2nd Annual
Verde Fest
Aug 15 10am-4pm
Cortez City Park

—This one by M-CAN—

Click here for Vendor Application

In the Cortez City Park. Free to All.

• Renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, etc.)
• Recycling (Dolores Recycling Initiative)
• Environmental and social responsibility (prevention groups)
• Natural health
• Green building techniques (earthship, strawbale, passive solar, etc.)
• Alternative vehicles
• Organic Agriculture (composting demo)
• Green space conservation (Montezuma Land Conservancy)
• Local Economics (Agri-tourism, eat local)
• Eco products
• Konservation Kids (sustainable activities for kids)
• Music and food

• Standard 10 x 10 Booth $25
• Non-Profits (501©3) $10

• Engage and educate the community about the sustainable practices available in the area
• Celebrate our communities' sustainable efforts

• Desert Rock protests refusal of air permit Gov. Ritter argues against power plant
  by Joe Hanel
  Herald Denver Bureau
  Article Last Updated; Wednesday, June 17, 2009
  
  DENVER — Backers of the proposed Desert Rock power plant have asked a federal appeals board to reinstate the plant's air-pollution permit, which the Environmental Protection Agency took back in April.
  
  Meanwhile, Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter...(more)
  
  
• EPA sued over claims of air pollution in West By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN, Associated Press Writer – Fri Jun 5, 9:03 pm ET
  
  ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was sued Friday by an environmental group that claims the agency has failed to safeguard public health in the West by not limiting the transmission of air pollution across state lines.
  
  The EPA requires states to have plans aimed at addressing the interstate transport of ozone pollution, the primary component of smog, and fine particles or soot, but WildEarth Guardians claims New Mexico, California and a handful of other Western states do not have such plans...(more)
  
  
• EPA has filed a motion with the EAB to withdraw the entire Desert Rock air permit From: Mike Eisenfeld
  Date: Mon, Apr 27, 2009 at 5:53 PM
  Subject: EPA has filed a motion with the EAB to withdraw the entire Desert Rock air permit
  To:
  
  EPA is acknowledging deficiencies in the air quality permit for Desert Rock and has remanded the entire permit for EPA Region 9 reconsideration of particulate matter, Best Available Control Technology, issuance of the permit without consulting under the Endangered Species Act, failure to complete a Maximum Achievable Control Technology analysis for hazardous air pollutants, and insufficiency of other impact analysis for the project.
  
  We believe that EPA has made an important decision here to legitimately analyze the project for it's real impacts.
  
  

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• New! It’s Now Legal to Catch a Raindrop in Colorado KIRK JOHNSON
  Published: June 28, 2009
  
  DURANGO, Colo. — For the first time since territorial days, rain will be free for the catching here, as more and more thirsty states part ways with one of the most entrenched codes of the West.
  
  Precipitation, every last drop or flake, was assigned ownership from the moment it fell in many Western states, making scofflaws of people who scooped rainfall from their own gutters. In some instances, the rights to that water were assigned a century or more ago.
  
  Now two new laws in Colorado will allow many people to collect rainwater legally...(more)
  
  The NYTimes online requires a free account to read articles.
  
  
• U.S. Global Change Research Program - Southwest Note: This is a U.S. Government website.
  
  Recent warming in the Southwest has been among the most rapid in the nation. This is driving declines in spring snowpack and Colorado River flow. Projections of future climate change indicate continued strong warming in the region, with much larger increases under higher emissions scenarios compared to lower. Projected summertime temperature increases are greater than the annual average increases in parts of the region and are likely to be exacerbated by expanding urban heat island effects. Further water cycle changes are projected, which combined with increasing temperatures signal a serious water supply challenge in the decades and centuries ahead. The prospect of future droughts becoming more severe due to warming is a significant concern, especially because the Southwest continues to lead the nation in population growth...(more)
  
  
• Southwestern Chapter of U.S. Government Report on Climate Change (pdf) The Southwest region stretches from the southern Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Coast. Elevations range from the lowest in the country to among the highest, with climates ranging from the driest to some of the wettest. Past climate records based on changes in Colorado River flows indicate that drought is a frequent feature of the Southwest, with some of the longest documented “megadroughts” on Earth. Since the 1940s, the region has experienced its most rapid population and urban growth. During this time, there were both unusually wet periods (including much of 1980s and 1990s) and dry periods (including much of 1950s and 1960s).449 The prospect of future droughts becoming more severe as a result of global warming is a significant concern, especially because the Southwest continues to lead the nation in population growth...(more)
  
  
• Ex-PUC chairman: Tri-State electric co-op could be headed down coal-fired road to ruin By David O. Williams 5/28/09 7:33 AM
  
  Ron Lehr was chairman of the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC) in the early 1990s when the Montrose-based Colorado Ute Electric Association went bankrupt because of what he deemed "a colossal blunder that put them out of business."
  
  Lehr, now an attorney for the renewable energy association Interwest Energy Alliance, said Colorado Ute built the Craig 3 coal—fired power plant in northwest Colorado that the co—op´s board felt would be needed to power the state´s about—to—boom oil shale industry. That industry went bust in the 1980s, and Colorado Ute followed suit a few years later...(more)
  
  
• Moab Uranium Tailings Pile Starts Moving At Last MOAB, Utah, Mary 6, 2009 (ENS) - The process of removing 16 million tons of radioactive waste that has been piled on the Colorado River bank for decades began on Monday in the southeastern Utah city of Moab.
  
  The uranium tailings are being moved to a permanent disposal site 30 miles north, near the town of Crescent Junction. ..(more)
  
  
• Air Quality in the Four Corners and San Juan Mountains - Mountain Studies Institute Overview:
  
  MSI is addressing pressing air quality issues concerns with a combination of research, monitoring, outreach, and collaboration.
  
  The San Juan Mountains are perceived as having crystal clean air due to the remoteness from large cities. These mountains are in close proximity to an industrialized area, however. The Four Corners is a center for coal-fired energy and methane (natural gas) production. For example, San Juan County in northwestern New Mexico is one of the largest emitters of power plant mercury among all counties in the nation. An additional coal-fired power plant and about 12,000 more natural gas wells are proposed for the Four Corners. ..(more)
  
  
• Southwest Colorado reaps benefits from stimulus spending Joe Hanel
  Journal Denver Bureau
  Saturday, May 16, 2009
  
  DENVER — The Four Corners will get nearly a third of all the stimulus money the Department of the Interior is sending to Colorado...(more)
  
  
• State looking for local weatherization partner 5/16/2009 6:00:00 AM
  Joe Hanel
  Journal Denver Bureau
  
  DENVER — The Governor's Energy Office is looking for a local partner to help it spend stimulus dollars on weatherizing people's homes.
  
  GEO officials want to find one government or nonprofit agency to manage all the work in La Plata, Montezuma, Archuleta, Dolores, and San Juan counties. The local agency will use either its own employees or contractors to make people's homes more energy efficient. The work will be paid for by the federal stimulus package, which Congress passed in February...(more)
  
  

• New! U.S. Global Change Research Program - Southwest Note: This is a U.S. Government website.
  
  Recent warming in the Southwest has been among the most rapid in the nation. This is driving declines in spring snowpack and Colorado River flow. Projections of future climate change indicate continued strong warming in the region, with much larger increases under higher emissions scenarios compared to lower. Projected summertime temperature increases are greater than the annual average increases in parts of the region and are likely to be exacerbated by expanding urban heat island effects. Further water cycle changes are projected, which combined with increasing temperatures signal a serious water supply challenge in the decades and centuries ahead. The prospect of future droughts becoming more severe due to warming is a significant concern, especially because the Southwest continues to lead the nation in population growth...(more)
  
  
• New! Southwestern Chapter of U.S. Government Report on Climate Change (pdf) The Southwest region stretches from the southern Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Coast. Elevations range from the lowest in the country to among the highest, with climates ranging from the driest to some of the wettest. Past climate records based on changes in Colorado River flows indicate that drought is a frequent feature of the Southwest, with some of the longest documented “megadroughts” on Earth. Since the 1940s, the region has experienced its most rapid population and urban growth. During this time, there were both unusually wet periods (including much of 1980s and 1990s) and dry periods (including much of 1950s and 1960s).449 The prospect of future droughts becoming more severe as a result of global warming is a significant concern, especially because the Southwest continues to lead the nation in population growth...(more)
  
  
• The Future of Energy: A Realist's Roadmap to 2050 — Popular Science Which technologies will finally free us from oil?
  Posted 06.17.2009 at 12:57 pm
  
  This December, when representatives from 170 countries meet at the United Nations climate talks in Copenhagen to replace the expiring Kyoto climate treaty, the smart money predicts unprecedented collaboration. American political change coupled with spiking carbon dioxide levels could inspire a communal project on a scale not seen since World War II. A consensus, backed by science, is emerging among the international community that by 2050 we need to reduce emissions of C02, methane and other greenhouse gases to approximately 80 percent lower than they were in 1990...(more)
  
  
• National Security and the Threat of Climate Change A study by The CNA Corporation with an advisory board of 11 active Generals and Admiralsl
  
  This is a pdf format slide presentation best viewed with whole pages showing. After opening, click the icon with up/down arrows indicating each page shown top to bottom. ...(more)
  
  
• Scientists Debate Shading Earth As Climate Fix All Things Considered, June 16, 2009
  
  Engineering our climate to stop global warming may seem like science fiction, but at a recent National Academy of Sciences meeting, scientists discussed some potential geoengineering experiments in earnest.
  
  Climate researcher Ken Caldeira was skeptical when he first heard about the idea of shading the Earth a decade ago in a talk by nuclear weapons scientist Lowell Wood...(more)
  
  
• UN warns of 'megadisasters' linked to climate change Tue Jun 16, 2:18 pm ET
  
  GENEVA (AFP) – The United Nations on Tuesday raised the prospect of "megadisasters" affecting millions of people in some of the world's biggest cities unless more is done to heed the threat of climate change.
  
  "We are going to see more disasters and more intense disasters as a result of climate change," UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes said at the opening of a four-day conference on reducing disaster risks...(more)
  
  
• Climate change hits China's 'poor hardest' Wed Jun 17, 4:31 am ET
  
  BEIJING (AFP) — Climate change hits China's poor the hardest and also forces some of those lifted out of hardship back into it, activist groups Greenpeace and Oxfam said Wednesday.
  
  The two urged the Chinese government to review its existing poverty alleviation policy to take climate change into account, in a report compiled with experts from the nation's Academy of Agricultural Sciences...(more)
  
  
• Act now on global warming, US government report urges WASHINGTON (AFP) — Americans must take quick action to slow climate
  change or face a future in which devastating weather extremes affect everything from water supplies to food production, a US government report said Tuesday.
  
  Global warming, which the report blames largely on human-induced emissions of heat-trapping gases, has already brought weather and environmental changes including higher temperatures and sea levels, retreating glaciers, and earlier snowmelt, says the report by the US Global Change Research Program, a grouping of government agencies and the White House...(more)
  
  
• White House: Climate change damage happening now By Seth Borenstein, Ap Science Writer — 1 hr 28 mins ago
  
  WASHINGTON — Harmful effects from global warming are already here and worsening, warns the first climate report from Barack Obama's presidency in the strongest language on climate change ever to come out of the White House.
  
  Global warming has already caused more heavy downpours, the rise of temperatures and sea levels, rapidly retreating glaciers and altered river flows, according to the document released Tuesday by the White House science adviser and other top officials...(more)
  
  
• Scientists: Global warming has already changed oceans By Les Blumenthal, McClatchy Newspapers — Tue Jun 9, 6:50 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON — In Washington state , oysters in some areas haven't reproduced for four years, and preliminary evidence suggests that the increasing acidity of the ocean could be the cause. In the Gulf of Mexico , falling oxygen levels in the water have forced shrimp to migrate elsewhere.
  
  Though two marine-derived drugs, one for treating cancer and the other for pain control, are on the market and 25 others are under development, the fungus growing on seaweed, bacteria in deep sea mud and sea fans that could produce life-saving medicines are under assault from changing the ocean conditions...(more)
  
  
• Report: Climate change crisis ´catastrophic´ By Hilary Whiteman
  CNN
  
  LONDON, England (CNN) -- The first comprehensive report into the human cost of climate change warns the world is in the throes of a "silent crisis" that is killing 300,000 people each year.
  
  More than 300 million people are already seriously affected by the gradual warming of the earth and that number is set to double by 2030, the report from the Global Humanitarian Forum warns.
  
  "Climate change is the greatest emerging humanitarian challenge of our time, causing suffering to hundreds of millions of people worldwide," said the forum´s president, former U.N. Secretary—General Kofi Annan...(more)
  
  
• Obama 'optimistic' US can lead on climate change Fri Jun 5, 11:59 am ET
  
  DRESDEN, Germany (AFP) – President Barack Obama said Friday he was increasingly hopeful that the United States can lead the way on climate change, six months before crunch global talks in Copenhagen.
  
  "I'm actually more optimistic than I was about America being able to take leadership on this issue, joining Europe, which over the last several years has been ahead of us on this issue," Obama said after talks with Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany...(more)
  
  
• Greening the Herds: A New Diet to Cap Gas This article requires a NYTimes Online free account. NYTimes articles are excellent original reporting.
  By LESLIE KAUFMAN
  Published: June 4, 2009
  
  HIGHGATE, Vt. — Chewing her cud on a recent sunny morning, Libby, a 1,400-pound Holstein, paused to do her part in the battle against global warming, emitting a fragrant burp.
  
  Libby, age 6, and the 74 other dairy cows on Guy Choiniere’s farm here are at the heart of an experiment to determine whether a change in diet will help them belch less methane, a potent heat-trapping gas that has been linked to climate change. ..(more)
  
  
• Air Quality in the Four Corners and San Juan Mountains - Mountain Studies Institute Overview:
  
  MSI is addressing pressing air quality issues concerns with a combination of research, monitoring, outreach, and collaboration.
  
  The San Juan Mountains are perceived as having crystal clean air due to the remoteness from large cities. These mountains are in close proximity to an industrialized area, however. The Four Corners is a center for coal-fired energy and methane (natural gas) production. For example, San Juan County in northwestern New Mexico is one of the largest emitters of power plant mercury among all counties in the nation. An additional coal-fired power plant and about 12,000 more natural gas wells are proposed for the Four Corners. ..(more)
  
  
• New worries on Arctic permafrost thaw By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent – Fri May 22, 8:49 am ET
  
  OSLO (Reuters) – A rise in concentrations of a powerful greenhouse gas over the Arctic after a decade of stability is stirring worries about a possible thaw of vast stores trapped in permafrost, experts said.
  
  Levels of methane in the atmosphere rose 0.6 percent in 2008, according to preliminary data from the Zeppelin station on a remote island in the Norwegian Arctic, after a similar 0.6 percent gain in 2007, Norwegian officials said.
  
  The 2007 rise outpaced a global rise in methane of 0.34 percent to a new record high after levels had been stable for about a decade. World data for 2008 are not yet available...(more)
  
  
• As Alaska Glaciers Melt, It´s Land That´s Rising This article requires a NYTimes Online free account. NYTimes articles are excellent original reporting.
  
  By CORNELIA DEAN
  Published: May 17, 2009
  
  JUNEAU, Alaska — Global warming conjures images of rising seas that threaten coastal areas. But in Juneau, as almost nowhere else in the world, climate change is having the opposite effect: As the glaciers here melt, the land is rising, causing the sea to retreat.
  
  Morgan DeBoer, a property owner, opened a nine-hole golf course at the mouth of Glacier Bay in 1998, on land that was underwater when his family first settled here 50 years ago. Mr. DeBoer figures he has picked up enough additional land since then to build nine more holes...(more)
  
  
• Report warns against Coral Triangle collapse (CNN) — Experts have warned that the richly diverse coral reefs of the Coral Triangle around southeast Asia will disappear by the end of the century if action is not taken against climate change.
  
  As well as the loss of one of the world's most diverse underwater ecosystems, the knock on effect would be the collapse of coastal economies that supports around 100 million people, according to the WWF— commissioned study outlined at the World Ocean Conference this week. ..(more)
  
  
• Congress sets marathon hearings on fixing global warming By David Lightman and Renee Schoof, McClatchy Newspapers — Tue Apr 21, 7:00 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON — As Congress began work Tuesday on groundbreaking climate legislation, Washington lawmakers were unusually optimistic on Earth Day 2009 about getting at least some climate-change legislation passed this year.
  
  Lawmakers were talking Tuesday about finding common ground on energy efficiency measures. The tougher part will be putting mandatory curbs on the emissions from burning fossil fuels that scientists say are making the Earth's temperature rise...(more)
  
  
• Federal Government Cracks Down on Mercury Pollution From Cement Kilns Air pollution rules from new administration will cut mercury pollution by between 81 and 93 percent
  April 21, 2009
  
  Washington, DC -- The federal government is proposing, for the first time, to reduce airborne mercury pollution from cement kilns with new rules issued today. The new standards will cut mercury pollution from the nation's more than 150 cement kilns between 11,600 and 16,250 pounds (or a reduction of 81 to 93 percent), according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.
  
  Led by Lisa Jackson, the EPA Administrator newly appointed by President Obama, EPA is proposing first time standards for cement kilns of mercury, hydrochloric acid, and toxic organic pollutants such as benzene. In addition, the agency is strengthening the outdated standards for particulate matter to better control kilns' emissions of lead, arsenic, and other toxic metals...(more)
  
  
• Study: SE Asia will be hit hard by climate change By Michael Casey, Ap Environmental Writer — Mon Apr 27, 5:15 am ET
  
  BANGKOK – Southeast Asia will be hit particularly hard by climate change, causing the region's agriculture-dependent economies to contract by as much as 6.7 percent annually by the end of the century, according to a study released Monday.
  
  The Asian Development Bank study focused on Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. Those countries are especially vulnerable because they have large coastal populations facing rising sea levels and rely heavily on rice and other agriculture products which could suffer from water shortages as well as floods. Vietnam was found to be the most vulnerable...(more)
  
  
• Drilling drives a wedge at (Indigenous Peoples) climate change summit By Mary Pemberton, Associated Press Writer — Sat Apr 25, 4:31 am ET
  
  ANCHORAGE, Alaska – To drill or not drill for new oil and gas.
  
  That was the issue that drove a wedge Friday between young people and many of the older delegates at the United Nations-affiliated Indigenous Peoples' Global Summit on Climate Change.
  
  The five-day summit ended Friday with Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, president of the United Nations General Assembly, describing it as "a rather successful gathering."..(more)
  
  
• Catastrophic sea levels 'distinct possibility' by Marlowe Hood Marlowe Hood — Wed Apr 15, 2:11 pm ET
  
  PARIS (AFP) – A breakthrough study of fluctuations in sea levels the last time Earth was between ice ages, as it is now, shows that oceans rose some three meters in only decades due to collapsing ice sheets.
  
  The findings suggest that such an scenario —— which would redraw coastlines worldwide and unleash colossal human misery —— is "now a distinct possibility within the next 100 years," said lead researcher Paul Blanchon, a geoscientist at Mexico's National University...(more)
  
  
• NASA: Ozone Layer Disaster Averted WASHINGTON, March 19, 2009
  
  (AP)
  Here's rare good news about an environmental crisis: We dodged disaster with the ozone layer.
  
  A NASA study about ozone-munching chemicals from aerosol sprays and refrigeration used a computer model to play a game of what-if. What if the world 22 years ago didn't agree to cut back on chlorofluorocarbons which cause a seasonal ozone hole to form near the South Pole?
  
  NASA atmospheric scientist Paul Newman said the answer is a "bizarre world."..(more)
  
  
• Success Stories: Cleaning Up Planet Earth Robin Lloyd
  LiveScience Senior Editor
  Cleaner air, cleaner water and cleaner-burning gasoline — which means less brain—toxic lead in our blood — are the major achievements of the modern environmental movement, but global climate change looms as the elephant in the living room, experts say.
  
  Let's start with the good news on this anniversary of Earth Day.
  
  "After almost 40 years, the environment is significantly improved in many ways from the condition it was in on the first Earth Day in 1970," said Eric Goldstein, a lawyer with the National Resources Defense Council..(more)
  
  
• Steep emissions cuts take a chunk of warming with them – study 14 April 2009 (UPDATED 4:30 pm EDT)
  But "we can no longer avoid significant warming during this century," lead scientist warns.
  By Douglas Fischer
  Daily Climate editor
  
  BOULDER – Drastic, economy-changing cuts to greenhouse gas emissions will spare the planet only half the trauma expected over the next century as the Earth warms.
  
  And that’s the good news.
  
  Because a failure to significantly curb these planet-warming gases will truly transform our world in less than 100 years...(more)
  
  
• Climate clock is ticking By William Marsden, The Gazette
  April 3, 2009
  
  ...Had global warming suddenly pressed the gas pedal to the floor? If so, the world was in for quite a climate ride – dramatic, jarring changes in climate much sooner than expected. Climate scientists were deeply worried.
  
  "It really caught the scientific community by surprise," Professor James Ford, a McGill University geographer and Arctic expert recalled. "The Arctic system is close to crossing the threshold beyond which we will get dramatic changes in climate."...(more)
  
  

• Fertilizer industry finds its alternative energy: corncobs By Renee Schoof, McClatchy Newspapers — Mon Jun 15, 4:00 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON — American agriculture has become increasingly dependent on foreign sources of natural gas, a key ingredient in the nitrogen fertilizer that farmers use to get high yields of crops such as corn and wheat.
  
  Now, a California start-up company is preparing to open a plant that will make fertilizer in the U.S. and reduce fossil fuel emissions from agriculture.
  
  Nothing exotic needed, said the company, SynGest of San Francisco . The raw ingredient for the same ammonia-based fertilizer farmers have used for decades is something many already have and don't really need — corncobs...(more)
  
  

• Here Comes the Sun. Right? This article requires a NYTimes online free account. Their articles are excellent and it's worth signing up.
  By KATE GALBRAITH
  Published: May 2, 2009
  Hillsboro, Ore.
  
  BEHIND a giant solar factory here, backhoes are digging away, preparing for a new wing that will quintuple production. Inside, an outspoken German executive named Boris Klebensberger is fretting about the color of the new carpet. Samples perch on his window sill alongside floor plans.
  
  Expanding a factory? Picking out carpeting?
  
  Did anyone tell him that there’s a recession?
  
  Buoyed by the potential promise of a green economy, Mr. Klebensberger, who heads the American branch of SolarWorld AG, a company based in Bonn, Germany, is ramping up production of solar cells in a retrofitted factory that had its grand opening last October — in the teeth of the financial crisis...(more)
  
  
• UA receives $15 million solar power research grant By: Marissa Hopkins
  Issue date: 5/4/09 Section: News
  
  The UA is on the forefront of innovative solar energy research. A $15 million grant was awarded to the university April 27 from the United Sates Department of Energy, making the UA one of the government's new 46 Energy Frontier Research Centers.
  
  "It's not every day that you get 15 million bucks in the mail," said Neal Armstrong, director of the research group. "Fifteen million sounds like a lot, and we'll spend it wisely."..(more)
  
  
• Freescale Unveils Breakthrough in Power Conversion Technology for Solar Applications Mar 10, 2009 4:52 PM
  Freescale has developed advanced, ultra—low—voltage DC—to—DC converter technology that enables industry—leading solar cell startup and operating performance and efficiency at levels as low as 0.32 volts, as well as operation down to 0.25 V. Most ICs cannot start up at voltages less than the typical turn-on voltage of a transistor (approximately 0.7 V) without external assistance. This limitation reduces system design options and increases the complexity of power conversion and energy recovery applications involving ultra-low voltages...(more)
  
  
• New solar-panel technology 'more than oilsands': Researcher EDMONTON — Twenty years from now, if roofs around the world are speckled with power-generating plastic solar panels, it may be thanks, at least in part, to a microscopic layer of Canadian technology sandwiched inside each one.
  
  Researchers at the National Institute for Nanotechnology at the University of Alberta have developed a method that increases the efficiency in plastic photovoltaic cells by 30 per cent, a breakthrough they say may someday help make cheap, clean solar power available to the masses...(more)
  
  
• Did a Berkeley, California, Bureaucrat Revolutionize the World Energy System? March 12, 2009
  COPENHAGEN—
  
  Daniel Kammen won rousing applause at a session on energy efficiency here after describing a financing scheme that the city of Berkeley set up last year. The system follows existing forms of infrastructure financing, including the way that towns pay for power lines, sewage systems, or new roads. The idea is that towns would float a bond, backed by the municipality, and homeowners would use the money to first make their homes energy-efficient and then install solar power panels on their roofs. As they'd save money on their energy, they would pay back the financing through a monthly note...(more)
  
  
• First Solar first to US$1 per watt manufacturing cost 25 February 2009 | By Mark Osborne | News > Thin Film
  
  Photon Consulting may have recently projected the PV industry to reach the US$1 per watt manufacturing cost threshold in 2012, but First Solar has ignored such projections and reached this important milestone in the fourth quarter of 2008, with a cost per watt of US$0.98. First Solar, not wanting to sit back and wait for competitors to catch-up, expects further reductions in the coming years that could see a cost per watt below US$0.65 by 2012 or earlier...(more)
  
  
• First Solar sees breakthrough in manufacturing costs John Walko
  EE Times Europe
  02/26/2009 11:41 AM
  
  LONDON — Solar module manufacturer First Solar Inc. had both bright and subdued forecasts for the emerging solar industry, unsettling investors with suggestions that it expects demand to fall, competition to increase and huge financial challenges for the industry in the near future, as it revealed it had broken the $1/watt price barrier by reducing manufacturing costs to just $0.98/watt. ..(more)
  
  
• Silicon Genesis Bridges the Gap with 20um “Kerf-free” PV Foil SiGen Sets a New Wafer Thickness Record With 20um Mono c-Si PV Foil
  
  SAN JOSE, Calif. — Silicon Genesis, a leader in process and technology for engineered substrates announced today that it has produced the first ever 20um thickness solar-cell foils. The 125 mm square monocrystalline silicon (mono c-Si) foils were found to be robust and highly flexible. Neither a thin—film nor a wafer, the new form-factor was named a "foil" to better describe its unique physical characteristics as a thin, flexible yet free-standing material. This achievement represents an important milestone in the development of SiGen’s PolyMax™ kerf-free wafering technology...(more)
  
  
• Solar Cell Sets World Efficiency Record At 40.8 Percent ScienceDaily (Sep. 30, 2008) — Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have set a world record in solar cell efficiency with a photovoltaic device that converts 40.8 percent of the light that hits it into electricity. This is the highest confirmed efficiency of any photovoltaic device to date...(more)
  
  
• Fool's Gold could slash cost of solar power New research reveals a number of cheaper, more abundant alternatives to silicon
  Tom Young, BusinessGreen, 20 Feb 2009
  
  Scientists at Berkeley have this week released research revealing that alternative raw materials, such as iron pyrite — or Fool´s Gold — could offer a far cheaper alternative to silicon for solar panel manufacturers.
  
  The rapid growth of the global solar market has been repeatedly hampered by shortages of silicon, which is used to make the semiconductors found in many solar panels...(more)
  
  
• Dow at work on solar power shingles ASSOCIATED PRESS
  
  MIDLAND, Mich. – Dow Chemical Co. says it aims to start selling power-generating roof shingles by 2011.
  
  The chemical giant has been at work for the past year on a $50 million (U.S.) project called Dow Solar Solutions to develop a product to sell thermoplastic solar roof shingles throughout North America.
  
  Dow Chemical is collaborating with home builders and with Global Solar Energy Inc., an Arizona-based maker of flexible materials...(more)
  
  
• Samsung's Blue Earth is First Solar-Powered All-Touchscreen Cellphone
  By: Kit EatonFri Feb 13, 2009 at 9:17 AM
  
  Samsung's Blue Earth is the first solar-powered all-touchscreen smartphone. The device even takes energy saving a bit further with a built-in "eco-mode" system.
  
  This system sets low screen backlight brightness and duration with a single click, and switches the Bluetooth module into a special "low consumption" mode. There's also a built-in pedometer and some associated software that translates the distance you've walked into equivalent CO2 savings versus making the journey in a vehicle--it even presents the data in the number of trees you've saved...(more)
  
  
• Tri-State news "Solar power could supplement coal plant" 2/9/2009 10:53:20 PM GMT
  
  Energy News
  Copyright 2009 Albuquerque Journal
  By Michael Hartranft Journal Staff Writer
  
  PREWITT, NEW MEXICO: New Mexico's abundant sunshine could figure prominently in the future of the big coal-fired power plant in Prewitt, N.M. The Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association has reached agreement with the Electric Power Research Institute to use its Escalante Station in a case study on...(more)
  
  

• Solar DIY Space Heating Projects
  Plans for a wide variety of solar space heating projects you can build.
  
  Solar space heating can be 25 or more times more cost effective than solar electric (PV) systems, and the systems are excellent DIY projects. Payback for these low cost solar heating systems can be as little as one year...(more)
  
  

• New! A company plans to construct the world's largest solar power project ever, in the Sahara By Dan Smith Posted 06.22.2009 at 1:29 pm
  
  Solar power is an exciting source of renewable energy, but has so far mostly been used to power little things like homes, cars and small villages. But what if solar energy was used on a scale that would power the majority of Europe? The Desertec Foundation, a Jordanian and German company are hoping to secure financing for a radically ambitious project to harness solar energy in the world’s most barren, sun-drenched expanse, the Sahara Desert. Desertec claims that if only 0.3 percent of the expanse of the Sahara was covered with solar panels, it would power the entire European continent. If up to 1 percent of the desert were covered, it could power the entire world...(more)
  
  
• World's Largest Solar Power Tower Starts Generating in Spain SEVILLE, Spain, April 30, 2009 (ENS) - Abengoa Solar has begun commercial operation of the giant new PS20 solar power tower located at the Solucar Platform, near Seville. With a generating capacity of 20 megawatts, the new power tower will produce enough solar energy to supply 10,000 homes.
  
  During a three-day production and operational testing period last week, the PS20 surpassed the predicted power output, further validating the high potential of power tower technology, the company said in a statement. ..(more)
  
  
• World’s Largest Solar Power Plants With Thermal Storage To Be Built In Arizona
  Joe Romm
  April 24, 2009 2:07 PM
  
  What's the easiest way to deal with the intermittency of many renewable sources of energy? Cheap storage. And what form of storage is much cheaper and has a much higher round-trip efficiency than electric storage? Thermal storage.
  
  That's a key reason concentrated solar-thermal power (CSP) is a core climate solution. It has the most potential of any zero-carbon electricity since it can most easily be integrated with thermal storage -- technology that is available today, as made clear by this just announced 200-MW plant Albiasa Solar of Spain will build in Arizona:..(more)
  
  
• Google shows alternative energy firms the way David R. Baker, Chronicle Staff Writer
  Thursday, April 2, 2009
  
  Picking the right place for an immense solar power plant or wind farm is a tricky business, one that can turn natural allies into enemies.
  
  An open stretch of desert might look empty to a renewable-power developer who wants to blanket a few hundred acres with solar panels or mirrors. To environmentalists, the same spot could be vital habitat for an endangered lizard or bird - an ecosystem too delicate to touch...(more)
  
  
• Think Solar, Think Small (about smart vs national grid) By Craig D. Rose
  This article appeared in the February 16, 2009 edition of The Nation.
  
  January 28, 2009...Although massive expansion of the electric grid threatens to despoil the last of America's undeveloped places, some environmentalists mistakenly believe the urgency of dealing with climate change leaves no alternative to large, remotely sited renewable electric-generation facilities and the transmission lines they need to get power to consumers. In fact, there is an alternative: "distributed generation," or smaller solar technology installations on rooftops and near existing transmission lines, or even scaled-down wind farms sited closer to consumers. ..(more)
  
  
• DOE's book "The Smart Grid, An Introduction" (4Mb pdf file) It is a colossal task. But it is a task that must be done.
  
  The Department of Energy has been charged with orchestrating the wholesale modernization of our nation’s electrical grid.
       While it is running.
       Full-tilt.
  Heading this effort is the Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability. In concert with its cutting edge research and energy policy programs, the office’s newly formed, multi-agency Smart Grid Task Force is responsible for coordinating standards development, guiding research and development projects, and reconciling the agendas of a wide range of stakeholders. Equally critical to the success of this effort is the education of all interested members of the public as to the nature, challenges and opportunities surrounding the Smart Grid and its implementation...(more)
  
  

• Northwest utilities turn to nuclear, 25 years after industry collapsed By Les Blumenthal, McClatchy Newspapers — Sun Jun 14, 6:00 am ET
  
  WASHINGTON — A consortium of utilities in the Pacific Northwest once known as "Whoops," synonymous with the collapse of the nuclear power industry, wants back in the game.
  
  Though many blame the demise of the industry on the 1979 accident at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island , the financial meltdown of the Washington Public Power Supply System — WPPSS — became the poster child for all that went wrong...(more)
  
  
• Nuclear waste dogs US energy policy Yucca Mountain was supposed to be where the highly toxic material was sent. But Obama's energy budget leaves it out.
  By Gail Russell Chaddock | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
  from the March 6, 2009 edition
  
  Washington - President Obama's proposed budget for fiscal year 2010 all but sinks prospects to store America's nuclear waste at Nevada's Yucca Mountain. But it leaves wide open the role of nuclear power in building "a new economy powered by clean and secure energy" – and the question of what to do with existing, highly toxic nuclear waste. ..(more)
  
  
• NRC releases license schedule for nuclear expansion 11 February 2009 – NRG Energy and Toshiba Corp. could receive by 2012 a Combined License for the proposed 2,700 MW South Texas nuclear project, according to a schedule released by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission...(more)
  
  

• New! Green Power Takes Root in the Chinese Desert By KEITH BRADSHER
  Published: July 2, 2009
  
  DUNHUANG, China — As the United States takes its first steps toward mandating that power companies generate more electricity from renewable sources, China already has a similar requirement and is investing billions to remake itself into a green energy superpower...(more)
  
  Note: This NYTimes Online article requires a free account.
  
  
• Regulators give go-ahead for offshore wind farms By Barbara Barrett, McClatchy Newspapers — Wed Apr 22, 5:25 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON — The federal government has cleared the way for developers to plant wind farms in offshore waters on the Outer Continental Shelf.
  
  The regulations were published Wednesday afternoon in the federal register and promoted by President Barack Obama at an Earth Day speech on a wind farm in Newton, Iowa ...(more)
  
  
• Stimulus may get small wind turbines spinning By William Armsby
  
  (CNN) -- The gale force of President Obama's $787 billion economic stimulus package could breathe new life into an emerging industry: small wind turbines.
  
  The bill provides a 30 percent investment tax credit to consumers who buy these turbines, which are typically used to help power homes or small businesses...(more)
  
  
• A Japanese Town That Kicked the Oil Habit By Coco Masters / Tokyo Monday, Dec. 22, 2008
  
  Wind turbines at Kuzumaki
  Courtesy of Kuzumaki
  
  Shin Abe doesn't find it odd that the picturesque little Japanese town of Kuzumaki, where he has lived all his life, generates some of its electricity with cow dung. Nor is the 15-year-old middle school student blown away by the vista of a dozen wind turbines spinning atop the forested peak of nearby Mt. Kamisodegawa. And it's old news to Abe that his school gets 25% of its power from an array of 420 solar panels located near the campus. "That's the way it's been," he shrugs. "It's natural." ...(more)
  
  
• TransCanada wins approval for U.S. wind power lines Tina Seeley, Bloomberg Published: Thursday, February 19, 2009
  
  TransCanada Corp. won federal approval of its rate plan for two proposed power transmission lines that would primarily deliver wind-generated energy from Montana and Wyoming to the southwestern U.S.
  
  The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in Washington voted Thursday for the projects -- a 1,000-mile line known as Chinook that would stretch from Montana to Nevada and a 1,100-mile line, known as Zephyr, stretching from Wyoming to Nevada. Both would end south of Las Vegas...(more)
  
  

• Fertilizer industry finds its alternative energy: corncobs By Renee Schoof, McClatchy Newspapers — Mon Jun 15, 4:00 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON — American agriculture has become increasingly dependent on foreign sources of natural gas, a key ingredient in the nitrogen fertilizer that farmers use to get high yields of crops such as corn and wheat.
  
  Now, a California start-up company is preparing to open a plant that will make fertilizer in the U.S. and reduce fossil fuel emissions from agriculture.
  
  Nothing exotic needed, said the company, SynGest of San Francisco . The raw ingredient for the same ammonia-based fertilizer farmers have used for decades is something many already have and don't really need — corncobs...(more)
  
  
• Lab finds new method to turn biomass into gasoline By Jasmin Melvin — Tue Apr 21, 3:19 pm ET
  
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) — U.S. scientists have combined a discovery from a French garbage dump with breakthroughs in synthetic biology to come up with a novel method for turning plant waste into gasoline, without the need of any food sources.
  
  A synthetic biology lab at the University of California San Francisco identified a compound able to use biomass to produce a gas that can be converted into a gasoline chemically indistinguishable from fossil—fuel based petroleum...(more)
  
  
• Cold-Weather Testing of 100% Permaflo Soy Biodiesel at the Arctic Circle 3 March 2009
  
  The Indiana Soybean Alliance (ISA) is partnering with University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), the Alaska Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station (AFES) and Purdue University to road test Permaflo Biodiesel, a formulation of biodiesel that significantly reduces the traditional problems of biodiesel gelling in cold-weather conditions...(more)
  
  
• Wood Chips to Heat Laboratories, Save Natural Gas October 24, 2008
  Photo of hands holding wood chips, with a much larger pile of chips in the background.
  
  Wood chips from beetle-killed trees will heat NREL's laboratories this winter.
  
  The Renewable Fuels Heating Plant, behind NREL's Field Test Laboratory Building, will displace as much as 80 percent of the natural gas used to heat the campus, offsetting 4.8 million pounds of carbon dioxide (or 2,200 metric tons of carbon) each year.
  
  On winter's icy threshold, NREL is switching to a sustainable and efficient source of heat using wood thinned from Colorado's dying forests.
  
  The lab will fire up its Renewable Fuel Heat Plant (RFHP) this fall as the weather gets colder. The new $3.3 million boiler facility will heat South Table Mountain Campus laboratory buildings by burning wood chips that includes trees lost to the region's mountain pine beetle epidemic.
  
  By burning biomass from forest-thinning operations and other wood waste sources, the facility will displace as much as 80 percent of the 50,000 million BTUs of natural gas used annually to heat the STM campus...(more)
  
  
• Mines waste methane energy
  By Jodi Peterson
  High Country News
  
  Aspen, like many Western cities, is working hard to cut its greenhouse-gas emissions. The ski resort gets three-quarters of its electricity from renewable sources, provides free mass transit, and sells "Canary Tags" to fund local emissions-cutting projects. One possibility for such projects is at coal mines, three of which lie 50 miles southwest.
  
  Coal mines are a global-warming double whammy. Each ton of coal burned emits about three tons of carbon dioxide. Then there's the methane that seeps from underground coal seams - it packs 21 times the climate-changing punch of CO2. To neutralize it, the methane can be burned off, or, better still, used to generate power. The resulting emissions reduction can then be sold to a city or business that wants to offset its contribution to global warming...(more)
  
  

• New hydrogen car backed by Porsche scion Tue Jun 16, 9:53 am ET
  
  LONDON (AFP) — A new hydrogen car designed for use in cities and backed by a relative of the founder of German luxury sportscar maker Porsche was on Tuesday unveiled in London.
  
  The two-seater Riversimple Urban Car can travel 240 miles without refuelling, weighs just 350 kilogrammes (770 pounds) and has a top speed of 50 miles per hour.
  
  In fuel efficiency terms, it can do the petrol equivalent of 300 miles per gallon and emits only water. Manufacturers hope it could go into production from 2013...(more)
  
  
• 11 Eastern States Commit to Regional Low Carbon Fuel Standard HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania, January 6, 2009 (ENS) - Pennsylvania has signed a letter of agreement with 10 other eastern states to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels and other sources by developing a regional low carbon fuel standard.
  
  Vehicles using low carbon transport fuels include cars powered by hydrogen fuel cells; electric cars such as plug-in hybrids; cars fueled with ethanol, especially cellulosic ethanol made from non-food plant materials; and cars fueled with biodiesel. ..(more)
  
  
• A Better Place for Electric Cars Shai Agassi's Better Place is teaming with Renault and Nissan to make electric cars a reality in Israel
  
  by Steve Hamm
  
  In the first program of its type, Israel, two auto companies, and an electric vehicle startup on Jan. 21 announced they will roll out a system for enabling mass use of electric vehicles in Israel. Renault and Nissan NSANY will convert conventional cars to run on electric motors and the startup, Better Place, will sell the cars and operate a network of charging locations and battery replacement stations. The technology and business model face long odds in replacing the gasoline engine. But the project will draw lots of attention, given the hundreds of millions of dollars and high-powered partners behind it. ..(more)
  
  
  
  
• FORD, LEAR EARN ACCOLADES FOR INNOVATIVE USE OF SOY FOAM IN SEAT CUSHIONS
  * Society of Plastic Engineers’ Automotive Division honors Ford Motor Company and Lear Corporation for their innovative use of soy-based foam in car seats.
  
  * Ford dominates 2008 Automotive Innovation competition, winning in several categories, including top vehicle award.
  
  * Environmental advantages of soy-foam include; reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions compared to the current petroleum-based material, lower energy to produce, up to 24 percent renewable content, and reduction of dependency on volatile energy markets...(more)
  
  
• Run Cars on Green Electricity, Not Natural Gas November 19, 2008 — 11
  Copyright © 2008 Earth Policy Institute
  Jonathan G. Dorn
  
  With the dramatic increase in oil prices earlier this year translating into higher prices at the gas pump in the United States, concerns over U.S. dependence on foreign oil are once again part of the national discussion on energy security. Combined with the growing understanding that carbon emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels are driving global climate change, the debate is now focused on how to restructure the U.S. transport system to solve these two problems. While the idea of running U.S. vehicles on natural gas has lately received a great deal of attention, powering our cars with green electricity is a more sensible option on all fronts—national security, efficiency, climate stabilization, and economics.
  
  Having a fleet of natural gas—;powered vehicles (NGVs) would simply replace U.S. dependence on foreign oil with a dependence on natural gas, another fossil fuel. The United States has scarcely 3 percent of the world´s proved natural gas reserves, yet even without the increased demand that would result from an NGV fleet, the country already consumes nearly a quarter of the world´s natural gas. At current rates of consumption, U.S. proved reserves would only meet national demand for another nine years...(more)
  
  
• Future planes, cars may be made of `buckypaper'

• A new spin on battery technology By Rupert Goodwins ZDNet.co.uk
  Posted on ZDNet News: Mar 12, 2009 12:49:06 PM
  
  Researchers at the universities of Miami, Tokyo, and Tohoku have discovered a new form of battery.
  
  Charged by the application of a very strong magnetic field, the Magnetic Tunnel Junction (MTJ) contains a set of nano-magnets - zones some 5 nanometers across in a zinc-gallium-arsenic-magnesium matrix - which absorb energy and then release it over time. Although the effect had been predicted, the size and duration of the result was not.
  
  "We had anticipated the effect, but the device produced a voltage over a hundred times too big and for tens of minutes, rather than for milliseconds as we had expected," said one of the researchers, in a story in ScienceDaily. "That this was counterintuitive is what lead to our theoretical understanding of what was really going on." ..(more)
  
  
• Gene-engineered viruses build a better battery Thu Apr 2, 2009 4:25pm EDT
  By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor
  
  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers who have trained a tiny virus to do their bidding said on Thursday they made it build a more efficient and powerful lithium battery.
  
  They changed two genes in the virus, called M13, and got it to do two things: build a shell made out of a compound called iron phosphate, and then attach to a carbon nanotube to make a powerful and tiny electrode...(more)
  
  
• New battery material could lead to rapid recharging of many devices March 11th, 2009
  
  MIT engineers have created a kind of beltway that allows for the rapid transit of electrical energy through a well-known battery material, an advance that could usher in smaller, lighter batteries — for cell phones and other devices — that could recharge in seconds rather than hours. ..(more)
  
  
• Storing the Breeze: New Battery Might Make Wind Power More Reliable Using a massive battery to store electricity generated by wind may make it more reliable--and cheaper
  By David Biello
  
  Winter winds howl off the Dakota prairie through Minnesota, turning the 1,100 megawatts worth of wind turbines in Xcel Energy's system in that state. By 2020, the utility expects to more than triple that amount in a bid to avoid more polluting energy sources. But the wind doesn't always blow and, even worse, it often blows strongest when people aren't using much electricity, like late at night.
  
  So Xcel Energy, Inc., has become one of the first utilities in the U.S. to install a giant battery system in an attempt to store some of that wind power for later. ..(more)
  
  
  

• Google.org Awards $10.7 Million to Advance Geothermal Energy Technology
• Geothermail energy ready for take-off
  In the first half of 2008, total world installed geothermal power capacity passed 10,000 megawatts and now produces enough electricity to meet the needs of 60 million people, roughly the population of the United Kingdom. In 2010, capacity could increase to 13,500 megawatts across 46 countries - equivalent to 27 coal-fired power plants - Jonathan Dorn of the Earth Policy Institute reports...(more)
  
  
  
  
  

• New! Green Power Takes Root in the Chinese Desert By KEITH BRADSHER
  Published: July 2, 2009
  
  DUNHUANG, China — As the United States takes its first steps toward mandating that power companies generate more electricity from renewable sources, China already has a similar requirement and is investing billions to remake itself into a green energy superpower...(more)
  
  Note: This NYTimes Online article requires a free account.
  
  
• Global CEOs back greenhouse gas cuts, carbon caps By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer – Tue May 26, 3:46 pm ET
  
  COPENHAGEN – Global business leaders added momentum to prospects for a new U.N. climate treaty by agreeing Tuesday that the world must cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by mid-century by setting specific limits on carbon...(more)
  
  
• Court Blocks Alaska Offshore Drilling on Environmental Grounds WASHINGTON, DC, April 17, 2009 (ENS) - Three conservation groups and a native village in Alaska declared victory today as the federal government's attempt to expand oil and gas drilling off the Alaska coast was vacated by a U.S. appeals court in Washington, DC.
  
  The three judge panel ruled that the Bush-era Department of the Interior failed to consider the impact of drilling on the ocean and on marine life before it began the process in August 2005 of expanding an oil and gas leasing program in the Beaufort, Bering, and Chukchi seas.
  
  The court ordered the Interior Department, headed currently by Secretary Ken Salazar, to analyze the proposed leasing areas to determine the risk of environmental damage before moving ahead with lease sales. ..(more)
  
  
• Federal Government Cracks Down on Mercury Pollution From Cement Kilns Air pollution rules from new administration will cut mercury pollution by between 81 and 93 percent
  April 21, 2009
  
  Washington, DC -- The federal government is proposing, for the first time, to reduce airborne mercury pollution from cement kilns with new rules issued today. The new standards will cut mercury pollution from the nation's more than 150 cement kilns between 11,600 and 16,250 pounds (or a reduction of 81 to 93 percent), according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.
  
  Led by Lisa Jackson, the EPA Administrator newly appointed by President Obama, EPA is proposing first time standards for cement kilns of mercury, hydrochloric acid, and toxic organic pollutants such as benzene. In addition, the agency is strengthening the outdated standards for particulate matter to better control kilns' emissions of lead, arsenic, and other toxic metals...(more)
  
  
• GOP chair denies global warming Speaking on a nationally syndicated radio program, Michael Steele, whose official job title is Embattled Chairman of the Republican National Committee, placed himself in opposition to empirically observed reality earlier this month when he denied the existence of global warming...(more)
  
  
• 18 States Urge EPA to Act on Global Warming February 17, 2009
  
  On Feb. 5, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley lead an 18-state coalition, the Corporation Counsel for the City of New York, and the City Solicitor of Baltimore, urging U.S. Environmental Protection Administrator Lisa Jackson to act in response to the 2007 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA.
  
  "On April 2, 2007, the Supreme Court established the EPA's responsibility to regulate greenhouse gases under the federal Clean Air Act. With the change in administrations, we are extremely hopeful that the EPA will finally start to do its job under the statute," Coakley said. "The second anniversary of the Court's ruling is now on the horizon, and we are today urging Administrator Jackson to issue as quickly as possible a determination that greenhouse gases are endangering public health and welfare." ..(more)
  
  
• Stimulus may put some wind in clean energy's sails By Renee Schoof | McClatchy Newspapers
  WASHINGTON — Many of the jobs that the economic stimulus would create are generated by the parts of the plan that also are intended to help combat global warming and reduce the nation's dependence on fossil fuels.
  
  The $787.2 billion stimulus plan that President Barack Obama will sign Tuesday includes the nation's largest investment to date in cleaner energy. More than $80 billion in spending and tax cuts will go toward renewable domestic energy, a better grid to transmit electricity, energy research and programs to reduce the use of fossil fuels, such as weatherizing homes and federal buildings...(more)
  
  
• Pollution Giant: New Colorado Coal Mine It will be a brand new underground coal mine. It will be the biggest underground coal mine in Colorado. It will spew nearly 4 million tons of methane -- a powerful greenhouse gas -- into the atmosphere every year. By doing so, it will boost Colorado's total greenhouse gas emissions by a whopping 3 percent over 2005 levels.
  
  And that doesn't include the roughly 20 million tons of CO2 produced by burning the 8 million tons of coal that will come out of the mine each year for up to 30 years, thus feeding our nation's addiction to dirty fuel...(more)
  
  
• EPA May Reverse Bush, Limit Carbon Emissions From Coal-Fired Plants By Steven Mufson and Juliet Eilperin
  Washington Post Staff Writers
  Wednesday, February 18, 2009; Page A02
  
  The Environmental Protection Agency will reopen the possibility of regulating carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants, tossing aside a December Bush administration memorandum that declared that the agency would not limit the emissions.
  
  The decision could mark the first step toward placing limits on greenhouse gases emitted by coal plants, an issue that has been hotly contested by the coal industry and environmentalists since April 2007, when the Supreme Court ruled that carbon dioxide should be considered a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. ..(more)
  
  
• Stimulus expected to add jobs to build new energy system WASHINGTON — Many of the jobs that the economic stimulus would create are generated by the parts of the plan that also are intended to help combat global warming and reduce the nation's dependence on fossil fuels.
  
  The $787.2 billion stimulus plan that President Barack Obama will sign Tuesday includes the nation's largest investment to date in cleaner energy. More than $80 billion in spending and tax cuts will go toward renewable domestic energy, a better grid to transmit electricity, energy research and programs to reduce the use of fossil fuels, such as weatherizing homes and federal buildings...(more)
  
  
• Feeding In Renewable Energy BreakthroughsRenewable energy really needs is a shift to permanent, effective policies to pursue and develop its potential, write REPP's George Sterzinger and Nanosolar's Martin Roscheisen.
  
  by: George Sterzinger, Executive Director, Renewable Energy Policy Project, and Martin Roscheisen, CEO, Nanosolar
  
  January 21, 2009
  
  At a time when many people in Washington are running around with their hair on fire looking for schemes to dramatically increase renewable energy use by mid-February at the latest, let's consider that what renewable energy really needs is a shift to permanent, effective policies to pursue and develop its potential...(more)
  
  
• Climate Scientists Released from Federal Gag Order WASHINGTON, DC, January 18, 2009 (ENS) - Bush administration rules limiting what U.S. Department of Commerce employees can say to the media or in public do not apply to climate and weather scientists, according to an agency email released by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a service organization for state and federal employees.
  
  As a result, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration specialists represented by the National Weather Service Employees Organization do not have to obtain agency pre-approval to speak or write, whether on or off-duty, concerning any scientific topic deemed "of official interest." ...(more)
  
  
  
• Without Delay: Congress to Fast-Track Climate Legislation WASHINGTON, DC, January 15, 2009 (ENS) - The heads of some of America's largest corporations together with the leaders of five of the country's largest environmental groups today presented a joint plan to Congress for climate protection legislation. Congressional Democrats met their call for immediate action with assurances that they agree - there is no time for delay.
  
  Testifying before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce in the first congressional hearing of 2009 on climate change, members of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership called for a reduction in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent of 2005 levels by 2050 through an economy-wide cap-and-trade program. ..(more)
  
  
  
• EPA Abandons Attempts to Change Clean Air Rules
  WASHINGTON, DC, December 11, 2008 (ENS) - The Bush administration has dropped plans to adopt two Clean Air Act rules that would have allowed power plants and other polluters to increase smog and soot pollution.
  
  The first rule concerned the Clean Air Act's New Source Review program. It would have allowed coal-fired power plants to increase their power output by installing new equipment without adopting pollution controls.
  
  The second abandoned rule would have weakened special air quality protections that Congress adopted for national parks and wilderness areas. If the rule had been adopted, it would have been easier to build a coal-fired power plant, refinery or factory near a national park...(more)
  
  
  
  
• Western Governors Ask Obama for National Green Energy Plan
  WASHINGTON, DC, November 28, 2008 (ENS) - In a letter to President-elect Barack Obama, the Western governors are urging swift action in adopting and implementing a national energy plan that would transform the country's energy infrastructure and economy while reducing greenhouse gas emissions...(more)
  
  
• Big U.S. Corporations Urge Quick Carbon Cap-and-Trade Legislation BOSTON, Massachusetts, November 19, 2008 (ENS) - Five large U.S. corporations and a coalition of investors and environmental groups today announced that they have formed a new organization to lobby for strong U.S. climate and energy legislation in early 2009 to spur a clean energy economy and reduce global warming.
  
  The founding members of Business for Innovative Climate and Energy Policy, to be known as BICEP, are Levi Strauss & Co., Nike, Starbucks, Sun Microsystems and The Timberland Company...(more)
  
  
  
  

• Google, Utilities Bringing Energy Usage Data To Consumers
  By Thomas Claburn
  InformationWeek
  May 20, 2009 03:20 PM
  
  In a move to connect the emerging smart energy grid with the Internet, Google on Wednesday announced partnerships with eight national and international energy companies to allow consumers to access data about their energy usage through Google's PowerMeter gadget.
  
  Google PowerMeter is a software application that can be embedded on the company's iGoogle personal home pages. It displays data about home energy usage, data provided by the new generation of network-ready smart power meters that are being installed by various utilities around the world...(more)
  
  
• Utilities Turn Their Customers Green, With Envy A desire to keep up with neighbors is spurring conservation.
  
  By LESLIE KAUFMAN
  
  Published: January 30, 2009.
  
  The NYTimes Online requires a free registration to view their articles. Their in-depth reporting is among the best in the world.
  
  
• Surprise drop in power use worries utilities Nov. 21, 2008 10:26 AM
  The Wall Street Journal
  
  An unexpected drop in U.S. electricity consumption has utility companies worried that the trend isn't a byproduct of the economic downturn, and could reflect a permanent shift in consumption that will require sweeping change in their industry.
  
  Numbers are trickling in from several large utilities that show shrinking power use by households and businesses in pockets across the country. Utilities have long counted on sales growth of 1 percent to 2 percent annually in the U.S., and they created complex operating and expansion plans to meet the needs of a growing population.
  
  "We're in a period where growth is going to be challenged," says Jim Rogers, chief executive of Duke Energy Corp. in Charlotte, N.C. ..(more)
  
  
  
  
• Physicists urge U.S. to prioritize energy efficiency

• Downtown Atlanta recycles self into a Zero Waste Zone By Erin Levin
  CNN
  
  ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) —— Last year, downtown Atlanta lost a convention to another Southern city because the visiting group perceived the other city as "greener" than Atlanta. The loss propelled Holly Elmore into action.
  
  "Environmental practices are fast becoming a strong consideration in business decisions," explains the Green Foodservice Alliance founder. Elmore teamed up with Atlanta Recycles and Laura Turner Seydel —— eco—awareness consultant and an Atlanta native —— to create the South´s first Zero Waste Zone...(more)
  
  
• Motorola W233 Renew Expected Q1 2009
  
  
  6th January 2009
  
  Based closely on the Motorola W230, the Motorola W233 Renew is Motorola's attempt to produce an environmentally friendly mobile phone...(more)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Recyclable phone made from recycled material.
• Back at Junk Value, Recyclables Are Piling Up The New York Times Online requires a free registration to view their articles, but they have the best in-depth and broadest selection of articles available.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Cargill breaks ground on Chicago soy foam plantCHICAGO, Illinois, July 9, 2008 (ENS) - Food and agricultural giant Cargill Tuesday broke ground on a $22 million factory in Chicago to produce plant-based plastics. These polyols can replace petroleum-based chemicals usually used in polyurethane products, such as flexible foam cushioning for furniture, bedding and automotive products.
  
  The privately held, $71 billion Minneapolis-based company says when the new plant comes online in November it will produce Cargill's BiOH™ brand soybean-based polyols...(more)
• eWaste - For the Digitally Deceased, a Profitable Graveyard By JOHN HANC
  THE NEW YORK TIMES
  Thursday, November 13, 2008
  HARD DRIVES, printers, fax machines and cellphones move along a conveyor belt at the rate of six tons an hour into the gaping maw of a 16-foot-tall, 60-foot-long shredder at e-Scrap Destruction, in Islandia, N.Y.
  
  Inside a chamber covered to prevent flying debris, the machine’s steel blades noisily...(more)
  
  
• Plastic Shopping Bag Disasters This slideshow reveals the disastrous plastic bag situation worldwide as well as statistics on recycling bags.
  
  
• Click here to find out about FreeCycleCortez.
  This is a local way to recycle your unwanted stuff by giving it to someone who can use it. Find what you need free locally, too.
• "The Prophet of Garbage" - Recycling Anything Joseph Longo´s Plasma Converter turns our most vile and toxic trash into clean energy—and promises to make a relic of the landfill.
  
  It sounds as if someone just dropped a tricycle into a meat grinder. I´m sitting inside a narrow conference room at a research facility in Bristol, Connecticut, chatting with Joseph Longo, the founder and CEO of Startech Environmental Corporation. As we munch on takeout Subway sandwiches, a plate—glass window is the only thing separating us from the adjacent lab, which contains a glowing caldera of "plasma" three times as hot as the surface of the sun. Every few minutes there´s a horrific clanking noise—grinding followed by a thunderous voomp, like the sound a gas barbecue makes when it first ignites...(more)
  
  

• Lethal air pollution booms in emerging nations GENEVA, March 22 (AFP) Mar 22, 2009
  
  International experts are warning that potentially lethal air pollution has boomed in fast-growing big cities in Asia and South America in recent decades...(more)
  
  
• Read Eric Janes LWV letter to the EPA re Desert Rock PSD and CO2 regulation. ..."First, we are very concerned that the EPA has withdrawn its comments on carbon dioxide in the PSD permit. The EPA clearly has legal authority and the moral responsibility to regulate greenhouse gases, and the EPA should require reasonable controls on the 12.7 million tons/year of carbon dioxide emissions from the proposed project. This PSD permit should not be approved and issued until it addresses control of carbon dioxide emissions. If the EPA national rulemaking process for regulation of greenhouse gases has not yet advanced to a point where carbon dioxide regulatory requirements can be communicated to the Desert Rock Energy Company, then the atmosphere of the Four Corners, and the people and natural resources of the Four Corners area who so depend upon that atmosphere should be given the benefit of the doubt."...(more)
  
  
• New 'pollution radar' developed to provide unprecedented picture of urban smog - 9 Mar 2009
  By University of Leicester
  Page 1 of 3
  
  Technologies have health and scientific benefits
  
  Scientists and industrialists have invented a sophisticated new air quality measuring device that can act as a pollution radar over cities.
  
  A team from the Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd, the University of Leicester and EADS Astrium are behind the technology that can be placed on satellites to provide unprecedented detail of gases in the atmosphere.
  
  The researchers are also developing ground-based instruments this year, which will be able to create 3D maps of atmospheric gases...(more)
  
  
• A jolt brings Corning back to its research roots (AP)
  (Corning develops mercury filter for coal fired stacks) Posted on Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:57PM EST
  
  CORNING, N.Y. - By day, Kishor Gadkaree puts samples of a honeycomb-shaped filter into a miniature gas chamber that simulates the insides of a coal-burning smokestack.
  
  These rigorous tests will take years. But by night, Gadkaree dreams that this filter — which is designed to neutralize the poisonous mercury spewed by the world's coal-fired power plants — will be the next big hit for a nearly 160-year-old company that recently survived a brush with extinction...(more)
  
  

• 
  Friday, June 12, 7pm, Cortez Rec Center
  

  A Grandfather and 5yr old grandson

  explore whats happening to the ocean they love in this 90 minute documentary.

  

  Imagine a world without fish!

  
  
• A Crude Awakening
  THE OILCRASH
  
  Saturday, December 13, 6:30pm
  Lava Productions, AG
  Zurich Switzerland
  
  
• 
  
  FROM NEW ZEALAND
  FILMED IN INDIA Saturday, Nov 22 - This was well attended and we had a great discussion afterward.
• Saturday, May 3 - This was very well attended and a great discussion ensued.

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• Manufactured Landscapes
  There were requests to redo this one. Everyone should see where their stuff comes from and where it goes.

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• Independent America
  Lots of good ideas in the discussion afterward.
  Buy local (at least 10% of your purchases)
  and keep our money here in Montezuma County.

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• Kilowatt Ours
  This video revealed coal fired power problems as well as what is being done and what we can do.
  
  Check out the Kilowatt Ours blog.