Some Chinese Firms Turn Green As They Go High Tech

The Chinese firm BYD Corporation, a little-known company that within a decade has become the world’s second-largest battery producer, now has plans to build a 'green' plug-in hybrid car by the end of the year. (Photo: New York Times)

Air Permit Granted For Coal Plant On Navajo Nation

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency signed off on an air permit for a proposed coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation, depsite the opposition of environmentalists, but to no one's surprise. (Photo: Associated Press)

Colleges Now Train Wind Technicians To Fill Growing Need

Wind turbine towers are popping up throughout the United States at the rate of almost 10 per day, highlighting a critical absence of maintenance and repair crews and prompting community colleges to start training wind technicians. (Photo: Associated Press/MSNBC)

Reports Raise Hopes For Better Energy Storage

Two scientific papers have shown progress in methods for storing energy, which is an essential but difficult component of any plan to turn intermittent energy sources, like wind and sun, into reliable replacements for current hydrocarbon fuels.

Green Group Calls Gore Energy Plan Attainable

The head of an environmental group that was founded by Al Gore has told lawmakers that the former vice president's announced goal of generating all U.S. electricity from clean, renewable sources within 10 years is attainable, contradicting criticisms that the plan was unrealisstically ambitious. (Photo: Reuters)

MIT Scientist Solves Solar Price Problem

An American scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has developed a new way of powering fuel cells that could make the process of storing solar energy practical for home owners, allowing them to produce electricity to run lights and other appliances at night. (Photo: Reuters)

LOOSE ENDS | Friday

• Reuters reports that 'Geological shifts over millions of years may explain the huge wealth of fish, corals and other life in seas between Asia and Australia and hold clues to modern conservation'
• Reuters also reports that fires are 'engulfing woodlands in the coastal tourism province of Antalya and threatening sites of ancient culture'
• The Guardian (UK) reports that a 'six-ton northern bottlenose whale stranded on harbour flats in Hampshire is suffering from kidney failure' and will have to be put down
• The Lost Angeles Times reports that a judge in Southern California has ruled that 'thirteen proposed electricity-generating plants cannot be built without the necessary environmental and health analyses'
• The Los Angeles Times also reports that the US fisheries service has agreed 'it must measure health effects on salmon' of pesticides that make it into 'streams in the Pacific Northwest and California'.
• BBC News reports that 'more needs to be done to encourage investment in large-scale biomass plants if the EU is going to meet its renewables goal'
• BBC News also reports that 'Andrew Simms, co-author of a Green New Deal, says we have 100 months to halt dangerous climate change'
• Agence France-Presse reports that British Energy, EDF takeover talks have stalled
• The Times (UK) has reported that some are complaining that a Scottish wind farm a blot on the country's greenness
  

Oilman Pickens Holds Town Halls To Promote Wind

Texas oil and gas tycoon T. Boone Pickens has decided to launch a series of town hall meetings across the so called "Wind Belt" of America to help promote the new energy, starting off in Kansas, the site of an intense battle between supporters of wind energy and those supporting traditional of coal-fired power plants.

GM Sales Down, SUV Prices Up: Trending Green?

Reuters reports that General Motors Corp has posted a $15.5 billion quarterly loss as a 20% drop in North American sales coupled with plunging SUV prices prompted deep charges for its auto finance business - further proof of a waning American proclivity for un-green gas guzzelers.

Florida Crystals Might Give Up Land To Complete Everglades Project

Florida Crystals, which owns about 35,000 acres needed to recreate the River of Grass section of the Everglades, has entered into negotiations that would allow the state to have much of the needed acreage in return for allowing the company to use other, newly-purchased state land so as to preserve jobs - and, moreover, to produce fuel for clean-energy projects? (Photo: New York Times)