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From Guest Blogger Joshua Gold: What BMW Is Doing in Hybrids in 2013

craigshieldsPosted on November 27, 2012 Posted in Electric Vehicles

You may be less likely to tear out your hair during your family’s next road trip if you take that trip in the BMW Active Tourer. This compact hybrid is in the concept stages, but is expected to come complete with amazing amenities that are sure to drive BMW sales as easily as it drives your crew to your destination. BMW is pushing out their new hybrids from Chapman BMW in AZ to dealers across the country. If the average 94 mpg is not enough to drive BMW sales in your direction, perhaps these fabulous, family-friendly features will be.

Big Space Without a Big Footprint

Room for cargo and kids is a must in a family vehicle, but you also don’t want a vehicle so large and lumbering it leaves little room in your garage for toys and bicycles. The Washington Post praises the compact hybrid for maximizing space while retaining a fairly small carbon footprint. The overall measurements are 171 inches long by 72 inches wide, with a height of 61 inches. That’s garage-size for sure. That also comes with four doors for easy entrance, exit and packing, a cargo area that makes packing possible, and hybrid drivetrain with under-floor battery pack. No space is wasted. (more…)

Tagged with: Electric Vehicles, EVs, hybrids

U.S. President Obama's “All-of-the-Above” Energy Strategy

craigshieldsPosted on November 26, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Politics

A friend of mine who had made some energy-related suggestions to President Obama just received a very thoughtful and well-written note in response, talking up the “all-of-the-above” strategy. I respond:

That’s great. From here, I’d like to see some real numbers and commitments to bringing them about. In particular, I want to see us:

• Immediately remove the subsidies to the oil and coal companies.

• Get entirely out of the coal business over the next 35 – 40 years, with legislation that would force the generators and consumers of energy to pay for its comprehensive costs, including remediating damage to our lungs and ecosystems; encourage the rest of the world to do the same.

• Put people back to work in energy efficiency (insulation, smart-grid, LED lighting, higher efficiency HVAC, etc.) and in rebuilding our ancient grid. (more…)

Tagged with: Aeroponics, aquaponics, biofuels, biomass, car-sharing, clean energy, climate change mitigation, coal-fired power plants, Conference of Parties meetings, CSP, damage to ecosystems, energy and the Carter White House, energy efficiency, energy storage, geothermal, global climate change, global warming, high efficiency HVAC, incentive to integrate renewables, insulation, LED lighting, locally-grown organic food, lung damage, mass transit, new ethos of energy conservation, ocean current, President Obama’s “all-of-the-above” energy strategy, PV, rebuilding our ancient grid, Renewable Energy, ride-sharing, run-of-river hydro, small vehicles for commuting, small vehicles for urban package delivery, smart grid, subsidies to the oil companies, tidal, walking and bicycling, wind

Renewable Energy — A Fad?

craigshieldsPosted on November 26, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Politics

Needless to say, all of us here in the U.S. are glad that the 2012 election is behind us and that we no longer have to deal with the incredible level of rancor and lies that were embodied in the campaigns. And if you’re asking why I would want to dredge any of that up again, I don’t have a good answer. Having said that, I thought I’d comment on the Romney campaign’s claim to the effect that renewable energy was a “fad.”

Obviously, the ultimate destiny of clean energy is an unknown at this point; its ultimate resolution lies in the future – perhaps the distant future. But I propose an open-ended question to the citizens of the world: How likely do you think it may be that our current course with respect to the consumption of resources – fossil fuels in particular – is sustainable, as Romney and his people claimed? Is it really credible that our planet’s wish to migrate to an energy course that isn’t poisoning us is a “fad?” I hate all stupid campaign rhetoric, but that struck me as particularly outrageous.

Tagged with: clean energy, Renewable Energy, renewable energy a fad, Romney campaign

The Turimiquire Foundation Addresses Sustainability

craigshieldsPosted on November 26, 2012 Posted in Sustainability

It’s that time of the year when we all start thinking about holiday gift-giving. I had a Jewish roommate in college, a funny but ornery character, who summarized Christmas as “crass commercialism.” Though I was raised a Presbyterian, he didn’t offend me in the slightest; I couldn’t help but agree. Huge marketing budgets are focused on getting us to spend big on gifts for people who really don’t need them. (more…)

Tagged with: environmental impact, population growth, sustainability, Sustainable Agriculture, Turimiquire Foundation

Conference of Parties Takes on the Kyoto Protocol

craigshieldsPosted on November 25, 2012 Posted in Sustainability

I just got back from a short hike with a friend during which we discussed the status of some of the world’s largest countries vis-à-vis renewable energy. This, of course, reminded me that we’re headed into another Conference of Parties (COP) meeting, starting tomorrow. In particular, the 18th session will take place from Monday, 26 November to Friday, 7 December 2012 at the Qatar National Convention Centre in Doha, Qatar. The principal issue: what to do about the Kyoto Protocol. (more…)

Tagged with: clean energy, Conference of Parties, Doha Qatar, global climate change, global warming, Human rights, International Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, Kyoto Protocol, nationalism, pollution, Rajendra Pauchari, Renewable Energy, resource consumption, world government

Celebrating Global Non-Profits that Advance Sustainability

craigshieldsPosted on November 24, 2012 Posted in Sustainability

Here’s a post that I just put on RenewableEnergyWorld.com, in which I congratulate Meg Cichon, Associate Editor, for her wonderful article on global sustainability.

In my piece, I took the opportunity to point out that, in addition to all the other good things that stem from bringing clean energy to the people of rural Africa and other developing parts of the world, electrification facilitates education, by providing reading light and Internet access.

It’s impossible to overstate the importance of this. It’s really the world’s failure to educate the BoP (“bottom of the pyramid”) that perpetuates poverty, and perhaps even worse, expands the population. Educated women do not have 12 children.

Again, great going, Meg.

Tagged with: bottom of the pyramid, clean energy, developing world, educate the BoP, electrification facilitates education, global non-profits that advance sustainability, global sustainability, Meg Cichon, people of rural Africa, perpetuate poverty, population control, Renewable Energy, RenewableEnergyWorld.com, sustainability

It's a Small World in Renewable Energy

craigshieldsPosted on November 24, 2012 Posted in Biofuels

I had a Skype chat yesterday with a well-heeled investor/entrepreneur in Dubai whose family has numerous business operations in Africa and the Middle East – including Pakistan, the country in which one of my favorite projects is located. Readers may remember last June’s webinar, which featured a clean energy project in Landhi, a large industrial town in the eastern part of Karachi, which, when fully developed, will convert the dung of 400,000 tightly confined buffaloes into biofertilizer and biogas.

Currently, there is a plant there running 24 hours a day, but it’s very small, a tiny fraction of the size required to implement the concept fully. To my surprise, when I described this to my contact in Dubai, he told me that he’d been there, and knows the people who run it.

I tried to talk up the value of the project, both from a financial and humanitarian perspective, and I’m hoping that these folks will invest. If they put up $5 million, the organization’s CEO Robert Orr will be able to raise an additional $13 million in project financing, and within a year, he’ll have the entire plant operational, mitigating one of the most egregious environmental catastrophes on the planet, while creating a solid profit stream to pay off the investors.

Tagged with: biofertilizer, biogas, buffalo dung, Dubai, environmental catastrophe, Karachi, Landhi, Pakistan, Renewable Energy, UAE

Clean Energy on Both Sides of the Atlantic: Uncertain

craigshieldsPosted on November 23, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Politics

The enemies of renewable energy are having a field day all over the world. Here’s an article about clean energy in the UK, and how it’s getting pounded with the same hammer that it is over here, i.e., uncertainty: removal of feed-in tariffs, varying taxes, changing priorities, all brought to you in living color with vitriolic arguments in the British press, as only they can do it with such splendor. In this one short article, the word “uncertainty” occurs four times, as well as “flex,” and – my favorite – “unfathomable twists and turns.”

It’s a circus.

Tagged with: alternative energy, clean energy, feed in tariff, Renewable Energy, uncertainly

Renewable Energy Technology Improving Performance, Reducing Costs

craigshieldsPosted on November 23, 2012 Posted in Renewables - Science

Here’s some good news in the photovoltaics world: the first about a new record in solar efficiency and the second about a super-absorbent solar cell.

I’m reminded of a conversation I have frequently with clean energy nay-sayers.

As renewable energy is built squarely on high-tech, what is the certain outcome? Ever-improving performance and steadily declining costs.

Does anybody think we’ll still be burning coal and driving Hummers in the year 2050? Of course not.

Why? Among other things, because the trajectory for solar, wind, and the others is so rapidly pushing the cost per Watt down.

Then why aren’t we embracing the future, working on these technologies full-bore, while doing the right thing for the environment at the same time?

Tagged with: clean energy, coal-fired power plants, environment, Hummer, new record in solar efficiency, photovoltaics, Renewable Energy, renewables, super-absorbent solar cell

Fastest Electric Vehicles

craigshieldsPosted on November 23, 2012 Posted in Electric Vehicles

Here’s a cool infographic called “The Fastest Electric Vehicles on Earth” that I thought readers would enjoy, from these folks. What they say here is certainly true: we tend to think of EVs as slow, glorified golf carts. Yet those of us who have driven Teslas have quite a different impression; they’re little rockets, with better acceleration than Porsches.

There is also a good discussion of the Catch 22 facing the EV adoption curve. They’ll be expensive until they’re common, but they’ll be uncommon until they’re inexpensive.

Tagged with: Electric Vehicles, Fastest Electric Vehicles