Alternative Energy posts, articles, and infographics

Eco-Bling: Good or Bad?

May 2, 2012 by Allison McKenzie
with 141 views

Not too long ago, I was sitting in the patient chair at my dentist’s office, chatting with the dental hygienist as she started to clean my teeth. This particular person had not worked on my mouth before, so we were covering the basics of “do you have kids?” and “what do you do for a living”? I did as succinct a job as I could of... [read more]

Webcast: Energy Storage and Renewable Power

April 23, 2012 by Henry Spethmann
with 33 views

Energy Storage and Renewable Power:Is Storage a Solution to Renewable Intermittence and Grid Inefficiency? The intermittent nature of natural, carbon-free energy sources like the sun or wind has always been one of renewable power's major limitations, leaving us reliant on fossil fuels or nuclear power to supply the majority of so-called... [read more]

Mapping With Abandon

April 4, 2012 by J. Kevin Byrne
with 529 views

I teach at a design college. Last month a senior was mapping abandoned properties in Minneapolis using Google Fusion software; her purpose was to elicit some storytelling from urban residents. A couple dozen property markers popped up in her map of North Minneapolis neighborhoods; surprised by a noticeable linear pattern, she inquired of... [read more]

Want a More Sustainable Energy System? Here’s Five Mistakes to Avoid

April 4, 2012 by This Big City
with 123 views

Successive UK governments have committed themselves to making our energy system more sustainable. But their plans to do this are seriously flawed. Specifically, they are making five key mistakes.The first is to believe that only large energy companies can deliver meaningful quantities of low-carbon energy, and that the contribution of... [read more]

Climate Change and Our Future: Does Culpability Matter?

March 30, 2012 by Zachary Hirschfeld
with 108 views

Are humans culpable in climate change? Are the problems human-induced? Does it even matter? [read more]

Sustainable Economic Development

March 13, 2012 by ECPA Urban Planning
with 161 views

Why are we always developing or researching sustainable and alternative energies? What’s missing? Is it funding? Some sort of academic, cultural, or political understanding? Or are we waiting for an unknown and unknowable new technology to appear? Perhaps we aren’t waiting for anything; change, after all, is difficult. What’s past is... [read more]

Utility and Renewable Energy Leaders Plan Ahead

February 27, 2012 by Glenn Meyers
with 62 views

The California Clean Energy Fund (CalCEF) ran the first of a series of forums to outline a viable business model for U.S. renewable electricity in the 21st century Wednesday, bringing together leaders from utility, development, regulation, and financial institutions to define an actionable strategy for U.S. renewable electricity... [read more]

Are Artificial Trees the Answer for Carbon Capture?

February 16, 2012 by This Big City
with 203 views

Within six or seven years, could we be seeing ‘artificial trees’ in use to combat climate change directly, soaking up carbon dioxide from the ambient air? [read more]

Is Waste-to-Energy the future of energy in New York?

January 18, 2012 by Next American City
with 273 views

Coverage of Mayor Bloomberg’s state of the city address focused, as the speech did, on the mayor’s raft of education proposals, with some additional attention to his mentions of police corruption and the minimum wage. But the mayor’s reference to a once-controversial notion—“the possibility of cleanly converting trash into renewable energy”—passed all but unnoticed. [read more]

To Frack or Not to Frack?

January 12, 2012 by The Dirt ASLA
with 90 views

New York State’s Department of Environmental Conservation is poised to make a long-awaited decision that will determine if and how High Volume Horizontal Hydraulic Fracturing (or fracking) should proceed. [read more]

Think Buildings: At the Vanguard of the Green Economy

December 12, 2011 by Jason Hartke
with 229 views

One of the bright spots at this COP is the work being done to quick start funding for the Green Climate Fund, which was one of the most significant outcomes from last year’s COP in Cancun. The idea is to create and grow this Fund to $100 billion a year by 2020, which would support climate mitigation and adaptation measures. As you can imagine, delegates are negotiating intensely through the end of the week to determine how to best and most fairly finance this fund, including opportunities to leverage private sector investment. [read more]

The U.S. Needs a National Renewable Energy Standard

November 17, 2011 by The Dirt ASLA
with 159 views

D.C., Carol Browner, who was very recently climate change “czarina” at the White House and once head of the Environmental Protection Agency (E.P.A.); Jim Connaughton, Constellation Energy, and former head of the Council for Environmental Quality under President George W. Bush; David Hawkins, Natural Resources Defense Council; and Dave McCurdy, American Gas Association, all emphasized the need for a national renewable energy standard given no big climate change and energy legislation will be coming out of Congress in the next 18 months to 2 years. [read more]