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Why Tesla Is Building City-Sized Batteries

Giant batteries are crucial to the future of power grids everywhere, but they are only one of the zanier forms of energy storage already in use around the country.

101 Ways Donald Trump Has Betrayed his Populist Agenda

Alan Zibel Public Citizen
Trump has often said he would govern for the benefit of the middle class. But he blurted out the truth about which interests he actually represents when he told friends at his $200,00-a-year Mar-a-Lago club, “You all just got a lot richer.”

Friday Nite Videos | August 25, 2017

Portside
Nuclear Waste | John Oliver. Guy Davis | 'Walk On'. ‘If Mexico Is Paying for the Wall, Why Shut Down the Government?' Weekend Update: Pete Davidson on Colin Kaepernick. Trump Pardons Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

Nuclear Waste | John Oliver

Nuclear waste poses a serious threat to public health if it's not stored in a safe place. John Oliver explains why the United States desperately needs to build a metaphorical toilet for all that waste.

How the Light Gets In

H. Patricia Hynes Portside
In these times of climate change denial, macho military chest-beating, stagnant wages, and soulless extremes of wealth and poverty, light-bearing cracks are all that we have. The northern Great Plains, likely the richest wind regime in the world, the potential of tribal wind power exceeds 300 gigawatts across six states, according to the Department of Energy. This motherlode is equivalent to about half of the current electrical generating capacity in the United States.

Drowning the World in Oil - Trump's Carbon-Obsessed Energy Policy and the Planetary Nightmare to Come

Michael T. Klare Tom Dispatch
Donald Trump, at war with the American safety net, and the environment, not to mention the planet -- and that's before we even get to actual war, which will be overseen by a crew of Islamo- and Irano-phobes. If, as Klare points out today, Trump himself has a serious case of nostalgia for the America of his youth, with its untrammeled growth and its fossil-fueled wonders, don't think that nostalgia doesn't include military affairs, and future military adventures and wars.

Why Standing Rock Is a Test for Obama—And All Climate Choices Ahead

Mark Trahant Yes! Magazine
The people who are camped at Standing Rock are giving President Obama the opportunity to show how a managed decline in the use of fossil fuels is possible. And, if done right, inspiring. As the president said, “This gives us the best possible shot to save the one planet we’ve got.”

Nuclear Power Plant? Or Storage Dump for Hot Radioactive Waste?

Robert Alvarez Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The basic approach undertaken in this country for the storage and disposal of spent nuclear fuel needs to be fundamentally revamped. Instead of waiting for problems to arise, the NRC and the Energy Department need to develop a transparent and comprehensive road map identifying the key elements of—and especially the unknowns associated with—interim storage, transportation, repackaging, and final disposal of all nuclear fuel.
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