News from January 2009

Earth

But how can we ease population without taking draconian steps? By developing in ways that we should be anyway, experts say. Are there too many people on Earth? That question is rarely raised today, in part because it conjures up the possibility of governments intruding into the most private and profound decision a couple can [...]

Buzz grows for modernizing energy grid

Alternative energy is taking it on the chin this recession, with solar and wind developers canceling projects and laying off workers. But a far more obscure slice of the energy sector is hotter than ever: the electricity grid. How hot? President Obama has made modernizing the nation’s vast power network a key piece of his [...]

Air Force drops plan to make fuel from coal in Montana

WASHINGTON The B1, B52 and C-17 already have been certified to run on the coal-mix blend, and the F-15, F-22, C-5 and KC-135 all have also used the blend, Strasburg said. The Air Force is looking for alternatives to oil to make sure that it can continue to operate its aircraft when supplies are tight. [...]

When Technology Fails: How to Survive the Long Emergency

Finally, a book for the millions of people who realize that making the shift to sustainability is a matter of economic and ecological survival. Taylor Haynes: A lot of people are now really concerned — or even hopeless — about the state of the world and what our future holds. Peak oil and climate change, [...]

Byron King: Why Oil is Too Cheap

…The Hubbert geology-based model of scarcity morphed in the past couple of years. The more recent concern has become aboveground issues. There are things like politics (Venezuela, for example); war (Iraq); insurrection (Nigeria); access to sites (Russia); other macro-investment trends (the rise of national oil companies — NOCs) and broad issues, like limits to industrial [...]

Oil price slump a challenge to Obama

Alternative energy looking less viable A slide in oil prices may be good for consumers battered by the U. S. economic slowdown, but it could pose a challenge for President Barack Obama’s ambitious plan to revolutionize America’s energy use. Obama’s plan — outlined during the campaign last year when oil prices hit a record $147 [...]

Iter: Flagship fusion reactor could cost twice as much as budgeted

The international project, which aims to produce cheap green power by recreating the conditions inside the sun, already absorbs half Britain’s energy research budget An experimental fusion reactor that will recreate the conditions at the heart of the sun to create cheap green power could cost twice as much as governments had planned for, the [...]

Foundation Coal Idling 3 WVa mines

Mine operator Foundation Coal Holdings said Friday it is idling three underground mines in southern West Virginia in the latest sign that the recession is catching up with the industry. Work at the mines and an associated preparation plant is ceasing immediately, Linthicum Heights, Md.-based Foundation said. The Laurel Creek complex produces about 1 million [...]

What’s in your package?

A $4.6 billion coal gift in stimulus package, record profits for FutureGen members While Peabody Coal, one of the prime sponsors of the FutureGen boondoggle in Illinois, announced an eightfold increase in profits in their fourth quarter reports for 2008, the Senate Appropriations Committee just approved legislation for an additional $4.6 billion in handouts to [...]

Australia: 31 dead in heatwave

AT least 31 people have perished in South Australia’s 40 degree-plus heatwave, while firefighters are battling huge blazes threatening homes, power installations and a coalmine in Victoria. South Australian Premier Mike Rann says there will be an inquiry into how the national power regulator has handled the state’s heatwave, the political heat turned up as [...]