Read this Nov. 5 story from the Huffington Post illustrating 5 reasons why solar power is already a viable alternative to fossil fuels. It’s frustrating to still hear dissenters say that renewable energy is not ready to compete with fossil fuels as a means to power our country. The solar industry is growing
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The Common Sense Canadian: Shell predicts end of oil in 2070
Read this Oct. 18 piece from MNN.com on an interesting new report from one of the world’s largest oil companies, envisioning the end of oil and future of renewable energy. Has Shell become a shill for Tesla Motors? That’s the shocking conclusion of the market analysts Motley Fool, looking at the
Continue readingThe Common Sense Canadian: China’s chaotic leap forward to a green economy
When most people talk of China and its environmental and energy challenges, they tend to paint a very bleak picture. While this view is historically justified, things are changing fast in today’s China. Criticism of China’s environmental record has been traditionally well-justified. After all, China: 1) displaced the US as the world’s largest energy consumer as
Continue readingThe Common Sense Canadian: Microgrids: Sustainable alternative to investment in “old energy”
The Common Sense Canadian has made much of the Harper government’s promotion, facilitation and subsidization of big oil and the Clark government’s current LNG export fetish. The underlying messaging to Canadians in both cases is: support these projects or face economic and social armageddon. What seems to get lost in
Continue reading350 or bust: Next, Kansas Republicans Plan To Outlaw Sunshine
* No matter how hard the fossil fools try to stuff the renewable energy genie back into the bottle (click here to read more about Kansas’s latest back-the-past bill), the green energy economy is growing. For example, in March 2013 the number of Australian homes with solar power systems passed
Continue readingEclectic Lip: Steven Chu’s “Time to Fix the Wiring” at four years
Former US Energy Secretary Steven Chu’s recent resignation — his farewell letter is here — is no doubt celebrated in the fuel cell quarters as passionately (or more so) than it is mourned in the rest of cleantech. Early in his term, Chu infamously argued (infamously, at least, to fuel
Continue readingEclectic Lip: Our Renewable Future part 1: clearing “myth”conceptions
With Obama talking the talk on climate action in his State of the Union address yesterday, now seems a good time to start compiling a planned set of blog entries about renewable energy. Many many others have done so online already (as evidenced by the fact I’m linking to them!)
Continue reading350 or bust: Canadian Democracy on Decline, While Renewable Energy Surges In Other Countries
I’m on the road this week doing several climate change presentations to various Catholic organizations and churches, so I have very little time to spend on the computer. Here’s a few of the graphics I came across when I popped onto Facebook this morning – click on them to read
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Heartland Institute, ALEC and More Gearing Up to Undermine Renewable Energy
shutterstock_87374705.jpg One of the environmental movement’s biggest accomplishments over the past decade has been convincing states to adopt so-called renewable portfolio standards (RPS). RPS require a state’s energy supply to diversify, gradually shifting away from fossil fuels and towards renewable sources like geothermal, wind and solar. At least 30 states now have
Continue readingopenalex: Community Scale Solar: Portland (OR) and Durban (South Africa)
[A piece I wrote is running in the most recent edition of UN-Habitat’s Urban World magazine. The article covers a gutsy and successful residential solar project in Portland (OR), and a similar project that I gave a hand with in Durban (South Africa). OK, I admit I’m a bit late
Continue reading350 or bust: Durban: “Down With Canada”
Concerned citizens from around Africa and the globe have gathered in Durban South Africa to “Occupy Cop17″, as hopes for a global agreement to address the climate crisis fades. As part of Occupy COP17, participants chanted “down with Canada” outside the official U.N. negotiations. It makes me so ashamed of
Continue reading350 or bust: Mercer And Holmes On Solar Panels
Just in time for the Ontario election, where Tory leader Tim Hudak is promising to kill the innovative Green Energy Act if elected, here’s Rick Mercer and Mike Holmes, two Canadian icons,in a great clip from last week’s Mercer Report: For…
Continue readingopenalex: Solar Map of New York City
New York City’s new Solar Map has gone live, and it’s a beauty. With a googlemap style interface, you can zoom into any building in the greater NYC area. Click on the building and up pops an estimate of the solar power you could generate on its r…
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