By Amiel Blajchman •
August 22, 2008
Like this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and stay up to date.
Wisconsin’s Governor’s Task Force on Global Warming has recommended that the state achieve 2005 levels by 2014; reduce emissions by 22% from 2005 levels by 2022 (someone one day will have to explain to me the fascination with number alliteration); and finally, it calls for 75% reductions from 2005 levels by 2050.
The task force has also recommended a two-pronged approach, adopting state level support for either a federal or state-level cap and trade program, as well as a series of policy recommendations for several important state industry sectors:
- Energy Sector
- Transportation Sector
- Agriculture and Forestry Sectors
- Industry Sector
- Waste Sector
Converting the U.S.’s ample and renewable volumes of cow manure into biogas could provide as much as 3 percent of the nation’s electricity needs, say two researchers at the University of Texas at Austin.
In a new study published in the online journal Environmental Research Letters, Amanda Cuéllar and Michael Webber conclude that harnessing the full potential of cow poop power could not only help generate as much — or more — electricity as wind and solar power do today, but could greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
By Max Lindberg •
May 22, 2008
“Railroads are the most environmentally friendly and energy efficient way to move goods on land.”
Freight trains have evolved over the years, carrying freight in a variety of ways, including taking semi-trailer rigs off the highways and shipping them on flat-cars. If you’re anywhere near a railroad track, you’ll see what are called intermodal trains carrying shipping containers stacked on top of one another, along with trailers and the usual box cars and other forms of equipment.
However, the physical infrastructure in some areas of the country creates a barrier for some railroads who want to stack shipping containers in order to carry more freight.
By Max Lindberg •
May 22, 2008
“One train can carry the load of more than 280 trucks.”
If you live near a railroad, you see them every day, flat cars with semi-trailers secured to the deck, or shipping containers stacked two-high. They’re moving freight that isn’t clogging our highways and polluting the air with excess hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxide and particulates produced by over-the road trucks.
So says the CSX Railroad, a major carrier of goods in the mid-Atlantic shipping corridor, now positioning itself for $700 million in system improvements. The program is called National Gateway, a project the railroad says will create a more efficient flow of rail traffic between Mid-Atlantic ports and Midwestern markets.
What’s more unsightly: a backyard clothesline or a dangerously warming world driven to the tipping point by greenhouse gas emissions? Ontario officials have decided on their answer, which is why they’ll be banning local bans on outdoor clotheslines this summer.
A climate change summit is taking place March 31st-April 4 in Bangkok. Representatives of over 170 countries are meeting to get a draft accord in place for a successor to the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012. The deadline to reach a new protocol has been set for a December 2009 meeting in Denmark.
An interim summit held in Japan mid March convened representatives of the world’s top 20 greenhouse gas emitting countries responsible for 80% of the world’s pollution. It appeared that little progress was made. But all countries including the US agreed in Bali that they’d participate in the negotiations to the Kyoto’s successor and that promise was upheld two weeks ago. What was termed a “principle of common but differentiated responsibility” was accepted as a framework for negotiations. In other words, the new pact will bind all countries to various actions.
Florida this week boosted its supply of renewable energy when its largest solar power array went online.
The Sunshine Energy Solar Array was dedicated Monday by Gov. Charlie Crist and Florida Power & Light (FPL) officials. The facility is located on a former landfill in Sarasota County.
The Sunshine array is not only Florida’s largest, but the second largest in the entire Southeast U.S. The array of 1,200 solar panels covers more than 28,000 square feet of Rothenbach Park, and is expected to generate about 250 kilowatts of electricity.
That’s enough to power 55 homes and prevent the annual release of more than 654,000 pounds of carbon dioxide into the air, according to FPL.
By Paul Smith •
February 7, 2008
You’ve probably heard about carbon offsets. They’re everywhere these days, and it seems not a week goes that I don’t hear about a company pledging to go carbon neutral. And yet, it all seems so…full of hot air. What’s real? What do they really do? Which will make the most impact? How are the different purveyors, well, different?
I have a suggestion: Take a look at LiveNeutral.
Why? Well on a basic, financial level, they are a non-profit. And? And that means that offsets purchased through them are tax deductible. More, you say? The resulting lower overhead means better priced offsets as compared to similar for-profit companies offering similar quality offsets.
There’s good news for the future of green-collar employment, but it comes with a caveat: maximizing job growth in green industries will require the right public policy support. That means law-makers need to approve measures such as a renewable portfolio standard, incentives for renewable energy, public education programs and adequate funding for research and development.
If such measures are put in place, the U.S. could see as many as one out of every four [...]
Can better energy efficiency help us reduce our consumption of fossil fuels and curb our greenhouse gas emissions? Maybe not as much as some hope.
While some people tout better and more energy-efficient technology as one solution to our current fuel and climate challenges, their expectations might be overblown. A new study from the UK Energy Research Centre, for example, finds that improved efficiency sometimes creates a tendency to use more energy, or [...]
A booming airline industry might be great for the economy, but it’s wreaking increasing havoc with the environment. Aviation today spews out only 3 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions, but the segment is expanding fast — faster, in fact, than any improvements in efficiency are likely to keep pace with. According to the Christian Science Monitor,
"Efficiency is only set to improve at 1 or 2 percent per year at best,
[...]
Wisconsin’s Governor’s Task Force on Global Warming has recommended that the state achieve 2005 levels by 2014; reduce emissions by 22% from 2005 levels by 2022 (someone one day will have to explain to me the fascination with number alliteration); and finally, it calls for 75% reductions from 2005 levels by 2050.
