By Bridgette Steffen

Part of living lightly on the planet is reducing the square footage of your home and living space. We applaud home designers like Minneapolis-based Hive Modular for presenting a very practical and stylish 2-bedroom home that is only 1,410 square feet. This new home was completed on an urban infill lot and is part of Hive’s popular B-Line series. Optimally situated, this home is a great example of a solar passive home and features many green design elements that help make its environmental impact minimal.

This model of B-Line Small shown here is a simple bar-shaped design with a flat-pitched roof that takes advantage of the southern aspect. Flat or more traditional roof designs are also available. This particular house has 2 bedrooms, kitchen, dining and living space. However, all homes are constructed with modular elements and the B-Line series can be expanded to include more rooms, larger spaces and extra bonus rooms. Construction costs for B-Line homes start from $160/sq ft, not including the cost of the land. According to Paul Starkney, co-founder and partner for Hive Modular, this home cost $185/sq ft to build.

The stylish little home features many environmentally-friendly products including concrete counter tops, no-VOC interior paint, FSC-certified framing wood and locally-sourced flooring, James Hardie fiber cement exterior cladding, a rainwater collection system, energy-efficient appliances and use of recycled materials. The cute house exemplifies living practically — from its building process to its infill location; from the small yet adequate size, to the sustainably-sourced materials.

For more photos see the original article at Inhabitat.

 

by Ben Block

The Netherlands has been regarded as the cycling nation since before World War II. In a 1938 newspaper article, the bicycle was dubbed "the most Dutch of all vehicles."

Decades since, bike infatuation still appears to be on the rise. In Amsterdam, residents now choose bicycles rather than automobiles for more of their trips, according to a recent study.

Between 2005 and 2007, Amsterdam residents rode their bicycle 0.87 times a day on average, compared to 0.84 trips by automobile. It was the first time on record that average bike trips surpassed cars, the research group FietsBeraad reported last month.

Although additional bike trips are often necessary to complete errands that could be done in a single car ride, the findings reflect a decreasing reliance on automobiles throughout Dutch urban centers.

"In town, the car is not the mode of transport," said Hans Voerknecht, international coordinator for FietsBeraad. "The bicycle is the grease in the traffic system, and in part, the economic system.... It makes everything possible."

The group also reports that car trips in 2006 decreased by 14 percent compared to 1990. Downtown bicycle trips increased 36 percent, and cycling rates have remained steady elsewhere throughout Amsterdam.

The high level of cycling is an accomplishment for the Dutch capital, but not a great surprise considering Amsterdam's long-held love affair with bicycles, said Ralph Buehler, an international urban affairs professor at Virginia Tech University.

"It's the result of the policies they have implemented over the past 30 years to make bicycle use more attractive and safe, etc, while also implementing policies for car use in the city to be more inconvenient, stressful, and less attractive," Buehler said. "Even the queen bicycles."

Among Western nations, cycling is most popular in the Netherlands. Nearly 30 percent of Dutch commuters always travel by bicycle, and an additional 40 percent sometimes bike to work, according to FietsBeraad [PDF].

Commuters worldwide are turning to bicycles in an effort to abandon gasoline-burning vehicles and incorporate physical exercise into their travel routine. Global bicycle production increased by 3.2 percent in 2007 to 130 million units, according to the Worldwatch Institute.

In both Germany and Denmark, more than 20 percent of commuters travel by bicycle. And cycling still accounts for more than half of all trips in some Chinese cities, although private automobile use is on the rise nationwide.

In comparison, less than 2 percent of trips in North America and the United Kingdom are by bicycle.

The high level of bicycle ridership in Amsterdam is due to a variety of bike-friendly transportation policies. The city boasts an extensive system of bicycle paths that allow riders to bypass traffic signals and shortcut through neighborhoods. Residential neighborhoods restrict speed limits to 30 kilometers per hour to improve safety. Bike parking facilities are located citywide, while vehicle parking downtown is highly restricted.

The Netherlands plans to spend about 70 million Euros on bicycling projects in Amsterdam between 2007 and 2010 - an average of 13 Euros per city resident.

"They're really making bicycling attractive," Buehler said. "People who normally drive, they know it will take five Euros for parking and take 10 minutes more than if they bike."

As more cyclists fill Dutch streets, bike fatalities have remained among the lowest worldwide. From 2002 to 2005, an average of 1.1 Dutch biker was killed per 100 million kilometers cycled. In comparison, fatality rates in the United Kingdom and United States are 3.6 and 5.8, respectively.

In addition to spending more money on cycling infrastructure, the Netherlands has promoted mixed-use neighborhoods, which allow residents to make shorter bike trips. Fatalities also generally decrease when ridership rises, a theory known as "safety in numbers."

"If there are more people on bikes, it might be that car drivers are more aware of cyclists. So when they make a right turn, they look over their right shoulder," Buehler said. "In a city like Amsterdam, most people make bike trips...so the driver is more likely to be a biker him or herself." 

Ben Block is astaff writer with the WorldwatchInstitute.Reprinted with permission.

Hines, an international real estate firm, is proving companies can build and operate green without having to submit to the expensive Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) process. Hines has designed a system similar to LEED and one that accomplishes the same goal: sustainability. 

The Hines Green Office (HinesGO) system builds on and compliments U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s EnergyStar program, both programs which the company also participates in. Like LEED and EnergyStar, offices are assessed for energy and water efficiency, sustainable materials, waste reduction and recycling, indoor air quality and maintenance products, and transportation options.

Through the HinesGO initiative, the company is greening 177 office spaces managed by the firm. They have completed assessing and implementing greener operating methods for 89 of their international offices to date in addition to building green from the start.

LEED has done an excellent job of transforming the new and retrofit construction industry to greener, more sustainable buildings. The HinesGO program expands on existing standards by also factoring in cost benefits, and factors such as employee traveling, recycling of all materials, and human considerations.  Having a program like this can also be cheaper and less time consuming than other certification processes, and could assist companies to make sustainable improvements that might be otherwise unrealistic in these economic times.  

Whie it is home to many revered religious sites, Israel also seems to have a strong faith in its ability to produce innovative energy technologies.

The Israel Ministry of National Infrastructures and the U.S. Department of Energy updated the United States-Israel Energy Cooperation act this week during the Eilat-Eilot International Renewable Energy Conference. The Cooperation Act will fund joint ventures between U.S. and Israeli businesses with $2 million ($1 million from each country) aimed at creating a renewable energy storage initiative to reduce the world’s oil dependence.

"Israel is well-known in the world as a technology innovator. The concentration of scientific innovation in the country is impressive," said Jonathan Shrier, Assistant Secretary, Office of Policy and International Affairs, U.S. Department of Energy.

Two projects have already received approval for the funding – Seambiotic and Better Place. Seambiotic is the first company in the world to utilize flue gas from coal-burning power stations for algae cultivation, and Better Place aims to create an electric car infrastructure with swappable batteries, and has already received a lot of venture capital.

The collaboration will continue long after this three-day conference ends. Two conferences in the U.S. and two in Israel will take place annually. The annual conference in Sde Boker, Israel, will focus on the technological advancements in the Renewable Energy industry while the annual Eilat-Eilot conference will serve as a platform for industry-ready technologies to exhibit and market their offerings. In addition, researchers from Israel will spend significant time working in the U.S. market, while researchers from the U.S. will do the same in Israel.

Other announcements during the conference show a prospect for a thriving renewable energy market in Israel. In efforts to turn Southern Israel into the Silicon Valley of renewable energy, the Eilat-Eliot region is creating the Timna Renewable Energy Park, and the AORA Solar Thermal Module in Kibbutz Sammar will be the world’s first commercial hybrid solar gas-turbine power plant.

Israeli ventures connected to renewable energy projects are sure to catch increasing venture capital attention as the region picks up speed.
 

In addition to presenting numerous environmental concerns, corn-based ethanol also poses serious risk to human health, which makes cellulosic ethanol from non-food feedstocks a more promising alternative – as long as researchers and developers get more funding for it.

Cellulosic ethanol is a type of biofuel that comes from lignocellulose, a structural material that comprises much of the mass of plants, and is often produced from switchgrass, poplar trees or woodchips. According to new studies published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the environmental and health costs associated with cellulosic ethanol are less than half those of gasoline and of corn ethanol. The analysis studied the impacts of cellulosic and corn-based biofuels and of gasoline, and accounted for possible impacts ranging from the energy used in refineries, to the pollutants pumped out of car tailpipes, and the consequences of cultivating corn or other plants used to make biofuel.

From all accounts, cellulosic ethanol looks to be the winner of the popular alternative energy sources. Switching to cellulosic ethanol from gasoline could significantly reduce the amount of pollutants emitted during fuel production and consumption because ethanol burns more cleanly than gasoline, and crops cultivated to produce biofuel also absorb carbon dioxide – which reduces greenhouse gases. Plus, cellulosic ethanol requires less fertilizer than corn ethanol to produce, and there's no energy required for heat at biorefineries. In fact, the biorefineries that produce cellulosic ethanol can actually generate excess electricity by burning lignin.

The decrease in pollutants, and fine particulate matter in particular, by using cellulosic ethanol as opposed to gasoline or corn-based ethanol, could lead to reduced symptoms of aggravated lung diseases that have been linked to heart attacks, asthma and premature death.

The only problem with it is that funding isn’t always easy to secure. The recently passed $787 billion economic stimulus bill was slated to include $50 million for a USDA program that would have helped farmers get grants and loans to produce energy on farms, and another $200 million to help existing ethanol plants retrofit to add in cellulosic ethanol production. However, the House and Senate cut it at the last minute. Instead, the Department of Energy got $1.6 billion for research on energy, including biofuels, but not specifically targeted at cellulosic ethanol.

"The Department of Energy really has no idea how to do this," said Senate Agriculture Committee chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) of developing cellulosic ethanol.

So now it may be up to individual corporations to lead the way in the development of the next generation of ethanol. BP, world-wide fuel suppliers, and Verenium Corporation, a biotech company focused on developing cellulosic ethanol, announced Wednesday that it would form a 50-50 joint venture to develop and commercialize cellulosic ethanol from non-food feedstocks. Together, they have agreed to commit $45 million in funding and assets to the joint venture company that will become one of the nation’s first commercial-scale cellulosic ethanol facilities, to be located in Highlands County, Florida. The proposed ethanol facility is expected to break ground in 2010, with production beginning in 2012 – if the joint venture company can find the nearly $300 million needed to construct the 36 million gallon-per-year facility.

This is another situation in which businesses and corporations must lead the way to a renewable energy-driven future if the government is unable or unwilling to provide incentive and funding for such endeavors. If BP is successful in this venture, perhaps someday soon the fuel we pump into our cars from one of its many gas stations will be based on cellulosic ethanol.

By Bridgette Steffen

Morris Architects, a Houston-based architecture and design firm, recently took top honors for two of their submissions in the Radical Innovation in Hospitality design competition. The grand prize winner, the Oil Rig Platform Resort and Spa makes use of one of 4,000 oil rigs out in the Gulf of Mexico and transforms it into a luxurious eco-resort and spa. We love how the inspired renovation takes an iconic source of dirty energy and converts it to an eco-haven that generates all of its power from renewable sources.

Sponsored by the John Hardy Group and Hospitality Design Magazine, the international design competition focused on innovations in hospitality. The Morris design team wanted to take advantage of the an abandoned oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico and reuse the structure, transforming it into a vibrant and commercially viable destination. The luxury resort offers many amenities including interaction with the surrounding ocean - boating, snorkeling, diving and other water sports. The Rig Hotel will also draw in conferences and business meetings, and will serve as a cruise ship’s main port of call en route to other locations in Mexico and the Caribbean.

Situated in the middle of the ocean, the Rig Hotel will need to be as autonomous as possible, generating all of it’s own power from renewable energy, most notably via a large vertical axis wind turbine affixed to one of its foundation towers. Wind power tends to be far more efficient off-shore than on-shore, and the turbine will meet a significant portion of the Rig’s energy demands. Wave energy generators will be buoyed nearby with undersea cables to transmit the power. Solar panels will be affixed on the sides and top of the rig. Additionally, geothermal heat pumps will take advantage of the consistent water temperatures at lower sea levels to aid with heating and cooling of the interior rooms. All of these power systems can easily be integrated into the existing rig infrastructure.

The Oil Rig Resort and Spa will provide unparalleled views of the Gulf through patron’s rooms as well as a glass lobby floor. The lobby will be naturally lit with ambient light, which will be reflect the ocean. A central core will be filled with water, which acts as a ballast to help stabilize the platform during stormy conditions. This central core will also host theatrical performances much like the Cirque du Soliel show ‘O’ in Las Vegas. Guests will be able to view the show from their own room every night.

Individual guest rooms are prefabricated off site and transported via ship in a standard cargo container to the rig. The rooms are not large and have been optimized to maximize space. Couches turn into beds at night and can be moved over the hot tub for viewing of performances. The room can also extend out over the water for better views of the Gulf. The eco-resort provides a state-of-the-art luxury accomodations, as well as sea-water swimming facilities, a grand ballroom shopping, dining, nightly entertainment, a casino, and boat slips. And considering that there are over 4,000 oil platforms out there in the Gulf, it’s certainly a novel way to reuse the existing structures.

 

There's a windmill on the corner of my block. It helps power a new home that also relies on solar and other renewable energy. But I don't often see it revolving, and when it is spinning, the blades emit a low drone that I wonder if those living immediately around the house can hear. I also worry, perhaps irrationally, that it will claim the lives of innocent birdlife in my hood.

PacWind, a California-based wind energy company founded in 1998, has an answer to these worries. It makes wind turbines (shown here) that use vertical blades, are visible to birds and can operate even in winds that would be too high or too low to make conventional windmills work effectively, according to the company.

PacWind garnered some attention late last year after Jay Leno installed a PacWind turbine to help power his 17,000-foot garage (that's the size garage he needs for his, like, 5 million cars). And Ricoh, the Japanese maker of copiers and camera, is installing a billboard in Times Square that is lit by lights powered 95% by PacWind turbines (and 5% by solar).

And on Wednesday PacWind got a lift through a deal with WePower, another California startup that has been involved with PacWind since late last year when the two companies began a partnership through which WePower would manufacture up to 500,000 of PacWind's vertical axis windmills annually (and handle many of business needs, such as managing tax incentives, energy rebates and carbon credits). This week, WePower has announced it has also purchased PacWind's patented and proprietary wind energy technologies.

Riffing off the Ricoh billboard concept, the two companies are now promoting "windvertising," wherein a company's logo is printed across the blades of the vertical windmill and are visible as its spins (think of how a flip-book works). So the company gets an animated billboard with no energy consumption – in fact, the billboard generates electricity while spinning, which can be fed into the grid.

WePower says that if the estimated 500,000 billboards that are currently found along US highways were to convert to windvertising and if the turbines spun at an average wind speed of 10 miles per hour, they would generate roughly 16.8 billion kWh of electricity. "At this level they could power approximately 1.5 million homes and would reduce about 5.3 million tons of CO2 from being emitted into the air per year," it says in a press statement.

WePower might be a good company to keep an eye on, because its eyes are on much more than the advertising market: it believes its turbines are a smart alternative to large-scale windmills for generating power in tight urban corridors, like mine.

The company also just purchased distribution rights to an electrical power generator platform designed by Aura Systems.

And Forbes reports that in a meeting of the nation's regional utility commissioners in Washington, D.C. this week, the new secretary of energy, Steven Chu, said he'll move quickly to foster the large investments in clean energy that the stimulus bill supports. If most of the stimulus money were directed at wind energy, it would be enough to "underwrite the construction of 30,000 MW of wind power," says Forbes, quoting Hugh Wynne, an analyst at Bernstein Research. "That's more wind capacity added in the U.S. in two years than exists worldwide," the article states.

Reprinted with permission from Triple Pundit.

By Edwin Black

Now that the $787 billion stimulus package has become law, a key emphasis is “green jobs” and energy rescue. But the single most important program in becoming energy independent and regaining financial health is never mentioned in the massive Congressional text.

Without that program, it will take one to two painful decades to kick our national addiction to oil. Without that program, our vulnerability to an oil interruption due to a petropolitical or terrorist blockage of the Strait of Hormuz continues as a clear and present danger. Without that program, America’s economic house of cards will continue to weaken as we continue to send approximately a $1 trillion overseas, primarily to OPEC suppliers. Without that program, hundreds of thousands of auto industry workers have no real chance of rapidly returning to secure work. That undiscovered program is vehicle “retrofitting” to create a Retrofitting Revolution. [Watch former Intel head, Andy Grove's presentation at the 2008 Plug-in Conference on this topic.]

Retrofitting, referred to by many as upfitting, means converting existing petroleum burning cars and trucks to vehicles that operate on something else such as electric, compressed natural gas (CNG), propane, hydrogen, second-generation biofuels, non-agrifuel ethanol, such as that derived from sugar cane, and other forms of alt fuel and alt propulsion.

The numbers are numbing. Currently, some 250 million gas-consuming cars and trucks ply America’s roads, with more than a million being added monthly. By 2015, experts expect more than 300 million gas guzzlers in America. Obama’s original campaign pledge to place 1 million plug-in hybrids on the road by 2015 is meaningless rhetoric. By 2015, one million plug-in hybrids, electric, compressed natural gas or any other alt propulsion vehicles will hardly be noticed. They will represent a mere drop in the oil barrel.

True, at first glance, some of the green aspects of the stimulus package offer eye appeal. Certainly, the legislation provides $30 billion for a smart power grid, advanced battery technology and related energy efficiency measures. Add to this, $20 billion in tax incentives for renewable energy and energy efficiency to be doled out over a decade, plus $6.3 billion for energy efficiency in federally assisted low-income housing, and $5 billion to weatherize more than 1 million homes owned by middle-class families.

But no mention is made of retrofitting cars and trucks immediately. Immediately means next week. Currently, 98 percent of all transportation is fueled by oil. That is a mandate imposed by OPEC and Detroit, a mandate that can only be broken by national will and the money to support it.

To retrofit, Obama will have to suspend misguided and obstructive EPA guidelines that currently prohibit converting gasoline cars to abundant, cheaper compressed natural gas or other fuels. Punitive EPA testing procedures of at least $50,000 per engine type has ensured there is virtually no retrofitting industry now functioning in America. That industry will need to be invented. An entire army of unemployed autoworkers and cash-starved fleet managers stand ready to participate. But this potential remains unstimulated by the legislation.

Indeed, there are 28,000 public and private fleets, including about a quarter million postal vehicles and about 100,000 trucks at UPS alone. The nation’s taxi fleet is 100,000 strong with a 100 percent turnover every three years. By immediately requiring fleet purchases to be alt fuel and alt propulsion, the manufacturers will have a mad scramble to fill orders. The Postal Service could do this with a pen stroke. Here again, this potential remains unstimulated by recent legislation.

Requiring all new vehicles to become multifuel vehicles would spur the Retrofit Revolution. Pending bipartisan legislation for an Open Fuel Standard already requires half of all cars to be multifuel by 2012. That is too distant a goal. It can be done right now for $100-$200 per vehicle if Detroit will do so instead of pleading the case for bankruptcy. This mandate to retrofit would extend to hundreds of thousands of unsold vehicles now parked for lack of buyers. An economic sector of green jobs could be born overnight. Yet this potential remains unstimulated by this stimulus oriented legislation.

Open Fuel along with the Obama administration’s retrofitting efforts can immediately spur alternative fuel production. There is no magic bullet in alt fuel. A fuel democracy should reign. This democracy could include second-generation biofuels, such as those produced by algae, pond scum and other forms of life. It could also include an array of alcohol fuels, the technologies of which have been long ago proven but lack the dollars to drive them toward mass production. Methanol, used everywhere in China, could be introduced into America within weeks; companies are lined up to make it happen. Sugarcane ethanol from Brazil and the Caribbean is waiting to flow into America’s East Coast if only the punitive Iowa Corn-sponsored 54-cent tax levy will be lifted. Ammonia and propane advocates are ready to deploy their fuel especially for off-road vehicles and heavy trucks through the Midwest.

 

Compressed natural gas (CNG) and hydrogen are waiting to sweep into America’s garages. Neither CNG nor hydrogen needs a neighborhood gas station infrastructure. Auto makers who say that are continuing to mislead. Home or office refueling devices, such as those now under the control of Honda and largely kept off the market despite surging demand, convert ordinary household oven gas to fuel. Even T. Boone Pickens was unable to purchase the technology to bring these simple home and office refueling devices into common use. Honda would not release the financial information needed to complete the $17 million sale. Legislation could easily free up this technology. TARP took that approach to toxic assets. But the refueling technology Honda is keeping off the market is not toxic; it is terrific.

CNG and hydrogen possibilities dazzle the mind. GM’s hydrogen fuel cell Equinox uses simple electrolyzed water to create the hydrogen gas that powers the car. The Hydrogen Equinox, which has no engine or motor, drives like any other car. So does Honda’s exquisite Hydrogen Clarity and Civic GX CNG car. There is no bar to mass producing these cars now in America. There are 8 million CNG cars in the world manufactured overseas by the major carmakers. They can make them in America as well.

In fact, Iran is currently converting its national fleet from gasoline to compressed natural gas at the rate of 20 percent per year to counteract tightening sanctions. Its same-day, government-subsidized $50-per vehicle conversion campaign will soon make Iran gasoline-free. American can do this.

Electric cars—first produced in 1835--are hardly new technology. Manufacturers from GM to Nissan are all rushing to once again produce them en masse, starting within the coming year or two, once a steady supply of batteries can be assured. The jeep was made as an urgent war machine to effect the invasion at Normandy. The first 75 jeeps were produced in just 75 days and hundreds of thousands thereafter. America can do this.

If America did launch the Retrofitting Revolution, it would spur an economic renaissance that would not only help recover American domestic woes, but create an exportable industry that could help move the world off of oil while keeping American dollars in America. Hence, the payout would include a massive peace dividend that can only be achieved when oil is subtracted from the world equation.

Reprinted with permission from EV World

. Edwin Black is the New York Times best selling investigative author of IBM and the Holocaust, Internal Combustion and his just released book, The Plan: How to Save America When the Oil Stops—or the Day Before (Dialog Press). He can be reached at www.edwinblack.com.

For conscious consumers and interested investors, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility has created a Climate Watch List of companies that are lagging behind their peers in responding to climate change.

The ICCR, a group of faith-based investors, filed shareholder resolutions with eight of the nine companies, including ExxonMobil, Chevron, General Motors, Southern, Standard Pacific, Ultra Petroleum, Massey Energy, Consol Energy and Canadian Natural Resources. Investors believe the companies aren’t adequately dealing with climate-related business impacts, whether from physical changes, emerging climate regulations or growing global demand for low-carbon technologies and services. Two of the oil companies – Canadian Natural Resources and Chevron – were targeted for extensive investments in Canada’s oil sands region, where controversial carbon-intensive extraction technologies are being used to produce more than one million barrels of oil each day.

Investors also filed resolutions with 49 other businesses, such as Avis/Budget, Hertz, Citigroup, Ameriprise, Home Depot, Bed Bath & Beyond, NV Energy, International Paper, ConocoPhillips and Haliburton. Apple, Novell, SanDisk and Southwest Airlines also made the list.

“These climate watch companies are ignoring a major business trend that will influence their competitive positioning for years to come,” added Mindy S. Lubber, president of Ceres, a coalition of investors and environmental groups. “Given the political shift in Washington, all companies should be minimizing climate risks and maximizing clean energy opportunities. Companies that miss this trend are setting themselves up to fail in the 21st century low-carbon economy.”

Shareholder resolutions put much-needed pressure on companies to disclose their financial exposure and response strategies to climate-related business trends, and were filed by some of the nation’s largest public pension funds, as well as labor, foundation, religious and other institutional shareholders. The shareholder filings are coordinated by the Ceres investor coalition and the ICCR. A full list of investors filing resolutions with each of the companies can be found at the Ceres or ICCR Web sites, as well as a list of 150 companies and their rankings in the “climate risk profile.”

A new study by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory says that as much as half of all workplaces may be too hot in the winter and too cold in the summer. This Goldilocksian conclusion was based on analysis of temperature data collected from buildings across the country and may be useful in the fight to reduce energy waste.

The researchers found that keeping your cubicle above or below the sweetspot temp of 73.4º F increased symptoms (such as headaches, fatigue and difficulty concentrating) in employees by 30-80%. In all, over 50% of the buildings measured fell into this category. Their findings also suggest that, on average, building temperatures were kept one full degree lower in summer than in winter, even though people tend to be more comfortable with warm conditions when it's toasty outside.

On the plus-side, however, adjusting these conditions could not only result in more robust underlings, but save on energy costs as well.

"As we look for ways to save energy, these results suggest a potential win-win situation," says Berkeley researcher Mark Mendell. "Our findings suggest that energy efficiency and keeping buildings healthy and comfortable for the occupants are not necessarily in conflict."

So the next time you have to wear a sweater to the office in the middle of July, tell your building manager it's making you sick.

Green Energy Resources has identified an international need for biomass power and is targeting the European export market.

 

The company uses wood scraps from industry that are broken woodchips which is burned for energy or processed into a gas to generate electricity.  Green Energy Resources says it has developed a heat treating methodology for purning woodchips and has secured a $50 million contract to export biomass to Europe.

Utilizing biomass for energy provides a plethora of environmental benefits. Collecting wood scraps reduces landfill, as well as preventing any chemically treated woods from degrading into soil and water supplies. Secondly, replacing coal-powered energy with essentially recycled biomass decreases the amount of greenhouse gases and air pollutants entering the atmosphere, according to the company.

Green Energy Resources’ process helps nations' satisfy the conditions of the Kyoto Protocol through a reduced carbon footprint when compared to coal burning. In recent decades, burning wood for energy has been an unwelcome source of power because then, it meant cutting down forests for wood. By collecting wood scraps, forests are preserved instead of destroyed. 

While biomass accounts for less than 3 percent of power generation in the U.S., globally biomass makes up more than 10 percent of energy supplies, according to data cited in the book Profit From The Peak.

Burning biomass for energy is a renewable resource in countries such as India and China where coal is the dominant power supply. Collecting wood scraps can create local jobs while not requiring harvesting CO2-absorbing plants or trees.

See also: Austin Building Nation’s Largest Wood-Waste Biomass Plant             

Wood Gas-fueled Plant in Japan wins Best Renewable Energy Power Plant of the Year

With the passing of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, also known as the economic stimulus bill, utilities and states have even more incentive to develop smart grids.

The $787 billion economic stimulus package included $4.5 billion for research and development, pilot projects and federal matching funds for the Smart Grid Investment Program to modernize the electricity grid.

Smart grids feature intelligent meters, wireless technology, sensors and software that allow customers to monitor their energy use and cut back when the grid is maxed out. This helps prevent blackouts and conserves energy, reducing the need to access backup energy plants.

Senator Maria Cantwell, Democrat from Washington and recently appointed chair of the Energy Subcommittee of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee,  worked to get $11 billion for "smart grid" technologies included in the plan. The White House said it would take about a month for the money to start flowing.

Cantwell has led the push for green energy in her state of Washington. An estimated 47,000 green energy jobs in the state's private sector already account for more than $2.2 billion in earnings annually – which some could more than double in 30 years. She helped the Bonneville Power Administration get an additional $3.25 billion in borrowing authority so it can modernize the region's power grid and bring alternative energy sources on line. And, as part of her congressional duty to oversee the nation’s nuclear sites, she must feel happy that $2 billion of the plan is going towards the cleanup of the decommissioned nuclear production complex, the Department of Energy Hanford Site.

The GridWise Alliance recently reported that a potential disbursement of $16 billion in smart grid incentives would act as a catalyst in driving associated smart grid projects worth $64 billion and create 280,000 jobs.

While this allotment is less than GridWise says is necessary to create a surplus of smart grid-related job opportunities, it should be sufficient incentive to drive the growth and development of new smart grid technologies. The government frequently makes mandates, but it’s not so often that there are equivalent funds to back up those mandates, so this is a rare opportunity for the energy and technology sector.

Another group that will reap financial benefits from the stimulus is the Demand Response and Smart Grid Coalition (DRSG). The trade association, which provides support for companies involved in the demand response and smart grid sectors, announced last week that four more companies – Honeywell, Echelon, Ambient and Steffes – have joined. DRSG, which works with policymakers, stakeholders and customers, now boasts nearly 20 members, including IBM and Google.

Federal and private secor investment in the smart grid will also be a boon to computing hardware and software companies that will leverage wireless and IP communications technology to add intelligence to the grid.

By Nick Hodge

This is a partial list of funding objectives outlined in the just-signed stimulus; see if you can identify a theme:

$2.5 billion for energy efficiency and renewable energy research

$1 billion energy efficiency programs including energy-efficient appliances and trucks and buses that run on alternative fuel

$4.5 billion to boost the energy efficiency of federal buildings

$6.3 billion for energy efficiency and conservation grants

$5 billion to weatherize old buildings

$2.3 billion in tax credits for energy efficiency technology manufacturers

The theme, in case you missed it, is billions of dollars for energy efficiency. In fact, the $21.6 billion being set aside for efficiency measures works out to about 3% of the $787 total package.

Not bad for a sector that was recently dismissed as "laughable of course"—a point my colleague Sam Hopkins touched on a few weeks ago.

Of course, wanting to use less power to do the same things isn't "laughable" by any stretch of the imagination. It's actually quite a smart way to reduce energy demand instead of expensively increasing supply with new generation assets.

And if you understand the different approaches to energy efficiency, along with the companies involved, it can actually be a very profitable investment vehicle.

Like it or not, taxpayers—both present and future—are now on the hook for a rather large tab. So exploiting the stimulus' effect on the market by investing in the sectors it designates as winners is not only prudent, but critical.

Investing in Energy Efficiency

There are two main approaches to energy efficiency on a large enough scale for investors to profit.

The first is the classical sense of the term: doing more with less. This can be accomplished by upgrading a building's thermostat to a digital model that adjusts energy use in real time, by installing energy efficient lights like compact fluorescents and light emitting diodes (LEDs), or simply by switching driving habits to get more miles per gallon.

Obviously, there's more money in some of those approaches than others. But that doesn't mean they're not all good ideas.

Take energy efficient lighting, for example. Just this morning Energy Focus (NASDAQ: EFOI) announced it was selected as an official "GSA Schedule Contractor of energy efficient lighting projects for Federal stimulus package projects."

The stock popped nearly 40% in early trading this morning, before settling in to more sustainable 11% gain—a perfect example of both energy efficiency's investment potential and how investors can use the stimulus for profit.

Take a look at a chart of that stock for the day compared to the struggling DOW:

There are long-term, diversified approaches to investing in energy efficiency as well. Systems providers like Honeywell (NSYE: HON) and Johnson Controls (NYSE: JCI) are two stalwart plays in the sector.

By taking this approach you can leverage the stimulus, and the private capital flow it will incite, to boost the bottom line of your portfolio.

Taking personal steps, like turning off lights when not in use or throttling back your hot water heater, while not directly beneficial to your portfolio, has a positive impact on your bottom line as well.

But the real ground-floor investment opportunity is in an emerging sector dubbed...

"Demand Response"

Not to be confused with energy efficiency, demand response is the reduction of demand in response to rising prices or inadequate supply.

This has become a favorite technique of utilities because it is more easily implemented than efficiency measures and it prevents them from having to construct costly peaking power plants fired by coal or natural gas. (Which will grow even more expensive once cap-and-trade legislation is implemented.)

Utilities contract with demand response companies that install electricity monitoring software and communication hardware in participating customers' homes. These devices aggregate power that is drawn by reducing demand from hundreds of HVAC systems and noncritical industrial machines.

The demand response company, like Comverge (NASDAQ: COMV) for example, is paid by how many reduced megawatts they direct back into the grid. Customers are often compensated or credited for the power they allow to be drawn from their homes or businesses.

What's more, manufacturers of this technology are now eligible for a 30% tax credit for certified projects thanks to the new stimulus. The bill calls for up to $2.3 billion in such credits, which will make the relevant companies all the more attractive to investors.

Be sure to pay attention to this sector as the stimulus provisions are implemented and digested by the market. You should be leveraging their effects for all they're worth.

Call it like you see it.

Reprinted with permission from GreenChipStocks.

As part of the stimulus spending spree, Amtrak gets $1.3 billion, and high speed rail projects will receive $8 billion. This investment in infrastructure and new projects shows that the Obama administration and the new Congress are committed to rail and transit. (Having a president who lived in Chicago, with its plentiful mass transit, probably had something to do with this newfound enthusiasm for trains and buses.)

As I wrote two years ago, the quality and quantity of rail service is a regional concern, and it takes federal authority (and money) to get the trains moving the right direction.

American Public Transportation Association President William W. Millar points out that in addition to the spending on projects, the stimulus also provides incentives for passengers.

“We are very pleased that Congress, for the first time, has made the transit commute benefit equal to the parking benefit, which is currently $230 per month. This action will provide a tax-free way for employers to encourage their employees to use energy-efficient, fuel-saving public transportation.”

Another group, the National Association of Railroad Passengers, says that the new funding transfers the pressure for improving rail:

Governors and state departments of transportation, to expeditiously complete applications for sound rail projects;

Governors and state departments of transportation, to make appropriate use of the flexibility that lets some of the $27.5 billion in “highway” money go to passenger and freight train projects;

The Secretary of Transportation, to create a sound strategic plan about how to use the rail funds;

The Secretary of Transportation, to give applications for good rail projects prompt and favorable decisions;

Amtrak, to commit its capital funding within the required 30 days;

Amtrak, to use its funds to make clear its commitment to a truly national system with a dramatically improved resilience to, for example, Chicago winters;

Private railroads and commuter agencies, to take full advantage of the opportunities to fund important projects (including the Chicago-area CREATE project aimed at untangling congestion in the nation’s rail hub).

Amtrak needs to step up and improve the quality of service as well as the performance of arrival times. In the Midwest, Amtrak is trying to improve its image by running a promotion to get people riding the rails from Milwaukee to Chicago to watch baseball.

The importance of public perception towards trains can't be underestimated. The money is a great first start, but attitudes need to change as well. Trains have to be perceived as cool, and not just something you have to do if flying or driving is even more of a hassle.

One effective tool: providing free WiFi service in train stations and on the trains, as they are doing in the Bay Area and other places. Being able to stay productive (or even entertained) during hour-plus commutes can go a long way towards luring new passengers to ride the rails.

New research sheds light on the efficacy of solar panels, and indicates that we may soon be able to get more bang for our buck when it comes to solar energy systems.

Explained in a recent issue of Accounts of Chemical Research, a team of Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) researchers found a way for nanocrystals of certain semiconductor materials to generate more than one electron of energy after absorbing only one photon from the sun. This means that solar panels could potentially produce much more energy than they currently do, but still absorb the same amount of photons.

According to the LANL Web site, "when a conventional solar cell absorbs a photon of light, it frees an electron to generate an electrical current. Energy in excess of the amount needed to promote an electron into a conducting state is lost as heat to atomic vibrations (phonons) in the material lattice. Through carrier multiplication, excess energy can be transferred to another electron instead of the material lattice, freeing it to generate electrical current—thereby yielding a more efficient solar cell.”

“Researchers still have a lot of work to do,” said researcher Victor Klimov. “One important challenge is to figure out how to design a material in which the energetic cost to create an extra electron can approach the limit defined by a semiconductor band gap. Such a material could raise the fundamental power conversion limit of a solar cell from 31 percent to above 40 percent.”

Even a difference of 9 percent in increased efficiency could be enough to make solar power cost-competive with fossil fuel energy in many applications . The more energy and cost efficient solar panels become, the more renewable energy becomes increasingly reliable and widely used.

By Philip Proefrock  

Wind farms are typically located in remote, sparsely populated locations. The big turbines work best when they have good access to undisturbed (and therefore faster moving) wind. So rural and off-shore locations have been the best choices. But, while they're good for generating electricity, those aren't the places where most of the power is needed.

In the middle of Albany NY, on top of the 41-story Corning Tower, the city's tallest building, a small test wind turbine has been erected to study the available wind and help determine the feasibility of having larger building-mounted turbines for electricity production. The test turbine has only a 7-foot diameter and can produce just 1.5 kilowatts of electricity when spinning at full capacity. That is less than one-tenth of one percent of the power that the building uses, but it's just for the test.

Urban settings are generally considered less desirable for wind power generation, and the swirling winds found in a city are difficult to harness efficiently (although vertical-axis turbines are better suited for winds that rapidly change direction). Wind power design guidelines typically indicate that having a higher tower means the turbine is able to reach stronger winds, which means more power generated. The tallest buildings in a city may offer access to high, unblocked (and not swirling) winds that are fairly powerful and productive.

We've seen some concepts for both small, building mounted turbines and other schemes for urban wind as well as examples of actual buildings with attached large turbines. There are several problems associated with building mounted turbines, ranging from noise and vibration from the turbine causing discomfort for the building inhabitants to structural loading issues associated with the added equipment. These are problems that can be solved, though. If tall buildings do offer good wind access, then more urban towers may start sporting propellers on top.

Reprinted with permission from EcoGeek

Desperate times call for desperate actions, and for GM, Ford, Chrysler, and the U.S. Economy, the times don't get much more desperate.

So instead of tinkering with the auto industry and providing loose oversight, it's time to mobilize the auto companies to tackle the overhaul of American transportation to be more sustainable.

President Obama is organizing his top advisers to oversee the auto companies' internal restructuring plans. But the benchmark for any"way forward" should be "how do they compare with the transportation goals as outlined in the stimulus package?"

The stimulus package has a powerful if imperfect set of transportation objectives, which will be addressed through billions in funding. So let's get GM to be part of the solution, instead of the problem.

The stimulus allocates money for transportation as follows, (thanks to the Alliance to Save Energy for the Breakdown):

$8 billion for capital assistance for high-speed rail corridors and Intercity Passenger Rail Service

$6.9 billion for transit capital assistance, of which $100 million is for public transit agencies for capital investments that will assist in reducing the energy consumption or greenhouse gas emissions of their public transportation systems

$1.5 billion in grants for state governments, local governments and transit agencies, for capital investments in surface transportation infrastructure, including New Starts and Small Starts projects and passenger and freight rail transportation projects, as well as highway and bridge projects

$300 million for assistance to state and local governments to acquire efficient alternative fuel vehicles. Authorized under Section 721 of the EPACT05.

$300 million for grants to state and local governments to reduce diesel emissions. Authorized under Title VII, Subtitle G of the EPACT05

$300 million for GSA’s Motor Vehicle Acquisition and Motor Vehicle Leasing program, in order to replace the Federal fleet with more efficient vehicles.

So per the administration we want: more regional rail, more busses, and more fuel efficient and alternative fuel vehicles. So rather than an almost blank check, like was more or less given to financial institutions who continued with their scurrilous ways, lets tie all loans and grants to these projects. I spoke a few days ago with transit enthusiast George Beard, who also teaches at Portland State University, and he suggested boldly realigning the auto industry with our national objectives. Why not put some of Chrysler and GM's engineers and skilled workers to work building hybrid buses and train engines, and expand the number of vehicles that get more than 30 mpg or run on biofuels to power government fleets?

GM used to build buses and trolley cars (before dismantling the transit lines), built airplanes during World War II, and sold off Allison Transmission just two years ago, so there is precedent.

The Obama administration has put its stake in the ground that many of us support: We want a different kind of transportation, with more public transit, and different types of personal transport. It only makes sense for GM, Ford and Chrysler to be included in these plans and not provide funding for activities outside the scope of this mission. If they (and the auto workers, who must make concessions) don't want to be part of it then we will pay the way for the companies that do.

The justifications -- climate change, national security, and revitalizing the American economy -- demand strategic action that will cause some short-term pain.