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Category: Renewable energy

Extracting electricity from air

Extracting electricity from air

The Observer reports: In the early 20th century, Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla dreamed of pulling limitless free electricity from the air around us. Ever ambitious, Tesla was thinking on a vast scale, effectively looking at the Earth and upper atmosphere as two ends of an enormous battery. Needless to say, his dreams were never realised, but the promise of air-derived electricity – hygroelectricity – is now capturing researchers’ imaginations again. The difference: they’re not thinking big, but very, very small….

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Prigozhin couldn’t seal Putin’s fate but all of us in the West still can

Prigozhin couldn’t seal Putin’s fate but all of us in the West still can

Peter Pomerantsev writes: For decades, Putin’s crimes were enabled by business and political actors who claimed that greater economic interconnection would lead to a more peaceful Russia. Even after Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014, German companies, especially, continued to expand their business with Russia. For decades, human rights concerns were thrown out – who needed them, when on both sides economic self-interest would ultimately dictate government policy? This thinking ignored the fact that the Russian regime interpreted…

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A once-shuttered California mine is trying to transform the rare-earth industry

A once-shuttered California mine is trying to transform the rare-earth industry

Maddie Stone reports: In arid southeastern California, just across the border from Nevada, sits the only large-scale rare-earth element mine in the Western Hemisphere. Here at Mountain Pass, rocks are dug out of a 600-foot pit in the ground, crushed, and liquified into a concentrated soup of metals that are essential for the magnets inside consumer electronics, wind turbines, and electric vehicles, or EVs.* Today, that metallic soup is shipped to China, where individual rare earths are separated before being…

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Scientists find way to make energy from air using nearly any material

Scientists find way to make energy from air using nearly any material

The Washington Post reports: Nearly any material can be used to turn the energy in air humidity into electricity, scientists found in a discovery that could lead to continuously producing clean energy with little pollution. The research, published in a paper in Advanced Materials, builds on 2020 work that first showed energy could be pulled from the moisture in the air using material harvested from bacteria. The new study shows nearly any material can be used, like wood or silicon,…

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Drastic climate action is the best course for economic growth, study finds

Drastic climate action is the best course for economic growth, study finds

Yale Climate Connections reports: For decades, many economists’ analyses seemed to justify inaction on weaning the economy from fossil fuels, saying the astronomical cost of such rapid transformation would strangle economic growth. These experts were heeded over scientists who warned that acting too slowly would court climate catastrophe. But in recent years, more economists have begun to agree that the short-term costs of aggressive action are not as high as once thought, while the long-term costs of inaction are much…

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Despairing about climate change? These 4 charts on the unstoppable growth of solar may change your mind

Despairing about climate change? These 4 charts on the unstoppable growth of solar may change your mind

Shutterstock By Andrew Blakers, Australian National University Last year, the world built more new solar capacity than every other power source combined. Solar is now growing much faster than any other energy technology in history. How fast? Fast enough to completely displace fossil fuels from the entire global economy before 2050. The rise and rise of cheap solar is our best hope for rapidly mitigating climate change. Total solar capacity tipped over 1 terawatt (1,000 gigawatts) for the first time…

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Is the GOP war on ‘woke finances’ delaying climate action?

Is the GOP war on ‘woke finances’ delaying climate action?

Inside Climate News reports: Republican-led states are asking federal regulators to block the world’s largest investment firm from imposing climate-related financial practices on utilities. While the GOP’s war on so-called “woke finances” has had limited success in stemming the flow of money into clean energy, there’s growing evidence the political pressure could be delaying climate action. On Wednesday, Republican attorneys general from 17 states filed a motion with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission asking the agency to stop BlackRock from…

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EPA’s car pollution rules would save Americans trillions of dollars

EPA’s car pollution rules would save Americans trillions of dollars

Yale Climate Connections reports: Electric vehicle (EV) sales are surging in many countries around the world, including the United States. According to the Department of Energy, EVs accounted for just 1% of new U.S. car sales in 2017. That share surpassed 3% in 2021 and approached 6% in 2022. Though the U.S. remains well below the global average EV share of new car sales, which exceeded 14% in 2022, the American market is catching up fast. According to an analysis of global markets…

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Why Texas, a clean energy powerhouse, is about to hit the brakes

Why Texas, a clean energy powerhouse, is about to hit the brakes

The Washington Post reports: Already No. 1 in wind power, and home to a fast-growing solar industry, Texas is poised to become a renewable energy powerhouse — timely because President Biden’s climate bill is about to deliver billions in subsidies. But instead of embracing the green boom, Texas’ Republican-controlled legislature has introduced a spate of bills that could slow the growth of wind and solar industries, which has their leaders alarmed. “Every state has legislation related to the placement of…

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EPA lays out rules to accelerate sales of electric cars and trucks

EPA lays out rules to accelerate sales of electric cars and trucks

The New York Times reports: The Biden administration on Wednesday proposed the nation’s most ambitious climate regulations to date, two plans designed to ensure two-thirds of new passenger cars and a quarter of new heavy trucks sold in the United States are all-electric by 2032. The new rules would require nothing short of a revolution in the U.S. auto industry, a moment in some ways as significant as the June morning in 1896 when Henry Ford took his “horseless carriage”…

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In big climate move, EPA set to unveil tough limits on auto emissions

In big climate move, EPA set to unveil tough limits on auto emissions

The Washington Post reports: The Biden administration will soon unveil stringent limits on auto tailpipe pollution, aiming to ensure that as many as two-thirds of all new passenger vehicle sales are electric by 2032, according to three people briefed on the proposal. The Environmental Protection Agency plan — the toughest ever from the EPA on auto emissions — threatens to spark a fight with several automakers, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss proposals that…

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Averting crisis, Europe learns to live without Russian energy

Averting crisis, Europe learns to live without Russian energy

Paul Hockenos writes: When a cold snap hit northern Europe last November, ordinary citizens and industry leaders alike feared the onset of an agonizing winter of deprivation, spiraling energy prices, unheated buildings, and work stoppages. After all, embargoes in place as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had severely curtailed oil and gas deliveries to many countries and upended supply chains that much of Europe had come to rely on. Germany — whose industrial economy depended heavily on Russian…

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Biden administration announces first-ever wind energy lease sale in Gulf of Mexico

Biden administration announces first-ever wind energy lease sale in Gulf of Mexico

CNN reports: The Biden administration on Wednesday announced the first-ever US offshore wind energy lease sale for the waters in the Gulf of Mexico, an area long dominated by oil and gas production. The White House and US Department of Interior said they are proposing to open up more than 300,000 acres of offshore waters for offshore wind development — one area off the coast of Lake Charles, Louisiana, and two off the coast of Galveston, Texas. However, Interior is…

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War in Ukraine triggered ‘unstoppable’ growth in renewable energy production across Europe

War in Ukraine triggered ‘unstoppable’ growth in renewable energy production across Europe

Vox reports: One year ago, on the cusp of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it seemed unimaginable that renewable energy in Europe could overtake electricity from oil and gas. But not even a year later, it did. By the end of 2022, wind and solar combined overtook natural gas in electricity generation. The latest data on Europe’s renewable transition tells a remarkably upbeat story about the hard things countries can accomplish on climate change with enough political will. Before the Russia-Ukraine…

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China invests $546 billion in clean energy, far surpassing the U.S.

China invests $546 billion in clean energy, far surpassing the U.S.

E&E News reports: China once again topped the world in clean energy investments last year, a trend that could challenge U.S. efforts to develop more homegrown manufacturing. Nearly half of the world’s low-carbon spending took place in China, according to a recent analysis from market research firm BloombergNEF. The country spent $546 billion in 2022 on investments that included solar and wind energy, electric vehicles and batteries. That is nearly four times the amount of U.S. investments, which totaled $141…

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How California’s ambitious new climate plan could help speed energy transformation around the world

How California’s ambitious new climate plan could help speed energy transformation around the world

Electrifying trucks and cars and shifting to renewable energy are crucial for California’s zero-emissions future. Sergio Pitamitz / VWPics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images By Daniel Sperling, University of California, Davis California is embarking on an audacious new climate plan that aims to eliminate the state’s greenhouse gas footprint by 2045, and in the process, slash emissions far beyond its borders. The blueprint calls for massive transformations in industry, energy and transportation, as well as changes in institutions and human…

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