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Africa Aims to Combat Climate Change By Greening the Desert
In Africa, climate change is exacerbating the desertification of the continent. The Sahara Desert, which covers the majority of northern Africa, is spreading southward at a rate of 30 miles per year.This spread of desert sands into the semi-arid...
Portugal Achieves 70 Percent Renewable Energy in First Quarter
Alto Lindoso (Image credit: Energias de Portugal)Portugal’s electricity network operator announced that renewable energy supplied 70 percent of total consumption in the first quarter of this year. This increase was largely due to favorable weather...
Australia: 100 Percent Renewable Energy Could Be Cost-Effective by 2030
A new study published in Energy Policy, and flagged by Wired, suggests that a bold-but-not-extreme carbon price could make providing all of Australia’s electricity needs cost-effective by 2030. This would meet all of the country’s electricity demand...
Rosie the Riveter On A Wind Turbine: Women And The Growing Green Economy
By Mari Hernandez and Rebecca LeftonIn March, the Bureau of Labor Services released its green jobs report, which reported a total of 3.4 million jobs associated with the production of green goods and services in 2011 – up from 3.1 million green jobs...
Study Confirms Climate Change Will Keep Driving More Intense Precipitation
Climate change will bring more and more extreme precipitation events this century.A new study from NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center confirms what climate scientists have long been saying about climate change’s effect on the hydrological cycle.If...
USDA: Climate Change Will Double Area Burned in Wildfires By 2050
Wildfires in the U.S. will be at least twice as destructive by 2050, burning around 20 million acres nationwide each year, according to a federal report released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Scientists from the U.S. Forest Service, who...
New Data Reveals U.S. Coal Use Rising Again
By Kristin Meek, via World Resources InstituteNew data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reveals a troubling trend: Coal-fired power generation — and its associated greenhouse gas emissions — were on the rise as 2012 came to an...
U.S. Installed Most Wind Energy In 2012
Credit: Navigant ResearchThe U.S. is now the largest wind power market, and a U.S. company is the world’s number 1 supplier, according to a new industry report by Navigant Research.This is a big shakeup in the global wind market. Danish wind...
Extracted Oil And Gas Wastewater Causing Earthquakes?
A 2011 magnitude 5.7 quake in OK, linked to wastewater injection, buckled US Highway 62. (Credit: John Leeman)After pulling massive amounts of fossil fuels out of the Earth’s crust so we can burn it up into our atmosphere, we have a good sense of...
Learning from Germany's Renewable Energy Transition
(Credit: Institute for the Future)by Julius FischerGermany is moving forward to replace fossil fuels with renewables faster than most countries. But there is always pushback, most recently in the form of much media discourse about rising...
New Oceans Study: Global Warming Accelerated in Past 15 Years
Argo buoy taking measurements. (Credit: Argo Project Office)By Dana Nuccitelli via Skeptical Science.A new study of ocean warming has just been published in Geophysical Research Letters by Balmaseda, Trenberth, and Källén (2013). There are...
Solar Energy for Chicago Affordable Housing
Kyocera Solar and VGI Energy are teaming up to bring solar power to affordable multifamily housing units in Urban Chicago, according to SolarLove.org.VGI Energy is a “socially and green-minded company” as SolarLove.org puts it, and Kyocera is a...
