EIB) voted Monday to adopt a new state pollution limit requiring the state’s largest emitters to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions by 3 percent per year from 2010 levels starting in 2013.
Monday’s ruling is the culmination of a two
In the face of Congressional inaction on climate change and a right wing political movement intent on doing all in its power to prevent sweeping climate action, an encouraging trend for the climate is the growing list of coal-fired power units scheduled to be taken off the grid. Coal is
A new EPA proposal is taking aim at reducing emissions from power plants that affect people living downwind. Air pollution from these sources has been shown to cause thousands of asthma cases and other cardio-respiratory impairments. The proposed regulations have been termed
(Reuters) – Old coal-fired power plants in Europe must be closed by the end of 2023 if their owners are not prepared to fit equipment to filter out acidifying pollutants, European Union member countries agreed on Friday, two sources in the talks said.
All other power stations must start planning to cut out pollutants such as sulphur and nitrogen oxides that damage human health and soil and water quality.
No, says a new report from the Global Justice Ecology Project, the Global Forest Coalition and Biofuelwatch called “Wood-based Bioenergy: The Green Lie”.
Burning wood – even fast-growing, genetically engineered trees designed to be used for fuel – merely increases the dangers of climate change, especially among the poorest nations, where much of the tree-growing takes place.
Growers argue that the tree plantations are growing on “marginal” land, but there is no such thing as marginal land in a poor country like Borneo, for example, where such land is used for grazing livestock, gathering wild plants for food or medicine, or as housing space.
Even the argument itself is specious. Some of these monoculture plantations are encroaching on arable land, or invading old-growth forests, a process that ends up displacing indigenous forest people
BrightSource Energy, Inc., developer of utility-scale solar thermal power plants, has raised an additional $150 million in its most recent equity financing. The Series D round brings BrightSource’s total equity financing to more than $300 million and positions the company for significant growth.
New investors including Alstom and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) joined existing investors in this round, led by VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
The additional financing will be used to support BrightSource’s 2,610 megawatts in contracts with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison to build 14 solar power plants in the US southwest by 2016. The funds will also be used by BrightSource to further its international expansion plans.
BEIJING (Reuters) – Cities across eastern and central China are rationing power for industry and urging residents to limit gas use after a wave of icy weather sent energy demand soaring while straining supplies of coal that were already tight.
Much of China’s manufacturing and farming heartland shivered on Wednesday under snow, sleet and unusual cold that drove south after dumping big snowfalls on Beijing and much of the country’s north in past days.
Daytime temperatures in Shanghai and across the nearby coastal provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang skidded close to 0 degrees Celsius (32 F), and many areas inland were hit by snow or sleet, according to meteorological departments.
A new report from Pike Research of Colorado says the addition of carbon capture systems to power plants will add 50% to 70% to the cost of creating electricity for existing and future plants.
The report, titled “Carbon Capture and Sequestration: Drivers and Barriers, Technology Issues, Key Industry Players, Market Analysis and Forecasts,” adds that such increases in costs will be initially underwritten by governments but gradually passed on to ratepayers.
Texas is a major battlefield in the fight between high speed rail advocates and opponents. The lone star state is the home base for many of the forces that are against the development of passenger rail in the United States. The “big three” opponents of high speed rail are all located in Texas and have been successful in preventing better passenger train construction for decades. This group consists of:
1. Texas is firmly a “red state” that is home to many members of the Republican Party political elite. This includes the family of Bush 43 (now retired into a private residence in a Dallas suburb), Rick Perry (state governor who made headlines promoting the idea of succession from the Union) and two Republican senators – John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison. Republicans have proven themselves, by their legislative record and public statements, to be against passenger rail investment.