Google goes geothermal with EGS.
posted on Aug 19, 2008 - View this thread

Andy Grove on Our Electric Future - "Energy independence [viz.] is the wrong goal. Here is a plan Americans can stick to." Perhaps some infrastructure spending^1,2 is in order? [etc., &c., cf.]
posted on Jul 15, 2008 - View this thread

Inconvenient Truths: Get Ready to Rethink What It Means to Be Green. Last month, Wired published what it called "10 green heresies" which makes the case for urban living, intensive forest management and, er, air conditioning, among other things.
posted on Jun 13, 2008 - View this thread

If hydrogen-cell cars are no good, how about hydrogen-cell motorbikes!
posted on May 14, 2008 - View this thread

Do You Want To Know RIGHT NOW How You Can Drive Around Using WATER as FUEL and Laugh At Rising Gas Costs, While Reducing Emissions and Preventing Global Warming?
posted on May 13, 2008 - View this thread

Dr. President: "The next president of the United States of America will control a $150 billion annual research budget, 200,000 scientists, and 38 major research institutions and all their related labs. This president will shape human endeavors in space, bioethics debates, and the energy landscape of the 21st century." With the coming election, the AAAS has created a new website and devoted a section of their journal Science to the Democratic and Republican candidates' positions on science and technology issues. But to help further clarify their positions, some people are calling for the candidates to have a presidential debate on science and technology. [Via The Intersection and Wired Science.]
posted on Jan 9, 2008 - View this thread

The dangers of living in a zero-sum world economy - naked capitalism reprints (with added commentary) an FT article by Martin Wolf on why it's vital for (civilised) society to sustain a 'positive-sum' world, otherwise: "A zero-sum economy leads, inevitably, to repression at home and plunder abroad." Wolf's solution? "The condition for success is successful investment in human ingenuity." Of course! Some are calling for more socialism, while others would press on to build more megaprojects. For me, at least part of the solution lies in environmental accounting and natural capitalism :P
posted on Dec 19, 2007 - View this thread

Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal by Joel Salatin. This Saturday will mark this article's four year anniversary. Frankly, I was mildly surprised not to have found it mentioned before in MeFi. It's a good read about a sad state of affairs; how our government is turning its own people into outlaws, because freedom has been traded in for an illusion of security. ...but then we already knew that. Don't we?
posted on Aug 29, 2007 - View this thread

Autism is growing, especially in the Silicon Valley. We’ve talked of this twice before, but what are we missing about the connection between autism, geekhood, and the Silicon Valley? Let’s talk about this more [inside].
posted on Aug 13, 2006 - View this thread

Dead Ringers: the Science Museum asks us the question "should we upgrade our mobile phone?" "No" and "no" say the Times and the Observer, but we still do: on average every 18 months. What's the problem? Well it isn't just the lead, arsenic, beryllium and brominated fire-retardant cases (pollutants all) disappearing into our land fills (which are not covered by the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive [WEEE] in Europe). Coltan also goes into our phones. It occurs mainly in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and as such our demand for upgrades has been contributing to a war (despite mobile phone companies' claims to the contrary, coltan is not regulated like timber). If we must upgrade, we can at least recycle or hack our old phones.
posted on Aug 7, 2006 - View this thread

Timeline of Trends and Events (1750 to 2100). Large image, lots of info. Via digg
posted on May 27, 2006 - View this thread

The Ghost Nets: A New Kind of Pollution What happens when a fishing boat loses a net on the high seas? No longer made of biodegradeable materials, these nets (which can be up to a mile long) drift freely through the oceans like needles in a haystack, trapping marine life and damaging coral reefs. Now a team of NOAA working on the GhostNet 2005 project has developed a computer model to help identify convergence zones and locate these floating threats so cleanup can ensue. [Link to audio of NPR story about the project here]
posted on Jun 23, 2005 - View this thread

Incredible feat of engineering or environmental disaster in the making? Despite continued protests, the Karahnjukar project rumbles onwards. Some people are desperate to see it stopped, although the Icelandic public aren’t so sure. In fact, Alcoa - the US company driving the project – is proud of its environmental achievements. Whatever the truth, there’s no denying that the area under threat contains some stunning scenery. Take a look while you still can.
posted on Jun 16, 2005 - View this thread

Neato Next Generation Truck Stops IANAT (I am not a trucker), so I had no idea trucks could just plug into truck stops complete with air conditioning, power, internet, satellite TV, etc. And the bonus is that these facilities are environmentally friendly since the truck doesn't have to be left running all night.
posted on Jan 11, 2004 - View this thread

World solar challenge 2003. Darwin to Adelaide 19 - 28 October. Check out the route. Meet the teams. Have a look at the Green Fleet class as well, where technology meets reality. I won't be able to watch the race but have high hopes for next year's Olympics.
posted on Oct 18, 2003 - View this thread

Challenging the Goliath of Environmentalism This piece is a brief chronicle of the (mis)adventures of a "green" whose only sin is optimism. Are the environmentalists too doomsday-ish for their own good? Is technology the problem, or part of the solution? Link via The Daily Grail.
posted on Feb 22, 2002 - View this thread