By Stefan Andreasson 25 November 2019 (The Conversation) – A global campaign encouraging individuals, organisations and institutional investors to sell off investments in fossil fuel companies is gathering pace. According to 350.org, US$11 trillion has already been divested worldwide. But, while it may seem a logical strategy, divestment will not lower demand for fossil fuels, which […]
By Kevin Crowley 2 December 2019 (Bloomberg) – At EOG Resources Inc.’s Francisco lease in the heart of the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas, a half dozen cows laze in the shade of a tree next to black oil-storage tanks. A small flare burns atop a steel pylon, like a memorial to the boom […]
By James Temple 19 November 2019 (Technology Review) – A new report from the MIT Energy Initiative warns that EVs may never reach the same sticker price so long as they rely on lithium-ion batteries, the energy storage technology that powers most of today’s consumer electronics. In fact, it’s likely to take another decade just to eliminate […]
By Jon Gambrell 16 November 2019 DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – Protesters angered by Iran raising government-set gasoline prices by 50 percent blocked traffic in major cities and occasionally clashed with police Saturday after a night of demonstrations punctuated by gunfire, in violence that reportedly killed at least one person. The protests put renewed […]
By Sudarshan Varadhan 15 November 2019 NEW DELHI (Reuters) – More than half of India’s coal-fired power plants ordered to retrofit equipment to curb air pollution are set to miss the deadline, private industry estimates and a Reuters analysis show, as millions in the country wake up to toxic air each day. Thermal power companies, […]
By Laura Mallonee 3 November 2019 (Wired) – Less than two miles from Iceland’s Reykjavik airport sits a nondescript metal building as monolithic and drab as a commercial poultry barn. There’s a deafening racket inside, too, but it doesn’t come from clucking chickens. Instead, tens of thousands of whirring GPUs perform the complex, exhaustive calculations […]
By Emily Holden 11 October 2019 MONACA, Pennsylvania (The Guardian) – Construction cranes climb into the sky and sprawl across the massive petrochemical facility that will turn a byproduct of fracked gas into plastic on the banks of the Ohio River, just outside Pittsburgh. Even at a distance, from the car park of a cancer […]
By Leilani Chavez 28 October 2019 MANILA (Mongabay) – In 1996, when a community in the Philippine municipality of Pagbilao agreed to house a coal power plant a few hours’ drive from Manila, the residents had high hopes. The fishing town saw in the dominating edifice full-time jobs and food on the table, says Warren […]
By Muyu Xu and Melanie Burton 22 October 2019 BEIJING/MELBOURNE (Reuters) – China, the world’s top coal buyer, is on track to boost imports of the fuel by more than 10 percent this year, traders and analysts said on Tuesday, countering earlier expectations that shipments would be capped by Beijing at the same level as […]
By Nadja Popovich 24 October 2019 (The New York Times) – New data reveals that damaging air pollution has increased nationally since 2016, reversing a decades-long trend toward cleaner air. An analysis of Environmental Protection Agency data published this week by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University found that fine particulate pollution increased 5.5 percent on average across the […]