Today's Energy News Summaries | Energy NEWS Central - Current Energy News You Can Use

MEMC Building World's Largest Solar Plant?

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 19:50:00 +0000

MEMC Electronic Materials says it is building the largest solar plant in the world, in Italy.

Chevron to cut 2,000 jobs

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 19:00:45 +0000

Chevron, the US' second biggest oil company, said it will cut a further 2,000 positions in its refining and marketing division as it reduces its global downstream workforce by 3,900 employees or about 20 per cent over two years

Monbiot vs. Leggett duking it out over solar panels and feed-in tariffs - Mar 9

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:15:54 +0000

-Are we really going to let ourselves be duped into this solar panel rip-off?
-Solar panels are not fashion accessories
-There is no 'green treachery' in questioning this solar panel rip-off
I accept George Monbiot's £100 solar PV bet

Cramer: Grab Chevron under $70

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:00:00 +0000

NEW YORK (TheStreet) - - Jim Cramer recently trimmed his position in Chevron, but explains why he'd jump back in under $70.

Crude Oil Trying to Hold Above $80

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:34:00 +0000

The April crude contract recently dipped 15 cents to $81.72 a barrel, paring its losses since the price approached $80 earlier in the session.

Solar Gainer: Hoku Scientific

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:00:00 +0000

Hoku Scientific makes progress toward completing its problematic polysilicon plant.

SunPower Adds Italian Power

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:20:00 +0000

SunPower expects to complete two 1-megawatt solar plants in Italy before year-end, as the race to make Italy the next solar boom market heats up.

Biofuels - Mar 9

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:55:39 +0000

-Green fuels cause more harm than fossil fuels, according to report
-Chemists create biofuel from plant waste
-Seeking a More 'Poplar' Biofuel

UK results: Antofagasta profits unaffected by Chile earthquake

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:54:51 +0000

Tuesday's UK results round-up: the Chilean copper miner used its annual results to reassure investors that its operations had not been seriously affected by the earthquake

Transition Culture roundup - Mar 9

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:36:28 +0000

-A March Round-up of What’s Happening out in the World of Transition
-Transition on ‘One Planet’ on BBC World Service
-Transition Sunshine Coast delivers EDAP
-“Genuine resilience results from expanding the human footprint”. Discuss

First Solar Sells 300 MW of Utility Solar

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:24:00 +0000

First Solar sells the majority of the energy to be generated from a planned 550 MW solar project to Pacific Gas & Electric.

Housing & urban design - Mar 9

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:21:40 +0000

-Public safety means more than just cops
-Dominican Authorities Approve Container Cities For Haiti Housing Relief
-Detroit homes sell for $1 amid mortgage and car industry crisis
-Digital designer shows what future towns could look like

Libraries

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:38:22 +0000

Even more useful than the books or activities, though, is the principle behind libraries, that we and our neighbours can pool our resources and hold things in common that all of us occasionally need. Most of the Western World, however, adopted this principle for books and then stopped, never extending it to other obvious areas of life.

The Scalability of Biochar

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:03:22 +0000

A popular idea at the moment to address climate change is biochar - essentially taking organic materials, charring them, and burying them in the soil. As the Wikipedia explains:

Biochar is charcoal created by pyrolysis of biomass, and differs from charcoal only in the sense that its primary use is not for fuel, but for biosequestration or atmospheric carbon capture and storage.[1] Charcoal is a stable solid rich in carbon content, and thus, can be used to lock carbon in the soil. Biochar is of increasing interest because of concerns about climate change caused by emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHG).

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Women’s Rights, Population and Climate Change: The Debate Continues

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 12:37:11 +0000

Should climate activists and feminists support campaigns to slow population growth? Laurie Mazur says that alliance will strengthen the movement. Ian Angus strongly disagrees …

Magical thinking

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 12:21:10 +0000

Peak Shrink has an interesting post on The Tyranny of Positive Thinking, a review of Barbara Ehrenreich's book Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America. In it, she expresses the same frustration I've felt when dealing with our cult of positivity.

Using behavioral science to make smarter energy policy

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:42:50 +0000

On Friday, journalist John Fleck made a great point, comparing coverage of two new pieces in Science. One is about the latest potential climate disaster: methane venting from the seafloor in the Arctic. The second is about a promising new climate solution: using behavioral science to influence energy use. Not surprisingly, the disaster got tons of coverage. The solution got none. This is entirely typical. As Fleck says, "The problem space gets more attention than the solution space."

We're All Sunk

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:17:47 +0000

It's almost too easy to vilify corporations. What, with all the evil stuff they do. Take the coal industry for example, who blow up our mountains, poison our air and water, contribute massively to global climate change, and spend untold millions of dollars on disinformation campaigns, lobbying Congress, buying Senators, and lying to block efforts to tackle the climate crisis. I mean, they are practically begging for our hatred, right? Right.

BHP moves coking coal sales to short-term price contracts

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 02:00:00 +0000

BHP Billiton, the world's largest miner, said yesterday that it had moved a "significant portion" of its coking coal sales for 2010 to "shorter term market based...

Oil prices poised for flip as stockpiles diminish

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 02:00:00 +0000

Crude futures are doing a slow-motion backflip, stoking speculation about the next move for oil prices. The futures curve, plotted with prices of oil to be delivered...