Electric vehicles offer the promise of reduced environmental externalities relative to their gasoline counterparts. We combine a theoretical discrete-choice model of new vehicle purchases, an econometric analysis of the marginal emissions from electricity, and the AP2 air pollution model to estimate the environmental benefit of electric vehicles. First, we find considerable variation in the environmental […]
Currently, there are about 369,000 electric cars on California roads, and Gov. Jerry Brown hopes to bring that number up to 5 million by 2030. That might appear to put electric cars on a collision course with a fragile power grid. But a report released Thursday by San Francisco-based think tank Next 10 suggests that […]
The rev of combustion engines will be around for a while if patents are any indication of staying power. Automakers were granted more protection last year on innovations to the 140-year-old technology than for electric cars, according to analytics platform Cipher. While the gap is narrowing, closing it will take another decade. . . . […]
A second judge in as many months has tossed a climate lawsuit brought by cities against major energy companies. In dismissing the New York City lawsuit, U.S. District Court Judge John F. Keenan wrote, “Global warming and solutions thereto must be addressed by the two other branches of government. ” Judge Keenan, like his fellow […]
Why is this all happening now? After all, scientists have been working on these alternative types of reactors since the beginning of the Cold War, yet they’ve never caught on. The history of advanced reactors is littered with the carcasses of failed attempts. A salt-cooled reactor first ran successfully back in 1954, but the United […]
A quick bit of background: On July 6, the temperature hit 108 degrees in Los Angeles. A day later it hit 104 degrees, roughly 20 degrees hotter than normal. The scalding temperatures led to record electricity demand forcing the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to ask customers to voluntarily cut their electricity use. […]
California’s grid operator is asking customers to limit electricity use during peak hours to help keep power flowing as a “heat dome” settles over the southwestern U.S. But they were warned of this months ago. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) warned in May that California faced “significant risk of encountering operating conditions that […]
Other proposals in the mix include allowing industrial and commercial energy customers to cut the cord that binds them to major utilities, as well as a bid to help California reach its climate goals by fashioning a fully “clean” power supply by 2045. California is at the forefront of the budding consumer choice movement—ratepayers leaving […]
A famous quote from Virgil’s Aenid 5.231, says, “They can, because they think they can,” comes to mind over the recent headline by the San Francisco Chronicle, “California slashes emissions, hits major greenhouse gas goals years early.” The California Air Resources Board (CARB) on June 11th released data showing California’s greenhouse gas emissions, “dropped 2.7 […]
Top air-quality regulators at the state Capitol may be on a collision course with local power players when it comes to how frequently Californians should drive their cars in the state’s internationally lauded fight against climate change. Many regional lawmakers and other officials have started pushing back on the notion that commuters need to limit […]
The push toward wind is playing out in a high-rise office building 100 miles south of Wyoming’s capital in Denver. There, TransWest Express is laying out plans to build a 730-mile transmission line across the American West. CEO Bill Miller points to a map and the start of the project — 1,000 wind turbines to […]
Prices on solar panels did rise last summer as the Trump administration publicly considered the tariffs, mostly on imports from China and other Asian countries. That caused U.S. companies to scramble to purchase as many foreign panels as they could to beat the looming duties. The higher prices led two U.S. manufacturers to say they’d […]
Thousands of Los Angeles residents were left without power Saturday morning after a heat wave prompted high electricity demand throughout the city. “Friday’s record-setting heat led to unprecedented peak electricity demand,” according to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP). High demand caused power outages throughout city and left 34,500 customers in the […]
Global Warming: Once more, science provides bad news for global warming alarmists. U.S. CO2 levels again declined during 2017, despite overall global output again rising. Credit U.S. fracking and the natural gas boom. But don’t worry: the hysteria won’t end. The new report, based on U.S. data, shows clearly the U.S. continuing downward trend. “The […]
Gas power plants are mushrooming all over the country, with almost a 20 percent gas capacity gain of 90,000 megawatts from 2017–2020 alone. Bolstered by rising efficiency, the more that we have turned to natural gas, the more our CO2 emissions have plummeted. Our power emissions are now the lowest they have been since 1985. […]