Floating solar panels could provide over a third of global electricity
Panels on reservoirs can keep enough water for 300 million people from evaporating.
Cities & Planning
How saving the rainforests could prevent the next pandemic | Grist
Artifical Intelligence and Climate Change
With Heat From Heat Pumps, US Energy Requirements Could Plummet By 50% - CleanTechnica
About 80% of the energy requirements of a fully electrified society with heat pumps everywhere possible already exist. Electrification and heat pumps radically reduce the requirement to build new wind, solar, nuclear, hydro and geothermal primary energy sources.
Kenya to combat rural energy access gap with over 130 solar minigrids
Kenya’s government plans to build 137 solar minigrids across remote locations in the East African country. The project received $150 million in funding from the World Bank.
Metro Launches the H Line, its First RapidRide Line in Nine Years
This weekend King County Metro starts service on the RapidRide H line, running between Downtown Seattle and Burien. The seventh RapidRide line and the first launched since the RapidRide F in 2014, …
Permanent Elegance of NY’s Flatiron Building
Flatiron Building in New York is coming up for auction soon. I learned about that when I posted a photo of the Flatiron Building being constructed on a social network. It triggered a chain of thoug…
What You Don’t Understand About Seattle’s Light Rail Expansion May Doom the System
There is no spine. There is no Ballard to West Seattle extension. There is no one coming to save us. By 2042, Seattle should have four Link light rail lines covering downtown and branching out to R…
Climate in the United States
The United States has experienced a wide variety of extreme weather over the last 125 years, impacting people, communities, and geographies. Track monthly data on how counties experience severe weather, including precipitation and temperature.
U.S. home heating is fractured in surprising ways: Look up your neighborhood
The split shows that much of the South, and rural America, could ditch fossil fuels easier than big cities and the coasts.
Cherry Blossom Brouhaha Obscures Missed Opportunities on Pike and Pine Streets
A long-planned street revamp in downtown Seattle made headlines this month when a group of preservation advocates, many aligned with Pike Place Market, pushed back on the planned removal of two row…
The concrete that helps the climate
Concrete is the defining material of the Anthropocene and takes a terrible toll on the climate. Martha Henriques goes in search of the ways it could be better for the climate.
In the once-cool forests of the Pacific Northwest, heat poses a new threat | Grist
Example projects | Urban green-blue grids
Green-blue urban grids make cities sustainable, resilient and climate-proof. This website will help to find fitting measures and inspires with attractive examples.
One Queens activist resorts to a hunger strike in long-running fight over a city building - Gothamist
How The Netherlands Built a Biking Utopia
In the 60s and 70s the Dutch government was building car-centered cities. Here's how and why they pivoted.
The Future of Cities: The Texas Triangle | Newgeography.com
How to revitalize Downtown Seattle, according to Crosscut readers
They envision the neighborhood with fewer cars and more walkability, affordable housing, green infrastructure, restaurants and businesses.
Funding Request Would Plan 200 Mile Trail Connection At Seattle’s Doorstep
An impressively long list of governments on the Kitsap and Olympic peninsulas have joined together to jointly request funding finish a 200-mile biking and walking trail that will connect the Pacifi…
Agroecology is a poverty solution in Haiti (commentary)
Haiti is facing a profound political and economic crisis. Functional governance that serves the interests of Haiti’s people is largely nonexistent. One of the necessities to overcome this crisis is transitioning from the extractive environmental and economic model that has long plagued the country to one that is regenerative and good for Haitians and their […]
Astronomy on the Flats: How the Moons of Mars and the Death of a President Altered the Late Nineteenth-Century Washington, DC, Landscape
Editor’s note: This post is part of our theme for March 2023, Science City, an exploration of the ways cities and science have interacted over time and around the world. By Vincent Femia Simo…
Energy Colonialism Will Worsen the Urban-Rural Divide | Newgeography.com
Safety Strategies Abound for Rainier Valley Link, Yet Urgency to Implement Lags
Rainier Valley has seen more than its due share of collisions over the years. Martin Luther King Jr. Way S is a particularly problematic spot where serious injuries and fatalities are common. Inter…
Constantine Backs ‘North of CID’ Light Rail Station, Bypassing Chinatown and Midtown
King County Executive Dow Constantine has sided with those seeking to site light rail outside of the Chinatown-International District (CID). In his annual State of the County speech yesterday, Cons…
Washington Governor Jay Inslee Mandates An All-Electric State | Newgeography.com
WA’s Missing Middle Legislation Threatened by Grab Bag of Municipal Excuses
Almost every single Monday or Tuesday night of 2023 has seen city councils in cities of all sizes across Washington meet with a common topic on agenda after agenda: House Bill 1110. The bill has be…
The case for 15-minute cities
A "15-minute city," where all essentials are 15 minutes away by foot or bike has come under fire from conspiracy theorists.
How H-town got its Hustle
If you look at a map, New Orleans looks like a natural place to put the Gulf of Mexico’s largest port. It feeds right into the Mississippi River. Yet it
Everett Link Must Think Out of the Box to Avoid Generational Errors
This is a second installment examining the Everett Link Extension alternatives currently undergoing scoping. The first piece focused on station and station area alignment alternatives. This second …
Freight Advisory Board Isn’t Ready To Stop Fighting West Marginal Way Bike Lane
In January, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) announced that after over two years of planning, it intends to finally install a permanent bike lane along a short stretch of West Margin…