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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Biofuels

I had breakfast yesterday with a venture capitalist in Greensboro, NC, who had expressed an interest in waste-tires-to-fuels.  People are using pyrolysis in this capacity, with varying degrees of success, in plants all over the world, and I’ve noticed a growing amount of interest in making this happen here in the U.S., where we landfill 300 million such tires each year.

Within an hour of our meeting, I had connected him with the principals of two of the projects that I recommend in this space.  We’ll see where this goes.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

By the time I’ve driven my rental car off the Avis lot in any particular city, I’ve usually found a radio station that I think will speak to me.  During the day, it’s normally the local NPR affiliate, but after hours, the choice becomes more interesting.  Last night, it was WXYC, from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, whose late-night DJ “Riley” had a sweet and unaffected charm in her presentation of some terrific music.  At her repeated suggestion, I called in a request.  I knew it would make her evening to know that someone was listening, and I could tell by the sound of her voice when she took my call on the first ring that I was right. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Climate Change

I’m so glad I took advantage of today’s opportunity to interview Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Nobel Prize winning climate scientist and chairman of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). 

At several points in the conversation, I was reminded of my discussions with my friend and colleague Wally Rippel, who often makes the point that we 21st Century Americans have astonishingly little regard for science.  Any of us can name dozens of great athletes, actors, singers – even notorious criminals.  But how many of us can name a few great living scientists? (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

With gas prices rising every month, people who don’t have a car yet are now having second thoughts because of such issues. While it’s true that we really can’t do something about our planet’s dwindling fossil fuel sources, we can, however, choose to get vehicles that are fuel efficient. Or perhaps, one could go straight to the challenge of getting vehicles run by electricity. (more…)

by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

I’m writing this on a US Airways flight, kicking off my trip to interview Dr. Raj Pachauri. Everything’s running right on time so far.

To their credit, the airline has an active recycling program.  But might they be overzealous?  For the third time on this flight, they’ve come by to try to recycle the plastic cup I’m keeping to drink water.  In another hour, they’ll be coming back through offering more water – and more cups to replace the ones they recycled an hour ago. 

This, by the way, is why the adage: “Reduce, re-use, recycle” is in that particular order.  If you can not use something at all, that’s best.  If you have to use it, try to re-use it.  If you cannot do either, recycle.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Wind Energy

There are those who argue against the validity of the electric vehicle movement, on the basis that, in most cases in the US, putting additional load on the grid means burning more coal.  Yet regardless of the extent to which this is true, the position completely evaporates in the face of distributed generation. 

I’m going to be helping my friends at Continental Wind Power tell their story of midsized wind (200 – 900 kilowatts) to an audience of managers of factories, farms, schools and universities, municipalities, military bases, etc.  It’s easy to see how well this plays into an integration of EVs.  For instance, I would tell a farm: If you’re in a decent wind area, install one of our 400 kilowatt turbines and knock out about 2000 kilowatt-hours per day off your electric bill.  Or install two, and, on top of that, charge your fleet of electric farm vehicles.  Cut out all that diesel from your budget – and all that pollution from our skies. 

Sounds pretty compelling to me. 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

I often write short, high-level pieces summarizing the pros and cons of the oil economy vs. a transition to renewables, and I like to refer readers to others’ work when I come across articles that I think will resonate.  Linked above is a very good one by columnist Sarah van Gelder, co-founder and executive editor of YES! Magazine: a “national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas with practical actions.”

Republicans may object to her using words like “dirty” and “deadly” to describe the Romney ticket’s energy plan, but, to be fair, we need to admit that the U.S. energy policy is very much at stake in the 2012 elections, and Americans aren’t exactly feelin’ the love from the Republicans vis-à-vis renewable energy and environmental responsibility. 

 

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Climate Change

I’m leaving for the East Coast tomorrow morning for a series of meetings, including what I call my “anchor appointment” (i.e., the one event that absolutely shouldn’t be postponed or conducted by phone/email), my interview with Dr. Raj Pachauri, one of the most prominent players in the international climate change scene.  We’re meeting at his office at Yale University.

I’m ashamed to say that I’ve never been on the Yale campus.  I did my undergraduate work at Trinity, less than an hour north, but never got down there.  In the 1970s, their squash team was too good for us, and I never attended any of the guest lectures they hosted.  I’ll arrive an hour or so early, just to walk around, take in some of that ivy, and nod hello to a few bright young people.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Here’s a podcast in which Toronto Star writer Tyler Hamilton talks about some of his picks for clean energy start-ups.  He and I agree univocally on a number of issues, like the imperative to move away from fossil fuels, and the mixture of crackpots, frauds, and legitimate innovators that are coming out of the woodwork to present potential solutions as a result of the ever-heightening demand for alternative energy sources.  I’m not as bullish on some of the ideas he supports as he is, but he obviously has a great deal on the ball, and I recommend readers check this out.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

I remember the first evening of a course in existentialism I had 37 years ago this fall, in which I asked the professor, “According to (Nobel prize-winner and existentialist superstar) Albert Camus, ‘suicide is the only valid philosophical question,’ implying that all the work of people like Socrates, Descartes, and so forth is ‘invalid.’  This strikes me as patently wrong.  What am I missing here?”  Fast-forward to last week, when I began Brian Greene’s The Fabric of the Cosmos, and was thrilled to see that he opens with the precise same point about Camus. 

It’s seems pretty clear that there is a great deal of validity to the work humankind has done, especially over the past few hundred years, in trying to decipher the riddles of matter, energy, space, and time.  What really is all this stuff?  Where did it come from?  Why is it here?  Is there a limit to our ability to perceive and understand it (especially now that it seems reality exists in more than three spatial dimensions)? 

I’m happy to note that the realms of science and philosophy are re-converging into one another, after the fairly hostile divorce that lasted several centuries. In any case, Brian Greene is one of my new-found heroes.  If you want a good introduction without going to a 500-page book, here’s one of his Ted Talks, in which he explains superstring theory.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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