Stories by David Biello

Failure by the two presidents to discuss climate change leaves China ahead, based on actions if not words

Scientists and engineers are trying inventions such as artificial trees to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere

The DNA, found in museum and frozen specimens, would boost the species’s diversity

It converts CO₂ in the air into alcohol that can be burned as fuel

A new device that combines chemistry and synthetic biology could prove key to renewable fuels and even chemicals—and combating climate change

You just have to ask them the right way, Tom Vilsack says in an interview 

Cellulosic ethanol continues to struggle to use inedible crop waste to match ethanol from corn—and fossil fuels

Your battery-powered vehicle is only as green as your electricity supplier

As hoped-for precipitation from El Niño falls short, Los Angeles resorts to a controversial method to reap water from the sky

Oil firms might pay to use CO₂ emissions from power plants, but low petroleum prices could doom the effort

The world may have seen the last of air with CO2 levels below 400 parts per million

The fate of what might prove to be the most important technology for solving global warming—carbon capture and storage—is floundering

What is Bill Gates betting on to provide the world with cheap, clean, reliable energy?

Scientific American's energy and environment editor, David Biello, met with Bill Gates on February 22 to discuss tackling carbon emissions while at the same time making necessary energy available to ever more of the globe’s growing population.

How will the fight over corn ethanol affect the Republican vote in Iowa?

Scientists find a layer of plastics, radiation and soot embedded in the planet's surface, defining a new Anthropocene epoch

Every credible plan for reducing global warming hinges on carbon-trapping technology playing a major role. That doesn't seem likely

A terrible earthquake, massive drought and nuclear power captured the imagination this year

Ethanol, saltwater and fermentation all get involved

A brief portion of the December 9 conversation during the climate talks in France between Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz and Scientific American’s David Biello

The Paris pact represents the first worldwide effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in next decade

U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz tells Scientific American how to achieve massive deployment of clean-energy technology

Among its goals, the coalition of countries, including the U.S., wants an agreement that the world must aim as soon as possible to hold global warming to 1.5-degree Celsius and work toward a long-term low-carbon future

Planet-wide geoengineering schemes might work—or backfire. Either way, there is no getting around the need to reduce CO₂ in the atmosphere