Moving Forward

China burns the most coal out of any country and is taking steps to reduce their CO2 emissions while continuing to be crutched on coal energy. Their performance is not ideal, but it will be impactful.

One of Obama's budget cuts will be the hydrogen energy project. Bush II supported a hydrogen economy without acknowledging the obstacles, Obama is now stepping away from it to focus on more likely alternative fuels.

Solar energy harvesting technology is advancing, making it cheaper; cheaper than oil. This the point at which alternative fuels can overtake fossil fuels, when the market signals via price people respond, and in this case they stop using oil.

The Pika (a cute little mammal) might be listed as endangered due to global warming.

12/26/08: Oil prices, Oil prices, Oil prices

I have been writing a lot about the price of oil, but only because not enough is being done to protect the health and wealth of humans and the environment. Since not enough is being proactively done we have to wait for the markets to signal investment in alternative energies. What economists are really trying to say in this scenario is that as long as oil is cheaper than wind or solar power there will always be large numbers of humans that will accept the cost to themselves and their environment for prices to be lower in the current moment.

This is an article from the "christian science monitor" commenting on how great it is that oil prices are low and expected to be low in the next year.

These two articles from "business week" are about decreased investment in a sustainable economy because of low oil prices, and this one is about Obama trying to do something governmentally about a market that is not signaling the long term costs and supplies of energy sources.

12/24/08: Environmental Economic stuff

The economist gives a good article on alternative engines and focuses on steam. It is a bit satirical but the solution to environmental degradation (in the popular media it is a.k.a. "Climate Change") needs to be as broad as possible.

The price of oil needs to be high to create large investments in alternative energies and a "sustainable" economy. But, the price of oil is low. This article shows what happens to investment in a sustainable economy when the USA goes into a depression and the price of oil is low.

The economist supplies another great article on computers and how green this whole technology thing is . The article gives some good information on how sustainable the carbon emissions of the computer world are. Currently, Computing and Telecommunications produce 2% of global emissions which is comparable to the amount that aviation emits (plane travel). The article did not specify what was being emitted by technology use, but apparently it is 2% of global emissions of all things. Pollution is not a single thing, some pollution is preferable to other pollution. So, 2% of global emissions does not mean much. But, the article is worth reading, and so is most of the economist.