Meet 'photoswitches,' a breakthrough set of materials that act as their own batteries, absorbing energy and releasing it on demand.
theatlantic.com - by Todd Woody - April 15, 2014
The next big thing in solar energy could be microscopic.
Scientists at MIT and Harvard University have devised a way to store solar energy in molecules that can then be tapped to heat homes, water or used for cooking.
The best part: The molecules can store the heat forever and be endlessly re-used while emitting absolutely no greenhouse gases.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is an international treaty established in 1992 to cooperatively tackle climate change issues. The ultimate objective of the UNFCCC is to stabilize atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations at a level that would prevent dangerous interference with the climate system. Canada ratified the UNFCCC in December 1992, and the Convention came into force in March 1994. At the 15th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the UNFCCC in 2009, Canada signed the Copenhagen Accord, under which Canada has committed to reducing its GHG emissions to 17% below the 2005 level by the year 2020.Footnote1
ecogeek.org - by Philip Proefrock - April 12, 2014
A new, grid-tied offshore wave energy project called CETO is being readied off the west coast of Australia, near Perth. Carnegie Wave Energy is installing what is called the "first operating wave energy array scheme in the world." The installation will consist of three submerged buoys 11 meters (36 feet) in diameter, which will be anchored offshore. The buoys will create high pressure water which will be pumped to an onshore generating station to produce electricity.
In addition to producing power, the CETO technology incorporates an interesting synergy - it is also used to provide fresh water.
thinkprogress.org - by Ari Phillips - April 8, 2014
Royal Dutch Shell, Adidas, Unilever, and some 70 other companies released a communiqué urging world governments to keep carbon emissions since the industrial revolution to a cumulative of 1 trillion metric tons. This is the emissions cap needed to keep warming below two degrees Celsius and avoid catastrophic impacts of climate change, according to the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, which for the first time calls for a trillion ton cap. We have already surpassed the halfway mark and are somewhere around 578,935,750,000 tonnes of carbon at the moment.
A large field of fracking sites in a Colorado valley. 'The industry’s singular solution to the climate crisis is to dramatically expand an extraction process that releases massive amounts of climate-destabilising methane.' Photograph: Ted Wood/Aurora Photos/Corbis
From climate change to Crimea, the natural gas industry is supreme at exploiting crisis for private gain – what I call the shock doctrine
theguardian.com - by Naomi Klein - April 10, 2014
The way to beat Vladimir Putin is to flood the European market with fracked-in-the-USA natural gas, or so the industry would have us believe. As part of escalating anti-Russian hysteria, two bills have been introduced into the US Congress – one in the House of Representatives (H.R. 6), one in the Senate (S. 2083) – that attempt to fast-track liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, all in the name of helping Europe to wean itself from Putin's fossil fuels, and enhancing US national security.
huffingtonpost.com - by Steve Horn - March 17, 2014
. . . Yet even as some say we are witnessing the beginning of a "new cold war," few have discussed the ties binding major U.S. oil and gas companies with Russian state oil and gas companies.
newscientist.com - by Andy Coghlan - March 25, 2014
Oil giant Exxon Mobil has promised to reveal how much of its fossil fuel reserves could become worthless if governments agree to cut greenhouse gas emissions. It is the first major fossil fuel company to declare the size of its exposure to the so-called carbon bubble – the over-valuation of fossil fuel companies that could result if their assets are left unused.
To save ourselves from the worst impacts of global warming, we have to leave fossil fuels in the ground instead of burning them.
Image: A harvester collects maize in a field at Severn Trent's crop-fed power plant in Stoke Bardolph, near Nottingham. Photograph: David Levenson/Getty Images
theguardian.com - March 14th, 2014 - George Monbiot
In principle it's a brilliant solution. Instead of leaving food waste and sewage and animal manure to decay in the open air, releasing methane which contributes to global warming, you can contain it, use micro-organisms to digest it, and capture the gas.
Biogas from anaerobic digestion could solve several problems at once.
The famously testy Parisians have one more reason to grumble after the French government announced that half the cars in the city would be banned from the roads, starting on Monday, in an effort to combat smog pollution.
From 5.30am, a scheme of alternating driving days, based on odd and even number plates, will come into effect for cars and motorcycles after Paris pollution reached dangerous levels for five consecutive days.
Even before the restrictions were announced, Parisians were given free travel on buses, metros and public bikes over the weekend.
The Doomsday scenario we should have been worrying about
theregister.co.uk - by Iain Thomson - March 19, 2014
Video - A new analysis of data from NASA's Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO) by Chinese and Berkeley helioboffins shows that a July 2012 solar storm of unprecedented size would have wiped out global electronic systems if it had occurred just nine days earlier.
"Had it hit Earth, it probably would have been like the big one in 1859, but the effect today, with our modern technologies, would have been tremendous," said UC Berkeley research physicist Janet Luhmann.
The 1859 storm, also known as the Carrington Event, after the British astronomer who recorded it, swept over the Earth at the end of August and is the largest recorded solar storm in history.
Andres Gutierrez/AP
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