The Scottish Government has created one of the biggest international innovation prizes in history - a £10 million challenge for advances in wave and tidal energy. At a ceremony this week in historic Edinburgh Castle, details of the 'Saltire Prize' were revealed to leading scientists, environmentalists and potential entrants after being finalised by a panel of international experts who comprise the prize Challenge Committee. Dr Anne Glover, Scotland's Chief Scientific Adviser and Chair of the Challenge Committee, said the Saltire Prize will be awarded to the team that can demonstrate in Scottish waters a commercially viable wave or tidal energy technology that achieves a minimum electrical output of 100GWh over a continuous two year period using only the power of the sea and is judged to be the best overall technology after consideration of cost, environmental sustainability and safety.

Energy and environmental leaders, including representatives from the Nature Conservancy, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Pew Environment Group, recently met with members of President-elect Obama's transition team. The groups came carrying a monstrosity of a document that describes their recommendations on energy and environmental issues for the new administration. The 391-page report, entitled "Transition to Green," was made available Monday on Obama's transition Web site. The environmental groups had suggestions for a wide swath of federal departments, from Energy to Education and Homeland Security to Defense.

Gore's terrific speech is here. Note: It plays for a minute and then stops. It takes 2 minutes for the video to buffer, then works fine. The last 10 minutes are here:

According to a Stanford University researcher, 'wind, water and sun beat biofuels, nuclear and coal for clean energy.' The scientist 'has conducted the first quantitative, scientific evaluation of the proposed, major, energy-related solutions by assessing not only their potential for delivering energy for electricity and vehicles, but also their impacts on global warming, human health, energy security, water supply, space requirements, wildlife, water pollution, reliability and sustainability.' Wow! The researcher found that some sources of energy were 25 to 1,000 times more polluting than the best available options. Some of his conclusions make sense, some are controversial, but read more…

Recently the town of Heerlen in the Netherlands repurposed an old abandoned coal mine into a brilliant source of geothermal energy. The project takes advantage of flooded underground mine shafts, using their thermal energy to power a large-scale district heating system. Dubbed the Minewater Project, the new system recently went online and provides 350 homes and businesses in the town with hot water and heating in the winter and cool water in the summer.

From March 4-6, world leaders in the renewable, green, clean technology and energy efficiency sectors will gather in Bangalore for Green Energy Summit 2009. The summit is a highly efficient forum for varied stakeholders from solar, wind, biomass, IT, transport, construction, aviation, nanotechnology and biotechnology to bring together the business and science of the most important and relevant Green Energy and Clean technologies (http:// www.greenenergysummit.com).

Wales has laid down the gauntlet to Scotland and Northern Ireland in the race to develop tidal energy technology. Last week, Cardiff-based Tidal Energy Limited (TEL) announced plans for a 1MW trial installation at the Ramsey Sound in Pembrokeshire, South Wales. The company hopes its DeltaStream horizontal turbines will be in the water by summer 2010, making them Wales' first signifcant tidal install. TEL says its 12-month test project will use technology that's proven to be grid-compliant, enabling it to connect to the national grid and earn an income from generated power.

The Age recently had an article on the emerging practice of "guerilla gardening", taking a look at the "Gardening guerillas in our midst". This concept seems to have steadily increased in popularity in recent years (admittedly from a very low base) as the permaculture movement's ideas have been propagated through the community. Unlike the usual approach taken when trying to grow food in the suburbs - converting spare land on your own property (as discussed by aeldric previously and, more recently, in Jeff Vail's series on A Resilient Suburbia) - guerilla gardening involves cultivating any spare patch of urban land that isn't being used for another purpose, which could provide a substantial addition to the food growing potential of suburbia.

Going solar seems to get easier by the day - both logistically and financially. Before, homeowners had to save up to pay the huge upfront cost of buying and installing solar panels. Now, would-be solar energy users don't need to put up startup funds - nor do they even have to deal with an extra repayment bill! The latest company making solar power accessible is Renewable Funding, a financial company with a new solar-friendly product called CityFIRST. CityFIRST basically allows homeowners to install solar panels with no upfront cost - using a solar installer or contractor of their choice - then pay for panels over 20 years via a line item on property tax bills.

Siemens Building Technologies is sponsoring a Virtual Trade Show on December 10th and 11th from 8:00am - 6:00pm CST. This Virtual Energy Forum is a two day online-only event focused on how leading companies can adopt better energy management practices to cut costs, while at the same time adopting clean energy alternatives -- presenting alternative energy technologies, policies, and best practices in a live, interactive environment. The event is designed to meet the needs of corporate energy executives in a way that is not possible with physical events, webinars or other means.

The second Environmental Hall of Fame ceremony will be held in Chicago beginning tomorrow through Saturday, Nov. 20-22. Among the environmental celebrities to be honored are Pierc Brosnan (James Bond) and his wife, who have been activists in the movement. Two of the New Energy Congress' Global Top 100 Clean Energy Technology companies will also receive awards: Stirling Energy Systems, a concentrated solar technology that heats a highly-efficient Stirling engine, has been in first place in the Top 100 for over a year. Green Power Inc., which is commencing commercial production of a 100 ton per day municipal waste-to-diesel plant, recently rose to 15th place on the Top 100 list.

CNN reports that Obama is planning an economic stimulus package based on energy efficient buildings and improved internet access - Obama outlines initiative to create 2.5 million jobs. President-elect Barack Obama on Saturday outlined some of his plan to create 2.5 million jobs by 2011, and said he will push for immediate action by Congress when he takes office in January. Obama wants to make public buildings more energy-efficient, repair roads and bridges, modernize schools, increase broadband access and ensure that health care professionals have access to the latest technology. "Our government now pays the highest energy bill in the world," he said in the weekly Democratic radio address.

Matthew Simmons has received quite a bit of press in the past week, after his Ocean Energy Institute floated a proposal to build a $25 billion, 5 GW wind farm in the Gulf of Maine. Offshore wind farms have a number of advantages over their land based equivalents - they are less hazardous to wildlife, have fewer objections raised on NIMBY concerns and winds are generally stronger over the oceans than they are over land.

Welcome to the do it yourself guide to transform your home to a Solar Powered Home, a Wind Powered Home or a combination of both. The first thing you need to know is although solar and wind energy are free and clean they are not free to get. With this guide though you will be able to make it economic to switch to solar or wind power.

If you don't already know it by now carbon dioxide is the leading cause of global warming. Since it is the largest factor in global warming it would be prudent for us to eliminate this emission first. Although we can never fully eliminate carbon dioxide, because we and every other air breating creature exhale it, it is possible to reduce it enough to the point it doesn't cause global warming.

Doing a few chores around the house this month can save homeowners major expense in the spring, according to Rick Felton, President of Homeservice Club of Canada. "By doing a little preventative maintenance now, you can prevent minor problems from escalating into a major headache in the spring," Felton said. "Minor repairs done now can prevent air and moisture penetration from attacking the structural integrity of your home down the road," he added.

Clean energy company Econcern will partner with China National Offshore Oil Corp and Sinohydro to invest 863 million euros ($1.09 billion) to build four Chinese wind farms, the companies said on Tuesday. Construction of the wind farms, which will generate around 720 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy, will begin in 2009, Netherlands-based Econcern said in a statement.

Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Monday unveiled an ambitious plan that calls for installing solar panels on residents' rooftops to meet 10 percent of the city's energy needs by the year 2020. "Our solar initiative is the largest of any kind anywhere in the world. When it takes full effect, L.A. will have 1,280 megawatts more capacity -- more than exists in the entire United States today," said the mayor.

Energy Policies To Maximize Energy Security And Economic Development Hosted by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance Date/Time: January 9, 2009 8:30 am to 5:30 pm Detailed Conference Agenda Location: Buntrock Commons, St. Olaf College - Northfield, MN Hear from the experts on Renewable Energy Payments (a.k.a. feed-in tariffs): * Paul Gipe, the North American expert [more info] gives his excellent tutorial * National policy expert, Wilson Rickerson [more info] llustrates the spreading wave of feed-in tariff legislation * German energy expert, Willi Voigt, shares his experience with implementing feed-in tariffs in Germany and their stunning success

TreeHugger has a post on micro-wind power devices for the home - Hot Home Wind Turbines You Can Actually Buy, Plus One You Wish You Could. Though solar panels definitely hog the renewable energy stage when it comes to home installations, a number of new, innovative wind turbines have entered the market in the past couple of months. Not all of these are intended to be mounted on your roof, some you'll need a bit of a yard (and a dearth of neighbors) to install and they vary in price from affordable to "when am I going to actually pay this off?", but they all go to show that there's more than one way to harness the wind to generate electricity. Check 'em out...