Energy

California to Require All New Car Purchases in 2035 to be Electric, in Massive Change for Auto Industry

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The California Air Resources Board has ruled that no all-gasoline cars can be sold new in California by 2035, according to AP. This measure has brought California into line with the European Union, which has the same deadline for going electric, as does Canada. Some 17 other states, including New […]

Climate Crisis

How Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act strengthens EPA’s future ability to take on Big Carbon and the Supreme Court

The Conversation

By Patrick Parenteau, Vermont Law School | – The new Inflation Reduction Act is being justly celebrated as the most significant piece of federal legislation to address the climate crisis to date. It includes about US$370 billion in incentives for everything from solar panels to electric vehicles. But there’s some confusion around what it allows […]

Featured

Why the Right Wingers in Israel and the US Really Oppose Iran Nuclear Deal: They want Regime Change Instead

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Right wing Israeli politicians such as former prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and even centrist politicians like caretaker Prime Minister Yair Lapid have fulminated against any US renewal of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). As with the loony Right wing in the US (increasingly […]

Climate Crisis

The Inflation Reduction Act’s Incentives are a Start to a Green Energy Revolution, but Now comes the Hard Work

The Conversation

By Daniel Cohan, Rice University | – The new Inflation Reduction Act is stuffed with subsidies for everything from electric vehicles to heat pumps, and incentives for just about every form of clean energy. But pouring money into technology is just one step toward solving the climate change problem. Wind and solar farms won’t be […]

Climate Crisis

Gravity power holds major promise for the decarbonization of electricity grids: Wind and solar energy get a lift from falling-weight technology

contributors

By David Henry | – ( Landscape News) – The Energy Vault Resiliency Center, a scalable gravity-powered energy storage center that holds major promise for supporting clean energy transitions. Business Wire 4 August 2022 David Henry The general workings of gravity are nothing new: What goes up must come down. Over the past decade, scientists […]

Natural Disasters

Shelling of Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant exposes multiple risks – a nuclear expert tells us what they are

The Conversation

By Ross Peel, King’s College London | – Shelling has recently intensified at the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, raising international safety concerns. Ukrainian staff continue to operate the massive plant under strict control and stressful conditions. Both Russia and Ukraine are blaming one another for the continued attacks, and damage. Disinformation and fake news […]

Climate Crisis

With Biden’s IRA, Why Homeowners are Costing themselves Money if they don’t Install Solar Panels

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) has established a 10-year 30% tax credit for installing solar panels on your roof.It is a worthwhile thing to do if someone is planning on being in their house for the long term. And it isn’t only the panels themselves that the IRA subsidizes through […]

Featured

Why the Iran Nuclear Deal would benefit America, regardless of whether Tehran is in other ways a Bad Actor

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – There appears to be some movement in the indirect negotiations between Iran and the United States over the reentry of the United States into the 2015 Iran nuclear deal and a return to full compliance with it by Iran. The European countries directly talking to Iran presented what they called […]

Climate Crisis

19 Years ago America Really Wanted Iraq’s Basra for its Oil, which is now Making it Uninhabitable

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Poet Robert Frost asked if the world would end by fire or ice. It turns out that it is both, the fire of global heating and the melting of earth’s surface ice and resultant biblical floods. Nowhere is this more clear than in Iraq. Not everyone will suffer equally from […]