Clean Energy Transition

"@davidroodman David Roodman My solar panels just completed their first megawatt-hour! http://bit.ly/dUc8V4 http://bit.ly/awm13C"

Despite increasing green awareness and steadily rising gasoline prices, Americans and other denizens of the developed world - not to mention millions of new Chinese and Indian drivers hitting the road every week - are loath to give up the freedom and privacy of their personal automobiles. But snarled traffic, longer commute times, and rising pollution levels have given city transportation planners new ammunition in their efforts to encourage the use of clean, energy-efficient public transit. One of the newest tools in their arsenal is so-called congestion pricing (also called variable toll pricing), whereby cars and trucks are hit with higher tolls if they access central urban areas at traditionally congested times.

"Energy affects everyone's lives, and pockets, and the way we think about energy here in the UK is changing fast. Up and down the country there are already hundreds of people getting together and setting up renewable energy projects. They're proving that there really is an alternative way to do things. But at the same time only 2% of people are on green tariff's."

A recent study by Logan group at Penn State University also demonstrated similar findings in that the energy contained in hydrogen gas not only can offset the energy used for the desalination process but has surplus that can be used for downstream processing.

Several years ago even the mobile phones were very expensive, not to mention computers and airplane flights.

The example of mobile phones is of little relevance here, because cost reduction is driven by the scaling laws of microelectronics. However, the reducing cost of flights - in a way the ultimate energy application - offer a good benchmark. What will happen to flights though if commodity and energy prices go up in the long run?

"Electro Magnates is a cutting edge carbon-reducing sustainability project at the intersection of computer science, social media and behaviour change. The project's deliverables are to design, implement, and evaluate a suite of social software applications - including games - to encourage positive behaviour changes in energy consumption. The project will specifically design software interventions to be used by employees and students in educational and public sector work-places and environments in the county of Lincolnshire in the UK."

A few good points. And whether we agree on climate science or not, the scientific debate should remain open and serene. In the end, there will always remain a degree of uncertainty, and the decision to act, and to what extent, becomes then a political choice.

"DSIRE is a comprehensive source of information on state, local, utility, and federal incentives and policies that promote renewable energy and energy efficiency. Established in 1995 and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, DSIRE is an ongoing project of the N.C. Solar Center and the Interstate Renewable Energy Council."

DSIRE is a comprehensive source of information on state, local, utility and federal incentives and policies that promote renewable energy and energy efficiency. Established in 1995 and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, DSIRE is an ongoing project of the N.C. Solar Center and the Interstate Renewable Energy Council.

Australia's first community wind farm.

The parameters for this project are interesting. The biggest challenge for these cooperatives is to scale up to finance larger projects. The fact that this group raised almost 10 M$ is encouraging.

Interesting that EWEA develops this kind of tool.

What's the key to using alternative energy, like solar and wind? Storage -- so we can have power on tap even when the sun's not out and the wind's not blowing. In this accessible, inspiring talk, Donald Sadoway takes to the blackboard to show us the future of large-scale batteries that store renewable energy. As he says: "We need to think about the problem differently. We need to think big. We need to think cheap."

The Fraunhofer Institute is using a redox flow battery, a type of cell that uses two electrolytic fluids exchanging protons through a membrane. This process generates electricity. Although this type of battery isn't new, the Fraunhofer Institute improved the energy density, making it equivalent to that of a lithium ion battery.