'Alternative' energy and less energy

11/07/24
Author: 
Jeremy Appel
Rio Tinto - Kennecott open pit copper mine. Salt Lake County, Utah. How do we balance the needs of an energy transition with the harsh realities of mining critical minerals like copper? Photo by arbyreed/Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Jul. 11, 2024

As the world inevitably transitions away from fossil fuel extraction, there’s a growing international consensus that mining critical minerals — including copper, nickel, cobalt, zinc and more — will have to ramp up in order to power clean energy sources.

03/07/24
Author: 
John Woodside
Illustration by Ata Ojani/Canada's National Observer

July 3, 2024

Natural Resources Canada tapped a fossil fuel lobby group to help provide recommendations on expanding the nascent hydrogen sector, documents obtained by Canada’s National Observer reveal.

03/07/24
Author: 
Marc Lee
How BC’s oil and gas industry sidestepped carbon pricing - illustration

Jun. 27, 2024

When BC first introduced a carbon tax in 2008 the point was to apply it to all emissions causing climate change, but start at a low rate and increase it over time. Yet, as the carbon tax has increased for households at the gas pump and to heat homes, large industrial players—including the oil and gas industry that is causing climate change—have steadily evaded their carbon tax.

03/07/24
Author: 
Nick Gottlieb
American fighter planes in formation at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany. It serves as the headquarters for the United States Air Forces in Europe – Air Forces Africa (USAFE-AFAFRICA) and NATO Allied Air Command (AIRCOM). Photo by Roland Balik/US Air Force/Flickr.

Jun. 27, 2024

There is no path to a renewable future which leaves American hegemony in place

The United States has a material, vested interest in obstructing progress on climate change. This argument, laid out by Amitav Ghosh in his 2021 book The Nutmeg’s Curse, is crucial for understanding the politics not just of climate change, but of the world: everything from the American trade war against Chinese renewable technologies to the ongoing genocide in Gaza can be linked to it.

23/06/24
Author: 
Evan Halper and Caroline O'Donovan
Microsoft hopes to generate power from atomic fusion and is partnering with Helion, which is testing prototypes at its headquarters in Everett, Wash. (Chona Kasinger for The Washington Post)

Jun. 21, 2024

As power needs of AI push emissions up and put big tech in a bind, companies put their faith in elusive — some say improbable — technologies.

The mighty Columbia River has helped power the American West with hydroelectricity since the days of FDR’s New Deal. But the artificial intelligence revolution will demand more. Much more.

29/05/24
Author: 
Adam Mahoney , CAPITALB
Miners carry bags of ore in the copper-cobalt Shabara artisanal mine near the town of Kolwezi, Lualaba, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, on June 20, 2023. ARLETTE BASHIZI / FOR THE WASHINGTON POST VIA GETTY IMAGES

May 27, 2024

Black transit activists in the US are calling attention to the plunder of the Congo for cobalt mining.

he story of “John Doe 1” of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is tucked in a lawsuit filed five years ago against several U.S. tech companies, including Tesla, the world’s largest electric vehicle producer.

21/05/24
Author: 
John Woodside
Though there has been a slight decline in the number of fossil fuel-connected directors on the boards of Canada's Big Five banks in recent years, critics still raise concerns about the industry's influence. Art by Ata Ojani/Canada’s National Observer

May 21, 2024

Canada’s largest banks are deeply entrenched in fossil fuels, having pumped at least $1.2 trillion into the sector since the Paris Agreement was signed in late 2015. But it’s not just their investments and lending that are increasingly under scrutiny –– it’s their leadership, too.

21/05/24
Author: 
Primary Author: Mitchell Beer
parked electric cars - Mario Roberto Durán Ortiz/wikimedia commons

May 15, 2024

Canada faces an investment gap of more than C$600 billion to complete the shift to a zero-carbon road transportation system by 2050, but the effort will more than pay for itself, a new analysis shows.

Much of the new investment will depend on comparatively small public spending on electric vehicle infrastructure that must increase 23-fold by 2050 to enable the rest, the Corporate Knights research department concludes in a presentation delivered at an electric mobility conference earlier this month.

09/05/24
Author: 
Damian Carrington
They are terrified, but determined to keep fighting. Here's what they said

May 8, 2024

They are terrified, but determined to keep fighting. Here's what they said

"Sometimes it is almost impossible not to feel hopeless and broken,” says the climate scientist Ruth Cerezo-Mota. “After all the flooding, fires, and droughts of the last three years worldwide, all related to climate change, and after the fury of Hurricane Otis in Mexico, my country, I really thought governments were ready to listen to the science, to act in the people’s best interest.”

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