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It was a day when the shift from the past to the future was almost palpable. It started Thursday morning in Berkeley where Green Wombat was moderating a panel of tech luminaries gathered at the University of California's Global Technology Leaders Conference. As Shai Agassi, founder of electric car infrastructure company Better Place, makes the case for harnessing Silicon Valley's technological innovation to Detroit's manufacturing might to create a sustainable car industry, dispatches from the automotive apocalypse roll down my BlackBerry: Ford (F) shares sink to $1.01…GM's (GM) stock falls to its lowest level since World War II…U.S. automakers beg for a bailout…California Congressman Henry Waxman ousts Michigan's John Dingell - the Duke of Detroit - from his 28-year chairmanship of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee. Agassi slips out of the conference and an hour later I catch up with him across the Bay at San Francisco City Hall where he and representatives of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the mayors of San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland announce a $1 billion project to build a regional network of electric car charging stations. Better Place has signed similar deals with governments in Israel, Denmark and Australia, but California is the company's first foray into the U.S. market. Planning for the Bay Area network begins in 2009 with construction scheduled to start in 2010 and commercial rollout set for 2012.

Here's a wave power technology which you may not have heard of: It's called the Searaser and (though only in prototype stages, I've got some reservations about how well it may scale up, as well as the name which somehow I always see as 'Sea Eraser') it may be worth watching. The principle is fairly simple and proven in a different context: Use the Searaser to pump quantities of sea water up a hill where it can be stored in ponds until needed and then released downhill to drive hydroelectric turbines to create power. This is how the Searaser works:

Scientists working at Arizona State University's Laboratory for Algae Research & Biotechnology hope that tiny algae will be able to fuel jumbo jets. Now, their research is being spun-off as a $3 million research and commercialization collaboration between Heliae Development and Science Foundation Arizona to develop, produce and sell kerosene-based aviation fuel derived from algae. The researchers say they've already moved their work from the lab bench to a pilot-scale demonstration and production project.

State regulators in Colorado have given the green light to plans by Xcel Energy to shut down two coal-powered energy plants in the state, and build one of the world's largest utility-scale solar-power facilities. Following discussions lasting several days, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) backed the power company's voluntary decision to close the two coal-fired plants at Denver and Grand Junction, making Xcel the first utility in the U.S. to make such a move solely in an effort to reduce emissions.

The Peruvian alternative energy company Iberoperuana Inversiones SAC has commenced construction on a 240 megawatt wind energy farm. It is Peru's first major alternative energy project. Iberoperuana Inversiones plans to invest $240 million in the farm, which is projected to provide clean electricity for an estimated 80,000 families in Peru's southern desert region of Paracas. The wind energy park will be located near the city of Ica (near Paracas National Park and the Nazca Lines) and will be known as the "Parque Eólico San Andrés" (San Andrés Wind Park).

While still a small percentage of overall electric generation, there's no denying that wind power has been growing consistently in the United States. In 2007, an additional 5,329 megawatts of capacity was added, an amount which was slightly more than a quarter of all new global wind capacity that year. Currently an additional 8 gigawatts of wind capacity is under construction and scheduled to be operational by the end of 2008. The result: This will be the third straight year that the United States leads the world in annual wind power installations, according to a new study by Emerging Energy Research.

By changing the way that conventional silicon solar panels are made, Day4 Energy, a startup based in Burnaby, British Columbia, has found a way to cut the cost of solar power by 25 percent, says George Rubin, the company's president.

At the risk of sounding like a cheerleader, the scale of some of the new solar power plants being announced over the past few weeks are just astounding. PG&E has contracted with a 250 MW and a 500 MW solar plant in California, a 250 MW integrated solar plant/manufacturing facility is being built in India, and the Clinton Foundation is discussing building a similar 5,000 MW facility in a different part of India. At the beginning of the summer a new 10 MW thin-film facility was claiming the record for that category and a 400 MW solar thermal plant in the Mojave Desert was big news. Furthering the great solar scale-up:

We've written with great fanfare about Beluga Skysails, the cargo ship that has successfully used a large kite to generate energy for operations during windy periods at sea. The billowing kite cut energy around 20 percent during a trip from Venezuela to Germany and up to Norway earlier in 2008.

Scientists mimic essence of plants' energy storage system. In a revolutionary leap that could transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine.

New South Wales, Australia is the site of a pilot project where solar thermal technology reduces the use of fossil fuels. Coal and solar generate electricity using the same turbines. Coal power plants can utilize solar to produce 15%-60% of the electricity. A higher quantity is possible, but requires significantly more modifications to be made to the coal boilers.

Can you imagine being able to produce enough water in the Sahara to grow crops there? Can you imagine harnessing sufficient quantities of solar power to supply electricity to cities in Africa and cities in Europe? Can you imagine producing a sustainable bio-fuel that doesn't impact on world food supplies? Charlie Paton, Michael Pawlyn and Bill Watts can and what's more they can imagine all these happening in the same place at the same time.

If electric vehicles aren't your thing, then you may be pleased to hear that at least one company is working on giving that tried and true internal combustion engine a major boost. Artemis, an Edinburgh, Scotland-based company, has developed a hydraulic hybrid transmission that could potentially double the mileage of most vehicles -- by accident, as it happens. The firm's original goal had been to simply reduce CO2 emissions on the highway by 30% (a goal it also achieved).

Al Gore has made a major speech in Washington this morning, setting out an ambitious goal for the USA to produce all of its electricity from carbon-free sources by 2020. I thought I'd comment on the technical feasibility of the plan, and the underlying economics of such an endeavour.

While certain American politicians complain about a million bucks being included in the country's energy plan to promote bikes, in the UK they are investing £140 million (about US$ 280 million) to create dedicated bike lanes, provide bike parking, safety training, on-street bike rental networks and a campaign to promote bicycling in 12 Cycling Demonstration Towns.

Looking to make solar panels cheaper, MIT researchers have created sheets of glass coated with advanced organic dyes that more efficiently concentrate sunlight. The researchers, whose results appear in this week's issue of Science, say that the coated glass sheets could eventually make solar power as cheap as electricity from fossil fuels.