Joseph Romm also has an interesting article about how we might go about stabilizing the CO2 to the level recommended by the IPCC at 450 ppm.
Some think we need to reach 350 ppm to be safe. These two links cover it.
http://climateprogress.org/2008/04/08/the-technologies-needed-to-beat-450-ppm-part-1/

http://climateprogress.org/2008/03/31/is-450-ppm-carbon-dioxide-politically-possible-1/

I have been following the solar thermal story for the past year, and Joseph Romm’s article convinced me of what I already thought.

We have the technology. At least 8 companies are ready to get busy building them
Solar thermal plants can store heat in molten salt, oils or water. They can provide steady power day and night. They are perfectly suited to the daily energy demand cycle. They are cost competitive, especially when they get up to scale. They can be air cooled or water cooled.
They are low tech, using readily available building materials. The salts are basically harmless and abundant. When they are water cooled they can also purify water, like brackish or polluted water. This would be a boon to countries like India. Large areas of the world are suitable, including the mideast, large areas of China, India, North Africa, Australia, Mexico etc.
1% of the Sahara desert could power the whole world. 3% of Morocco could power all of Europe. 8% of federal lands in Nevada could power the U.S.
Photovoltaics as distributed power all over the country added to the solar plants in the southwest gives you solar on a vast scale. Add in wind and most of the problem is solved.
Once you have a clean energy grid it can power cars too. In the meantime we can move toward plug in hybrids and electric cars. Plug in hybrids would give the average driver 100mpg overall.

As we phase out coal, this will free up large amounts of rail freight capacity.
Rail is much more efficient at long distance hauling than trucks. Trucks can be hybrids too.

Biomass to methane is another contribution that kills two birds with one stone, capturing methane, a strong greenhouse gas and using it for power, either burning it or in fuel cells.

Ships could save 10-30% on fuel by adopting parasails like the Skysail.
They are cheap. Another company in the U.S. is Kiteship. The Skysail can provide 6800 hp. Look them up.

Wind and solar are much faster and cheaper to get up and running than nuclear plants.
http://www.theleaneconomyconnection.net/downloads.html#Nuclear
This article shows why nuclear is completely non sustainable.

One of nuclears biggest weaknesses is that it needs enormous amounts of water for cooling.

Argonne National Lab says that an airliner crashing into a nuclear power plant could cause a complete meltdown, even if the containment building isn’t compromised. Think the twin towers was bad?

Oh and then there’s peak uranium, coming soon. read the article

The renewable energy plans that I have read all seem to have a lot in common. I am referring to the plan at Repower American,
Set America Free,
the Solar Grand Plan article in Scientific American,
partially T. Boone Pickens’ plan(the windpower part of it)
Plug in hybrid and electric vehicles
solar power plants in the southwest
wind farms in the midwest and Texas
biomass to methane
biofuels

http://rael.berkeley.edu/ebamm

Second, the full analysis of the energy balance and the carbon content of biofuels for transportation is going on right now here in California as we develop the Low Carbon Fuel Standard. Much of this
will appear online at the California Energy Commision site energy.ca.state.us

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There seems to be all of this buyin to the concept that Renewable Fuels equals Greenhouse Gas reduction. Isn’t our carbon dioxide problem more related to our level and intensity of fuel combustion utilization and our trashing of carbon sinks than to what type of fuel we use?

Is it time for a thought experiment?? Suppose we replaced all fossil fuel combustion tomorrow with the same level of biomass combustion…. From the standpoint of carbon dioxide, would the atmosphere-biosphere be better off? I have my doubts. While getting rid of “new” fossil fuel introduced carbon dioxide, we would likely be interfering with long term carbon sequestration in nature.

We have to get our carbon-climate management policies right, now, on the first try. Let us see the models that tell us more about fossil fuel vs. biomass-created carbon dioxide emissions and its consequences.