Blog – Page 1547 – 2GreenEnergy.com

For the Home Buyer: An Energy Efficiency “MPG” Sticker

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Efficiency

I had breakfast when I was back in New York last week with my friend and colleague Tom Konrad of AltEnergyStocks.com, during which we talked about all the “long-hanging fruit” for reducing the environmental impact associated with generating and consuming energy. Here’s one of Tom’s ideas that I really like: making a home energy audit mandatory whenever a house is sold. What if every home buyer had the equivalent of an EPA miles per gallon sticker — a rating of the energy efficiency of the furnace and the major appliances, as well as a grade for the level of insulation in the walls and roof? (more…)

Tagged with: AltEnergyStocks, energy "MPG" sticker, energy efficiency, energy efficient appliances, energy efficient furnaces, insulation, negawatt, Tom Konrad

Video on Chevron’s Appalling Behavior in Ecuador

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Fossil Fuels

Every few months, I try to remind myself to write something on Chevron and its overtly criminal behavior in Ecuador. Those who are keeping track here will recall that, for a period of 26 years, Chevron (then Texaco) deliberately dumped tens of billions of gallons of toxic byproducts of their oil extraction processes directly into Ecuadorian rivers and streams, simply because they thought they would never get caught. (more…)

Tagged with: benzene, cancer, Chevron, dioxin, Ecuador, rain forest destruction, toluene

Webinar: The Future of Transportation

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Electric Vehicles

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6eOlOEQoTI]In our February webinar, I spoke with Dan Sturges: transport designer, entrepreneur, teacher, and visionary, who discusses how we need to overhaul the way we move ourselves and are cargo around the surface of the planet.

Though we all want simple solutions, none exist. Currently, transportation is redundant, heavy, bulky, fossil-fuel-reliant, and unaffordable in every sense of the word. But what can be done to invoke things like mass transit, ride-sharing, micro-rentals, and small, light, and inexpensive urban transportation? What can be done to reduce car ownership — or at least the total number of miles driven? How can we encourage walking and bicycling? What about rethinking how and where we live?

Tagged with: car-sharing, Craig Shields, Dan Sturges, electric transportation, encouraging walking and bicycling, fossil fuels, future transportation, ICE passenger cars, mass transit, micro-rentals, overhauling transportation, reducing car ownership, reducing miles driven, ride-sharing, trams, transport designer, urban transportation, Webinar

Webinar: Top Business Plans in Renewable Energy and Electric Transportation

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Business

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyrehx520so]In December’s webinar, I present some of the best business plans I’ve encountered in renewable energy and electric transportation. This is a wide-ranging discussion that includes the ideas of transformative business plans, technical risk, and scaleable businesses, but then gets into specific business arenas: light-duty pick-up trucks, e-bikes, pyrolysis of waste tires, C&D waste processing, pyrolysis of MSW, solar thermal, synthetic fuels, use of off-peak wind energy, compressed air energy storage, zinc-air battery technology, sustainable building products, and hydrokinetics. I couldn’t resist the temptation to mention my upcoming book, “Is Renewable Really Doable?”

Tagged with: biodiesel, C&D waste processing, carbon black, e-bikes, electric transportation, Electric Vehicles, energy storage, EVs, exciting cleantech business plans, high head conditions, Hydrokinetics, Is Renewable Still Doable, light-duty pick-up truck, off-peak wind energy, pyrolysis of MSW, pyrolysis of waste tires, Renewable Energy Facts and Fantasies, scaleable business, Solar Thermal, sustainable building products, synthetic fuels, technical risk, transformative business plan, Webinar, zinc-air battery technology

Webinar: How to Increase Energy Efficiency of Existing Structures and WHY

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Efficiency

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAdKwrPHy9w]

Here’s 2GreenEnergy’s November webinar, in which noted environmentalist and energy expert Bruce Severance joined me for a lively discussion we called “How to Increase the Energy Efficiency of Existing Structures — and WHY.”

Tagged with: "2GreenEnergy webinar" environmentalists "energy experts" "Bruce Severance" "clean energy" "alternative energy" "renewable energy" "green energy" "Craig Shields", America’s geography and lifestyle, Chevron, climate policy, global climate change, largest GHG producer, per capita energy consumption, Shell Oil Company, Webinar

With a Level Playing Field in the 21st Century, Nothing Is Impossible

craigshieldsPosted on February 20, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Politics

Reg Wessels of South Africa’s Earth Corporation writes about my piece on the uncertainties of investors in renewable energy:

I often watch this debate with dismay, and as a non-American (but hugely supportive), I can’t help being frustrated by the US having to dance with the enemy. Whatever the solution, the free world looks to America with hope and admiration. Was this not the country that had the courage to pool all its resources for common purpose when the smoke had cleared over Pearl Harbor? Is this not the country that leads the world in innovation and technological expertise? Is this not the country that has shown ‘nothing is impossible’?

Reg: What a good point you raise here. I too wonder where my country has gone wrong, and I have to think I’m not alone here. (more…)

Tagged with: energy policy, energy price floor, role of government, U.S. Energy Policy in the 21st Century, U.S. politics

Integrating Renewable Energy Is Like Racial Integration in the 1960s: It’s Right, But It’s Not Easy

craigshieldsPosted on February 19, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Business

Over the few years that I’ve been writing here at 2GreenEnergy.com, I’ve offered a number of suggestions that, if accepted, would create a more level playing field between renewables and fossil fuels. In my recent piece on investor uncertainties in renewable energy, I argued for legislation that would establish a floor on energy prices, thus enabling alternative energy investors protection from price manipulation from the traditional energy industry, designed specifically to put them out of business.

In response, these words from a reader: (more…)

Tagged with: alternative energy, clean energy, green energy, integrating renewable energy, racial integration, Renewable Energy

“HOME” — Great Film About Our Planet and What We Must Do To Preserve It

craigshieldsPosted on February 19, 2012 Posted in Sustainability

My friend Jim Boyden just wrote me, and recommended this incredibly well-made and poignant film: HOME, which so artfully describes the fragility of our ecosystem, the delicate balance we need to maintain, and the tough choices facing mankind at this watershed period in our history. Hope you enjoy.

Tagged with: environmentalism, Glenn Close, Home, Jim Boyden, sustainability

From Guest Blogger Joshua Okomo: Year 2010 Global Investment in Green Energy Reached USD $211 Billion

craigshieldsPosted on February 19, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Business

According to report on global trends in renewable energy published in 2011 by Bloomberg New Energy Finance based in London, the global investment in renewable energy in 2010 was $ 211 billion, a 540 % increase from renewable energy investment accomplished globally in 2004. (more…)

Tagged with: alternative energy, clean energy, Global Investment, global investment in green energy, green energy, Green World is in making, Renewable Energy

What Climate Scientists Tell Us About Global Warming — And Why

craigshieldsPosted on February 18, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Science

The Cato Institute’s Jerry Taylor, whom I interviewed last week, writes in to offer a correction to my piece the other day on The Impetus for Renewable Energy that includes: “(Taylor) believes that the push for a migration from cheap and abundant fossil fuels to more expensive renewable energy that can only come about with government support is driven by a Marxist, anti-capitalist, anti-prosperity agenda.”

I said that many people in “my world” (that is, the right-of-center world, broadly defined) believe this. I didn’t say that I believed it. In fact, I do not (well, I’m sure it’s true for some, but I’m also sure it’s not true for others and I have no idea what the accurate percentage counts might be).

The point I was trying to make is (more…)

Tagged with: Cato Institute, climate science, global climate change, global warming, Jerry Taylor