The Sustainability Education and Economic Development (SEED) initiative, created by the American Association of Community Colleges‘ (AACC), is launching the SEED Green Action Plan Series, a series of models and resources for colleges looking to incorporate sustainability measures into their campuses. SEED was...
Image Info: US Army personnel with solar panels in Africa
With all the news about solar power lately, I thought it would be useful to go back to how solar panels work.
The short description goes something like this: Silicon is mounted beneath non-reflective glass to produce photovoltaic (PV) panels that collect photons from the sun and convert them into DC electrical power. That DC power then flows into an inverter, which transforms it into basic AC (...
Woody Guthrie put it best when he sang, "This land is your land." Until, that is, someone steals it from you. And from the redwood forests to the New York island, that's exactly what could happen if we don't stop an extreme bill in Congress that would essentially turn over 50 million acres of publicly owned wildlands to oil, gas, and mining companies for drilling, mining, logging, road construction, and other destructive development.
Wilderness that represents the historical, geological, and ecological diversity of the United States, from iconic red rock...
Image Info:
SOURCE: AP/Paul Sakuma
A sign advertises gasoline prices at a Chevron gas station in Mountain View, California,
View Big Oil's cash assets and profits (.xls)
On September 19 President Barack Obama announced his plan to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion over the next 12 years, including raising $1.5 trillion by closing special interest loopholes and other revenue raisers. This...
The New York Times reported earlier this week that oil companies drilling in the North Dakota shales are flaring off more than 100 million cubic feet of natural gas per day, enough energy to heat half a million homes. As one expert put it, “this is not what you would expect a civilized, efficient society to do: to flare off a perfectly good product just because it’s expensive to bring to market.”
...
The nation’s top climatologist, NASA’s James Hansen, has a new paper out — and he has been speaking out. At...
The U.S. has a hodge-podge of utility, state and federal tax-based incentives. The Germans have a comprehensive feed-in tariff, providing CLEAN contracts (in the U.S. parlance) to anyone who wants to go solar (or wind, or biogas, etc). What does that mean for the price of solar?
From a study of U.S. solar prices reported in Renewables International:
Perhaps most surprisingly, the study found that the planned...
The respected Pew Charitable Trusts is out with a report that won’t surprise EarthTechling readers who have noticed the steady stream of stories we’ve published about the increasingly green ways of the U.S. military. That said, the paper, “From Barracks to the Battlefield: Clean Energy Innovation and America’s Armed Forces,” is valuable for pulling together the many strands of clean-energy investment the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) is doing.
For instance: Pew...
Photo credit: American Vision Solar
Google’s director of Green Business Operations Rick Needham announced the Internet search and technology leader will invest $75 million to create an initial fund with Clean Power...
Image credit: Westinghouse Solar
The price of solar photovoltaic (PV) power modules has fallen drastically over the past year and more. Looking to capitalize on that trend, Westinghouse Solar announced...
New legislation recently introduced in Congress could mean thousands of new jobs and energy savings nationwide. U.S. Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland and Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho are co-sponsoring the Energy-Efficient Cool Roof Jobs Act.
The proposed legislation offers incentives that encourage the...
In my climate change course, we devote a week to discussing climate and past civilizations. Among the goals of that week is to erase the notion that climate change is inherently "bad", or inherently "good", from the student's minds. The effects of climate change on any system, whether a society or an ecosystem, depends on the adaptive capacity and the rate of the climate change. The same climate change that spelled the end of the Norse...
When there is an enormous revenue stream at stake, actions taken to delay making any changes can produce a good return on investment. There is no doubt in my mind that people interested in prolonging fossil fuel dominance over the world economy have taken action to insert doubt in the public consciousness about the hazard of an increasing rate of atmospheric CO2 dumping.
Contrary to the often stated canard that addressing climate change would require a huge, expensive...
OTEC is a technology that has been discussed and extensively researched until recently by the US government. Now OTE Corporation (@OTEcorporation on twitter) and Bahamas Electricity Company, announced that they...
For those of you who did not know, our military spends a lot of money to support itself. One of its biggest expenses is its huge appetite for energy. Specifically, according to Colonel Dan Nolan, “The DOD is the world’s largest oil consumer,” accounting for 25% of the globe’s consumption. Due to that need for oil, Colonel Nolan says that this is the first time since the Civil War that our country is funding both sides of a war.
...
In 2010, $8.1 billion was spent globally on smart technology in cities in the US, and within the next five years, that number is projected to jump to $39.5 billion, greatly expanding the capacity for smart city projects around the world. Currently, there are 102 smart cities in the world. Europe has the most at 38, with North America following closely with 35. Asia has 21, the Middle East and Africa combined have six, and South and Central America have two. The “...
Consumers are most likely to support smart grid technologies if it saves them money. That’s just one of the findings of a 2011 Consumer Pulse Survey conducted for Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative. The second most motivating factor for supporting smart grid technology is to avoid wasting energy, according to respondents.
The study included in-depth...
by Shannon Roxborough, September 23, 2011
Even as Congressional leaders continue to drag their feet on clean energy and many states keep renewables...
Subway systems consume enormous amounts of energy. To further complicate things, they usually require energy in short, intense jolts. For example, to get a ten-car subway train moving from a standing start might require a 30-second charge of three to four megawatts. Now, a company says they’ve come up with a new technology to harvest the wasted energy consumed by these systems.
Vycon Energy, a California-based company that specializes in energy storage systems, says that their advanced...
by...
Export dollars per job in the clean economy are almost double those in the broader economy. Median wages are nearly 20% higher.
Energy efficiency saves us bucket-loads of cash, but it also creates jobs for our...
A recently released solar map of New York City found enough room on building rooftops for solar panels to power half the city during hours of peak electricity use. Taking...
This is the first of three posts I am finishing up from my trip to Gridweek last week. Gridweek is one of three smartgrid conferences put together by Clasma, whose own Anto Budiardjo is a TEC blogger.
As you will hear more about in my upcoming posts, the mettle of...
In late August Siemens and the Swedish automobile manufacturer Volvo announced a comprehensive strategic partnership to promote the development of electric cars. Now Siemens presents its huge range of products in the field of e-mobility at the International Motor Show IAA in Frankfurt, Germany. At this important fair which will last until 25 September I met Michael Valentine-Urbschat, CEO of Siemens Business Unit "Inside Electric Car" and Roland Edel, Vice President and CTO for...
By Bob Deans, Natural Resources Defense Council
House Republicans are using the failure of Solyndra, the solar panel maker, to launch a political broadside, attacking President Obama and his visionary program to promote energy efficiency, renewable power and American jobs.
Solyndra’s bankruptcy has raised important questions. The FBI and others will find the answers. If there’s been misconduct, those responsible will be held to account.
In attacking green jobs, though, House Republicans are...
The latest RealClimate post, which describes the latest ice melt data from Greenland, features this really important figure. It illustrates an issue that arises every semester in my climate change course, and is, in a sense, fundamental to understanding to biogeochemical cycles and issues like why carbon is accumulated in the atmosphere.
The...
If the world is going to add a plethora of electric vehicles to its grids -- and all evidence suggests that is the very near future of transportation -- those grids and those cars are going to have to be very smart.
...
The drive to stem the use of coal for power production in the U.S. has gained considerable traction over the past decade. According to some sources, coal power holds the title of the single largest source of air pollution in the country while its supply chain contaminates every resource that it touches. Removing coal from our energy portfolio is one of the greatest ...
By Christine Souza, California Farm Bureau Federation
As energy planners and utilities look for ways to meet a California mandate that one-third of the state’s electricity come from renewable energy by 2020, developers increasingly look at productive farmland as sites for large-scale solar installations.
In one of the state’s most productive agricultural regions, the Central Valley from San Joaquin County to Kern County, about 33,000 acres worth of solar projects have been proposed to the California Energy Commission.
...
The Peppermill Resort Spa Casino in Reno, Nev., features 1,635 luxurious rooms and suites, two Tuscan-inspired pools, nine award-winning restaurants, sixteen themed bars and lounges, free nightly entertainment, 24/7 gaming action and a 43,000-square-foot Spa and Fitness Center with an indoor pool, sun deck and a Secret Garden.
Since 2007, the Peppermill has used geothermal energy...
Nobody likes to see $500 million in taxpayer funds lost. But as Congress investigates the loan guarantee given to the now-bankrupt solar manufacturer Solyndra, it’s important to put the failed loan into historical context.
America spends a staggering amount on the military (see ...
Consider the following three developments:
In the Arctic, ...
As sustainability leaders continually step up their game when it comes to tracking, managing and reducing energy use, they almost always hit a significant roadblock: Actually getting their energy use data from utilities.
...
I wrote in last week’s column about the three most interesting insights into the future of grid-connected energy storage offered last week at the 2011 NAATBatt Annual Meeting and Conference by David Mohler, chief technology officer of Duke Energy. It occurred to me after posting my article that I neglected one other important insight. The fourth insight came not from David’s speech but from where he went after his speech: David is in China this week exploring...
Following years of steady improvement in carbon emissions, energy efficiency and sustainability R&D spending, U.K. companies have seen a backslide during the last year, a sign illustrating the challenges they face in boosting the bottom line without growing their environmental footprints.
...
Practically every day we report on cleantech breakthroughs coming out of government labs, the private sector and universities. Before those new insights can be deployed, however, they need to be tested – which is where Pegasus Global Holdings hopes to enter the picture, and in a pretty wild way.
The firm...
With all the bad economic news and political turbulence in the US, it's been easy to lose track of the sovereign debt crisis in Europe, which appears to be spreading from smaller, peripheral countries like Greece to affect the banking systems of core European Union members like Italy and France. To read ...
It is no secret that wind energy is inherently intermittent. And when the wind is blowing the hardest — often at night when demand is at its lowest — there is no guarantee there will be demand for the electricity, or a place to store it when there is.
In fact, the two biggest technological hurdles to making windpower a reliable contributor to the electric grid are intermittency and storage. And although various storage systems have been proposed, tested or developed — ranging from giant batteries made of...
According to Pike Research, a company we cover quite a bit here at EarthTechling, over the next five years electric charging stations could top as many as 7.7 million worldwide.
The research firm says a predicted 37% drop in electric vehicle supply equipment will help spur sales. According to the data, up to 1.5 million...
The American Energy Innovation Council (AEIC)--composed of industry titans like Microsoft...
From the successes, hiccups and outright failures of utilities trying to deploy smart grid applications, those worth emulating are few. As previous posts on TheEnergyFix demonstrate, Southern California Edison is widely hailed for rolling out programs that are working. So is ...
It's not often that a $12 million investment in research can significantly advance a $60 billion market, and even rarer that anyone given a choice would decide to scrap it.
But that's exactly what...
A new study measuring the impact of building codes on household energy consumption found that building energy codes have actually reduced household energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. The Climate Policy Initiative (CPI) study looked at states energy usage from 1986 to 2008 and found that states that...
Just when it seemed like the debate about repealing oil and gas subsidies had faded away, President Obama gave the issue new life. Speaking at the White House yesterday, Obama proposed cutting certain tax credits to profitable oil and gas companies to pay for part of his $467 billion job-creation package.
“The bottom line is, when it comes to strengthening the...
“In addition to new energy efficiencies, we’ll be looking at social efficiencies.” -- Erich Gunther, Chief Technology Officer, EnerNex.
Gunther described the many changes he foresees in the future, including the drastic improvements in energy and social efficiencies -- referencing shared car services and public charging stations, just to name two -- during the opening Tuesday...
Plugging in an electric car very well and environmentally good, but what about the emissions reductions of connecting a large yacht or even an entire cruise ship to the grid? Currently, ships must burn fuel to maintain onboard systems, even at port. Linking just one cruise ship at port to the electricity grid could prevent the equivalent CO2 emissions of 2,500 cars. [Infographic]
Over 90 percent of the world’s cargo is transported by...
Cai Steger, Energy Policy Analyst, New York, Center for Market Innovation
Last week, Representatives Fred Upton and Cliff Stearns stated the following regarding the Solyndra bankruptcy:
"President Obama's signature green jobs program went from a darling of the administration, to bankruptcy, to now the subject of an FBI raid in a matter of days…Irresponsibly choosing...
When Americans hear about the Export-Import Bank of the United States loaning money in foreign countries, they can get a little worked up. But theoretically, at least, the bank’s programs can make sense, because they help finance the purchase of U.S. equipment, products and services in situations where commercial loans aren’t otherwise available.
Case in point: The Ex-Im is guaranteeing some $455...
By Kate Campbell, California Farm Bureau Federation
With harvest in full swing, trucks laden with bell peppers, watermelon and onions unloaded at a rapid pace last week at Morada Produce near Linden. Crews washed and packed the produce into boxes before a chain of forklifts carried the market-bound food to coolers.
Harvest activity is being played out across California right now, but there’s something different about Morada Produce: The company’s energy-intensive packing and cooling activities are costing a fraction of what electricity bills...
The iconic Empire State Building, whose green retrofit and refurbishing have become almost as celebrated as the landmark, earned LEED-Gold certification today.
The...
Silicon Valley is well known for its exciting new technology. For nearly 20 years, one builder has followed the Silicon Valley way by continuously innovating.
...
I had a completely different topic in mind for today's posting, but I'll have to come back to the energy implications of a potential European financial crisis later. Since President Obama's jobs speech to Congress last week I have been awaiting the text of the actual proposed bill, rather...
Illinois Governor Pat Quinn (D) has ...
Technology transfer and R&D efforts in the past few years say they are thinking hard about it
Everyone familiar with China's civilian nuclear energy program knows that there are three principal sources of technology coming into the country.
The first is the Russian VVER, a 1000 MW reactor which also comes in a 1200 MW model.
...
Recently formed ...
With the solar photovoltaic (PV) industry in a...
The United Nations has a stake in reduced greenhouse gases on a global scale, and as part of its climate mitigation strategies has recently launched a green hotel toolkit designed to help hoteliers go green while cutting operational expenses.
This new online toolkit, called Hotel Energy Solutions, will help hotels evaluate their energy...
Energy Star tends to be the entry-level certifcation for green buildings, and now, a new class of structures are eligible to bear the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency‘s green seal of approval: new multifamily high-rise residential buildings.
To...
In the last few weeks, it seems like every other day there’s been a different negative story about jobs in the new clean economy. I responded to an...
Solar power is a growth industry. More and more photovoltaic (PV) cells are visible on rooftops every day. Large projects are starting across the world and research continues to search for ways to make PV cells faster, cheaper and more efficient. But exactly how big is the global solar cell market? Just how big is this thing going to get?
According to a...
In 2003, several years after all the other manufacturing plants ceased production of the iconic Volkswagen Beetle, the last old style (Type 1) Volkswagen Beetle rolled off an assembly line in Pueblo, Mexico. After 21 million Beetles were manufactured worldwide, the long and storied career of the Type 1 VW Beetle finally came to an end. Or did it.
Although Volkswagen resurrected the Beetle with a totally redesigned "New Beetle" in 1998, Motorward reports that...
There are currently two glaring problems facing the integration of electric vehicles and renewable-energy generation into the existing grid infrastructure: unreliability of intermittent resources like solar and wind power, and end-of-life options for spent EV batteries. A forthcoming initiative from Electrovaya, a Canadian manufacturer of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, aims to find a single solution to both of these problems.
...
Google this week dumped a massive amount of data about how much energy it uses (a lot), and how efficiently the company uses it (quite).
As per usual with Google, the news came out via a...
This is a guest post by Joel Freeling of Shaw Environmental.
The number of energy finance programs has increased dramatically in recent years. As the variety of programs expanded, so too has the diversity of financial institutions participating in local programs. Each of these different types of financiers has specific strengths, weaknesses, and areas of focus. Only by understanding these unique...
Last night, President Obama unveiled his much-anticipated program, the $447 billion American Jobs Act, to jumpstart the faltering American economy. Here's my reaction.
...
The U.S. Army just clinched a deal that will move the military branch closer to its goal of using 25 percent renewable energy by 2025.
The Army will use private financing to install rooftop solar installations on as many 160,000 privatized military residences in 33 states. To put this in perspective, industry research suggests there are about 166,000 PV installations in the U.S., so the Army deal...
The ...
10,000+. That’s now over the number of commercial buildings that have been certified Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). The Green Building Certification Institute recently announced it’s 10,000th LEED commercial project.
The LEED green building program was created in 2000 and is now seen as a global symbol of green building...
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is embarking on a massive loan program to upgrade rural electric cooperative utilities. The improvements will include funding for smart grid technologies as well as improvements to generation and transmission facilities.
The $900 million in loans will go to 14 states and will help electric utilities upgrade, expand, maintain and replace rural America’s electric infrastructure. The funding will help build...
Click HERE to view map full size.
In the vacuum left by the U.S. Congress' inability/unwillingness to pass climate change legislation, and in light of a looming budgetary squeeze for all federal agencies, including/especially those researching and developing systems to the environment and natural resources, one might think that any federal money for a program that positions climate change...
You’ve read the statistics and you know you should be using energy-saving lightbulbs, but you’re still confused on which kind is best for you. Never fear. Consumer Reports just released a comprehensive report reviewing 30 different compact fluorescents and light-emitting diode bulbs.
Their tests show that many of the problems with early CFL and LED bulbs...
Could a green island in the middle of Cairo that’s been developed in recent years be preserved as an ecological zone with — more development? It may sound unlikely, but the El Warrak Cairo Trio Tower concept by Mans-Our Studio, WHM Design, Wahag Studio and designer Mohamed Sarha is nothing if not ambitious.
This green building concept design takes the edict of urban density...
Building energy codes, a staple among the policies regulating construction, yield solid reductions in consumption and emissions, according to research that examined hard data on energy use in states with codes on the books.
...
German-based E.ON AG's (Xetra: EOAN) North...
Although still being outpaced by the all-electric Nissan LEAF in terms of North American sales, the new Chevy Volt from General Motors is bringing fresh faces into dealerships around the country — or at least at...
Firms which are eligible for Climate Change Agreements (CCAs) should find it easier to comply and some will save money under new Government proposals. However, the...
In addition to reducing carbon footprint, empowering customers to more cost-efficiently manage their energy usage and fueling new business opportunities, the Smart Grid offers tremendous promise in terms of improving the reliability and availability of electricity service. Increased reliance on “microgrids” is one way how.
In a microgrid, a utility concentrates perhaps a wide array of distributed-generation technologies—diesel, fuel cells, natural-gas-...
Some nights I have trouble sleeping because I start “day” dreaming while trying to go to sleep. Last night it was about developing a solution to deliver clean water to the ultra-poor who live near salty or brackish water. We usually write about water conservation for rich Americans. You know, how to get...
Frances Beinecke, President of NRDC, New York City
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s memo outlining the GOP jobs plan was certainly timely. Our economy is facing towering challenges that call for bold, constructive ideas. Too bad Cantor’s proposed solutions are nothing more than a repackaged anti-government screed that seeks to help the pollution industry by repealing environmental and public health standards.
In the...
From activist Bill McKibben to actress Daryl Hannah, about 600 people have been arrested so far this week at the White House. They're protesting a planned tar sands pipeline cutting from the Canadian border all the way down to Texas.
Al Gore explains why a bipartisan coalition has come together to...
By David Metcalfe, August 31, 2011
In today's (more or less) post-recession market, CIOs and other senior IT decision makers are under pressure to do more with less. The demands on IT solutions are escalating, but execs are unable, or unwilling, to let technology budgets expand at the same speed.
...
Last Wednesday was a big milestone for people who care about public health and a livable climate. Two utilities announced the planned closure of nine coal plants.
Read more ...
Today, in the UK, the world's oldest nuclear power plant shut down.
Read more ...
The U.S. led the world in clean energy investment in 2011, but China retained the top spot in the latest Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index from Ernst & Young.
Read more ...
Today's morning news roundup - all the energy and climate coverage you need to read.
Read more ...
