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The commonly accepted wisdom in the energy industry is that the grid could only draw something like 20 percent of its power from wind and solar resources before encountering major reliability problems. But the new power flow simulation (.pdf), presented for the first time this week at the American Geophysical Union meeting, shows that, at least in California, the power grid might be able to handle three times that much renewable energy without encountering major trouble pushing electrons around the state.

The SBCI database for policy tools for energy efficiency in buildings presents a unique comparison and analysis of experiences from using different kinds of policy tools in over 50 countries on all continents.

There’s a full-blown fight in San Diego between common sense and enviro extremists over a new San Diego Gas & Electric power line called the Sunrise Powerlink… a project thats been winding its way through the state approval process for more than two years.

On Friday 22nd February, I attended the above conference in Aberdeen. With presentations from the EU Commission, The European Parliament, Scottish politicians and leading academics, this was a high profile event. There follows an account of the key issues raised by the various speakers together with my own observations and opinions on these matters.

Jonathan Manson presents the results of a survey conducted by the European Copper Institute (ECI) into the consequences for EU industry of poor power quality. These add up to €150bn annually, are mainly experienced by industry and caused by power interruptions (dips, surges, transients and short interruptions). Call for action is made to use of the significant and disturbing conclusions drawn from the analysis that has been carried out.

The New Scientist of 19 Jan 2008 carries an article, "Coal: Bleak outlook for the black stuff" (subscription required for full article), belatedly drawing attention to an interesting piece of analysis by Professor David Rutledge of CalTech in a lecture last October, where he suggests that world coal reserves are grossly overstated and could be substantially exhausted this century. It's well worth watching the whole hour of the lecture, because the PowerPoint alone [3MB] doesn't do his argument justice.

The Government this week unveiled a plan to supply power to more than 261 health centres. The Euro 36.5m (about Frw27.4b) project was presented before development partners this week. Most of the targeted health centres are based in rural areas.

Wind power, long considered to be as fickle as wind itself, can be groomed to become a steady, dependable source of electricity and delivered at a lower cost than at present, according to scientists at Stanford University. The key is connecting wind farms throughout a given geographic area with transmission lines, thus combining the electric outputs of the farms into one powerful energy source. The findings are published in the November issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology.

Tonight Jean Ziegler, the UN special rapporteur on the right to food, will present his annual report to the General Assembly in New York. In it, he will call for a 5-year moratorium on the production of liquid biofuels made from food crops such as corn, wheat, palm oil and rapeseed.

The implementation of new high-speed transport technologies re-shapes the demand balance between transport modes and rebound effects may occur. In this paper first a definition of environmental rebound effects of high-speed transport is presented and various cases are discussed. Second, a method is developed to determine and quantify the environmental rebound effects employing life cycle assessment. The method is illustrated in a case study by investigating the greenhouse gas emissions of a frequently discussed future underground maglev train system for Switzerland.

This report presents the results of the eleventh international survey. It provides an overview of PV power systems applications and markets in the reporting countries at the end of 2006 and analyzes trends in the implementation of PV power systems between 1992 and 2006.

In a follow-up to his now-legendary TED2006 presentation, Hans Rosling demonstrates how developing countries are pulling themselves out of poverty.

Investment of $20.2 trillion will be required by 2030 under the IEA alternative energy scenario, increasing nuclear capacity by 41% to 519 GWe and reducing energy demand by 10% and CO2 emissions by 16% compared with projections on present basis. Of this amount, $11.3 trillion will go for electricity: $5.2 trillion for generation, and the rest for transmission and distribution.

This report presents the current status of sustainable energy development, including the renewable energy and energy efficiency sectors. The information is intended to provide financiers and policy makers with an overview of the status of the sustainable energy market to help them weigh their commitments to the sector.