links
Awesome Twitter Exchange on the Politics of Clean Energy
I happened to see Dave Roberts of Grist (@drgrist), Brad Plumer of The New Republic (@bradplumer), Bryan Walsh of Time (@bryanrwalsh) and Jesse Jenkins and Devon Swezey of The Breakthrough Institute (@jessejenkins, @devonswezey) mixing it up on Twitter and wanted to preserve the exchange for perpetuity here.
I personally think all these guys are smart [...]
Link for 2010-01-15
Never mind what people believe—how can we change what they do? A chat with Robert Cialdini | Grist
Cialdini describes six “weapons of influence”:
* Reciprocity: people will repay favors.
* Commitment and Consistency: people will stick to commitments made publicly.
* Social Proof: people will do what other people do.
* Authority: people obey authority figures.
* Liking: people are [...]
Link for 2010-01-14
Wanted: A Cultural Revolution | Marc Gunther
"Consumer culture is not only causing environmental havoc, it’s often failing to deliver the well-being that it promises. Most people understand–and psychological studies of happiness confirm–that after we have achieved basic economic security (itself a cultural norm), what really makes us happy are close relationships, meaningful work, connections to [...]
Link for 2010-01-13
DENIS HAYES: Mr. Earth Day Gets Ready to Rumble – TIME
"Hayes, 54, didn't set out to be an environmentalist. He grew up in Camas, Wash., a small paper-mill town where the air stank from sulfur fumes. Like most other people there, he loved the outdoor life, but his concern over the damage the mills were [...]
My Burroughs-Style Year in Review
It’s hard to know how to recap a year in which you wrote a book proposal, sold a book, started a blog, and worked a full-time job. So much of my brain space is dedicated to writing that most of the time, I can’t remember my own name or tie my shoes. Still, I wanted [...]
Fast Tracking for Green Tech Patents
While the Copenhagen deal may not be exciting to many people, the Obama administration has been doing a lot for green tech innovation aside from pricing carbon.
Obviously, the RD&D money in the stimulus package was helpful, particularly during the downturn. The loan guarantees are a tried-and-true mechanism for getting capital-intensive projects built, too. But here’s [...]
links for 2009-12-19
Nature: Geothermal quake risks must be faced
"It is now becoming clear to the public, local authorities, the geothermal industry and regulatory agencies that deep geothermal systems carry a small risk — as do most technologies in the energy sector. Dams can break, nuclear power plants may fail, carbon dioxide released from the oil and gas [...]
links for 2009-12-14
Yale Sociology » Wendell Bell
* “Wendell Bell and Oliver W. Markley: two futurists’ views of the preferable, the possible and the probable. Journal of Futures Studies” 13, No. 3 (2009): 161-178 (by Darrell Kicker).
* “The American invasion of Grenada: a note on false prophecy,” Foresight 10, No. 3 (2008): 27-42.
[...]
Deregulation, Innovation, and Market Liberalization
Deregulation, Innovation and Market Liberalization by L. Lynne Kiesling
“Whereas the dominant regulatory paradigm has traditionally been centralized economic and physical control based on natural monopoly theory and power systems engineering, the ideas presented and synthesized by Kiesling compose a different paradigm – decentralized economic and physical coordination through contracts, transactions, price signals, and integrated intertemporal [...]
links for 2009-12-12
Biofuels, facts, fantasy, and feasibility
"It is frequently claimed that green algae are intrinsically more productive, often by orders of magnitude, than higher plants commonly grown as crops for food. There is no firm evidence for this belief. On the contrary, there is much experience which shows that algae are not more but less productive… Accordingly, [...]
Inventing Green by Alexis Madrigal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
