I know I’ve mentioned that I’m in pursuit of a manufacturing partner in the Americas for my client PlexiSun, developer of an innovative approach to building-integrated solar thermal hot water heating. By the term “building-integrated,” we mean that it doesn’t go on the roof, it is the roof. (more…)
It seems that almost every day, there is news, most of it incredibly good, about what Tesla, driven by charismatic entrepreneur Elon Musk, is up to. Recently, the news is the “Gigafactory,” to be located somewhere in the U.S. southwest, in which the company plans to build huge volumes of low-cost batteries.
When I sold the ExxonMobil that my father bequeathed me, I considered buying stock (more…)
We love the concept of offshore wind: it’s out of sight, and it harvests huge wind resources that are unobstructed by buildings, trees, and mountains. The issue, obviously, is the price tag. According to the U.S. Energy Information Agency (part of the Department of Energy), the projected LCOE (levelized cost of energy) for offshore wind in 2018 will be more than two and one-half times that of onshore.
But here’s an extra benefit that needs to be priced into the equation: the capacity to reduce the severity of storms. Extracting some of the kinetic energy on the periphery of hurricanes goes a long way to diminish the damage done by wind, and it also decreases the height and intensity of the ocean waves that batter the shoreline. The article linked above provides some estimates in terms of reduced damages in the case of Katrina and Sandy that would have been experienced had there been significant deployment of offshore wind in advance of those storms, and it’s pretty impressive stuff.
I’d like to thank our wonderful intern from France, Olivier Goavec, for this very interesting piece on the challenges associated with integrating large volumes of variable resources into the grid-mix. I hope readers enjoy it. – ed
When the Kyoto protocol was signed in 1997 in an effort to slow the pace of global warming, many countries began to change their approach toward energy. For example, the EU adopted in 2008 an internal agreement to produce 21% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020. The region follows an economic policy to provide incentive to investors, by providing an attractive kWh feed-in tariffs. Read Complete Article Here.
Nuclear energy is the world’s largest source of emission-free energy. Nuclear power plants don’t produce air pollutants, sulfur or greenhouse gases.
The United States has 65 commercially operating nuclear power plants with 104 nuclear reactors in 31 states around the country. 36 of the plants have two or more reactors. These plants have generated about 20% of U.S. electricity each year since 1990. (more…)
Recently, Science Daily published an article based on the research of scientists from the University of North Carolina and John Hopkins, outlining the results of adding renewable energy sources to the grid, and offering ideas on how to mitigate issues associate with this.
The developing renewable energy sources have a very high capital cost input, which in comparison with natural gas is hard to compete with. These renewable resources are abundant, and unlike natural gas will be available for many more years. (more…)
Within ten minutes of one another, I:
1) Got a call from someone with a perpetual motion machine that involves the movement of buoyant objects in water (I see at least two of these per year), and
2) Encountered this video in which U.S. Representative Jerry Anderson (R-UT) claims we need more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere – as much as twice our current levels, because a) it’s less than 0.5% of the air, b) (more…)
I just did a phone interview for a young lady writing a paper for a course she’s taking in college, which reminded me of how passionate the youth of today is about climate change and the environment more generally. She seemed really cheesed off that the IPCC (International Panel on Climate Change) is having such a tough time bringing the nations of the world together to form a meaningful and binding agreement that would limit greenhouse gas emissions.
You and me both, kid. 🙂
One person trying to become greener is great, but if they can persuade their entire neighborhood to do it we’ll all be able to make a much bigger difference.
Are you old enough to remember what neighborhoods used to be like decades ago? These days they’re completely different and this isn’t a good thing. They’re becoming a lot dirtier, but I’m not talking about the trash lying in the middle of the street. We’re wasting tons of energy and we’re polluting the environment at a frightening rate. Instead of trying to tackle our anti-green problems on your own I’m going to look at a few ways you can do it with the help of the lovely people who live in your neighborhood. (more…)
Here’s a popular video that makes an extremely important point: in problem solving – and in life in general – we tend to confirm what we believe, even though disconfirming our beliefs is so much more productive. This, of course, is reflected in the source of news we select; it explains why Fox News viewers tend to be climate change deniers: they choose a source of information that will re-enforce what they already believe.
But to be fair, am I any better? I tend to read things that confirm my belief that climate change is real and that we have an obligation to do something about it, etc. Having said that, there has been an enormous amount of work — for a variety of purposes – that’s gone into the process of disproving the concept of human-caused climate change, and, according to the vast majority of scientists who have reviewed that work, it has not been successful in discrediting the theory.
