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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Photovoltaics

Ikea Focuses its Attention on the Solar MarketIn an unprecedented move for a furniture retailer of the likes of Ikea, the company is now actively entering the solar market and stands to make a huge impact in the spread of solar energy in the UK. As the world’s largest furniture retailer, Ikea has store locations worldwide with a massive surface area to work with, a section of which will be allocated towards the retail sale of solar paneling.

This may have come as a surprise but a recent post on the Solar Contact blog defines the high potential of solar energy in the UK, stating that it is soon to become the 5th biggest solar market worldwide. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Plane Powered By Solar Photovoltaics

One of the cool features of living in a society that is built around the advancements of science is that we constantly see demonstrations of cutting-edge technologies in ways that, while they may not be terrifically practical, show how far we’ve come and what might be possible in the future.  In 1927, Charles Lindbergh (pictured) became the first person to make a solo flight across the Atlantic – not because such a voyage served a useful purpose, but to show that it could be done, and to celebrate the advancements that have been made since the Wright brothers did their thing 24 years earlier. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Energy, Water, and Food – Critical Shortages Are Headed Our WayHelping my children with their homework has always been a great joy to me.  Now they’re both in college, but the pleasure remains undiminished.  Of course, it’s important to refrain from actually doing their work for them, but that doesn’t mean I can’t provide assistance here and there.

My son is writing a paper for his Environmental Horticulture class, and he’s chosen the topic “Energy, Water, and Food – Critical Shortages Are Headed Our Way.”  (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Smart Grid

Energy Efficiency Is Just One Aspect of a Smart HomeI had a magnificent lunch today at a French Cajun place in Santa Barbara with a new business contact.  This gentleman runs one of the units of the Nikola Tesla Foundation in Los Angeles, focusing on connected homes.

His main area of interest is not energy efficiency per se, but the medical aspects of “smartness,” e.g., monitors that detect strokes and heart attacks, facilitating telemedicine, and so forth.   I believe that some of the people I’ve connected with over the years may be beneficial to his projects, so I plan to make a few introductions.

The first contact who pops into my mind is Jesse Berst, the editor of the Smart Grid News.  I interviewed Jesse for our webinar on Smart Cities a while back; he did a great job, and he’s fabulously knowledgeable — as well as very connected — in the industry.

 

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Make Your Office Eco-FriendlyA safe working environment is effective and economical for your business. An office is the heart of any business organization, as all communication, whether business decisions concerning the organization or just gossip, have to pass through it. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Can We Achieve a Sustainable Approach to Energy? Many Reasons To Think So, But Just As Many To Be PessimisticAs we recall from Dickens, “… it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, ….”

Those of us trying to pay attention to the world around us live our daily lives bathed in this type of schizophrenia.  Just when it seems that the fossil industry has an ironclad grasp on our throats (and lungs), along comes an article like this one, indicating the state of New York is very close to a complete rethinking of the way it regulates utilities.

If this happens, we have reason to think that, for the first time in history, we (or at least New Yorkers) will have an environment where customers have an incentive to use off-peak power and install solar and other forms of distributed generation, and utilities will have a reason to want to sell less power, while migrating to clean energy sources — actually exceeding the renewable portfolio standards.

Wow.

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Tom Steyer – Using His Money for the Good of the World Around HimI’m going to enjoy listening to Tom Steyer (pictured here) speak at the University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) next Tuesday evening.  I’ve written about him several times in the past; I often offer this encapsulated explanation of the man and his mission:  he’s the “anti-matter of the Koch Brothers.”

Steyer is a billionaire who vigorously sponsors sustainability in one form or another, e.g., his action to block the Keystone XL Pipeline.  On the other hand we have the Koch Brothers whose combined net worth is about $80 billion.  They invest heavily in the precise opposite: ensuring that fossil fuels maintain their monopolistic position as our de facto energy policy, regardless of the consequences to the health and well-being of everyone and everything on Earth – living now and in the future.  Here’s an article that shows what they’re doing to minimize the forward progress of solar energy.

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Hydrokinetics

Ocean Wave Energy Machines Have More Potential Than Some Would Like To AdmitHere’s a thinly guised attempt to ridicule the idea of government subsidies for renewable energy generally, clothed in a report on a failed company with a huge device to extract energy from ocean waves.  Obviously, the burden of proof of the cost-effectiveness of any technology lies on the shoulders of the developers, but I support the concept of government’s helping with the R&D costs of many different clean energy concepts, as long as they make some level of sense.

In particular, this basic technology, i.e., a multi-segmented tube that articulates based on the moving waters on the ocean’s surface, is not altogether doomed to failure.  In fact, we have one on our list of clean energy investment opportunities; it’s this one right here.  At scale, the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) can be very competitive.  And keep in mind that these devices are especially useful for bringing electrical power to operations at sea, where the practice of bringing in diesel to run generators is both expensive and environmentally hazardous.

 

 

by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Photovoltaics

Super-Concentrated Solar PV – Looks Like a Breakthrough HereHere’s an article about a breakthrough in super-concentrated solar PV from IBM researchers in Europe.  Incident sunlight is focused from a large parabolic mirror onto a semiconductor chip, producing electricity.  What’s new here?  Well, the concentration rate is 1000:1, meaning that an incredible amount of heat is generated simultaneously, which the team is able to capture and use for another purpose, e.g., water desalination.  The overall efficiency is over 80%!

I was happy to note that the fellow in this video is encouraged by the same basic fact that I often quote: At any given moment in time, the Earth is receiving 85,000 terawatts of power from the sun, while we’re using only 15 terawatts in the sum total of all our applications – about 1/6000th.  It’s there for the taking.

 

by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

The Future of Transportation Comes Down To a Battle Between Photovoltaics and PhotosynthesisElon Musk says it better than I can (imagine that!).  Here’s his recent article on the folly of ethanol, in which he makes (and quite ably defends) the proposition that electric transportation will eventually win the day.  Why?  Essentially it’s the relative efficiency of solar PV vs. photosynthesis.  (Of course, he could have thrown in wind energy, hydrokinetics, and geothermal as well.) (more…)