April 2010 Archives
Apr 30 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
The fight against global warming received some support from many American leaders quite familiar with preparing for battle. 33 retired U.S. military generals and admirals sent a letter to Senate leadership and placed an ad in targeted publications which states climate change is threatening national security. The communication details how the clean energy industry can supplant our dependence on foreign oil and create millions of domestic jobs in the process.
The beach is almost out of reach - and the EPA resident expert on sea level rise claims global warming is responsible for removing most of the sand from a common summertime east coast hangout near Washington DC. Jim Titus asserts natural sinking of the shoreline and slow but steady sea-level rise, mostly due to climate change, has driven the bay’s water more than a foot higher over the past century. Now, the following account from a 1900 brochure is inaccurate. “The bathing beach has a frontage of three miles, and is equal, if not superior, to any beach on the Atlantic Coast.” Not anymore.
A prominent green winemaker claims global warming should be studied and acted on but not necessarily for the health of his grapes. John Williams, the founder of Frog’s Leap in Napa Valley claims he’s worried about climate change for the sake of humanity and not the sake of cabernet. And Williams has done his fair share in reducing his impact. He’s installed 1,000 solar panels on the winery, his heating and cooling comes from a geothermal system and he refuses to install an irrigation system. Still scientists project the premium wine-grape production in Napa could decline substantially over the next 50 years due to global warming and few winemakers are making changes to protect their business. “Most of us are not very good at recognizing our risks until we are hit by them,” said one British climate expert.
Apr 30 2010
Several items relating to the business and technology of clean energy and the environment caught our attention this week:
Crowded cities are taking steps to convert congested streets into pedestrian malls and small miniparks and plazas. San Francisco's Pavement to Parks program is developing miniplazas near intersections in the city's Castro, SoMa and Mission districts and eyeing other neighborhoods for parklets. New York is building on the large popular pedestrian malls in Times Square and Herald Square to develop a $30 million east-west mall on 34th Street from Fifth to Sixth Avenues between Macy's and the Empire State Building. The goal is to discourage driving in Manhattan and encourage more mass transit.
A bill to change California insurance laws to allow car owners to rent out their vehicles in a car-sharing program was introduced this week by Assemblyman Dave Jones. Car-sharing is popular in urban neighborhoods but allowing personal cars to enter the programs could attract more people. "This is an opportunity to expand it, not only in our urban cores, but into suburbia," says Rick Hutchison, CEO of City CarShare, a Bay Area nonprofit organization. Spride, a San Francisco car-share startup, would work with City CarShare to test personal car sharing in the Bay Area if the legislation becomes law.
U.S. offices score low or average marks for being environmentally friendly, according to a survey of office workers in 16 cities by IBM Corp. Fewer than a third of office workers said their buildings are environmentally friendly, Reuters reports, while more than a third said their buildings were average. Fourteen percent said their offices use renewable energy, 60 percent said they do not and 26 percent did not know. IBM said half of the electricity going into office buildings is wasted, such as lights left on. Workers in San Francisco and Seattle, however, rated their buildings as very environmentally friendly.
Apr 29 2010
My colleague Joe Molica filed this report:
Once again, the time approaches to band the baby peregrine falcons who are the latest offspring of birds of prey that nest, rent-free, on top of the PG&E headquarters building in San Francisco.
Peregrines have been using the building as a perch since the 1980s, but in 2003 they began calling it home. The utility teamed up with the UC Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group (SCPBRG) to look after the birds. The public can look at them as well, thanks to a Web cam on the nesting box.
Glenn Stewart, a senior biologist with SFPBRG, will do the banding on Monday, May 3 at noon. The bands allow scientists to learn more about the dynamics of population recovery for the endangered peregrines but don’t interfere with their lives or activities. The bands must be attached within six weeks of when they were hatched (April 8), before the falcon eyases fledge, or take their first flights from the nest.
Due to loss of habitat and DDT poisoning, the peregrine population declined by 1970 to zero known nesting pairs east of the Mississippi, and just two known nesting pairs in California. Thanks the good work of organizations like SCPBRG, today there are some 250 peregrine falcon nesting pairs in
Apr 28 2010
In an historic boost for the future of renewable energy in the United States, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar today approved the long-delayed Cape Wind project, which could well become the country’s first offshore wind generation plant.
According to the Interior Department, the project would meet three-quarters of the electricity demand of Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and
The project has been in limbo for nearly a decade due to opposition from residents (including the late Senator Ted Kennedy), local environmentalists, Indian tribes and others. Scott Brown, the newly elected Republican senator from
But the project, if successful, could help unlock the vast potential for offshore wind energy on the East Coast of the
According to estimates by the Department of Energy, offshore wind resources could generate as much as 900 GW of power.
A recent study for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory concluded that the
While rival parties in the
Ironically, even
According to Renewable Energy World, “The Jones Act precludes any European based specialty vessel from taking part in commerce in
Don’t you love it?
Apr 27 2010
As
With its enormous population and double-digit economic growth,
The good news (unless you’re a business competitor) is that
In the field of transportation,
Further evidence that the center of gravity for green manufacturing may shift to China comes from a new survey by Ernst & Young. Six in ten Chinese respondents said they would consider buying an electric or hybrid vehicle—nearly five times more than those surveyed in the United States, Japan or Western Europe. (Fewer than one in four in the United States say they would consider buying an electric car anytime soon.) Chinese respondents were also much more likely to favor subsidizing local charging stations to make electric vehicles more practical.
Now for a reality check. From Bloomberg comes news today that “Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. dealers in Beijing say they don't have enough sport-utility vehicles in stock to meet demand, while hybrid models are selling at loss-making discounts.”
Honda sold only 193 hybrid Civics in
Bottom line: it’s easy to sound virtuous in a survey. What counts is where you put your money. The world is waiting to see which way
Apr 27 2010
Over recent years, unprecedented growth in the global wireless industry has led to a mountain of toxic electronic waste. The Electronics Takeback Coalition reports that three million tons of electronics are thrown out each year, but only 16 percent is recycled.
Although cities like San Francisco have launched programs to encourage proper disposal, a survey from ABI Research shows that most US consumers will only recycle their old mobile devices if there is an incentive to do so. While 38 percent of those polled said they have at some point recycled outdated mobile handsets, nearly 70 percent of those said they had donated their old handset to a charity organization and received a charitable contribution tax deduction. According to one industry analyst, “Virtue is not seen as its own reward in this case.”
To promote more cell phone recycling, two former chief executives of two major electronics companies -- Sprint and RadioShack -- have created a firm called eRecyclingCorps. Founded last year, eRecyclingCorps is promoting large-scale consumer buy-back programs and a global after-market to support the reuse and safe recycling of wireless phones.
The new eRecycling Corps program will work in Sprint's 1,100 stores and in 1,400 of its third-party dealers.
The concept is to work with carriers to offer consumers incentives to sell back their wireless devices, creating environmental benefit and economic opportunities that reward all who participate. The company's web-based system will integrate with the carrier's point-of-sale systems, offering consumers added convenience.
Apr 26 2010
On April 5, 29 coal miners died tragically at Massey’s Upper Big Branch mine. Although the accident was one of the worst in recent history, government figures show that about as many miners die in the
While government inspectors and mine owners investigate the lessons of this disaster, some experts are calling for leaving coal in the ground and tapping its energy by drilling instead of mining.
The technique they advocate is called underground coal gasification, or UGC. First suggested in 1868, and touted by Vladimir Lenin in 1913 as a way to free workers from deadly labor in the mines, UCG is now a widely proven, though sparsely deployed, technology.
The concept is to inject oxygen deep into a coal bed until it reacts, forming heat and various gases, including carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The gases can be burned directly for energy, turned chemically into liquid fuels, or used as petrochemical feestocks.
A new draft study issued last week by the National Energy Technology Laboratory on “domestic unconventional fossil energy resource opportunities” lists UCG as one of the most promising technologies.
The report estimates the amount of coal that UCG could tap in the United States at anywhere from 226 billion short tons to 3,600 billion short tons—a huge multiple of the 18 billion short tons of recoverable coal reserves at producing mines.
Plausible estimates for the amount of natural gas that could be created through UCG range from 1,500 trillion cubic feet—equal to all potentially recoverable natural gas in the
The technique has been tested at four sites in the
One of the major patent holders on UCG technology is Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).
Studies by LLNL, Ergo Exergy Technologies and GasTech Inc. , which is developing projects in
Still, unless carbon capture methods are radically perfected, tapping all this fossil energy runs the risk of turning the earth’s climate back to something resembling what it was during the age of the dinosaurs. Unless you have a thick hide and big teeth, you'd better hope UCG becomes just a transitional measure on the way to a post-fossil-fuel world.
Apr 23 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
Volcanic ash spewing from Iceland has had an adverse effect on air travel over the last couple weeks but climate scientists don’t anticipate the volcano doing much to alter the Earth’s temperatures. A 1991 volcanic eruption in the Philippines is linked with a global surface temperature decline of one degree Fahrenheit in the two years following the eruption. Due to the incredible plume of ash in Iceland, many have wondered if a similar cool down is on the way. Climate scientists claim most of the volcanic material in Iceland has remained in the troposphere, where chemical processes and precipitation can disperse it in a matter of days, rather than entering the stratosphere where it would have a more enduring influence on the climate.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) may be changing the chemistry of the oceans and eroding coral reefs in the process. A new report released by the National Research Council asserts that the oceans are a valuable resource in the fight against global warming because they absorb CO2. But it warns the salt-water bodies are more acidic now than they’ve ever been. Scientists claim the acidity affects underwater photosynthesis, nutrient acquisition, growth, reproduction and individual survival of fish and other sea life. They also believe the rising acid levels could potentially dissolve the heart of biodiversity in the oceans, otherwise known as coral reefs.
The executive producers of the Oscar-winning 2006 film “An Inconvenient Truth,” premiered their new film about global warming at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. “Climate of Change” focuses on the efforts by individuals from around the world to reduce their personal carbon footprint while fighting business interests that threaten the environment. The director claims the movie is intended to give audiences a different feeling than its climate predecessor. "I wouldn't exactly call it a feel-good film about climate change, but the idea was not to make a film that was scary," said Brian Hill. "We've got people doing something, people reacting to the kind of messages in films like 'An Inconvenient Truth.'”
Apr 23 2010
Several items relating to the business and technology of clean energy and the environment caught our attention this week:
Green MBA programs are taking root at universities across the country, adding courses on sustainability focused on people, profits and the planet. Presidio Graduate School in San Francisco and Dominican University in San Rafael grant green MBAs, while Stanford and UC Berkeley blend social, environmental and ethical issues in graduate programs. Babson College near Boston and Columbia University's Business School offer electives on financing and valuing sustainability, including responsible investing, microfinance and development banks. Marylhurst University in Oregon has introduced an online MBA degree in sustainable business.
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom is urging citizen volunteers to join a city-wide tree census that will be the test site to develop urban forest maps for cities across the country. The tree census is an online project developed by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection with help from Friends of the Urban Forest and the city. Anyone can go on online to enter tree counts but they won't be paid. The maps will help manage areas for future plantings and tree pests and diseases.
Greentech Media has come out with a list of top 10 "Green Giants," companies in strong positions with access to capital, technological depth, managerial expertise and factory capacity: Communist Party of the People's Republic of China, General Electric, Siemens, Nissan, Dow Chemical, Panasonic, Johnson Controls and Honeywell, Wal-Mart, Veolia and Cisco. Why China? A one-party government and state-owned status of many companies and banks and $500 billion in stimulus and direct investment funds put China in the category of a market participant, says Greentech. The government also is pushing collaboration with Western developers.
Apr 22 2010
They say there’s nothing new under the sun. Well, here’s proof.
In a press release yesterday, the University of Maryland boasted that a team of “students, faculty and mentors has earned one of 20 coveted spots in the international U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2011 to be staged on the National Mall next year.”
The contest challenges university teams from around the world to design and build houses powered only by the sun.
The release goes on to tout the “beautiful, sustainable, cost-effective and durable” building materials and the reuse of “household ‘wastes’ that retain valuable energy and nutritional resources.”
But what really caught my eye was the claim that one of its unique features is “an edible wall.”
I thought this concept sounded familiar, and it was. A little checking confirmed that specifications for edible walls, indeed for entire edible residential structures, have been floating around Europe and
As oulined in the treatise Hänsel und Gretel by the Brothers Grimm, a woman of a certain age, known to her unfriendly neighbors as “witch,” lived in the forest in just such a house, made of edible and biodegradable gingerbread and confections made of renewable sucrose.
Unfortunately, her pioneering design came to a bad end when two unruly children, who had been abandoned by their evil mother, forced the old lady into the oven, locked the door and burned her to a crisp. They proceeded to eat many of the sweets upon which the house was constructed before stealing the woman’s gold coins and returning to their happy father.
The old lady’s breakthrough environment design never found a large market, probably because of bad pr. German and Russian storytellers, no doubt in the pay of some oil oligarchs, portrayed her as a cannibal who preyed on young children. However, mock-ups of her design can readily be found today on the Internet. (I got more than 1.3 million web pages when I Googled “gingerbread house.")
The
Apr 21 2010
Here at PG&E we measure energy in kilowatt-hours and therms. But there’s another kind of energy we can’t live without: calories. One big industry exists to make sure we get enough of them. Ironically, another big industry exists to make sure we don’t get too many.
Calories and kilowatt-hours might not appear to have much in common. But fascinating research on how best to minimize empty calories—and thus epidemic obesity—has great relevance for policies to minimize dirty kilowatt-hours that contribute to global warming.
A recent study published in Psychological Science by medical researchers at the University of Buffalo tracked how mothers of diverse backgrounds changed their food purchases and consumption as prices were increased (taxed) on unhealthy foods or discounted (subsidized) on healthy foods. (Healthy foods were defined as those with a low ratio of calories to nutrients—think low-fat milk as opposed to high-fructose soda.)
You might assume at first that there shouldn’t be much difference—either approach changes the relative price of healthy and unhealthy food. You would, of course, be wrong (or else why would I bother writing this post?)
In fact, when healthy foods were subsidized, the mothers increased their calorie count without significantly improving their nutrient intake. With the money they saved on healthy foods, they bought more unhealthy food, setting their families up for higher rates of obesity.
In contrast, taxing unhealthy foods reduced overall calories consumed, cutting the proportion of fat and increasing the protein content of their food. Raising the price of high-calorie-low-nutrient foods by 10 percent reduced total fats consumed by 12.8 percent and total calories by 6.5 percent.
Congress has yet to muster the votes to pass legislation that would price carbon (through taxes, fees or cap-and-trade markets). Instead, federal and state programs offer a host of subsidies—production tax credits, investment tax credits and the like—to renewable energy, from solar panels to biofuels.
While the subsidies make greener products more attractive, Borenstein notes, they also make energy as a whole more attractive relative to other sectors, and thus increase overall energy consumption. Ironically, subsidies for clean energy also penalize energy efficiency.
Subsidies make the most sense when society hopes to nurture a new industry along for a limited time until it can stand on its own feet. As we all know, however, it’s hard to turn off the spigot once the money starts flowing. We also know that taxes are never popular. Maybe that's why politicians rarely listen to economists.
Apr 20 2010
For those short of cash but hungry for a meal, now there's an alternative to washing dishes: riding a bicycle generator to pay for dinner.
At
The hotel prides itself on being one of the greenest accommodations in the world. It has the largest expanse of solar panels of any building in northern
The bicycle generators won’t exactly save the earth—10 watt hours is only enough to run one dim flourescent bulb for an hour—but the promotion is great PR and good for eco-consciousness.
"Realistically, this isn't a practical way of generating a useful amount of energy, but I certainly wouldn't criticise it," Alex Randall of the Centre for Alternative Technology told the London Guardian. “As a lesson, and a means of public engagement, it's excellent – if you sit someone on a bike, pedalling hard, and show them they are only generating enough to power one lightbulb or TV, it makes them appreciate how difficult energy is to produce, and therefore why we should be careful not to waste it.”
As to the hotel’s other amenities,
Apr 16 2010
Several items relating to the business and technology of clean energy and the environment caught our attention this week:
Sportswear giant Puma will toss out shoe boxes to be replaced by reusable bags made from recycled plastic with a cardboard sheet to protect the shoes for transport. Puma will introduce the shoe bags in the second half next year, saying they will save 8,500 tonnes of paper and reduce water and energy in the production process by 60 percent. "Sustainability is not only absolutely necessary considering the situation our planet is in, we as companies are also overdue to take responsibility," Puma CEO Jochen Zeitz tells Reuters.
Directors of food giant McDonald's recommend that shareholders reject a proposal from the Humane Society that would require the restaurant chain to purchase 5 percent cage-free eggs for its supply. Some big fast food chains including Burger King, Subway and Wendy's and retailers Wal-Mart and Trader Joe's have made some commitments to buy or sell cage-free eggs, says the New York Times. McDonald's says its egg suppliers can use "battery cages" that provide 72 square inches of floor space per hen, but the Humane Society says it is not enough space for hens.
The greening of the funeral business continues next weekend with the National Burial Expo 2010 at a church in Raleigh, NC, the first event of its kind on the East Coast. Last November we reported on a eco-friendly funeral fair in a Berkeley church. Expo 2010 will include natural burial companies and presentations on home funerals, biodegradable coffins, organic shrouds, natural burial sites, organic caterers and more. Natural burial was the standard practice in the U.S. until the Civil War, when embalming was applied to preserve the bodies of soldiers for the train journey from battlefields to home, the Huffington Post reports.
Apr 15 2010
It looks like the Cash for Clunkers program now has a successor. Instead of promoting the sale of higher-mileage cars, this program's goal is to spur the sale of energy-efficient appliances.
The Department of Energy's Energy Savers program provides states with a total of $300 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to go toward rebate programs for energy-efficient appliances. The state programs began this month.
The program started in Texas last week, and rebates tapped out within hours of becoming available. The California Cash for Appliance Rebate Program begins on April 22, Earth Day.
California residents who want to cash in on their old refrigerator, clothes washer or room air conditioner should follow The California Cash for Appliance Program's three steps to savings:
1.) BUY an eligible energy-efficient appliance that is rated higher than Energy Star standards from a participating retailer or partner between April 22 and May 23;
2.) RECYCLE an existing, inefficient appliance; and
3.) SAVE by submitting the rebate package with a completed rebate application, a completed proof of recycling form, a copy of the original receipt or an original rebate request and a utility bill.
Plus, PG&E offers an additional $35 for old refrigerators or freezers, and $25 for old room air conditioners when customers arrange a recycling pick-up. Both the program's recycling requirement and PG&E's recycling incentive help ensure the appliances are not only taken out of commission for good (ahem, not simply plugged into a back-up outlet in the garage), but also properly recycled.
The program runs through May 23, or until funds are depleted. Based on the response in Texas, I'd prepare to submit your rebate package on Day 1 of the program, April 22.
Apr 14 2010
Bicycles in
Well, oil-rich
"Kids should be able to walk or bike to school," said Todd Scott,
For those familiar with the city, the biggest focus of the program next year will be to connect Corktown with Mexicantown, hopefully to foster more communal love.
The newspaper notes that
Apr 14 2010
It’s amazing that climate deniers have succeeded in confusing more people than ever in the
The last 10 years were the warmest on record, and 2009 was tied with the second hottest year on record. The first quarter of 2010 was the hottest January-through-March since temperature records began.
But for people who distrust (or don’t understand) statistics, dramatic photographic evidence of climate change might be harder to deny. Yahoo! recently assembled an invaluable collection of before-and-after shots of famous glaciers—or former glaciers—that are in full-scale retreat due to hotter temperatures.
Pictured here is Grinnell Glacier in 2005, shrunk to a mere one-tenth its size in 1938. From 100 glaciers when
Apr 13 2010
At your local grocery or farmer’s market, certified organic fruits, vegetables and meats carry extravagant prices. Similarly, green building products and green energy command a premium. Saving the world apparently isn't cheap.
But according to a new study in Business and Society by two
On the other hand, organic wines that don't brandish the organic label command a 13 percent price premium over wines of the same year, appelation and grape variety, suggesting that consumer appreciate their intrinsic quality.
Organic wine-makers already know how fickle consumers are. Many have toned down their marketing accordingly. Said the founder of Frog’s Leap Winery in
Close followers of the industry weren’t surprised by the study's findings. Wrote Adam Morganstern, editor of Organic Wine Journal:
There are many fantastic certified organic and biodynamic wines out there, but you have to know the names yourself because you won’t find it anywhere on their labels. This leads to confusion not only among wine drinkers, but also with sommeliers, servers and the workers at your local wine store. Thankfully, the balance is shifting, and organic and biodynamic wines are being perceived as higher quality in general, but until the top winemakers come out of the cellar, so to speak, the findings of this study don’t surprise us.
Veronique Raskin, proprietor of the Organic Wine Company, lamented that the study’s results, while true, were “as ridiculous as anything can get. Especially these days when ANY other organic product starts off with an advantage over their conventional counterpart in the mind of the public.”
Organic wines start with grapes grown without the use of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides or week killers. However, to earn recognition from the USDA’s National Organic Program, they must also be made without sulfite preservatives. Such wines can spoil more quickly, Raskin points out, “giving the public a negative perception of organic wines in general.”
The bottom line for organic vintners seems to be to work on their marketing. And the bottom line for wine lovers may be to seek out eco-labels for a bargain.
"Wine made with organic grapes — especially if it has an eco-label — is a really good deal," said co-author Laura Grant, a Ph.D. candidate at UC Santa Barbara. "For the price of conventional wine, you get a significantly better quality wine."
For a list of organic wineries, see http://www.organicwinejournal.com/index.php/category/wineries/.
Apr 12 2010
Rising out of the sand and towering above the cactus of the Californa desert, exotic newcomers are planting deep roots. With ramrod-straight stalks rising more than 200 feet, and giant three-leaf extensions that rotate in the wind, they dwarf the native flora and fauna.
These are wind turbines, planted by developers to take advantage of some of the best wind resources remaining in
In fact, the federal Bureau of Land Management has 63 wind project applications pending in its huge Desert District, compared to 53 front-line solar proposals, according to Greg Miller, renewable energy program manager for BLM's California Desert District.
“This is where everything is happening,” he told NEXT100. “The
A report issued last week by the state’s Renewable Energy Transmission Initiative estimates a potential for about 11,000 megawatts of economically viable new wind capacity in
About seven desert wind projects greater than 100 MW are in advanced planning stages.The largest is the Alta-Oak Creek Mojave Project. Based in
PG&E has also proposed building a wind generating plant in
Nancy Rader, executive director of the California Wind Energy Association, says that wind projects have much less environmental impact, and require much less mitigation, than solar projects because they leave most land undisturbed and don’t block wildlife corridors. Endangered desert tortoises can wander freely among the turbines, unlike fenced-off solar projects.
On the other hand, she concedes, “we do have avian impacts that are not easy to deal with,” especially given the expanded range of the endangered California condor.
In addition, tall turbines may interfere with military aircraft and radar operations. “Many desert wind projects may face military conflict issues,” Rader said. “There are a lot of bases down there.”
BLM’s Miller said processing all the wind and solar project applications also remains a big challenge, but his office is making progress.
“Today we have 12 employees,” he said. “A year ago we had three. And two years ago it was just me.”
Apr 09 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
The Obama administration is getting tough when it comes to pulling funding from nations that have decided to boycott the climate accord reached last year at the UN conference in Denmark. Bolivia and Ecuador have been outspoken against the accord and stand to lose $3 million and $2.5 million, respectively. The proposed decision must be approved by Congress, so the process of denial is not yet complete. Nearly 65 percent of the nations that attended the climate convention support the accord.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) delayed oil and gas leases on roughly 91,000 acres in Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota until further studies can be undertaken to determine how oilfield activities contribute to global warming. The delay marks a setback for an industry that is clinging to current business and scrambling to fight off tighter restrictions proposed by the White House. The agency recently signed a settlement suspending 61 oil and gas leases on nearly 38,000 acres in Montana. A BLM representative said the agency expects to have the tri-state studies complete by the end of September.
Severe storms that used to happen only once every 100 years on average may strike much more frequently in years to come, scientists say. A new study asserts rainfall amounts are increasing in the northeastern United States as part of a long term warming trend causing extreme climate events. Researchers argue that “100-year” floods have occurred in southern New Hampshire in 2005, 2006, 2007 and already in 2010. This kind of flooding may eventually cause municipalities to create new requirements for how and where people can build homes, businesses and utility infrastructure in the area.
Apr 08 2010
It must be a trend: on Monday, NEXT100 reported on U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood’s controversial endorsement of policies that support bicycling in order to promote “livable and sustainable communities.”
Two days later, British Conservative Party leader David Cameron, aiming to polish his green credentials as the country moves into election season, had himself photographed riding a bicycle to the House of Commons, accompanied by two police bodyguards (also on bicycles).
Now, just in time to support this biking renaissance, Bicycling magazine has published a list of
But before you get too enthusiastic about the two-wheeled commute, make sure your destination has a livable and sustainable climate.
The same goes for top-ranked
And
On the other hand, you won’t get any argument from me about the merits of
As for
Apr 07 2010
Bright, efficient, long-lasting LEDs are about as “green” as lights get. Ironically, the only thing they lack is a good source of green light itself.
That’s all about to change, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), which modestly claims that a new discovery there may “prove to be the biggest boost for illumination since Edison’s light bulb.”
The holy grail for all lighting technology is bright white light. As we all learn as kids, white is the combination of all the colors of the spectrum. At minimum, you need to mix red, blue and green together to make white out of color.
Mass-market LEDs first came out in red, as old-timers may remember from the early days of HP hand calculators. Pioneered by Monsanto, they were made of gallium arsenide phosphide. They were bright enough for indicator lights, not for illumination.
In the mid-1990s, Japanese scientists used indium gallium nitride to produce the first bright and blue LEDs. Combined with a yellow phosphor, they could emit a white light—but only with low efficiency.
Now a team of NREL scientists specializiing in high-efficiency solar photovoltaic cells—which convert light into electricity—has figured out a way to use some of the same principles to convert electricity into light, in particular, green light.
Solar cells, like LEDs, can be made of gallium indium nitride. NREL’s Angelo Mascarenhas and his colleagues had figured out how to fine-tune the manufacturing of solar cell lattices to better absorb light energy from the green part of the spectrum. Using the same tricks, they managed on their first try to trick an LED into emitting a deep green light.
Combined with blue and red, the technology “will give you one of the finest color-rendering white lights” available, Mascarenhas promises. And by varying the intensity of the underlying colors, the hue can be changed on command.
Note: contrary to NREL's breathless story, other scientists also claim to have cracked the green-light barrier, using zinc selenide. We'll let them fight it out for credit, as long as they hurry up to market.
Apr 06 2010
We who live in
The expert committee assigned by the NRC analyzed a host of technology and regulatory options and found some promising solutions: advanced diesel engines could potentially lower fuel consumption in tractor-trailers by 20 percent over the next decade, and hybrid power trains could improve fuel economy of transit buses and garbage trucks, which start and stop frequently, by up to a third.
The investments reviewed would break even at fuel prices ranging from $1.10 per gallon (a no-brainer) to $6.80 per gallon (a big loser).
Significantly, however, the committee concluded that “There may be more effective, less costly, and complementary approaches than vehicle fuel efficiency standards” and technology mandates." Two in particular caught my eye: higher fuel taxes, and mandatory driver training, both of which have been subjects of discussion at NEXT100.
“Fuel taxes operate to make fuel-saving technologies more attractive and provide incentives for saving fuel in operations, while involving fewer unintended consequences than standards,” the report concluded. In addition, “a tax affects the utilization of vehicles already on the road, while fuel consumption standards typically affect only new vehicles and can be implemented only slowly over time as the vehicle fleet transitions to the more fuel-efficient vehicles.”
As smart fleet operators have discovered, training drivers how to run their vehicles more efficiently—minimizing speed fluctuations, staying in the highest practical gear, keeping tires properly inflated and avoiding wasteful engine idling—can have a big payoff. “Indications are that this could be one of the most cost-effective and best ways to reduce fuel consumption and improve productivity of the trucking sector,” the report concludes, citing case studies that show fuel savings of up to 17 percent.
Apr 05 2010
Buses, trains and bike paths: you name the public transportation option, and Americans say they want it, according to a new national poll by Transportation for
More than four out of five surveyed voters agreed that “the
Today about 80 cents of every federal transportation dollar goes to highways, according to the organization. Nearly six in 10 respondents said they would spend a higher fraction on public transportation and less on roads.
This survey isn’t a fluke. The Washington Post today today reports a poll showing that people living in its metropolitan area favor refocusing government spending on public transportation over roads by a margin of 62 percent to 30 percent. A slight majority even supports raising taxes, if necessary, to increase funding for the metro rail system.
One of the champions of public transportation in the Obama administration is Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a former Republican congressman from
LaHood really riled some critics—who called him “delusional”—when he called for supporting bicycling and walking as well as more traditional buses and trains.
In an interview with GreenInc., LaHood said Americans aren’t about to give up their cars, but they want affordable and healthy alternatives that support “livable and sustainable communities:”
What Americans want is to get out of their cars, and get out of congestion, and have opportunities for more transit, more light rail, more buses, and some communities are going to street cars. But many communities want the opportunity on the weekends and during the week to have the chance to bike to work, to bike to the store, to spend time with their family on a bike. So, this is not just Ray LaHood’s agenda, this is the American agenda that the American people want for alternatives to the automobile.
Apr 02 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
More than three months after stolen emails caused climate change skeptics to believe leading climate scientists staged a cover-up, a new study commissioned by the British House of Commons Science and Technology Committee finds that Professor Phil Jones was not “trying to subvert the peer review process.” The study also asserts that Jones “should not be criticized for making informal comments on academic papers.” Jones’ reputation has been hit hard since reports of an alleged cover-up surfaced in December. His scientific colleagues are calling the report a general “exoneration” of Jones.
A new survey from the Economist Intelligence Unit claims the corporate response to global warming is fractured due to the “climategate” email scandal, a disappointing end to the UN summit in Copenhagen and the global recession. The survey polled more than 540 senior executives revealed about half are committed to investing in low carbon goods and services, while the other half feel the jury is still out when it comes to the court of the scientific community. The majority of respondents claimed they wanted to see “more climate change regulation.”
The Obama administration approved new rules that ramp up fuel economy in cars and crack down on emissions standards linked to global warming. As part of the plan, the EPA and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that by 2016, cars, SUVs and minivans will be required to average more than 35 miles per gallon while cutting their greenhouse gas emissions by more than 30 percent. If automakers are forced to comply, initial studies project the savings could amount to taking 21.4 million cars off the road.
Apr 02 2010
Several items relating to the business and technology of clean energy and the environment caught our attention this week:
Princeton Public High School in New Jersey has launched a new physical education credit that may be the first of its kind: gardening. "I think it's strangely enjoyable. It's definitely not easy to do or anything like that," says Tim Vasseur, a Princeton sophomore, shovel in hand. When the garden opened, 17 of 27 students in one class picked gardening; the rest played Frisbee, Green Inc. reports. Sophomore Kruthi Isola says: "It gives people who aren't that athletic -- and I feel like I'm not -- it gives them an opportunity to do something else. You learn how to do more than just play a game."
Venture capital investments in clean technology reached $1.9 billion in the first quarter, a 29 percent jump from the fourth quarter last year and an 83 percent surge from the 2009 first quarter, according to the Cleantech Group and Deloitte. "Key to the growth has been increasing interest in a broader range of cleantech themes, such as smart mobility and resource efficiency, which are taking over from the historically dominant renewable energy sector," says Sheeraz Haji, president of Cleantech Group. Transportation was the lead sector in dollars at $704 million in 27 deals. Energy efficiency had the highest number of deals at 39.
Microsoft and Ford Motor will work together to recharge future electric vehicles developed by Ford. Microsoft's Hohm energy management service will tell consumers the best times to recharge their cars at the most affordable price and help electric utilities manage their generating load. Ford plans to introduce five electric or hybrid cars by 2013. Utilities and other high-technology companies also are working on smart systems to manage energy consumption.
Apr 01 2010
The old cylinder water heaters we all know may soon be a thing of the past, as the Department of Energy (DOE) tightens standards on the appliance.
Greenwire reports tightened energy efficiency standards will apply to gas and electric water heaters manufactured starting in 2015. DOE claims the new standards will slash energy use of new large electric storage water heaters by 47 percent and large gas water heaters by more than 30 percent.
Standards most likely can be met on tanks with less than 55 gallons of storage capacity by adding more insulation. For those with more than 55 gallons in storage capacity, the new standards can be met only with heat pump and condensing technology.
DOE estimates a new electric water heater could cost an additional $140 to $974 at installation with a payback of six to seven years. And a new gas-fired storage water heater could cost an additional $92 to $805 at installation with a payback period of two to 10 years.
DOE plans to set new efficiency standards for more than a dozen categories of home and commercial appliances over the next 3 years.
Apr 01 2010
Everywhere you go these days, retail stores are advertising discounts and sales. But one thing no one is offering bargain-basement prices on is renewable energy. The sun and wind may be free, but the electric power generated from them commands a premium, especially now that so many utilities around the world are clamoring for cleaner energy.
Replacing fossil fuels with renewables to combat climate change will thus be a costly, if necessary, proposition. For example,
Now a recent study by energy experts at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimates that if other Western states aim to achieve the same goal by 2029, the required new capital investment in renewable generation and regional transmission lines could run as much as $350 billion.
According to co-author Andrew Mills, the average delivered cost of electricity would jump by about a third, from 10.3 cents per kilowatt-hour to 13.3 cents by 2029 to hit the goal of 33 percent renewables. Investing in the regional transmission grid and allowing free trade in renewable energy credits lowers the overall cost by about half a cent per kWh, by allowing the region to take advantage of the lowest cost resources, such as wind in the Rockies and northwest, and solar in the southwest.
Their analysis suggests that throughout the Western region, wind would account for roughly half of the renewables mix (38-65%), while solar would make up about a quarter to a third (14-41%). Biomass, geothermal and hydropower would make up the rest.
Their study is part of a multi-year analysis sponsored by the Western Governors’ Association and U.S. Department of Energy called the Western Renewable Energy Zones Initiative. Its goal is to bring together a wide variety of stakeholders—government agencies, environmental organizations, energy developers, tribal interests, utilities and others—to promote the construction of utility-scale renewable energy facilities and the transmission lines needed to bring their power to the people who need it.
