Bloomberg: Musk Reboots Tesla's China Strategy
A year ago, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk was greeted by rapturous crowds in Beijing and Shanghai as he handed over the keys to Tesla sedans. Now he’s back in China, and this time he’s on the defensive, trying to explain why sales have softened after starting so briskly.
In an interview with state media, Musk, 43, made a startling admission: there’s a backlog of unsold Teslas around the country because people he dubbed "speculators" ordered cars and never bought them.
As Musk huddles with his China team, Tesla is rushing to expand its network of charging stations to assuage range anxiety, add luxury features that suit local tastes, and retrain a sales force Musk previously described as “brain-dead.”
Public Radio International: Natural Gas and Solar Have Been Growing Together. Can That Last?
If photovoltaic seems more ornamental than a serious energy contender, the data over the past two years shows a dramatic increase in photovoltaic generation.
Both natural gas and photovoltaic costs have plunged in recent years. Some utility-scale photovoltaic projects in the West have power generation comparable to natural gas plants in the hundreds of megawatts and were built at costs competitive with other energy sources. At the same time, natural gas production is growing fast due to hydraulic fracturing and plummeting costs.
All this leads to a big question: As natural gas grows, will it clip solar’s success -- or can the two be collaborators in creating a less carbon-intense energy system?
Breaking Energy: Why It’s OK to Hate Solar
It’s OK to hate solar. I don’t, but I can see why some people might. It is, after all, a form of insurance -- and who likes insurance?
Solar is our planet’s insurance policy. While technology can help hedge against the negative impacts on the environment as a result of climate change, solar does it with additional benefits such as greater energy independence and a healthier economy.
Los Angeles Times: 4 Years After Fukushima, Japan Considers Restarting Nuclear Facilities
Nearly four years after Japan shut down all of its atomic energy plants in the wake of the disaster, the country is inching toward a momentous decision on whether to bring some of them back on-line, perhaps within the next year.
Such a move would have been unthinkable immediately after the disaster, which struck terror in the hearts of many Japanese and caused concern around the world. Though nuclear power provided 30% of Japan's energy before the accident, the government of then-Prime Minister Naoto Kan called on the country to give up its reliance on the technology, and opinion surveys showed that up to three-quarters of the public supported such a move.
USA Today: Corporate Bonds Show Green Shoots
Politicians may disagree over the need to address climate change, but companies and investors are increasingly financing technologies that provide energy more efficiently and cleanly.
Among the latest indications is a report from Standard & Poor's Rating Services on green bonds, a relatively new financing instrument, and one that is suddenly attracting attention from corporations around the world.
Citing data from the Climate Bonds Initiative, a nonprofit group based in London, S&P said the market for green bonds more than tripled in 2014 to $36.6 billion and could reach $100 billion in 2015.