In The News

A Football Stadium Covered in This Solar Cloth Could Power a Small Town

Megan Gambino January 2, 2015
Flexible, lightweight fabric could extend the possibilities for solar power and fit in places not practical for large panels. While the idea is not new, one startup has covered a 12-space parking lot with fabric containing photovoltaics that generate 15 kilowatts per hour, reports Megan Gambino for Smithsonian Magazine. A company goal is for solar technology not to compete for productive farmland...

How Crude Oil’s Global Collapse Unfolded

Russell Gold December 17, 2014
The price of oil has fell from $110 per barrel to about $60 per barrel for a combination of reasons: Increased US oil production has upended global markets; Nigeria once delivered a million barrels a day to the US; that dropped to zero this summer. Now oil-producing nations like Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Iran hunt for new customers and compete for Asian markets. At the same time, demand lags in...

How Wall Street Is Killing Big Oil

Deepak Gopinath October 16, 2014
Companies rely on stock markets to raise money by selling small shares of ownership to investors. But investors may be killing rather than boosting major private energy companies. “Once reliable market beaters, Big Oil shares are lagging,” writes economist Deepak Gopinath. “Under pressure from investors, the world’s largest oil companies are now forced to cut capital expenditure and sell assets...

Glasgow Becomes First University in Europe to Divest From Fossil Fuels

Libby Brooks October 13, 2014
Glasgow University in Scotland has voted to divest from the fossil fuel industry and is selling its holdings in the sector, worth £18 million, or US $12 million. The decision follows a year of pressure and campaigning from a student organization, the Glasgow University Climate Action Society, part of a broader international university movement. The “Fossil Free” university movement began in the...

Trans-Afghan Pipeline Initiative: No Pipe Dream

Marc Grossman August 28, 2014
Despite a stream of bad news, development plans are underway even among nations with adversarial relations. Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan and India signed an agreement in early July to move forward with a 1,700-kilometer natural gas pipeline. “This $7.5 billion project known as TAPI, or the Trans-Afghan Pipeline Initiative, has the potential to catalyze investment and trading opportunities...

A Field Day for Fracking

Wenonah Hauter July 16, 2014
The US and EU initiated a new round of closed discussions on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, a free trade agreement, with much of the content still kept top secret. However, the EU position on raw materials and energy was leaked in May, and the deal could eliminate restrictions on US exports of natural gas to Europe, reports Wenonah Hauter for Other Words. Concerns have...

A Greener Energy Matrix for the Caribbean and Central America

Harold Trinkunas July 4, 2014
The high cost of electricity and imported manufactured goods from the US rings the alarm for a future energy crisis in the Caribbean Islands and Central America. Electricity costs in some islands are about three times higher than those in the US. An alternative proposal based on green energy and other natural resources, such as natural gas, could help reduce carbon emissions, improve living...