The Strange Times Review

cool_car

There’s a Bizarro World quality to this period in history. Anyone covering news in these Interesting Times cannot possibly chronicle all the news that really marks the journey as we careen into our unimaginably strange future. Add yours in comments, but here’s what I found: California regulators decreed that, by law, your your car has [...]

Nation's Largest Utility Leaves US Chamber of Commerce — Because of Climate Change?

windfarm

John Rowe, Exelon CEO, said yesterday that climate change legislation is an urgent issue. At the same time, he announced that the nation’s largest utility would not be renewing its membership with the US Chamber of Commerce because of the Chamber of Commerce’s opposition to climate legislation.

Super High Speed Rail for China — $4 Billion Purchase

highspeed

China just awarded Bombardier Sifang a contract to build 80 “very high speed trains” for the country. These are super progressive trains that are energy efficient as well as lightning fast. China intends to invest a total of $300 billion in high speed trains by 2020.

New Dow Chemical Coating Speeds Up Solar Assembly-Line

solar_silicone

Not every breakthrough in the solar industry comes from efficiency gains from esoteric new Silicon Valley start-ups (though these are being catapulted by the recent funding bonanza) and university labs. Some come from understanding that half the cost of a solar installation is just the cost of getting boots up on your roof, like for [...]

Solar Energy Breakthrough: Goal of MIT Team

sunwater

MIT professor Daniel Nocera formed a company earlier this year to commercialize a new technology that can “split water” and store solar energy. The company’s key objective now: achieve a solar energy breakthrough.

US Army Plans To Deploy Hybrid Spy Ship Over Afghanistan

3d9a7a98-afa1-4f8b-87c8-38bf99d10fc7large

By 2011 the US Army’s Space & Missile Defense Command has plans to deploy a spy ship, which will be unmanned over Afghanistan. While this is a controversial move in itself, some eco-enthusiasts are applauding the consideration to model the aircraft after an experimental hybrid airship which took flight on a number of occasions in [...]

Hi-Tech Steam Lays the Green Clean on Visalia Superfund Site

Dynamic Underground Stripping is a steam-based remediation technology that cleaned up a Superfund site in Visalia, California, 100 years ahead of schedule.

With the help of a high tech underground steam cleaning technology developed at UCal-Berkeley and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a creosote-soaked Superfund site in Visalia, California has been cleaned up more than 100 years ahead of schedule, saving millions of dollars and pointing the way toward a more efficient and sustainable means of dealing [...]

Biofuel to be Made from Tuberculosis Bacteria

researcher examines biofuel-producing microbes

A team of researchers at MIT are engineering a strain of bacteria, which is similar to the type that causes tuberculosis, to produce biofuel. The researchers say that the bacteria are useful because they are hungry for a number of sugars and toxic compounds and produce lipids that can be converted to biodiesel.