Merkel's Party May Delay Solar Subsidy Cut (Bloomberg)
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats and their allies will propose a cut in subsidies for solar power from rooftop panels by 16% from June 1, instead of April 1, the Mitteldeutsche Zeitung newspaper said.
A Federal Climate Service Is Created to Provide Data (New York Times)
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will create a new climate change unit to gather and provide data to governments, industry and academia as part of a federal effort to prepare for long-term changes to the planet, officials said.
Bolivia Expects 5,000 Foreigners at Climate Forum (AP)
Bolivia's government said it expects thousands of activists, environmentalists and scientists to travel to the nation in April for its "alternative" conference on climate change, set up in response to Copenhagen's failure to produce a binding treaty.
UN Climate Panel Reviews Dutch Sea Level Glitch (Reuters)
The UN's panel of climate experts said it was reviewing whether it wrongly said that more than half of the Netherlands is below sea level in a new glitch after exaggerating the thaw of Himalayan glaciers.
Australian Carbon Trading Plan More Cost Effective (Bloomberg)
Australia's cap-and-trade bill would cost $1.3 billion during the first four years, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. That makes it more cost-effective than the opposition's alternative proposal, which carries a price tag of $2.8 billion over the same period.
EU ETS Intervention Call Howled Down (Carbon Positive)
A call by British politicians for intervention in the EU carbon market to lift the "flat-lining" price of carbon has drawn cautionary and critical responses from the government, Brussels and carbon market players.
Coal Ad Blitz Launches New Spot as Industry Sees Political Gains (Greenwire)
An advertising campaign that previously pushed the phrase "clean coal" launches new spots this week focused on jobs and low-cost power, the latest offering in a $120 million effort to sell Washington on coal's future.
Michigan Approves Grants for Offshore Wind Research (AP)
The Michigan Public Service Commission has approved two grants totaling about $1.7 million for studying the development of offshore wind technologies in the state.
Caterpillar Joins FutureGen Clean Coal Alliance (Reuters)
Caterpillar said it will join the FutureGen Alliance to build a $1.5 billion 'clean' coal plant to produce hydrogen and electricity while capturing and sequestering CO2 underground in Mattoon, Illinois.
Explosion Unlikely to Slow Gas Plant Development (AP)
The Connecticut explosion that killed five people won't slow the development of natural gas power plants. But it will likely lead to more scrutiny of a technique used to clear air from gas lines.
Nuclear Giant Areva buys Solar Company Ausra (Reuters)
The world's largest nuclear plant builder, Areva SA, is diversifying into solar power with the aim of becoming an industry leader, as it acquires U.S.-based solar thermal player Ausra, the company announced.
The Electric Taxi, Courtesy of Ford (Greentech Media)
Ford has unveiled its new TransitConnect at the Chicago Auto Show, an all-electric fleet car that will drive 80 miles on a charge and hit a top speed of 75 miles an hour.
Britain Launches Labeling for Green Power Tariffs (Reuters)
Britain has launched a scheme to certify and label electricity produced by green means so as to help consumers and small businesses choose tariffs to support suppliers doing more to cut carbon emissions than obliged.
China Releases First National Pollution Census (AP)
China said Tuesday that its first national pollution census has mapped more than 5 million sources of industrial, residential and agricultural waste throughout the country.
Global Warming an Olympic Worry, Says Rogge (AFP)
Global warming is starting to worry the International Olympic Committee, and the group's president, Jacques Rogge, said it would be a key issue examined in awarding any future Winter Olympics.
Toxic Coal Sludge
No product from this refined, treated processed resource flow? Shame, Yankee Engineers, Shame! You also let huge amounts of fairly clean CO2 up your stacks at coal fired power plants, and the "Cooling Towers" a symbol of your inept, pis poor abilities to extract power - you asshvles waste half the heat from the fuel to the wind! Not so in Sweden, they put this heat to good use! and from the fission(death-machine) reactors too! Yankee Doodle engineers, tooling around in the new 2009, 620 Hp, 231 Mph, 8 Mpg, engineered "just in time" for recession, Corvette, their car of choice, can hardly understand frugality. With the "Cheap Oil Age" ending, and the great republican depression worsening, and now spreading world-wide, these over-indulged egomaniacs will give way to the Chinese trained intelligentsia, coming to our shores in droves, and be displaced by smarter, more ambitious, less indoctrinated, individuals, if not from China alone, certainly from the rest of Asia, and America will see brighter days! The day of comeuppance is here, now!
get rid of coal
Yeah, that's right. Let's get rid of coal so we can all go back to live in the Dark Ages. What is your immediate solution to your "mean coal" claim to power our modern society? Over 50% of our electrcity comes from coal, the next largest is nuclear.
Do you walk the walk? Do you recycle religously (that means also saving your recyclable "trash" from eating out)? What do you do to conserve our resources? Most of the "environmentalists" I know are not much more than vengeful hippocrites. My family of four recycles everything possible, producing on average only 2 kitchen trash bags per month. Our thermostat is set at 65 F. We don't turn on the AC until the internal house temp. reaches at least 85 F. We are conservative, yet we do more to protect the environment that most so-called environmentalists do. We do not favor big government, and sure as hell don't want the government to tax me to death to "study" the biggest hoax of our time "anthropogenic global warming". And the "science" in "Inconvenient Truth" is a joke. Bad graphs, misleading diagrams... CO2 the problem for everything? Better stop breathing. Keep the oceans from releasing it too. What about that other very effective GHG--water vapor? Look into all the areas of the Earth. Only human arrogance can claim they have the power to change the Earth. Ever heard of sunspots? Volcanism? Orbit eccentricity? Precession? Even the reduced particulates (a good thing) brought about by the Clean Air Act (ever consider the possibility that with less pollutants in the atmosphere that more solar energy reaches the surface? The myriad other possibilities out there that cause climate change are not part of the so-called research. Leave coal alone. It's not the problem, people wasting it is.
But the mud has done much
But the mud has done much more than just sully a countryside. Americans' energy consumption habits are a top-tier political issue, and as we look for new ways to curtail global warming, wean ourselves from oil, and find sources of clean energy, coal's role is still unclear.
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