Like Juneau’s climate action plans, some of which reach back over 11 years, Sitka’s efforts to grapple with the climate crisis have confronted similar issues. Like Juneau, Sitka developed a plan a decade ago. Some items were completed, many were not. Both featured carbon reduction goals, but a lack of follow-up and analysis leave many…
Category: Climate Change
The coal industry comes tumbling down in the American West
The end of an era, a dark, toxic and earth-warming era that is finally coming to a close. While jobs are being phased out as the coal industry fades, it is crucial to note that clean energy jobs in the US are booming. ‘As a result of the industry’s consistent growth, clean energy accounted for…
Cooling the Earth
A friend recently sent me the link to this fascinating article and said, “This is why we need science.” Scientists are tapping into a law of physics to create cooling systems that work without special fuel or electricity. Working with colleagues, Aaswath Raman has developed a thin, mirror-like film engineered to maximize radiative cooling on…
How to drive fossil fuels out of the US economy, quickly
The US has everything it needs to decarbonize by 2035. This is a must read article, an uplifting and inspiring synopsis of the tremendous work of Saul Griffith, physicist, engineer, researcher, inventor, serial entrepreneur, and MacArthur “genius” grant winner. Griffith is the founder and chief scientist at Otherlab, an independent research and design lab that…
Navajo Women Are Bringing Sustainable Solar Power to the Navajo Nation
Another great example of the intertwining realities of climate justice – energy justice – social justice. And, a great story about committed individuals doing something about it. I believe that examples such as that of Native Renewables and Wahleah Johns show once again that we can all choose to be a part of the solution….
Hydrogen as Fuel? An Italian Pasta Factory Shows How It Could Work
Hopefully, experiments like this one will help to propel hydrogen as a fuel into the mainstream more quickly than is presently occurring. While energy is required to produce hydrogen, once isolated, it can be stored, in essence acting as a battery of sorts. And, hydrogen is lighter to transport, making it potentially a better candidate…
In A Post-Pandemic World, Renewable Energy Is The Only Way Forward
There has never been a better time to stop looking back, turn to the future, and build on the momentum now building. We can and we must power our future in a cleaner, cheaper, and wiser way. A post-pandemic economic reconstruction based on restructuring the energy map makes sense. We know we have to do…
Got 5 Minutes for the Mendenhall?
Our precious Mendenhall Glacier Recreation Area needs your attention. By this coming Friday. Please take five minutes, more if you have ’em, and send in your thoughts, ideas, comments, feedback and more to those planning for the next few decades of activity at the Mendenhall Glacier. Laurie Craig recently had a letter to the editor…
Climate-change activists say you can’t fight global warming through individual actions. They’re wrong.
The following piece by Robert Frank of the Washington Post may be one that you can relate to. I certainly can! The peer pressure, or peer education, effects of our individual actions can be much much bigger than we expect it will be. And, much bigger than our individual action alone. Buying my Nissan Leaf…
A new way to profit from ancient Alaskan forests—leave them standing
In selling the carbon rights to this land, Sealaska is forgoing potential logging fees: The value per acre of selling their trees is currently only about 10 percent of what could be raised from a timber sale. Still, even here, carbon credits hold certain advantages. Unlike logging, carbon credit sales leave the forest for trapping,…