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The Old Dominion’s political system and culture is often referred to as The Virginia Way which is nostalgically promoted as one “of honor, gentility and democracy”. Just like “MAGA” glosses over (ignores or even embraces) ugly parts of American history,  In reality, this ideology bred a corrupt political class, a runaway electricity company, a university […]

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Over 20 years ago, General Motors introduced the EV1. This all-electric car quickly won passionate enthusiasm from its drivers and seemed like a wedge into creating a clean electric vehicle future. Just a few years in, GM killed the program (literally crushing the vehicles) and the EV1 disappeared from the streets. As explored in Who […]

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The Commonwealth is en route to what might well be a game-changing electric school bus (ESB) program. Through creation of a large and long term program (somewhere in the range of 10-15,000 school buses over a decade), Virginia’s ESB acquisition could be the key project to drive down acquisition costs and thus accelerate moves from […]

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Electrify Everything Clean up the grid These two bullets are a core mantra for those concerned with addressing climate change. Some simple truth: The power (electricity) sector is, writ large, getting cleaner every day (with significant and potentially accelerating renewable energy growth) while liquid fossil fuels are, writ large, getting dirtier (as easy to get […]

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The Legislature is about to open in Richmond. The Democratic majorities, in the House and Senate, clearly seem prepared to act on legislation to move Virginia on a path toward a clean power (e.g., low-to-no carbon electricity) system. Framing this discussion are two different approaches, the Virginia Green New Deal (GND-VA) and the Virginia Clean […]

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Jay Rosen serves as a voice of sanity when it comes to journalism and journalistic practices. He, often at PressThink, delivers knowledge and insight with passion and eloquence. Rosen’s latest piece focuses on Chuck Todd’s Christmas Eve claimed of “naivete” (what Rosen makes clear is an admission of journalistic malfeasance) in not recognizing, as he […]

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Washington Post (and other news organizations) all too often seem to fall back to ‘both sides’ discussions that foster misunderstandings and implicitly undermines truthful discussion. And, far too often this ‘bothsiderism’ combines with, it seems, fear of angering Trump (or, at least #Cult45 devotees) to create misrepresentations. A story discussing political implications of Trump’s ignorant […]

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There are several legislative initiatives to lay down a path forward to modernize Virginia’s electrical grid with co-benefits of boosting the Commonwealth’s economic performance, creating jobs, reducing environmental injustice, improving health (economic, environmental, human), and putting Virginia on a path to address meaningfully the Commonwealth’s climate impacts. These initiatives do not align in many ways […]

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Wind expert Paul Gipe has calculated that Afghanistan and Iraq war costs could have paid for the United States to have, already, a fully renewable power sector: wind, solar and batteries. If we had instead invested the $6 trillion we squandered on war in the Middle East, we would, two decades later, have made our […]

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This morning, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) released the annual International Energy Outlook (IEO2019) which provides a forecast re energy through 2050. With projecting that energy demand growth will outpace renewable energy growth (with increased natural gas, oil, and coal usage) through 2050, EIA is forecasting that carbon emissions from energy usage will grow by […]

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