Check out Google Earth – the ‘view from above’ of your favorite American city. And look at the roofs of the office buildings, warehouses, shopping centers, and even the homes. Most of them are probably pretty dark in color – and this means they heat up a lot when the weather is warm – up to 50 degrees hotter than light roofs. All of those dark roofs mean that as a nation (more…)

The United States’ largest solar PV power plant has been completed in Boulder City, Nevada. The plant will provide enough power for 14,000 homes through an array of 775,000 thin-film photovoltaic solar panels.

Called Copper Mountain Solar, the 380 acre, 48MW facility belongs to Sempra Generation, a subsidiary of Sempra Energy. (more…)

Poland has teamed up with Siemens and BMW to create a recyclable subway car for Metro Warszawskie.

The Inspiro design was developed by Siemens in cooperation with the BMW Group DesignworksUSA, which is an independently operating BMW Group subsidiary based in Los Angeles, Singapore (more…)

The 53rd annual San Francisco auto show rolled into the city by the bay this week featuring a spectacular array of vehicles designed to thrill the imagination of young and old. A special feature of this year’s show is the debut of several all-electric, hybrid and alternative fuel autos that have already begun to roll off the assembly line. As a green journalist, I had looked forward (more…)

High-speed rail has been in the news a lot recently, in the US, in Europe, and in China. Some great news, and some not-so-great news. Here are 8 big stories from the past couple months.

1. The U.S. government awarded $2.4 billion to 54 rail projects in 23 states a couple weeks ago. This is in addition to the $8 billion awarded by the Obama (more…)

For thousands of years, nomadic herdsmen have roamed the harsh, semi-arid lowlands that stretch across 80 percent of Kenya and 60 percent of Ethiopia. Descendants of the oldest tribal societies in the world, they survive thanks to the animals they raise and the crops they grow, their travels determined by the search for water and grazing lands. (more…)

Amid the flurry of local and state ballot initiatives Californians will be voting on next month, we’re here to highlight two that have tremendous implications for our clean energy future:

Prop 23: Puts Climate Change Action & Renewable Progress on Hold:
VOTE NO (more…)

Last month, the news that President Obama had turned down free solar panels for the White House (by turning down the symbolic donation of one of the Carter-era White House solar panels from environmentalist Bill McKibben) was met with bewilderment by many in the environmental community. Many people, including McKibben himself, speculated that the image managers in the (more…)

Last week Secretary Chu invited you to submit your questions on home energy efficiency and the response was tremendous. We sifted through your questions and recently discussed many of them with the Secretary.

Here are the resources that the Secretary referenced during the discussion:

(more…)

With $50 and some elbow grease, a Purdue student created a hybrid vehicle that could inspire a generation of alternative motorists.

Purdue junior and physics major Tony Coiro spent $2,500 redesigning and retrofitting the used 1978 Suzuki motorcycle, and ended up with a solar- (more…)