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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Photovoltaics

Here’s a blurb on New Jersey’s project to install solar PV panels on 175,000 of its power poles.

Why fuss with roof-top solar when you can use pole-tops instead? New Jersey’s Public Service Electric & Gas will soon conclude the installation of 175,000 solar panels on its power poles in New Jersey. The $200-million project will eventually supply 40 MW for the utility.

“The beauty of the panels is that there are no capital costs – we already own the poles,” said PSE&G President and COO Ralph LaRossa to the Wall Street Journal. The utility must generate 3.5% of its electricity from solar by 2021 to meet a requirement set by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities.

Ahem.  “No capital costs?”  How about: “There are no capital costs for the land and part of the mounting?” Even with all this “beauty,” the project comes in at $5 a Watt, and with the capacity factor of PV in New Jersey, I’m sure the levelized cost of energy is extremely unattractive.  It’s really not something that I would order up if I were objectively trying to do the right thing for the rate-payers.   While I’m happy to have 40 mW of clean energy, I would think that if the state really wants 40 mW of PV, it could consider allocating the roughly 75 acres of land needed, instead of building 175,000 mini solar installations and sending its people up 175,000 poles to install them, not to mention maintaining them over time.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Once the stuff of a marginalized green movement, these days the word “sustainability” is just about everywhere you look. This is particularly true in marketing materials for agriculture businesses, in a hurry to out-green one another.

But sustainable farming doesn’t stop with the chemicals farmers do (or don’t) use; in fact, considering the environment is just one (albeit, very important) slice of the sustainability pie. Truly green farming considers the farmer as well as the product; in fact, sometimes that means putting the people above the product altogether. Let’s take a deeper look at the full range of principles that truly make an agribusiness sustainable, starting with the grounding principles as espoused by two well-known sustainable companies and working up.

1. Build Environmental Standards into the Business Model

Of course, no examination of sustainability would be complete without first understanding the kinds of environmental practices that can truly be sustained in a world with shrinking resources. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Fossil Fuels

In terms of the energy crisis, the States have had several controversies regarding natural gas for most parts of the year 2012. Politicians have been arguing about how to properly harvest natural gas as well as how the country can get it’s own supply of energy without having to rely on foreign oil. With President Barack Obama’s win during the last Presidential elections on November, natural gas will continue to be harvested, since experts have assured that the United States have enough natural gas reserves to last for 10 years. If one would also notice, there are new natural gas companies rising to meet residential and business demands for natural gas.

So I’m thinking, if natural gas was the biggest topic amongst those who are concerned about the nation’s energy supply, then what challenges are we going to face this 2013? (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

I wrote last week that I had no idea why Lisa Jackson would resign her position as administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, other than simply running out of strength from a 24/7 bombardment from certain business interests that are hell-bent on peeling back environmental reforms. Here’s a stronger theory from Democracy Now:

Speculation that Obama will approve the pipeline has grown in recent weeks following the sudden resignation of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency head Lisa Jackson. A source reportedly close to Jackson told the New York Post she did not want to be at the EPA when the pipeline is given the green light, saying: “She will not be the EPA head when Obama supports [Keystone XL] getting built.”

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

The people at ACORE, the American Council on Renewable Energy totally “get it.” 

Below is a reprint of part of their piece, “Renewable Energy Industry Achievements for 2012.”  In case it’s not obvious, the operative word here is “industry.”  ACORE understands that the real obstacle that clean energy faces is its status as a bone fide sector of our economy, i.e., its standing against an industry. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Efficiency

According to SmartGridNews, there is a pilot project in Maryland and Washington DC to bring about “a transition by electric utilities… to new business relationships with their customers, regulators, and competitors that would better align utility compensation with consumer benefit…” 

I’d love to think that we’re close to a bold new business model for our utilities, as it’s desperately needed, but I’m having trouble believing that; utilities are extremely conservative institutions that have also shown us a full century of dogged resistance to change.  Having said that, they’re under enormous pressure based on several factors that include slowing load growth, as the world becomes more energy efficient and ramps up distributed generation. 

 I’m reminded of the “irresistible force paradox,” i.e., “What happens when an irresistible force meets an unmovable object?”

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

OK, it was only #22 out of the top 25 victories in 2012 for progressive legislation, but at least it made the list.  IMO, it’s the single most important, what its author dubs: “Challenging Citizens United.”

Peter Dreier is professor of politics and chair of the Urban and Environmental Policy Department at Occidental College, not too far from my home in Southern California.  In this piece, he suggests that progressives are generally unsatisfied, “the glass is half empty” types of people – yet they should learn to wrestle with this aspect of their DNA and celebrate victories as they crop up.  And, to be sure, one of these victories is the wickedly effective backlash that Americans have unleashed against the United States Supreme Court’s decision in the “Citizens United” case.

Dr. Dreier writes:

(more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Climate Change

I remember learning about the “pathetic fallacy” in high school English, i.e., assigning human moral characteristics to inanimate objects, e.g., “the cruel sea.”  Obviously, there is nothing cruel about the sea; it has no motives or intentions.  Likewise, at least according to the existentialists, we live in a universe that is coldly indifferent to your and my happiness.  OK, but what about living creatures?  Don’t we refer to lions as “vicious?” Again, the idea of “vice” is used inappropriately; lions act out of physiological impulse; they don’t make moral choices.  

Here’s another brilliant piece from Bill McKibben, founder of the global climate campaign 350.org, and the author, most recently, of Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet that picks up on this point. 

He argues that most of our political discourse is essentially one set of opinions versus another.  There are intelligent, well-meaning people on both sides of the debate surrounding gay marriage, abortion, the death penalty, etc.  And in truth, the decisions we make in these arenas are rooted in a kind of democracy: when a definitive majority wants a certain thing to happen, eventually, it will.  

But climate change is different; it’s not man versus man; it’s man versus physics.  Even as our presidential candidates were astonishing us Americans and the entire rest of the world looking on with their conspicuous ignoring of the entire global warming concept, the ever-increasing concentration of greenhouse gases was melting the icecaps.  Physics doesn’t care what we think and feel; it simply is. 

That’s why McKibben’s not waiting around for Obama, hoping that the president becomes the man we expected him to be.  But what exactly is McKibben (and his army of followers) doing?  I hope you’ll check this out.  

 

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Solar Thermal

I keep an eye out for articles like this that talk about concentrated solar power (CSP –aka solar thermal) and the use of energy storage to make that power dispatchable.  Normally, they contemplate molten salt, as the cost of storing energy as heat is so much lower than other technologies, e.g., batteries. 

Here, however, the conversation, for some strange reason, revolved around compressed air energy storage (CAES).    Yes, as the spokesperson said, “the energy to compress the air could come from a solar thermal turbine. “ 

I’m not saying that it couldn’t, but it strikes me that it wouldn’t, given the horrendous inefficiencies that the project would suffer.  Let me ask frequent commenter Glenn Doty (and anyone else):  Am I wrong here?

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Efficiency

When I had my marketing consultancy, one of the main goals was to get high rates of return on the direct mail campaigns.  My secret weapon: giving away highly valued content.  To that end, I used to write “planning guides” – often 80 – 100 pages long — and give them to anyone who made the request.  Here’s my piece for Penske Logistics: “Supply Chain Logistics – a Planning Guide for Senior Management,” which drove an 18% response rate.

Here’s an opportunity for a planning guide that I saw coming 100 miles away: a free guide to data privacy.  Smart-grid, by definition, means the two-way flow of information regarding the use of electrical power.  But how much information does the average consumer want flowing out to the utilities and other agents external to the customer’s home?  How will that information be used?  This one’s called: A Regulator’s Privacy Guide to Third-Party Data Access for Energy Efficiency.

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