Alternative Energy

May 09, 2011 at 07:26 | Environmental Finance

Waves and tides could provide up to 240GW of renewable energy globally by 2050, requiring investment of £460 billion ($750 billion), according to the Carbon Trust – although the risk…

May 06, 2011 at 07:36 | Charlotte Dudley

Australia is targeting 20% clean energy by 2020, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), which would put investments in renewable energy at US$39 billion over the coming decade. BNEF…

May 02, 2011 at 07:47 | Andy Soos

A wake is the region of recirculating air flow immediately behind a moving solid body, caused by the air flow of surrounding air around the wind turbine. The air turbines…

Apr 28, 2011 at 08:20 | Professor Chris Rhodes

Always ready to air the other side of an argument, I return to the matter of whether Rare Earth Elements (REEs) and their impending scarcity are the Achilles heel of…

Apr 28, 2011 at 07:48 | Charlotte Dudley

Global biofuel use could increase more than 13-fold by 2050 and meet more than a quarter of demand for transportation fuel, without jeopardising food and environmental security, the International Energy…

Apr 26, 2011 at 09:02 | Taras Berezowsky

The world observes the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster (April 26th, 1986) today, the worst nuclear accident in history. The Fukushima debacle in Japan following the earthquake and tsunami…

Apr 25, 2011 at 09:27 | RFE/RL staff

When reactor No. 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded 25 years ago, it seemed nuclear power might die with it. Around the world, people recoiled in horror as…

Apr 22, 2011 at 08:13 | Brian Westenhaus

High oil prices, environmental and economic security concerns motivate a powerful interest in using algae-derived oils as an alternative to fossil fuels. Keep in mind that growing algae can require…

Apr 21, 2011 at 08:59 | Charlotte Dudley

Global clean energy investment in the first three months of 2011 totalled $31.1 billion, a 34% slump on the previous quarter and down 10% on the corresponding period last year,…

Apr 21, 2011 at 08:57 | Andy Soos

Will electric cars ever become the common way to drive?  What is needed is an infrastructure that allows easy recharging of the vehicle (such as gasoline stations are for the…

Apr 19, 2011 at 08:21 | Kurt Cobb

Nuclear researchers knew long ago that reactor designs now in wide use had already been bested in safety by another design. Why did the industry turn its back on that…

Apr 18, 2011 at 10:36 | Stuart Burns

Every time there is a spike in the cost of energy such as the ’73 crisis and the ’79/80 oil price spike — and then again in ‘07/08 — alternative…

Apr 13, 2011 at 09:05 | Jess McCabe

A leaked draft of the World Bank’s energy strategy says renewables and hydropower will receive a bigger proportion of financing from the institution, with further restrictions imposed on coal projects.…

Apr 13, 2011 at 09:04 | Ferdinand E. Banks

When the subject was oil, my students at the Asian Institute of Technology (Bangkok) were politely asked to study the situation in the United States. It told me everything I…

Apr 12, 2011 at 08:13 | Economywatch

Higher oil prices are usually good news for clean energy because they make costly technologies like solar and wind less daunting to investors. But for one of the world’s most…

Apr 12, 2011 at 08:10 | Graham Cooper

PensionDanmark, a pension fund with around €14 billion ($20 billion) under management, has made its second investment in offshore wind farms and is planning more. A consortium led by PensionDanmark…

Apr 11, 2011 at 09:08 | Stuart Burns

Events at Fukushima in Japan have put the spotlight not just on nuclear power as a source of energy, but on the storage of nuclear waste. Some of the gravest…

Apr 06, 2011 at 07:00 | Jess McCabe

The UK should turn its stockpiles of spent nuclear fuel into a £10 billion ($16 billion) economic opportunity, according to a report from the Smith School of Enterprise and Environment.…

Apr 04, 2011 at 01:47 | RFE/RL staff

After three weeks of efforts to regain control of Japan's damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, several bits of bad news this week showed the job could…

Mar 31, 2011 at 04:44 | Stuart Burns

So following the near meltdown of several reactors at Fukushima Nuclear Power, it’s dead is it? Well, to follow one FT article, you could be mistaken for thinking that…