Recently in the Efficiency Category
Mar 10 2010
Menlo Park city officials were impressed last month when they learned from PG&E that switching nearly 500 street lights to light-emitting diodes (LEDs) could save $28,000 a year in energy bills and maintenance costs.
And across the Bay in Walnut Creek, the city slashed its energy use for 126 streetlights by more than half when it recently converted to bright LED lights. To sweeten the deal, PG&E provided the city a rebate of $17,950 to install the energy-efficient lights. Danville earned rebates as well for converting 262 of its streetlights to LEDs.
All three cities will be glad to know that experts agree they made a smart choice. Engineers at the University of Pittsburgh recently assessed four different streetlight technologies and concluded that LEDs "strike the best balance between brightness, affordability, and energy and environmental conservation when their life span--from production to disposal--is considered."
The study was commissioned by the City of Pittsburgh, which is considering replacing 40,000 of its streetlights with LEDs. The city estimates that such an investment could save $1 million annually in energy costs, $700,000 in maintenance and 6,800 tons of carbon emissions.
In addition to thrifty energy consumption, LEDs last three to five times longer than standard high-pressure sodium and metal halide lamps. And unlike its competitors, LEDs contain no mercury and fewer other toxins.
Check out PG&E's web pages for more on the utility's streetlight program and incentives.
Mar 04 2010
Americans love a good competitive challenge, from the Olympcs and Survivor on down to kiddie soccer games. So what better way to promote energy efficiency than to turn it into a contest?
The EPA’s Energy Star program has been doing just that since 2008, promoting fun but fierce competition among building owners for recognition as the top energy saver in their city.
The San Francisco Earth Hour 24x7 Energy Challenge, co-sponsored by PG&E, promises to “identify—and shower kudos upon—the most energy efficient buildings in the city, as well as the properties that make the greatest gains in performance” over the period March 2008 to February 2010. (Contestants are using PG&E’s automated benchmarking service to track their monthy energy use data.) The Kilowatt Cup for “superior achievement in energy management” is scheduled to be awarded this April.
Such contests are being held around the country by EPA in partnership with the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), nonprofit organizations and utilities like PG&E.
And for good reason: building energy use is low-hanging fruit in the fight against climate change.
“Roughly 40 percent of all humanity's greenhouse gas emissions from energy come from the building sector," said Evan Mills of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. "I would rank it one of the very first, if not the first thing to do."
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In 2008, 150 school buildings entered
And not to be outdone,
Mar 01 2010
Suppose that for every dollar you invested in the stock market, you could reap an average return of $1.40. Most likely you'd be thrilled--especially after the last decade of losses in the S&P 500.
Yet few business magazines bothered to note the California Public Utilities Commission's estimate last summer that every dollar invested by utilities to promote energy efficiency should save customers at least $1.40--a 40 percent return on investment over just a few years.
Last year, McKinsey & Co. reported even more strikingly that economy-wide improvements in energy efficiency could save the United States $1.2 trillion--more than a thousand billion dollars--for an investment of less than half that sum. "The reduction in energy use would also result in the abatement of 1.1 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions annually – the equivalent of taking the entire
PG&E and other major California utilities have been investing in energy efficiency programs since the mid-1970s. PG&E's programs alone have saved customers more than $24 billion. Now their counterparts nationwide are getting the message, according to a new report from the non-profit Consortium for Energy Efficiency (CEE).
CEE says that U.S. gas and electric utilities spent $5.3 billion last year on efficiency programs, double the amount in 2006. And the number of states with energy efficiency programs jumped from 37 in 2008 to 46 last year.
CEE member utilities reported combined savings on electricity and natural gas of $8.6 billion in 2008. The savings prevented emissions of more than 55 million tonnes of CO2, equal to the output of about 12 coal-fired power plants.
Last fall, the CPUC approved a budget of $3 billion over three years for energy efficiency programs by PG&E, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric. The utilities will promote more efficient lighting, air conditioning, consumer electronics and building materials, among other things. Those programs should save the state the cost of building 1,500 megawatts of new generation--and all the carbon pollution that would go with it.
Feb 26 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
PG&E Corporation Chairman, CEO and President Peter Darbee and Carnegie Institution climate change expert Christopher Field released a short whitepaper for business leaders and policy makers on the scientific and economic issues central to the current conversation on global climate change and the need for a response by government and business. “My hope is that it serves to inform and engage more leaders in this issue and, ultimately, helps drive the adoption of smart climate and energy policies for our country,” said Darbee.
Want to see scientific evidence supporting global warming? There’s an app for that. Australian solar physicist John Cook of Skeptical Science has created an iPhone app that includes numerous climate skeptic arguments as well as the science-based counterarguments. So far, there are 90 climate skeptic arguments included and, of course, the scientific responses to those. You can see graphs and links to scientific papers or other sources in there as well. Cook calls the app “imperative” to the climate debate and “pretty cool.”
The non-partisan United States Geological Survey recently reported that the ice shelves on the southern Antarctic Peninsula have been retreating at an increased pace threatening coastal communities and low-lying islands worldwide. Scientists claim the pattern could lead to further accelerated glacier retreat on the continent and ultimately, sea level rise. Scientific data shows every ice front in this section of the peninsula has been retreating from 1947 to 2009, but the most dramatic changes have come since 1990.
Feb 24 2010
Solar cells are so passe. The hot new area for research is thermocells, which convert waste heat into electric power.
Sorry, I couldn't resist that one.
Power plants, factories, cars, computers--everything that uses energy in turn creates waste heat. If even a small fraction of that heat could be converted back into usable energy--in particular, electricity--the result could be dramatic energy savings and benefits for the environment. In principle, converting waste heat to electricity could double the battery life of cells phones or laptop computers, according to MIT engineer Peter Hagelstein.
A bunch of startup companies are working on just that challenge. They include Alphabet Energy, based in the basement of the Bancroft Hotel in
Others include MTPV Corp. in Austin, TX, GMZ Energy, founded by scientists at MIT and
Thermocells operate on the principle of the Seebeck thermoelectric effect, discovered in 1821 by the physicist Thomas Johann Seebeck. He found that heating one end of a metal bar created an electric current proportional to the difference in temperature at the two ends. Unfortunately, most materials that exhibit this property convert heat to electricity with extremely low efficiency, making it tough to create commercial solutions.
The race is on to increase conversion efficiencies and lower the cost of materials. Scientists at
They make it sound so easy.
Another team of scientists just reported using carbon nanotubes to triple the usual efficiency of thermocells, without the cost of exotic metals such as platinum.
One of the co-authors of their new paper, Dr. Baratunde Cola at
Feb 17 2010
According to the Book of Genesis, God said "Let there be light," and there was light upon the Earth.
Feb 12 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
Recent polls show public support for global warming is declining but British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is denouncing warming deniers calling them “anti-science, flat-earth climate skeptics.” Brown will co-chair the United Nations High Level Advisory group on Climate Change Financing. The group aims to raise cash to halt deforestation, encourage low-carbon development and adapt to rising sea levels, extreme weather events and higher temperatures.
President Obama wants to develop a new government agency that would focus specifically on Climate Change. During his campaign, he promised the American people he would devote a good portion of his administration’s time to fighting global warming. Obama announced that in an effort to live up to that promise, he was ordering the creation of a new organization. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Service will actually be a branch of the existing NOAA but will have its own director and specific agenda.
For the next couple weeks, Olympic hopefuls will adorn their colors and put their boots into bindings in the mountains overlooking Vancouver. And they’ll be racing and jumping towards medals in mostly man-made snow. January of 2010 was the warmest January on record in Vancouver, with temperatures averaging 44.8 degrees. This is in stark contrast to recent snow storms on the east coast of the United States, which have fueled the fire for global warming skeptics. Scholars of climate science argue that neither example is proof of anything. Instead they would point to longer term trends showing a gradual warming of the whole earth over the last thirty years.
Feb 12 2010
Several items relating to the business and technology of clean energy and the environment caught our attention this week:
Major league baseball spring training begins next week and the greening of the sport continues to show no letup. The Minnesota Twins are installing a giant underground storage tank the size of a freight car to harvest and recycle rainwater at their new ball park, Target Field. The Twins may save more than two million gallons of water a year. The Rain Water Recycle System will purify rainwater for human consumption as well as maintenance and irrigating the field. It was designed by Pentair, a company specializing in water systems and storage. The Twins also are seeking a LEED (Leadership in Engineering and Environmental Design) certification for the new park.
Eco-minded residents of Berkeley are recycling and composting so much that the city's refuse revenues are down by $4 million, the biggest factor in a $10 million city budget deficit. Residents are switching to smaller trash bins which carry a lower collection rate. People are buying less stuff so there's less packaging and cardboard waste, and a failed business means there's no trash to collect. "Not only does the amount of garbage change with the economy, but the very nature of garbage changes," says Robert Reed, spokesman for Recology Sunset Scavenger, San Francisco's garbage company.
Car sharing memberships in North America soared by 117 percent between 2007 and 2009, according to the Frost & Sullivan research firm, and total membership is projected at 4.4 million in North America and 5.5 million in Europe by 2016. The firm estimates that each vehicle in a car sharing fleet replaced 15 personally owned vehicles in 2009 and car sharing members drove 31 percent less than when they owned a personal vehicle. This means fewer cars on the road and a reduction of more than 482,000 tons of CO2 emissions. Meanwhile, car sharing firm Zipcar Inc. has pulled the 2010 Toyota Prius hybrids from its fleet (less than 1 percent) due to the recall for a potential brake problem. Zipcar also has removed 2009 and 2010 Toyota Matrix models in a previous safety recall.
Feb 10 2010
Automakers the world over are spending billions of dollars on high-tech R&D to eke out a few percent gains in vehicle mileage. And before their efforts make any noticeable difference to the environment, consumers will have to shell out hundreds of billions of dollars on cleaner new vehicles over the course of many years.
Yet the same result could be achieved at no cost, with no new technology, almost overnight. Simply by changing their driving habits and properly maintaining their cars and trucks, vehicle operators can readily improve their mileage by up to 15 percent--saving themselves big money and sparing the environment.
The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, composed of 11 major global carmakers, is promoting an EcoDriving movement to make exactly that point. It hasn't garnered nearly enough publicity, though it has been endorsed by many of the nation's governors, including California's Arnold Schwarzenegger.
- If just half of all drivers nationwide practiced moderate levels of EcoDriving, annual carbon dioxide(CO2) emissions could be reduced by about 100 million tons, or the equivalent of heating and powering 8.5 million households.
- If all Americans practiced EcoDriving, it would be equal to 450 billion miles traveled on our roadways without generating any CO2 emissions. That’s 1,500 CO2-free miles for every man, woman and child in the United States each year.
Many EcoDriving techniques (also called hypermiling) are obvious, others less so. You already know you want to avoid fast starts and stops by paying close attention to road conditions ahead. You probably know that mileage plummets as you drive faster than 55 mph because of aerodynamic drag. You may not know, however, that driving with your windows open above 40 mph generally wastes more fuel than relying instead on your air conditioner for cooling.
That said, be sure to have your air conditioning checked to make sure it's operating at maximum efficiency. And heed Barack Obama's much-lampooned advice during the presidential campaign about the wisdom of checking tire pressure monthly. More than a billion gallons of fuel may be wasted annually because of underinflated tires, according to the Department of Energy.
Driver education is especially important for improving the performance of corporate fleets--which is why the Environmental Defense Fund has a major initiative to promote fuel-smart driving practices. In Europe, the RECODRIVE project is promoting fuel-efficient fleet practices across the continent, with significant results.
Best of all, better driving promotes safety as well as fuel efficiency. Carrier, a division of United Technologies Corp., reports that it slashed at-fault accidents resulting from rear-end collisions by 45 percent in one year while cutting fleet emissions by 30 percent, and saving $1 million a year in fuel costs.
Feb 05 2010
Several stories on the science and politics of global warming caught our attention this week:
A white roof may look like a painted masterpiece to those who want to reduce urban heat. The National Center for Atmospheric Research recently completed a study demonstrating that white roofs can be an effective method for cooling. The study’s simulations provide an idealized view of different types of cities around the world and indicate that, if every roof were entirely painted white, the urban heat island effect could be reduced by 33 percent.
According to a new report released by a leading Canadian environmental group, the city of Vancouver, which will host the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, would earn a bronze medal if fighting climate change were an Olympic sport. The report claims the event’s organizers have done a good job building energy efficient venues, but have fallen a tad short when it comes to offsetting carbon emissions surrounding the Winter Games. Environment is one of the three “official pillars” of the Olympic movement.
Just before athletes from around the world will have a chance to earn their gold, silver and bronze medals, athletes from Indianapolis and New Orleans will go after the Vince Lombardi trophy. And it is estimated that this year’s Super Bowl – which the NFL says is more environmentally responsible than in the past – will produce 310,000 pounds of carbon emissions. In addition, researchers claim the stadium in Miami will use 187,000 KW of electricity and the television sets of home viewers will consume roughly 10,004,603 KW of energy. And speaking of green, it is estimated that close to 54 million pounds of avocados will be consumed by guacamole loving fans.
