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Monterey Shale Shakes Up California’s Energy Future
Posted by National Geographic: Josie Garthwaite on May 28th, 2013
National Geographic: It's easy to tick off the ways in which California is a leader in clean energy: It harvests more solar energy than any other state, has a program to curb greenhouse gas emissions from the vehicles on its famously long highways, and launched its own cap-and-trade system this year. ee accompanying photo gallery: "Pictures: Oil Potential and Animal Habitat in the Monterey Shale.")
And yet, a move is afoot for a quite different type of new energy development in the Golden State, beneath the same valley...
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Would a New Nuclear Plant Fare Better Than Fukushima?
Posted by National Geographic: Josie Garthwaite on March 23rd, 2011
National Geographic: For a world that was on the brink of a major expansion in nuclear power, a key question raised by the Fukushima Daiichi crisis is this: Would brand-new reactors have fared better in the power outage that triggered dangerous overheating at one of Japan's oldest power plants?
The answer seems to be: Not necessarily.
The nuclear industry has developed reactors that rely on so-called "passive safety" systems that could address the turn of events that occurred in Japan--the loss of power to pump...