Tag: Alternative and Renewable Energy

What Ails Offshore Wind: Supply Chains, Ships and Interest Rates

A few years ago, interest in offshore wind energy was so strong that developers proposed spending tens of billions of dollars to plunk hundreds of turbines the size of skyscrapers in the Atlantic Ocean from Maine to Virginia. But several of those projects have recently hit the skids after executives miscalculated the impact that the […]

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Saudi Arabia Is Trying to Block a Global Deal to End Fossil Fuels, Negotiators Say

Saudi Arabia, the world’s leading exporter of oil, has become the biggest obstacle to an agreement to fight global warming at the United Nations climate summit in Dubai, where countries are debating whether to call for a phaseout of fossil fuels, negotiators and observers said. The Saudi delegation has flatly opposed any language in a […]

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Europe and Asia React to U.S. Push for Tech and Clean Energy

The United States has embarked on the biggest industrial policy push in generations, dangling tax breaks, grants and other financial incentives to attract new factories making solar panels, semiconductors and electric vehicles. That spending is aimed at jump-starting the domestic market for crucial products, but it has implications far outside the United States. It is […]

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How to Stop the Biggest Threat to Europe’s Green Transition

For years, the European Union has been laying the foundation for what may be the world’s most ambitious climate policy: the European Green Deal, which puts Europe out in front in the global fight against climate change. This formidable bundle of policies steers countries to build renewable energy resources, find ways to improve energy efficiency […]

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Renewable Energy Could Be a Casualty in the War on Inflation. Here’s Why.

A global campaign to tame inflation is hurting the fight against climate change by steering developing countries away from renewable energy, raising anxieties among the officials gathered at the United Nations climate summit in Dubai. Those officials say they support efforts by central bankers to bring down rising prices by raising interest rates. But in […]

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Global Carbon Budget Report Finds Fossil Fuel Emissions Still Rising

Despite years of commitments from countries to slash the emissions of greenhouse gases that are warming the planet, they are still on the rise. Carbon dioxide released from burning fossil fuels is expected to rise by 1.1 percent in 2023 compared with 2022, scientists found in an extensive peer-reviewed analysis published this week. Researchers from […]

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1.5 Degrees Is Not the Problem

As leaders around the world meet for the 28th time to address the climate crisis — this time in the United Arab Emirates, one of the world’s largest oil producers — they need to rethink this threat and some of the other central challenges of our times. Those other challenges include devastating losses of biodiversity […]

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It Could Be a Vast Source of Clean Energy, Buried Deep Underground

In the rocky soil of Lorraine, a former coal mining region near the French-German border, scientists guided a small probe one recent day down a borehole half a mile into the earth’s crust. Frothing in the water table below was an exciting find: champagne-size bubbles that signaled a potentially mammoth cache of so-called white hydrogen, […]

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COP28 Climate Summit Begins Against Backdrop of War and Record Heat

With dire warnings of planetary catastrophe and urgent pleas to protect vulnerable populations, world leaders on Friday implored one another to stop burning fossil fuels and swiftly reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that are `dangerously heating the planet. At the United Nations climate conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, a parade of dignitaries invoked faith, […]

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A Tense Climate Summit Begins Against a Backdrop of War and Record Heat

With dire warnings of planetary catastrophe and urgent pleas to protect vulnerable populations, world leaders on Friday implored one another to stop burning fossil fuels and swiftly reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that are `dangerously heating the planet. At the United Nations climate conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, a parade of dignitaries invoked faith, […]

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Emirati Fund to Invest Billions in U.S. Firms for Climate Projects

An Emirati financial firm is planning to invest at least $30 billion in a new climate fund in partnership with some of the biggest names in North American finance, according to three people familiar with the plans. The move comes as the United Arab Emirates, this year’s host of the annual United Nations climate talks […]

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Emirati Fund to Invest Billions in U.S. Firms for Climate Projects

An Emirati financial firm is planning to invest at least $30 billion in a new climate fund in partnership with some of the biggest names in North American finance, according to three people familiar with the plans. The move comes as the United Arab Emirates, this year’s host of the annual United Nations climate talks […]

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COP28 Begins With Fossil Fuels, and Frustration, Going Strong

As leaders from nearly every nation on the planet gather on Thursday in the United Arab Emirates to confront global warming, many are carrying a sense of disillusionment into the annual climate summit convened by the United Nations. Countries talk about the need to cut the pollution that is dangerously heating the planet, but emissions […]

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Biden Takes on MAGA Republicans in Boebert’s Backyard

President Biden’s visit to a wind turbine factory in Colorado on Wednesday was as much a rebuke of his far-right opponents in Congress as it was an official stop to show off investments in clean energy and manufacturing. Mr. Biden toured the Pueblo factory of CS Wind, which lies in the district of Representative Lauren […]

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Harris to Stand In for Biden at COP28 Climate Conference

Vice President Kamala Harris will attend the annual United Nations climate summit in Dubai on Friday and Saturday, standing in for President Biden, who will skip the event for the first time since taking office. A spokeswoman for Ms. Harris said in a statement on Wednesday that while at the summit, known as COP28, the […]

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The Dilemmas of the U.A.E., a Petrostate, Preparing to Host COP28

The choice of a leading oil producer, the United Arab Emirates, to host this year’s U.N. climate talks has angered environmental activists. But for the Emirates and other countries both highly dependent on oil and deeply vulnerable to rising temperatures, grappling with climate change is an urgent dilemma for them, too. If the world abandons […]

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Documents Show Plan for Leader of COP28 Climate Talks to Promote Fossil Fuels

As hosts of global climate talks that begin this week, the United Arab Emirates are expected to play a central role in forging an agreement to move the world more rapidly away from coal, oil and gas. But behind the scenes, the Emirates has sought to use its position as host to pursue a contradictory […]

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Vietnam Is Jailing Environmentalists Who Helped It Secure Billions

When Vietnam was awarded a multibillion-dollar deal by a group of nine wealthy nations last year to work on reducing its use of coal, it agreed to regularly consult with nongovernmental organizations. Instead, the government has arrested several prominent environmentalists from those organizations who shaped policies that helped secure the funding, prompting concerns over sending […]

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Former Coal Towns Get Money for Clean-Energy Factories

In Weirton, W.Va., in the heart of coal country, a company started by MIT scientists plans to build a plant that will produce a metal and alloy critical for clean energy, fuel cells and cleaner steel. In Vernon, Texas, also a former coal town, a third-generation wind entrepreneur plans to manufacture turbines suitable for remote, […]

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Could Biden’s Clean Energy Push Be a Victim of Its Success?

Dalton, Ga., was once known as the carpet capital of the country. Economic diversification meant branching out from wall-to-wall to hardwood flooring. Now, at Qcells, a solar panel company, robots patrol acres of shop floor where delicate solar cells are packaged, laminated and boxed into sophisticated panels — 6,000 a day — in a highly […]

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Relax, Electric Vehicles Really Are the Best Choice for the Climate

It has been a bumpy few weeks for carmakers who sell electric vehicles, which are moving more slowly off the lot than they were earlier this year. What’s going on? It seems that American drivers may be more hesitant about E.V.s than automakers expected. I am familiar with trepidation about electric vehicles; I hear it […]

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In Biden’s Climate Law, a Boon for Green Energy, and Wall Street

The 2022 climate law has accelerated investments in clean-energy projects across the United States. It has also delivered financial windfalls for big banks, lawyers, insurance companies and start-up financial firms by creating an expansive new market in green tax credits. The law, signed by President Biden, effectively created a financial trading marketplace that helps smaller […]

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Nations Are Getting Serious About Climate Action. Just Not Serious Enough.

The world’s nations are taking more concrete steps to tackle climate change than ever before, but they are still very far from making the sweeping changes needed to keep global temperatures at relatively safe levels, according to a United Nations report issued on Tuesday. The annual assessment, known as the Emissions Gap Report, tracks the […]

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Los Angeles Will Offer More Energy Incentives to Low-Income Residents

Los Angeles said on Thursday that it would build electric vehicle chargers and offer bigger rebates for the purchase of battery-powered cars in response to a new report that concluded that low-income people were being left behind in the transition to clean energy. City officials said they would offer qualified residents up to $4,000 to […]

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U.S. and China Agree to Displace Fossil Fuels by Ramping Up Renewables

The United States and China, the world’s two largest climate polluters, have agreed to jointly tackle global warming by ramping up wind, solar and other renewable energy with the goal of displacing fossil fuels, the State Department said Tuesday. The announcement comes as President Biden prepares to meet Wednesday with President Xi Jinping of China […]

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5th National Climate Assessment Lays Out Climate Threats and Solutions

The food we eat and the roads we drive on. Our health and safety. Our cultural heritage, natural environments and economic flourishing. Nearly every cherished aspect of American life is under growing threat from climate change and it is effectively too late to prevent many of the harms from worsening over the next decade, a […]

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Heat Pump Installations Slow, Impeding Biden’s Climate Goals

More Americans are buying heat pumps, an environmentally friendly alternative to furnaces and air-conditioners that can significantly lower monthly energy bills. But the pace of installations has slowed in the past year, posing an obstacle to the Biden administration’s climate plans. Rising interest rates and inflation combined with a slow and confusing rollout of federal […]

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A Package of Bold Laws Puts Michigan on a Fast Track to Renewable Energy

The Michigan Senate gave final approval on Wednesday to a bundle of clean energy bills, transforming a state at the center of industrial America into a leader in the fight against climate change. The legislation, which passed both chambers of the Statehouse with narrow Democratic majorities, represents a turnaround for a state that had long […]

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Fossil Fuel Use Increasing, Not Decreasing, as Key Target Looms

In 2030, if current projections hold, the United States will drill for more oil and gas than at any point in its history. Russia and Saudi Arabia plan to do the same. They’re among the world’s fossil fuel giants that, together, are on course this decade to produce twice the amount of fossil fuels than […]

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How Your Child’s School Bus Might Prevent Blackouts

The four vehicles parked at a depot in South Burlington, Vt., look no different from the yellow school buses familiar to millions of schoolchildren. But beneath their steel shells, these buses are packed with technology that could be vital in the transition to clean energy. While their main job remains transporting children, the vehicles take […]

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