$100 million investment to help solar energy plan

clipped from www.signonsandiego.com Under an agreement announced yesterday, Phoenix-based Stirling Energy Systems said it has landed a $100 million investment from NTR, an international holding company in Dublin, Ireland. for Stirling, which has come under fire from environmentalists who question Stirling's role in the 150-mile Sunrise Powerlink proposed by San Diego Gas & Electric Co. the Arizona startup with 40 employees plans to develop a power plant, consisting of 12,000 solar energy dishes, near El Centro at an estimated cost of $400 million. The plant would generate enough electricity for nearly 300,000 homes in San Diego Environmentalists say they are skeptical of the Stirling proposal. They doubt that the company can move from its prototype models to large-scale production in time to enable San Diego Gas & Electric to meet a statewide mandate that requires it to use renewable energy for 20 percent of its total power supply by 2010.

Waste not, want not

clipped from www.tbnweekly.com As Floridians demand a new vision for the future, Florida politicians are jumping on the “green” wagon. Taking baby steps forward, Florida legislators are testing fertile new ground. In February, the newest and largest solar power facility in sunny Florida was switched on at Rothenbach Park in Sarasota County he array, the second-largest in the Southeast, consists of 1,200 solar photovoltaic panels mounted at ground level, covering more than 28,000 square feet or about half the size of a football field The solar panels convert sunlight into electricity, producing 250 kilowatts of clean energy, enough energy to power 55 average homes Operating them prevents the release of more than 654,000 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year FPL’s Sunshine Energy Solar Array

Stern Reality: Is Global Warming Even Worse than You Thought?

clipped from blogs.wsj.com Nicholas Stern, author of the gloomy, eponymous review that sparked a debate among environmental economists in 2006, said he was wrong. Things are actually much worse. From the Independent: “We badly underestimated the degree of damages and the risks of climate change,” said Lord Stern in a speech in London yesterday. “All of the links in the chain are on average worse than we thought a couple of years ago.” […]He also reiterated his previous estimates that governments and business must invest the equivalent of between 1 to 2 per cent of global GDP annually up to 2050 in new technologies and efficiency measures or face climate change of catastrophic proportions. The Stern Review “People who said this was scaremongering are profoundly wrong. If anything, I was too reticent. What we are playing for is the transformation of the planet,” he said. President Bush’s vague calls f Jeroen van der Veer has gone red in the face calling for Europe to increase funding of clean-coal technology

Moore’s Law: Why Enviros Are Wrong on Nuclear Power

Happy looking guy. Contemplating or a case of agita?

clipped from blogs.wsj.com Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore’s cheerleading for nuclear power is hardly news these days Mr. Moore, who now works as a nuclear-power advocate with the Clean and Safe Energy coalition, drops a few interesting pearls in an interview this week with Fareed Zakaria, the editor of Newsweek International. [W]e made the mistake of lumping nuclear energy in with nuclear weapons, as if all things nuclear were evil. I think that’s as big a mistake as if you lumped nuclear medicine in with nuclear weapons. [S]olar is completely ridiculous. The cost is so high—California’s $3.2 billion in solar subsidies is all just going into Silicon Valley companies and consultants. It’s ridiculous. Unfortunately now the environmental movement is the primary obstacle here. If it weren’t for their opposition to nuclear energy, there would be a lot fewer coal-fired power plants in the United States and other parts of the world today.

OT: Book buzz: Pausch's Last Lecture is a good one

The Last Lecture

clipped from www.usatoday.com Professor delivers 'Lecture': Randy Pausch's The Last Lecture makes its debut at No. 2 on USA TODAY's Best-selling Books list, but Pausch, who is dying of pancreatic cancer, says sales aren't the reason he wrote the book. "I personally only cared about the first three copies, which are for my kids," he says. The book, written with Wall Street Journal columnist Jeff Zaslow, builds on a "last lecture" Pausch gave in September at Carnegie Mellon. Many in the publishing world believe Lecture will be the next Tuesdays With Morrie, which became a publishing sensation. It, too, dealt with wisdom imparted by a dying professor. Hyperion has had nine printings; 2 million copies are in print. GALLERY: Pausch's life in photos

The new 'scuppies' wear a mantle of green

clipped from www.usatoday.com First came hippies, followed soon by yippies, then preppies, yuppies, buppies and guppies. Now meet the "scuppies": socially conscious upwardly mobile persons. You know these people because they're everywhere. They eat, drink and sleep organic. They think it's easy being green. They want to live well while doing good. "You can't throw a stick and not hit one in Starbucks or the Whole Foods parking lot," "My whole living room was done by Novica.com," the do-gooder artisan-promoting website. "I wondered, why can't we be socially conscious and upwardly mobile at the same time?" Failla says he invented this latest neologism 10 years ago Failla has published "The Scuppie Manifesto" on his website (scuppie.com) The goal is to make green the norm, not the expensive alternative. Every generation has its own -ppie acronym for describing groups of like-minded people. How come? Will the term "scuppie" last as long as, say, hippie?

Thoughts on Bush's latest speech on climate change

Worth reading. Follow the link.

clipped from gristmill.grist.org Posted by David Roberts at 11:48 AM on 16 Apr 2008 Same as it ever was The whole media world is in a frenzy, yet again, over a Bush speech on climate change. A new strategy! An effort to secure a legacy! Exciting new principles and goals! Even my own bosses are pressing me to come up with a thoughtful reaction. Sigh. I hate to be the party-pooper. But we've been here before. How many times does Lucy expect us to try to kick this football?