I coordinate NRDC's work on renewable energy--fuels and power--and policies that will advance them. For the last few years, I've spent the lion's share of my time working on biofuels, biopower, wind, solar, and geothermal. Along with a great team from our land, water, oceans, and climate programs, I try to understand what these technologies are capable of, what are the research, development, and economic challenges standing in their way, and what standards we need to put in place to make sure they really deliver the environmental benefits they promise. I went to Brown undergrad and Berkeley for my masters. I have just enough science, engineering, and economics to be dangerous and use this training to translate the cutting edge energy technology developments into policy recommendations
Posted July 29, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Solving Global Warming, U.S. Law and Policy
In the last week, 4 major newpapers have editorialized against the corn ethanol tax credit. First, The Chicago Tribune wrote under the headline: Enough Ethanol. Then The Washington Post wrote: It's time to end the excessive subsidies for corn ethanol....continued→
Posted July 20, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Solving Global Warming
Last night, the House Ways and Means Committee put the brakes on discussions to extend the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit (VEETC), a government kickback for Big Oil to buy and blend corn ethanol that they are already required to...continued→
Posted July 15, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
A new report released by the Congressional Budget Office yesterday afternoon reaches some eye popping conclusions about what our lavish support for old corn ethanol is costing us. For mature and mainstream corn ethanol, we the tax payers are shelling...continued→
Posted July 14, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
It should come as no surprise that the first copy of the full text of Sen Klobuchar's energy bill was found on a corn ethanol industry association website; the bill reads like the industry's wish list. Klobuchar says she's trying...continued→
Posted June 24, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Everyone who thinks Big Oil should get $31 billion from U.S. taxpayers, please sign on the dotted line. That’s the message of a new ad running today in Congress Daily sponsored by NRDC, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Friends of...continued→
Posted June 18, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Wouldn’t it be great if you had a bank account that automatically filled back up no matter how much you spent? You could just ignore how much you spent. Amazingly, the bioenergy industry has succeeded so far in convincing legislators...continued→
Posted June 11, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
A study commissioned by MA Department of Energy Resources and released today reaches the conclusion that burning trees to make electricity is worse for the climate than burning coal at least through 2050. In fact, the study by the Manomet...continued→
Posted May 28, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Heading into Memorial Day weekend and the traditional beginning of the driving season, my colleague Sasha Lyutse and I did a little digging into a recent study of corn ethanol policies and what would happen if the main corn ethanol...continued→
Posted May 28, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
I know nothing about this plant, but in the context of my two most recent blogs on the biomass loophole and its relationship with the definition of renewable biomass, I note with alarm two parts of this helpful blog on...continued→
Posted May 27, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Yesterday I wrote about 90 leading scientists calling on Congress and the Obama administration to carefully account for the greenhouse gas emissions from burning biomass. I want to underscore again that now is the time for Congress to pass a...continued→
Posted May 24, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Today a group of leading scientists from across the country sent a letter to congressional leaders and Obama officials urging them to carefully count the carbon from biomass burned for energy as part of a comprehensive climate bill or any other leg islation...continued→
Posted May 9, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil
Check out the map of the oil spill and the 2009 hypoxic zone in today's New York Times. As I mentioned in my last blog, the nitrogen runoff from corn grown all along the Mississippi causes a huge dead zone...continued→
Posted May 6, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Yesterday, RFA delivered a letter to President Obama urging immediate solution and long-term strategies in response to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Certainly both are needed, but unfortunately RFA’s solutions amount to using more corn ethanol today...continued→
Posted April 28, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Green Enterprise, Reviving the World's Oceans, Solving Global Warming
The exciting news today is that Secretary Salazar issued a record of decision approving the Cape Wind offshore wind project. As the Secretary acknowledged during his press conference, no project is without impact and minimizing and mitigating those impacts is...continued→
Posted April 7, 2010 by Nathanael Greene in Moving Beyond Oil, Solving Global Warming
Today, in yet another example of ethanol industry spin, the Renewable Fuels Association released a state-by-state version of its highly inflated jobs study. This is just another part of big ethanol’s effort to make the case for extending the Volumetric...continued→
Switchboard is the staff blog of the Natural Resources Defense Council, the nation’s most effective environmental group. For more about our work, including in-depth policy documents, action alerts and ways you can contribute, visit NRDC.org.
