Most recent 10 articles: Yale Climate Connections - Energy
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What is a passive house? - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Apr 17) |
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Apr 17 · In a webinar on April 19, we'll explore how climate organizations are currently using storytelling in their work, the impacts of these stories, and lessons learned from other movements.
Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
A well-insulated, airtight thermos or cooler can keep your coffee warm - or your water cold - all day. So-called passive houses are not all that different.
Like a thermos, they’re designed to keep heat from entering or escaping. So their design focuses on what’s called a building’s envelope - the walls, windows, roof, and foundation that separate the inside from ... Read more ...
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Schools in coal country are going solar - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Apr 16) |
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Apr 16 · In a webinar on April 19, we'll explore how climate organizations are currently using storytelling in their work, the impacts of these stories, and lessons learned from other movements.
Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Deep in the heart of coal country, schools in Wayne County, West Virginia, are going solar.
Conant: “The schools, they don’t have to pay for the equipment. They don’t have to pay for the panels, the labor. Instead, Solar Holler pays for all of that up front.”
Dan Conant is the founder and CEO of Solar Holler. The West Virginia-based solar ... Read more ...
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Want a climate-friendly home? You might need a new breaker box. - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Apr 5) |
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Apr 5 · In a webinar on April 19, we'll explore how climate organizations are currently using storytelling in their work, the impacts of these stories, and lessons learned from other movements.
Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Many people are replacing their old, fossil-fuel-powered furnaces and gas stoves with new electric heat pumps and induction stoves.
But some hit a snag when they find out that their home’s electrical panel, or breaker box, cannot handle all the extra electricity they’ll need.
Fowler: “That’s when you realize, oh, I need a little more juice.”
Eric ... Read more ...
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A blizzard put a hyper-efficient home to the test. It passed. - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Apr 2) |
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Apr 2 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
When the power goes out on a cold winter night, some people head to a hotel. Others huddle around a fireplace bundled up in hats and blankets.
But after a blizzard knocked out the power at Katrin Klingenberg’s home in Illinois, her house stayed warm and comfortable.
Klingenberg: “I was sitting in my living room in a T-shirt, and outside it was negative 40 windchill. And that’s kind of cool.”
She lives in a so-called passive house she designed herself. And she’s co-founder of Passive House Institute U.S., a nonprofit that works to increase ... Read more ...
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Yes, heat pumps slash emissions even if powered by a dirty grid - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Apr 1) |
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Apr 1 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Do you plan to take advantage of clean energy tax credits?
Tell us about it in this brief survey.
You might consider heat pumps to be a tantalizing climate solution (they are) and one you could adopt yourself (plenty have). But perhaps you’ve held off on getting one, wondering how much of a difference they really make if a dirty grid is supplying the electricity you’re using to power them - that is, a grid whose electricity is generated at least in part by fossil gas, coal or oil.
That’s certainly the case for most U.S. households: While ... Read more ...
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What is solar thermal? - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Mar 25) |
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Mar 25 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
When people talk about solar panels, they’re usually referring to solar photovoltaic panels, which convert the sun’s energy to electricity. But solar PV is just one way to harness the power of the sun.
Gasco: “Solar thermal is, I’d say, the simpler and kind of overshadowed little brother almost to solar PV. … I think it’s a really great technology in the simplicity and the efficiency of it.”
Gwe Gasco is with Eighth Fire Solar, an Indigenous-led initiative in Northern Minnesota.
The group manufactures and installs solar thermal panels, ... Read more ...
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Wind farm radar system reduces nighttime light pollution in Iowa - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Mar 22) |
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Mar 22 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
If you drive across Iowa at night, you might encounter a series of coordinated red lights flashing in the sky.
Greenwood: “It looks like a whole bunch of fireflies lighting up at the same time.”
Geoff Greenwood is with MidAmerican Energy, which operates 3,400 wind turbines across the state.
Red lights are placed on top of the turbines to prevent pilots from crashing into the structures, which can be more than 200 feet tall.
But that flashing lights up the night sky, which some people find annoying - so at three of its wind farms, ... Read more ...
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You can start applying for the American Climate Corps next month - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Mar 21) |
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Mar 21 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Do you plan to take advantage of clean energy tax credits?
Tell us about it in this brief survey.
The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively with Grist.
The program is modeled after President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps, launched in 1933 to help the country make it through the Great Depression. The positions with the new corps could range across a number of fields including energy-efficiency ... Read more ...
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Do wind farms hurt home values? When they do, it’s usually temporary. - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Mar 20) |
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Mar 20 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Some homeowners wonder if having a wind farm nearby will affect their property values.
A recent study finds that although wind farms can reduce nearby home prices, the drop is usually limited and only temporary.
Hoen: “We hope that this allows people to have greater confidence into what are the likely effects from building a wind project in the future and when those effects are likely to occur.”
That’s Ben Hoen of the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. He and his colleagues found that, on average, wind farms had no impact on property values in ... Read more ...
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Want clean electricity? These are the overlooked elected officials who get to decide. - Yale Climate Connections - Energy (Mar 13) |
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Mar 13 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
On a Tuesday morning in January, college student Aurora Gray stepped up to the podium in a windowless room in Atlanta, around the corner from the state capitol building. In front of her sat a five-member panel of elected officials that oversees how and where nearly every Georgia resident gets their power.
“The generation of energy … using fossil fuels has become an existential threat to our safety due to the undisputed impacts of greenhouse gas emissions on our planet,” Gray told the commission. “We must act now, as later is way too late.”
More ... Read more ...
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