Category:Energy

Right now, this category includes fossil fuels, as well as alternatives. Eventually there will be separate pages for solar, bio-fuels and wind. See also Transportation

Planet Forward is a bottom-up effort on WWW and PBS to have public input into energy policy.

New Scientist Site

UCTV has many interesting videos of talks on this topic.

Nuclear

Sourcewatch.org portal on the issue, including re-branding as green.

Wind

Saul Griffith unveils the invention his new company Makani Power has been working on: giant kite turbines that create surprising amounts of clean, renewable energy. TEDtalk video.

Solar

Paul MacCready flies on solar wings

Bill Gross, the founder of Idealab, talks about his life as an inventor, starting with his high-school company selling solar energy plans and kits. Learn here about a groundbreaking system for solar cells -- and some questions we haven't yet solved.

Bio-Fuels

Bio-Energy (actually quite different than bio-fuel)

Juan Enriquez offers a glimpse of some ground-breaking research to explore the potential of bioenergy. Our current energy sources -- coal, oil, gas -- are ultimately derived from ancient plants -- they're "concentrated sunlight." He asks, Can we learn from that process and accelerate it? TEDtalk video.

Craig Venter Can we create new life out of our digital universe?" asks Craig Venter. And his answer is, yes, and pretty soon. He walks the TED2008 audience through his latest research into "fourth-generation fuels" -- biologically created fuels with CO2 as their feedstock. His talk covers the details of creating brand-new chromosomes using digital technology, the reasons why we would want to do this, and the bioethics of synthetic life. TEDtalk video.

Bio-Fuel

Greasy Rider: Two Dudes, One Fast Food Fueled Car, and a Cross-Country Search for a Greener Future "Is it possible to drive coast-to-coast without stopping at a single gas pump? Journalist Greg Melville is determined to try. With his college buddy Iggy riding shotgun, he sets out on an enlightening road trip. The quest: to be the first people to drive cross-country in a french-fry car. " Long video interview with excerpts

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0D5ikVV1M8&feature=PlayList&p=C58AEAA25D8D264F&index=55 For Chris Somerville, director of the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI) at UCB, whether and how biofuels can be "truly positive" for carbon emissions and our energy supply is, as the saying goes, "in the details."

Fossil Fuels

Coal

Coal Swarm is a online project you can participate in to share info on coal. A project of Sourcewatch.org

Can Coal be Earth-Friendly? PBS Now 4/09 "Clean coal" explored.

KilowattOurs Excellent documentary on energy use Watch online with script and links }}

20th Annual Goldman Environmental Prize which was awarded to grassroots activists from around the world today. We talk with recipients including Maria Gunnoe, a West Virginian who battled against King Coal and mountaintop removal, and Rizwana Hasan who worked to end the dangerous ship breaking industry in Bangladesh. 4/09 audio

Article on coal mining devastation in Appalachia

Strange as This Weather Has Been by Ann Pancake about coal mining region of Appalachia

Everything in Its Path By Kai T. Erikson Recounts the devastating personal and communal effects of the 1972 Buffalo Creek, West Virginia, disaster on a tightly knit Appalachian community suddenly uprooted and dispersed.

Google Earth stops mountaintop removal.

EPA chief Lisa Jackson on mountaintop removal, climate legislation, toxics, and more (text and audio interview. 6/09)

Interview with Nancy Sutley, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, says coal isn’t going away anytime soon. (text and audio interview. 6/09 )

Ken Hechler, the 94 year old legendary West Virginia congressman (a former coal miner who has worked for their rights), was arrested in a non-violent protest with NASA's celebrated climate scientist James Hansen, actress Daryl Hannah, Michael Brune (executive director of Rainforest Action Network), and Goldman Prize winner Judy Bonds (assaulted by coal supporter), and dozens of other coalfield residents after crossing onto the property of leading mountaintop removal coal mining company, Massey Energy. More 6/09 also video

Oil

A Crude Awakening 2007 documentary. Maker site has some nice accompanying documentation.

Crude Impact: Oil Companies and the Environment from LinkTV Video.

Bill McKibben's recent review in the NY Times recommends Roberts' The End of Oil link and others on Global Warming

Avery Lovins on the Oil Endgame, a TEDtalk. See also www.oilendgame.com

ANWR Pro-Con

Blood and Oil Featuring Michael T. Klare (full preview online)

The notion that oil motivates America's military engagements in the Middle East is often disregarded as nonsense or mere conspiracy theory. In Blood and Oil, bestselling author and Nation magazine defense correspondent Michael T. Klare challenges this conventional wisdom and corrects the historical record. The film unearths declassified documents and highlights forgotten passages in prominent presidential doctrines to show how concerns about oil have been at the core of American foreign policy for more than 60 years -- rendering our contemporary energy and military policies virtually indistinguishable.

In the end, Blood and Oil calls for a radical re-thinking of US energy policy, warning that unless we change direction, we stand to be drawn into one oil war after another as the global hunt for diminishing world petroleum supplies accelerates.