energy efficiency
Dim Bulbs (The Sequel)
I did a post last November about the surprising tea party anger regarding energy-efficient light bulbs. The furor seems to be continuing. Here are some quotes from Republican Senators courtesy of EE News: “People in Idaho are just astonished that the federal government is telling them what kind of light bulb to put in their …
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CONTINUE READINGMichele Bachmann’s Unconstitutional Light-Bulb Bill
Congress can repeal the light bulb requirement (or not). It can mandate that an executive agency like DOE or EPA decide the three issues specified by Bachman. But Congress can’t make the validity of the light bulb requirement turn on a determination by GAO.
CONTINUE READINGBoehner Tweet on Plastics Sums Up Republican Disdain for the Environment
In hardly the biggest news story of the day, but one that really irks me, House Speaker John Boehner tweeted this morning, “The new majority — plasticware is back.” He’s referring to the move by the Republican majority to eliminate deposed Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s initiative to green the House of Representatives. The initiative included — …
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CONTINUE READINGA Roadmap for Sustainable Consumption
Individual consumption – including household heating and cooling as well as non-business transportation – creates roughly one-third of U.S. energy use and carbon emissions. It would feasible to reduce these emissions by twenty percent in a decade: there is a lot of low-hanging fruit yet to be picked. A range of individual actions, while seemingly …
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CONTINUE READINGChina and Carbon Markets
In a surprising development, China may be planning to create an internal carbon market a/k/a cap & trade. According to Climate Wire, When professor Chen Hongbo tried to promote carbon trading in China three years ago, he found himself under fire. As developing countries like China aren’t obliged to limit the byproduct of their economic …
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CONTINUE READINGThe “Rebound Effect” Falls Flat
Prompted in part by a recent article in the New Yorker, there’s been a lot of attention to the rebound effect lately. The theory is that increased energy efficiency in effect makes energy cheaper (as measured in cost per unit of benefit), so people actually consumer more energy. The empirical evidence is that this is …
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CONTINUE READINGGreen Housing, High-Tech Aspirations
For some holiday-time green inspiration, be sure to check out Lumenhaus, a dynamic new housing concept developed by Virginia Tech grad students, and currently on display in Chicago’s Millennium Park.
CONTINUE READINGBuidlings and Energy Efficiency — Just Being New Isn’t Enough
Newer buildings in California put more of a strain on the electric grid than do older buildings. That is the apparent conclusion of a new paper written by Howard Chong through UC Berkeley’s Energy Institute at Haas. The strain comes in the form of a greater “temperature response” – an increase in temperature on a …
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CONTINUE READINGDim Bulbs
It’s good to know that there’s still someone who isn’t afraid to stand up for the use of obsolete technologies and the right of every citizen to overpay for electricity.
CONTINUE READINGChilly in Baltimore: Energy Efficiency and Wind Power
I heard an interesting story on NPR today about “district cooling” in which a company in Baltimore uses ice to produce chilled water, which is transported to a number of building in the city for supplemental cooling. What really struck me as cool about this (sorry about the pun) is the fact that this system …
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