"A Japanese trade ministry panel today proposed expanding the feed-in tariff to require utilities to buy electricity at a premium from hydropower stations, wind turbine and geothermal operators. Utilities may have to buy renewable power at between 15 yen (17 cents) and 20 yen a kilowatt hour, according to a report released in Tokyo today. The incentive program would run for between 10 and 20 years, it said. The government wants to supply 10 percent of the country's primary energy from renewable sources by 2020, compared with about 3 percent in 2007, according to the International Energy Agency. The proposed tariff compares with 5 to 7 yen a kilowatt hour utilities pay for nuclear power and about 8 yen for oil- fired generation, said Tomohiro Jikihara, an analyst at Deutsche Securities Inc. in Tokyo. "

"The European Union looked to wind energy to provide 39 percent of its new power capacity in 2009, trouncing natural gas and solar power, statistics reveal. The European Wind Energy Association in statistics published Wednesday show the EU looked to wind energy in 2009 more than other sources. New wind power in the EU made up 39 percent of the new energy projects in 2009, with natural gas making up 26 percent followed by 16 percent for solar energy, the EWEA said. Meanwhile, the EU decommissioned more coal and nuclear facilities than were installed in 2009, suggesting renewable energy made up 61 percent of the new capacity in 2009."

"The German government has dubbed 2010 the "Energy Year" during which it will fund energy-related research projects with more than $600 million. It's one of the biggest challenges of our time: How should we shape our energy mix in times of a changing climate, dwindling natural resources and a growing demand for energy in quickly growing economies? Germany aims to tackle -- and maybe even answer -- this question this year with a multitude of events and funding efforts linked to the energy mix. "Financing energy research is among the top priorities of our science agenda," Germany's Science Minister Annette Schavan said Monday in Berlin. "The Energy Year is aimed at bringing into the middle of our society a debate about new solutions and concepts for the future energy mix." "

It was supposed to be a great leap forward in Britain's green energy revolution. Three of Labour's biggest beasts - the prime minister, Lord Mandelson and Ed Miliband - lined up in London on Friday to launch a new wave of offshore wind turbines the government hopes will create up to 70,000 "green collar" jobs over the next decade. But as snow brought Britain to a halt, the green dream had little hope of dominating the headlines.

It was supposed to be a great leap forward in Britain's green energy revolution. Three of Labour's biggest beasts - the prime minister, Lord Mandelson and Ed Miliband - lined up in London on Friday to launch a new wave of offshore wind turbines the government hopes will create up to 70,000 "green collar" jobs over the next decade. But as snow brought Britain to a halt, the green dream had little hope of dominating the headlines.

First Minister Alex Salmond believes Scotland has hit the energy jackpot for the second time. First came North Sea oil. Now, it's Scotland's abundance of wind and water which could prove to be our economic saviour. The big question is: How can Scotland cash in on its good fortune? Wind farms have become a common feature of the Scottish landscape. Indeed, many would argue they are all too common. The power companies themselves admit they are finding it harder and harder to identify suitable sites for new onshore wind farms.

First Minister Alex Salmond believes Scotland has hit the energy jackpot for the second time. First came North Sea oil. Now, it's Scotland's abundance of wind and water which could prove to be our economic saviour. The big question is: How can Scotland cash in on its good fortune? Wind farms have become a common feature of the Scottish landscape. Indeed, many would argue they are all too common. The power companies themselves admit they are finding it harder and harder to identify suitable sites for new onshore wind farms.

It seems cruelly ironic that tapping into Southern Nevada's vast solar energy potential could slowly drain our desert. Traditional solar thermal power plants that use wet cooled technology require millions of gallons of water over time in the process of converting solar rays into clean, renewable power for our community. Southern Nevada received some good economic news last month when Solar Millennium, a division of one of the world's top solar power generators, announced new plans to use a "dry-cooling" system on two proposed solar power plants in Amargosa Valley, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. This dry-cooling system will use 90 percent less water than previously planned.

NV Energy deal, legislation in Congress could help state develop solar power SolarReserve, a California energy company, is planning to build a 100-megawatt solar thermal power plant near Tonopah, and on Tuesday it announced that NV Energy had agreed to buy power from the plant. As Stephanie Tavares reported on the Las Vegas Sun's Web site, the plant is designed to use heat storage technology that will allow its steam turbines to run at night. The Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project is being vetted by the Bureau of Land Management. The company says it could break ground by 2011 and expects construction to last two years.

A new state energy plan released Tuesday calls for more conservation, more use of renewable sources such as solar and wind power, a tougher New York building code and a disclosure requirement for a building's utility usage when it's sold. Gov. David Paterson said the plan he accepted from the State Energy Planning Board provides the blueprint for a continuing transition to a clean energy economy over the next decade. Initiatives for 2010 include the building sale disclosure and removing loopholes that have limited the effectiveness of the state's energy code. Both require legislative action. Others include procuring 100 megawatts more of solar energy statewide and requesting bids for an offshore Long Island wind project.

A new state energy plan released Tuesday calls for more conservation, more use of renewable sources such as solar and wind power, a tougher New York building code and a disclosure requirement for a building's utility usage when it's sold. Gov. David Paterson said the plan he accepted from the State Energy Planning Board provides the blueprint for a continuing transition to a clean energy economy over the next decade. Initiatives for 2010 include the building sale disclosure and removing loopholes that have limited the effectiveness of the state's energy code. Both require legislative action. Others include procuring 100 megawatts more of solar energy statewide and requesting bids for an offshore Long Island wind project.

Capturing energy from the earth's heat is pretty easy pickin's for geologically-active areas of the world like Iceland, Indonesia, and Chile. In some locations, hot fluids are so near the earth's surface that heat from naturally-occurring hot fluids can be directly circulated through buildings for heating. Iceland, in particular, takes advantage of this low-hanging energy fruit. However, in most areas of the world where geothermal energy is captured, the heat is used to generate electricity. Conventional Geothermal Energy Unlike some of the more common alternative energies - hydro, solar, and wind - geothermal is impervious to weather conditions. This independence means it provides excellent base load electricity. Currently all commercial geothermal electricity is generated by so-called conventional systems, whereby naturally- occurring hot water or steam is accessed at comparatively shallow depths in areas of very high geothermal gradient. Wells are commonly drilled to depths on the order of 2 km. The water or steam they produce is used to spin turbines that in turn generate electricity.

The best prospects for large-scale renewable energy production and net-energy performance remain wind and certain forms of solar, according to a study released by two California-based think tanks. "It is reasonable to conclude ... that a full replacement of energy currently derived from fossil fuels with energy from alternative sources is probably impossible over the short term; it may be unrealistic to expect it even over longer time frames," explains Searching for a Miracle: Net Energy Limits & the Fate of Industrial Society. The report was published by the International Forum on Globalization with content provided by the Post Carbon Institute.

A Michigan public university plans to test a floating wind turbine platform to demonstrate how wind energy could work on Lake Michigan. Grand Valley State University's Michigan Alternative & Renewable Energy Center received $1.4 million in federal funding to conduct the study. The university plans to have the platform installed by the fall of 2010. Meanwhile, We Energies plans to issue a request for proposals in early November that will be the start of a $3 million study sanctioned by the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin to determine the feasibility of wind turbines on Lake Michigan. We Energies spokesman Brian Manthey said the energy utility is not involved in the Michigan study, but will collaborate with Grand Valley State to share information

If a report released Tuesday by the International Energy Agency is correct, then the $2 billion committed by the Alberta government toward the development of carbon capture and storage is nothing more than a drop in the bucket. The IEA estimates it will cost as much as $10 trillion U.S. between 2010 and 2030 for the world to keep carbon dioxide emissions below 450 parts per million and temperatures from rising more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. While that level of investment might be enough for even the most ardent climate change advocate to throw their hands up and surrender, there's a little bit of good news to be found in the report.

Jeff Vail has started a series looking at what I've long called the "EROEI hole" problem - making sure we don't leave the transition to renewables too late and find ourselves stuck in a situation where we have shrinking production of fossil fuels which are produced at ever lower EROEI values, thereby making constructing an alternative energy infrastructure a lot more problematic than it would be today - The Renewables Hump: Digging Out of a Hole. In the first post in this series, I introduced the general notion that renewable energy requires an up-front investment of energy, and that this may dramatically impact our ability to transition to a renewable-energy economy because the transition effort will initially exacerbate the very energy scarcity that is its impetus. Beyond this general notion that the transition to renewables first requires exacerbating our current energy scarcity, the time that it takes a renewable source of energy to return the up-front energy invested in it becomes especially critical. Here's a quick example (for the simplicity of these examples, I'm assuming that 100% of energy requirement is up-front with no maintenance requirement):

I'm not generally a fan of Jeremy Rifkind's work. But, as a commenter is quoted as saying at the end of this BBC News report on Rifkind's latest ideas for energy policy, "The world has room for visionaries." At a Prague conference, Rifkind outlined a grand scheme for solving economic and energy problems by rapidly moving Europe to distributed renewable energy resources integrated with smart grid systems. If you strip out the seemingly-obligatory-in-public-pronouncements-these-days promise of millions of "green jobs," it is a vision of what a smart grid system can do for distributed energy. Sure, too ambitious by half, but that is part of what makes it a vision and not a program for immediate action. Although, I'll have to say, there is an odd bit of centralization in a distributed energy proposal in which at "any one time the system will know what every washing machine is doing in Europe" and in the case of "peak demand, [with] not enough supply, software can say to two million washing machines 'forget the extra rinse'." (Though Rifkind notes his system is entirely voluntary and participants would be paid for their contributions.)

With an investment of US $10 billion dollars in energy efficiency improvements, India's economy would benefit from its potentially vast annual energy savings of 183.5 billion kilowatt hours, according to a new report from the World Resources Institute (WRI). "India's energy demand is expected to more than double by 2030. There is a dramatic need for domestic and international energy efficiency technology providers, service providers, and equipment manufacturers to develop innovative ways to conserve energy," said Robin Murphy, WRI vice president of external relations.

Technology Review has an article on new fuel cells that don't require platinum - A Catalyst for Cheaper Fuel Cells. A new catalyst based on iron works as well as platinum-based catalysts for accelerating the chemical reactions inside hydrogen fuel cells. The finding could help make fuel cells for electric cars cheaper and more practical. Fuel cell researchers have been looking for cheaper, more abundant alternatives to platinum, which costs between $1,000 and $2,000 an ounce and is mined almost exclusively in just two countries: South Africa and Russia. One promising catalyst that uses far less expensive materials--iron, nitrogen, and carbon--has long been known to promote the necessary reactions, but at rates that are far too slow to be practical.

The Times has a story in the "deserts of gold" genre, confusing solar PV (panels) with concentrating solar thermal power - Solar panels in the Sahara 'could power the whole of Europe'. There is a new twist to the story now though, with North Africa's wind power potential also being touted. All of Europe's energy needs could be supplied by building an array of solar panels in the Sahara, the climate change conference has been told. Technological advances combined with falling costs have made it realistic to consider North Africa as Europe's main source of imported energy. By harnessing the power of the Sun, possibly in tandem with wind farms along the North African coastline, Europe could easily meet its 2020 target of generating at least 20 per cent of its energy from renewable sources.

One of the reasons why smart grid is generating so much interest right now is its ability to enable the integration of renewable energy into the electric power network, leading to a broader generation portfolio and potentially beneficial carbon implications. Lots of the discussion of smart grid in policy and media (including places like Greentech Media, Cleantech, EcoGeek, GreenMonk, and the New York Times blogs Dot Earth and Green Inc.) has emphasized the potential economic and environmental value from having investments in the electric power network that make the accommodation of renewables easier, reducing transaction costs and shifting the margin at which investing in renewables is profitable.

The State Agency that runs California's electric Grid held an online Solar Energy Symposium on 1-29-2009. This is the library of all the presentations made. Most are PDF files.

This is Part 3 in a series on Passive Solar Design by Will Stewart, a Systems Engineer in the energy industry and longtime reader of theoildrum.com. As a new administration considers how best to make future infrastructure investments, it seems like some of the lowest hanging fruit is better utilization of the daily solar flux, not only directly with photovoltaic and hot water, but also in building construction and placement. I encourage our readers to further their understanding of passive solar concepts by reading/bookmarking this series.