Recent ArticlesElectric school buses don’t just eliminate the carbon and pollution emissions of their diesel-fueled counterparts; they also cost less to fuel and maintain over the long haul. Unfortunately for cash-strapped school districts, the upfront cost to purchase an electric school bus is still more than twice as much as the cost of a diesel bus today. And that’s not counting the cost of new charging infrastructure or the risk that those charging costs may drive a district’s electric bills through the...
The catastrophic breakdown of Texas’ natural gas and electricity system last week lacks a single villain to blame for it all. Instead, the widespread constraints in natural-gas supply and the shutdown of core power plant capacity that left millions without power can be chalked up to cascading failures between these two interdependent systems — and any solutions will need to take these interdependencies into account to avert a similar crisis in the future. That’s the emerging consensus from a...
Plans for a new 3.6-gigawatt natural gas power plant in the U.K. have been shelved by the developer Drax, highlighting the challenging economics of converting coal-fired power to a cleaner, but still fossil-fuel-fired, alternative. It would have been the largest gas plant in Europe and, unsurprisingly, drew the attention of environmental groups. They had claimed that the project’s permit was not compatible with the U.K.’s climate change laws. A court rejected that assertion, but the advocacy...
The U.S. Senate voted on Thursday to confirm former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm as Secretary of the Department of Energy, kicking off the administration’s grand plans to shift the country toward decarbonization while boosting the economy. After the vote, Granholm tweeted what has become a common refrain for her nomination: “I’m obsessed with creating good-paying clean energy jobs in all corners of America in service of addressing our climate crisis.” Senators confirmed Granholm with a...
A strong clean energy standard is among the most vital policy steps needed to push the United States toward an entirely decarbonized economy, according to new emissions modeling from clean energy research organization Energy Innovation. The analysis suggests President Joe Biden’s plan to move the country to carbon-free electricity must play a key role in helping the U.S. reach global climate targets to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius in the next century. In a Thursday report, Ener...
