If giant solar thermal power plants spread across the desert are like a mainframe, Sopogy is making the equivalent of a personal computer. The Hawaii-based company on Tuesday at the Intersolar 2008 conference will show off the latest version of its MicroCSP--essentially a shrunk-down version of concentrating solar power (CSP) equipment used in power plants.

Last week, the Japanese newspaper Nikkei caused a buzz by reporting that a redesigned Toyota Prius, to be released next year, will come equipped with solar panels. Toyota spokespeople will neither confirm nor deny the report, but several companies already offer solar roof kits for the Prius, and researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), in Golden, CO, have been testing one on a Prius modified to plug into the electrical grid.

The ocean's waves have enough energy to provide two trillion watts of electricity, according to the Department of Energy's office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. Extracting that enormous resource of power, however, has proved to be a herculean challenge.

University Park, Pa. -- A greener, less expensive method to produce hydrogen for fuel may eventually be possible with the help of water, solar energy and nanotube diodes that use the entire spectrum of the sun's energy, according to Penn State researchers. "Other researchers have developed ways to produce hydrogen with mind-boggling efficiency, but their approaches are very high cost," says Craig A. Grimes, professor of electrical engineering. "We are working toward something that is cost effective."

A new type of solar panel that allows light to pass through it like a pane of glass has been invented by scientists who said that it is 10 times more powerful than conventional methods of producing energy from sunlight.

A new, compact way to collect sunlight from windows and focus it to generate more electricity could make those multiple expensive rooftop solar panels a thing of the past.

Carl Hodges walks along a berm on a research plot where he grows salicornia and experiments with different planting and harvesting techniques. Hodges and his crew have flooded the plots with saltwater from the nearby Sea of Cortez.

A new way of capturing the energy from the Sun could increase the power generated by solar panels tenfold, a team of American scientists has shown. The new technique involves coating glass with a specific mixture of transparent dyes which redirect light to photovoltaic cells in the frame.

An ancient organism from the pit of a collapsed volcano may hold the key to tomorrow's hydrogen economy. Scientists from across the world have formed a team to unlock the process refined by a billions-year old archaea. The U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute will expedite the research by sequencing the hydrogen-producing organism for comparative genomics.

A hydrogen refuelling station which could be installed in the home as an alternative to visiting a petrol station has been unveiled. Users will need a hydrogen-powered car to go with it although the system can also be used for heating and cooking. Hydrogen has long been touted as an alternative energy source to carbon-hungry fossil fuels.

The solar industry is booming. With waves of investment and grants, the solar power industry is for the first time becoming a serious business. New power plants will soon be pumping power out to consumers, while other firms market to sell panels directly to the consumer, providing them with a more direct means of experiencing solar energy.

I've been mindful of the amount of water I use when making a pot of coffee ever since learning that one-third of the tap water used for drinking in North America is actually used to brew our daily cups of joe-and that if each of us avoided wasting just one cupful of coffee a day, we could save enough water over the course of a year to provide two gallons to every one of the more than 1.1 billion people who don't have access to freshwater at all.

Do you mind if I use energy.news

I use this specific tag to identify energy news stories in relationship to automated tag rolls for my website.



Hans De Keulenaer wrote:
> When posting to this group, please tag carefully, and where possible,
> annotate your bookmark with highlights and comments. Only these
> bookmarks add value - quality rather than quantity.
>
> Regarding
> tagging, we spend a lot of time keeping the tag cloud consistent. I've
> activated the feature to have group tag suggestions. Please bear in
> mind the following:
>
> - using only lowercase: so germany rather than Germany
> - use plural forms where both plural or singular could apply: e.g. cars, batteries, photovoltaics
> - use specific tags. Avoid 'energy', 'on', 'of', ... (these are actual tags encountered)
>
> Thanks for your consideration.

Hans De Keulenaer wrote:
> "energy news" is quite OK. Feel free to use it. Thanks for checking first.


Thanks and also for starting up the forums. You might want to see the forums with a quick listing of the tops news coming out on occassion. I'm an active user of http://www.Newsvine.com which is a large international news blog that allows comments after articles as a way to develop conversations between users. Things get quite hot some times, but once people learn how to get along everybody learns a lot. It takes a bit of time mind you, so I wouldn't hold much out for that here, but who knows...

ROME (Reuters) - Better insulation at home, less use of the car and even giving up an electric toothbrush can help people in rich nations halve emissions of greenhouse gases, a U.N. report said on Thursday.\n\n"Adopting a climate-friendly lifestyle needn't require drastic changes or major sacrifices," according to the 202-page U.N. Environment Program (UNEP) book entitled "Kick the CO2 Habit: the U.N. Guide to Climate Neutrality".

An innovative U.S. green technology company, with its main office located in Vancouver, Canada, has developed and owns the world-wide patents to, including Canada, United States, and Taiwan, a sophisticated new automotive muffler system that looks like a regular muffler, has no additional material or automobile-related installation costs, reduces vehicle emissions by an incredible 97% and remarkably, according to the inventor, improves gasoline mileage by 20%.

Is there life after cars? Could your house be transformed into a unit in a mixed-use, multifamily building with a vegetable garden on the roof? Would you drink "toilet to tap" water - purified, recycled sewage - or would you rather die of thirst?

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush put politics ahead of the facts Tuesday as he sought to blame Congress for high energy prices, saying foreign suppliers are pumping just about all the oil they can and accusing lawmakers of blocking new refineries. Bush renewed his call for drilling in an Arctic wildlife refuge, but his own Energy Department says that would have little impact on gasoline prices.