Editor’s note: Congratulations to our friends at Ecotality on the beta launch of their new blog, Ecotality Life (and for snagging our own Michael d’Estries as Senior Editor). We’ll be continuing our Friday post swaps with Ecotality, and we’re very impressed with the quality and direction of the new blog. Today’s post was originally published on September 6, 2007.

A company in China just came out with a new hydrogen bike. The company, Shanghai Pearl Hydrogen Power Source Technology Co, unveiled its creation at the 9th China International Exhibition on Gas Technology, Equipment and Applications. How they have gone 9 years with a name that long, I have no idea. You would think they would have learned from The InterUniversal Meeting of Those Who Like to Attend Expositions in Foreign Countries and Star Systems, but are too Afraid to Leave Their Respective Houses (IUMTWLAEFCSSALRH). At any rate, the bike seems to be a bit of a hit at the show. They already have some orders for it, and for a cool $2,600, who could resist? Never fear: they expect to have the price down to about $500 as soon as they can start mass producing them. No word on when that will be, but have faith.

The bike is clearly superior to electric bikes…with the exception of the price tag it has right now. It runs on renewable hydrogen, using a fuel cell. The tanks, conveniently located behind the seat for you convenience, take about half an hour to recharge, compared to a battery’s three hours. The tanks are also significantly lighter than the standard lead batteries on electrics. I’ll have to check in with my research team, but preliminary guesses are pointing to the LEAD for the extra weight. It is a delicious snack, but lead is not all that practical when trying to reduce weight. The bikes have a cruising speed of about 15 mph, for about 60 miles. That’s pretty good; I mean it is no Lance Armstrong, but I doubt you could buy Lance to pedal you around for under $2,600.

J’Accuse Robert J. Samuelson of facilitating inaction in the face of Peak Oil.

J’Accuse Robert J. Samulson of putting this nation through your peddling of false information about options to deal with Global Warming.

J’Accuse Robert J. Samuelson of putting this nation, humanity, my (and your) children at greater risk.

Robert J. Samuelson, J’Accuse … J’Accuse

"J’Accuse," by Émile Zola is perhaps the most influential and single "greatest newspaper article" in history. It caused an uproar in French politics. "No other newspaper article has ever provoked such public debate and controversy or had such an impact on law, justice, and society." Amid the falsely based prosecution of Dreyfus, it accused the French system of anti-Semitism and covering up treasonous acts by another. It is a powerful and important work, one that should be studied and remembered. And, it can speak to our times in so many ways.

And, when it comes to Global Warming,

"la verite est en marche et rien ne l’arretera"

Truth is on the march and nothing can stop it.

Robert J. Samuelson, J’Accuse. I accuse you of fostering a rear-guard battle against the truth. I accuse you of using your pedestal at Newsweek, The Washington Post, and elsewhere for peddling falsehoods cloaked in seeming reasonableness. I accuse you of seeking to confuse, rather than enlighten, on the critical issue of our times.

In Newsweek, The Washington Post, and elsewhere, Samuelson just published "Greenhouse Simplicities," which was an attack on the previous week’s Newsweek cover story "The Truth About Denial."

Samuelson’s claim:

The global-warming debate’s great un-mentionable is this: we lack the technology to get from here to there.

Upfront, clearly, unequivocably: This is false, this is not true! We, the United States and humanity, already have in hand energy efficient options to dramatically cut energy use and therefore emissions. (Well, that compact flourescent lightbulb that cuts your lighting electricity by 73%, that is just the tip of the (melting) iceberg folks.) To quote Royal Dutch Shell’s CEO,

More than half the energy we generate every day is wasted.

What’s the point of producing even more energy if we continue to waste most of it? Instead, we should aim to become twice as efficient in our use of energy by the middle of the next century. That is entirely feasible, provided that the will is there.

We have renewable energy (and, yes, nuclear power as well) technologies aleady in hand that can be displacing coal-fired electricity. We can (solely using technologies that already exist today), eliminate coal from our electricity system within twenty years.

That is entirely feasible, provided that the will is there.

Well, what does Samuelson claim: "At best, we might curb emissions growth."

Simply, purely, not true. It is not just the minor issue that we must do better, we can do much better than that without hardship and, well, we could even create a path for a carbon-negative society by mid-century "provided that the political will is there."

That is, unless we abandon any concept of an American ability to lead the world to a better future. Oh, well, Samuelson has abandoned that as he states:

Democracies don’t easily adopt painful measures in the present to avert possible future problems.

That is true, not easily. But, do we abandon all hope in the face of this? I guess, for Samuelson, that is the case. That we cannot hope for better from America and Americans but surrender in the face of challenge, inaction in the face of threat, lack of will when courage is called for. J’Accuse, Robert J. Samuelson, of denigrating America and Americans’ spirit and strength of character.

But, he wants to pound this in.

One way or another, our assaults against global warming are likely to be symbolic, ineffective or both. But if we succeed in cutting emissions substantially, savings would probably be offset by gains in China and elsewhere.

Ah, why bother to do anything, after all the Chinese and others in that ‘developing world’ are going to be polluting? Well, hmmmm, would not smart policy create a path for them to leapfrog to a sustainable and prosperous energy future, avoiding as much as possible heavy fossil fuel pollution? "Entirely feasible, provided that the will is there. …"

What to do about global warming is a quandary. Certainly, more research and development. Advances in underground storage of carbon dioxide, battery technology (for plug-in hybrid cars), biomass or nuclear power could alter energy economics.

Certainly it is a quandary, because those like Samuelson are inhibiting moves to anything sensible.

This is Samuelson’s favorite.

He claims that we don’t have anything in hand to do something about emissions (a claim, again, that is false) and thus we need to do research. Research to find that Silver Bullet solution.

Well, first off, there is no Silver Bullet solution. But the right path is that we do fund research, we do look for better paths forward, we do look for great new technologies. But, as we search for the better mousetrap to come, we start employing the great ones that we have in hand.

We have, in hand, much of what is required to create a prosperous and sustainable energy future despite the truthiness propaganda coming from the likes of Robert J. Samuelson.

Samuelson’s concluding paragraph begins:

But the overriding reality seems almost un-American: we simply don’t have a solution for this problem.

Yes, there are solutions. To again quote from an oil company executive, a solution path

is entirely feasible, provided that the will is there.

Well, Robert J. Samuelson, I have the will. Others have the will. We have the will to Energize America and the Globe to a prosperous and sustainable energy future.

This future “is entirely feasible, provided that the will is there.”

We will, Mr. Samuelson, we will provide that will.

Ask yourself: Are you doing your part to Energize America? Are you ready to do your part?

Your voice can, and will make a difference.

So … speak up… now!!!

Notes:

• Samuelson is impressive for how much mendacity he can fit into just one column. See Mary’s excellent Global Warming Naysayers for a discussion of other areas where we should say, "Robert J Samuelson, J’Accuse."
• Samuelson, sadly, often merits being called out. Just over a year ago, J’accuse! Distorting reality in "Global Warming’s Real Inconvenient Truth”, which was about a Samuelson OPED that "has factual errors, misleading statements and conclusions, and provides a counterproductive path for thinking about and achieving change for a better future."
• Answer the Call for a better future.

Editor’s note: This week, Ecotality’s Bill Hobbs takes a look at the Automotive X-Prize, a competition to develop a 100mpg automobile. This post was originally published on August 2, 2007.

The Automotive X-Prize has announced the first 31 teams accepted into their competition to create a commercially viable car that gets at least 100mpg. Among the teams accepted: Tesla Motors, Zap, Phoenix Motorcars, Fuel Vapor Technology and Team Velozzi. According to organizers over 300 teams have expressed interest in the competition and are considering jumping in. Commercial viability is a key criteria for picking the winner - the teams must demonstrate not just performance but also business plan showing that they can sell at least 10,000 of their vehicles annually.

Here’s the press release…

The Automotive X PRIZE (AXP), a competition designed to inspire a new generation of viable, super-efficient vehicles to help break our addiction to oil and stem the effects of climate change, announced today that over 30 teams have signed a letter of intent to compete once the prize is officially funded and launched.

The international competition, in which qualified teams will compete head to head, aims to dramatically increase consumer access to ultra-efficient, clean, affordable and desirable vehicles. The 30 plus teams include diverse groups from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany and Switzerland. More than 300 additional teams have inquired about joining and are actively considering entry.

“We are thrilled with the wide variety of teams and technologies from around the world that have expressed an interest in joining the competition,” said Dr. Peter H. Diamandis, CEO and Chairman, X PRIZE Foundation. “We are confident that the Automotive X PRIZE will motivate and bring visibility to a range of non-traditional solutions from both traditional and non-traditional players. The time for incremental change is over. We need radical breakthroughs to stem the consumption of fossil fuels. An X PRIZE can help make this happen.”

The independent and technology-neutral AXP competition is open to teams from around the world to prove they can design, build and bring to market 100 MPG or equivalent fuel economy vehicles that people want to buy. Industry experts will scrutinize team plans. Those that qualify will race their vehicles in rigorous cross-country stages that combine speed, distance, urban driving and overall performance. The winners will be the vehicles that exceed 100 MPG equivalent, fall under strict emissions caps and finish in the fastest time.

The Automotive X-Prize is from the same folks who created the Ansari X-Prize for the first successful private-sector rocket launch to reach space.

The competition is intended to be technology-neutral, meaning the vehicles don’t have to run on gasoline, and indeed many of the teams entering the competition are proposing vehicles that don’t use gasoline at all. As the presser explains, the winning vehicle must get “100 MPG or equivalent fuel economy,” though how equivalence is calculated isn’t explained.

The following 30 teams have signed a letter of intent signaling their intent to apply for the AXP competition:

• Aptera Motors - California, USA
• Commuter Cars Corp. - Washington, USA
• Cornell University - New York, USA
• DEHyds - Washington, USA
• Delta Motorsport - Northants, UK
• Desert Fuel - Arizona, USA
• Disruptech - California, USA
• Dragonfly Technology LTD - Northhampton, UK
• Fuel Vapor Technologies - British Columbia, Canada
• GreenIt! - Oregon, USA
• Herf Duo - Berlin, Germany
• HyKinesys - California, USA
• Kinetic Vehicles - Oregon, USA
• Kuttner Doran Inventions - Virginia, USA
• Loremo AG - Munich, Germany
• Maine Automotive X - Maine, USA
• MDI, Inc. & Zero Pollution Motors LLC - New York, USA
• Michigan Vision - Michigan, USA
• MotoTron Corporation - Wisconsin, USA
• Phoenix Motorcars - California, USA
• Porteon Electric Vehicles, Inc. - Oregon, USA
• Prometheus Systems, LLC - Arizona, USA
• Psycho-Active - Georgia, USA
• Roane Inventions - Texas, USA
• Society for Sustainable Mobility - California, USA
• Spirit One - Alberta, Canada
• Valentin Technologies - Wisconsin, USA
• Tesla Motors - California, USA
• Velozzi - California, USA
• X Tracer - Winterthur, Switzerland
• ZAP Motors - California, USA

The prize: an as yet unannounced sum of millions of dollars. The Ansari X-Prize for space flight was $10 million.

By Ecotality blogger Bill Hobbs. Originally published on July 23, 2007.

Regular readers of my writings here at the Ecotality blog know I have an abiding faith in the ability of profit-incentivized innovators and entrepreneurs to come up with solutions to the problems all tangled up in the global warming/energy puzzle, and today comes news out of Wales that fits thgreenbox.bmpat expectation to a tee.

It’s called the “Greenbox” and what it does is trap CO2 emissions from a vehicle’s exhaust system, and hold them for future use in making biofuel. Reuters reports:

The world’s richest corporations and finest minds spend billions trying to solve the problem of carbon emissions, but three fishing buddies in North Wales believe they have cracked it. They have developed a box which they say can be fixed underneath a car in place of the exhaust to trap the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming — including carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide — and emit mostly water vapor. The captured gases can be processed to create a biofuel using genetically modified algae.

Dubbed “Greenbox”, the technology developed by organic chemist Derek Palmer and engineers Ian Houston and John Jones could, they say, be used for cars, buses, lorries and eventually buildings and heavy industry, including power plants. “We’ve managed to develop a way to successfully capture a majority of the emissions from the dirtiest motor we could find,” Palmer, who has consulted for organizations including the World Health Organisation and GlaxoSmithKline, told Reuters.

The inventors “stumbled across the idea while experimenting with carbon dioxide to help boost algae growth for fish farming,” Reuters said, and they now are seeking venture capital either from government or industry.

A Greenbox small enough to fit under a car would hold the CO2 emission from burning on tank of gasoline, they say.

The crucial aspect of the technology is that the carbon dioxide is captured and held in a secure state, said Houston. Other carbon capture technologies are much more cumbersome or energy-intensive, for example using miles of pipeline to transport the gas.

“The carbon dioxide, held in its safe, inert state, can be handled, transported and released into a controlled environment with ease and a minimal amount of energy required,” Houston said at a demonstration using a diesel-powered generator at a certified UK Ministry of Transportation emissions test centre.

More than 130 tests carried out over two years at several testing centers have, the three say, yielded a capture rate between 85 and 95 percent.

Engadget, where I first read the story today, suggests that while the technology appears to work, people won’t be wanting to slide under their cars to remove the Greenbox and replace it with an empty Greenbox at each fill-up. That’s true. But that problem just needs its own environmental solution. Step one would be for filling station operators to realize that they now have a potential second business - emptying Greenboxes into a larger holding tank, and selling it to biofuels makers. And the Greenbox folks need to design a way for a filling station to plug in a hose and empty the Greenbox, rather than remove it.

“Abondance is the French Alps’ first ski station to fall apparent victim to global warming. It will almost certainly not be the last,” reports the Associated Press. One year there’s not much snow and the AP is certain it’s global warming? It could be global warming, but it also could be that next year the place will be inundated with snow. I recall a few years ago the Colorado ski resorts were bemoaning a lack of snow. Last year: snow was abundant.

So, is the lack of snow this year at the Abondance ski resort in the French Alps a sign of global warming or just a sign that, this year, they didn’t get a lot of snow? The AP’s journalists aren’t equipped to make such a call.

But the science of global climate change is improving:

Atmospheric and Environmental Research Inc. (AER), a leader in earth, ocean, atmosphere, and space science R&D, announced a major new development that will impact global warming and climate change predictions. Supported by the US Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program, AER’s rapid radiative transfer model for short wave energy has recently proven to be very effective in improving operational weather forecasts. The potential impact on global climate models is now under study.

“The importance of this advance is that all global warming and climate change predictions are based on models of the atmosphere, and in these models the depiction of clouds and how clouds interact with the scattering of sunlight is crucial to calculating the heating of the atmosphere,“ stated Dr. Ross Hoffman, Vice President of Research & Development at AER. “More accurate simulation of cloudiness means more accurate forecasts of climate change due to CO2 increases.“

AER’s research, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, should lead to improvements in climate modeling and climate change predictions, the company said in a press release, adding that AER‘s scientists “helped solve a long-standing problem of over predicting clouds over the oceans."

Humanity faces severe challenges in the coming century.

• Are you fearful about Global Warming? I am.
• Peak Oil giving you the blues? Join me in concern.

Well, let me add to your worries — as mine have been mounting. Water, one of the most renewable of renewable resources, ranks right up there with Global Warming and Energy in terms of key 21st century challenges.

Don’t believe me? (Or, if you already think this but want a more holistic perspective …) Well, perhaps it is time for you to spend some time with Fred Pearce and his wonderful When the Rivers Run Dry: Water–The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century.

When the Rivers Run Dry: Water–The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-First Century provides a whirlwind tour (34 chapters in 310 pages) of water issues, a tour both geographic (from Cambodia to Los Angeles, the Aral Sea to the Zambezi River) and in subject matter (from drought to dams, desalinization to sanitation). The core strength of the book is this travelogue nature, in Pearce’s mosaic of historical, technological, social, and environmental realities, limitations, and possibilities.

Malta Flooding: June 2007Pearce lays out challenges, such as the massive amount of water that can go into crops (and, in essence, the trade in water via agricultural trade), the impacts of dams on reducing actual water availability (evaporation), and the ways in which mankind is bumping against limits in water availability around the globe.

For example, in the four-page chapter “Halliburton’s Job for Qaddafi”, Pearce discusses the $27+ billion that have gone into mining Libya’s “fossil water” (”ancient underground water that is not being replaced by the rains”) — taking water from the Nubian sandstone aquifer, which “is the largest freshwater source on earth … [with] some of the water … more than a million years old.” For what: to irrigate Libyan desert … “The vast capital cost and the growing bills for pumping water from ever greater depths beneath the desert make heat grown from the Saharan water some of the most expensive on earth.” Should we count the ways in which this money could have been better spent on a sustainable Libyan future? Such as setting up Concentrating Solar Power systems for exporting electricity to Europe?

The next chapter tackles “The World’s Largest Mass Poisoning”, highlighting the law of unintended consequences where good deeds can turn bad. Throughout Bangladesh and environs, massive numbers of people are poisoned with arsenic, as they use wells dug with international assistance in the 1980s seeking to provide them cleaner water from underground than the fouled surface waters they were using. “Such folly. They forgot that nature can poison water too.”

There is much to learn from this book, such as that reservoirs are a major factor in manmade global warming, as about 1/5th of manmade methane comes from rotting plant matter in reservoirs. This equates to about 7% of manmade Greenhouse effect, which is more than aircraft emissions. And, the vegetation decay is worsened by being in a reservoir, as in a more oxygenated environment, this decay would lead to CO2 rather than methane. For example, the “renewable” energy project built for the Ariane space program, in French Guiana, emits about three times the GHG of an equivalent coal-fired plant. [p 143-144]

Drought: Po RiverPearce argues that key areas of the world (China, India) will face water collapse in the coming decades unless there is major change. He lays out convincing cases of the criticality of water for numerous security crisis points (Israel & the Palestinians; the Kashmir).

But, this book is not just about dire circumstances and facts. One item made me recall (perhaps with nostalgia) one stream of Israeli concept — that they would achieve peace with and prosperity for their neighbors through learning how to make the desert bloom and sharing that knowledge freely and broadly. Pearce discusses how an Israeli archeologist, Michael Evenari, rediscovered “rain harvesting”. In this case, Evenari recreated “an ancient Nabatean farm” in the Negev desert.

When I paid a vist to the Avdat farm, it hadn’t rained for six weeks. All around was barren wasteland. But on the farm, the soil was damp, a field of wheat was growing, and almond and pistachio trees were in leaf. … It was a stunning sight. And as I have spoken to practitioners of rainwater harvesting around the world since, I have discovered how important the Negev experience has been in their work. [p 269]

South Asians learned rain harvesting from Avdat. Oxfam learned it from the Indians and brought it to Africa. And, so on. Sadly, this sort of sharing of ways to turn the desert green has not been Israel’s dominant interaction with its neighbors and the world.

The below is a five-minute discussion of a similar effort to green the desert. Take the time to watch — this gives me hope that ’solutions’ are possible.

When the Rivers Run Dry is far from a perfect work. The absence of footnotes, the non-discussion of energy issues, and minimal mention of Global Warming impacts all weaken its impact for me.

And, at the end of the day, I have a core disagreement: it starts (and ends) with the title. Water is critical, even one of the three most pressing 21st century challenges humanity faces, but it is not “the defining crisis”. We could “solve” water and still be killing ourselves and humanity’s future in accelerated Global Warming through using ever more polluting energy systems. No, water is key; water is important, but it is not “the defining crisis”.

Having written this, Pearce has written a great travelogue, engagingly written in short segments that can be read when the opportunity strikes and the book returned to at a later time. Each chapter can stand by itself, but the chapters create an entirety, laying down the basis for a holistic understanding of the Globe’s water challenges today and in the century to come.

And, finally, Pearce should be commended. When the Rivers Run Dry is not just a nightmare tale, but Pearce points to real advances and real reasons for some optimism about paths for ameliorating (if not solving) the globe’s water challenges. Global Warming … Peak Oil … Water … three critical challenges for the coming century. When it comes to Water, When the Rivers Run Dry outlines the challenge but also suggests solutions.

*NOTES*

* Celsias had an excellent discussion of water issues last week, Water Worries.

The Live Earth mega-concert will be happening this coming Saturday, and former VP Al Gore, Live Earth founder Kevin Wall and Alliance for Climate Protection CEO Cathy Zoi have announced a “7 Point Pledge” which will be available at the seven-continent event and online.

I PLEDGE:

1. To demand that my country join an international treaty within the next 2 years that cuts global warming pollution by 90% in developed countries and by more than half worldwide in time for the next generation to inherit a healthy earth;
2. To take personal action to help solve the climate crisis by reducing my own CO2 pollution as much as I can and offsetting the rest to become “carbon neutral;”
3. To fight for a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store the CO2;
4. To work for a dramatic increase in the energy efficiency of my home, workplace, school, place of worship, and means of transportation;
5. To fight for laws and policies that expand the use of renewable energy sources and reduce dependence on oil and coal;
6. To plant new trees and to join with others in preserving and protecting forests; and,
7. To buy from businesses and support leaders who share my commitment to solving the climate crisis and building a sustainable, just, and prosperous world for the 21st century.

Granted, it’s hard to picture the fan who tunes in to the show only because they think their favorite pop star is awesome taking the time to seriously contemplate the details of the 7 point pledge, but at the bottom of the online pledge is a “Click here to continue and sign the pledge” button which leads to a menu of commitments to choose from which may seem more realistic to the enviro-newbie.

• I will change four light bulbs to CFLs at my home.
• I will shop for the most energy efficient electronics and appliances.
• I will shut off my equipment and lights whenever I’m not using them.
• I will ride public transit or carpool one or more times per week.
• I will forward a Live Earth email message to 5 friends.
• Add my name to the Live Earth pledge.

Of course there will be the cliche of those who find themselves unable to separate the message from the messenger, but this is an increasingly shrinking and irrelevant group. Consider the following in sheer numbers. Event organizers are claiming an expectation that 2 billion people will view the event. Whether that figure plays out as reality or not remains to be seen, but keep in mind that since Live Aid reached about 1.5 billion viewers, viewership of at least a billion is not an unrealistic expectation for this weekend. If one-eighth of one percent of the viewers are moved to make even minor efforts toward conservation within their personal life, do the math and you can see that this is not without meaning.

By Ecotality blogger Doug Snodgrass.  Originally published on June 28, 2007. 

Are you doing something about climate change? Perhaps the scope of your project is Live Earth-massive, or there’s a chance that the scale may be somewhat smaller. Either way, here’s something that you should know about. Celsias Blog is launching a program that aims to encourage individuals and groups to “register past, current or proposed climate change projects”. From the press release:

Projects might include cleaning up a waterway, organizing an eco-conference on campus, providing low-emission stoves, writing a petition to stop the use of plastic grocery bags, bringing photovoltaic solar energy to villagers, or creating a website for young environmental professionals. “We are looking for projects that will inspire others to do the same in their communities, and the possibilities are endless. By registering your project on Celsias, you will soon be able to share your knowledge, learn from others, and avoid pitfalls,” explains (Celsias’ CEO Nick) Lewis.

Project leaders will also be able to raise the visibility of their projects, recruit volunteers, attract resources and solicit funding.

Currently, the program is in the project registration phase, with the full-on unveiling expected sometime in July. Registration is free.

Editor's note: This week, Ecotality's Bill Hobbs points to an interesting new development: Algeria, a member of OPEC, has plans for exporting solar power. This post was originally published on June 20, 2007.

A member of OPEC jumps into the solar energy business? Gotta be from The Onion, right? Wrong. Algeria, which earns $1 billion every week exporting oil, is developing a plan to generate solar power for both export and domestic use, reports Reuters.

Algeria plans to make use of its hot southern desert to develop solar power for export and domestic consumption, the Opec member country said on Monday. The scheme is due to be completed by 2015 in Africa’s second-largest country, where most of the 33 million people live in the northern coastal strip. Temperatures in the desert south are high. “Algeria has a huge sunny area with big potential to be exploited. It has also financial and human resources. It lacks nothing. We can compete with other countries,” Energy and Mines Minister Chakib Khelil said.

Here’s some analysis from the Gulf Times of Qatar.

Opec member Algeria’s plan to generate solar power for export and domestic use is an excellent innovation that other Arab states would do well to emulate, a renewable energy advocacy group said yesterday. Wolfgang Palz of the Germany-based World Council for Renewable Energy said Arab states had been “left behind a bit” in the Western-led race for alternatives to fossil fuels but could catch up because they had the necessary educational base.

“For modern types of renewable energies like wind energy, the leadership is right now in Europe, California and Texas,” Palz, an engineer and physician by training, told Reuters. “Arab countries have been left behind a bit, and it’s very important now that political decisions are being taken to catch up with the rest of the world because Arab countries have resources - the intellectual resources - to do this.”

“We think that in the long run all renewable energies will be greatly needed because fossil and atomic energy will be progressively exhausted and disappear.” Palz praised Algeria’s plans to develop power for its domestic market as well as for exports from a hybrid solar-gas plant in the Sahara desert due to come on stream in 2009, with exports of power to Europe due to start up by 2015.

Algeria reportedly has enough oil to last it for 23 years and enough gas for 50 years at current production rates. But the country of 33 million people also has a fast growing population, high unemployment and booming demand for power.

Algeria’s move into solar energy is a very foreward thinking business move - it recognizes that Algeria’s economic future isn’t in the oil business but the energy business. Algeria isn’t the only oil-producing country that could make this kind of move. Much of the Middle Eastern oil nations are also blessed with an abundance of sunshine beating down on vast stretches of wide-open arid land and deserts. I don’t know, but I’m guessing there’s also incredible potential there for generating wind power, provided you could design wind turbines that would not be degraded by sandstorms.

As an American, I’m not entirely enthralled by the idea of the world becoming more dependent upon the Middle East for energy, but at least such diversification would benefit the environment and also lessen the dependence on the region’s abundant but ultimately finite underground energy resource.

Solar and wind power might also hold promise for parts of the Middle East and North Africa that have plenty of sun and wind but lack oil.

Editor's note: This week, A Siegel at the Ecotality blog takes a look at a new initiative from some major players in the home computing industry. This post was originally published on June 12, 2007.

Most people are unaware just how many kilowatt hours their computers burn and how many pounds of CO2 they help pump into the atmosphere. Interested in learning about this, there is no better place to start than Michael BlueJay’s Saving Electricity site.

Reducing energy use when you turn on your computer looks like it is going to get much, much easier. Earlier today, Climate Savers smart computing was announced at the Google campus. This initiative targets a 50% reduction in computer electricity usage by 2010.

From the press release:

Intel Corporation and Google Inc. joined with Dell, EDS, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), HP, IBM, Lenovo, Microsoft, PG&E, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and more than 25 additional organizations today announced the Climate Savers Computing Initiative (www.climatesaverscomputing.org). The goal of the new broad-based environmental effort is to save energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by setting aggressive new targets for energy-efficient computers and components, and promoting the adoption of energy-efficient computers and power management tools worldwide.

“Today, the average desktop PC wastes nearly half of its power, and the average server wastes one-third of its power,” said Urs Hölzle, senior vice president, Operations & Google Fellow. “The Climate Savers Computing Initiative is setting a new 90 percent efficiency target for power supplies, which if achieved, will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 54 million tons per year — and save more than $5.5 billion in energy costs.

The initiative is promising tools to help users reduce electricity use. And, they make the case for investing to cut that electricity use by 50 percent …

Even at modestly higher prices (about $30 per system), more efficient computers will pay for themselves in reduced energy costs. It’s a win-win situation for you and for the environment.

For example, a savings of just 20–30 watts in power consumption translates to a savings of $7.20 per year in direct energy costs at a price of $0.12/kWh for electricity. In an air-conditioned home, the total savings increases to approximately $10/year, which means the high-efficiency system will pay for itself in 2–3 years. Systems that remain turned on all the time typically pay for themselves within the first year of use. …

Reducing the power consumption of PCs and servers has secondary benefits throughout the larger community. It reduces electrical and air-conditioning loads in office buildings, data centers and homes, thus reducing the strain on regional generation facilities and the electrical grid. Last but not least, it reduces emissions of greenhouse gases.

The Climate Savers smart computing initiative looks like a serious effort to provide a path toward more energy efficient, greener computing … A path toward greener blogging …

Editor's note: This week, Ecotality blogger Steve Caratzas takes a look at a recent New York Times article that outlines Thomas Edison's green thinking. This post was originallly published on June 3, 2007.

The New York Times has a terrific article about Thomas Edison, and his unparalleled impact on our daily lives, as well as our current (you should pardon the pun) environmental situation.

No individual deserves more credit, or blame, for America’s voracious electricity consumption than Edison, who conceived not only that generating station but also the notoriously inefficient incandescent bulb and a slew of volt-thirsty devices.

However, Edison was also a green visionary of sorts, whose ideas about sustainable energy encompassed windmills and an energy-self-sufficient home.

Edison also, like other scientists of his day, was beginning to understand even then that fossil fuels wouldn’t last forever.

Makes you wonder how the global warming denialists would have dealt reacted: “Electricity? Balderdash! Nothing will ever replace the tallow candle! I deserve the right to live in a state of perpetual semi-darkness! Progress be damned!”

In 1931, not long before he died, the inventor told his friends Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone: “I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”

Sorry, Mr. Edison. We let you down.

Sports Illustrated’s Michael Farber has written an open letter to Al Gore, pleading with the former Vice President to help green up the National Hockey League’s Stanley Cup finals format.

Farber is concerned with the NHL’s current 2-2-1-1-1 system, wherein two games of the best-of-seven final series are played on one team’s home ice, followed by two games on their opponent’s home ice, returning back to the first team’s home ice, then to the opponent’s again, and finally – if seven games are required – one final game in the rink where the whole thing started. Confused? Perfect! Consider yourself a hockey fan.

Farber is seeking a more environment-friendly configuration:

You see, a 2-3-2 final would be a blessing for the environment. The NHL would be doing its patriotic best to be green — beyond its recycling of Anaheim Ducks defenseman Sean O’Donnell.

Lame jokes aside, Farber’s assessment is sound, and he has the math to support his supposition:

Under the current system, and if the series goes the full seven, you will fly to Anaheim for Game 1, back to Ottawa for Game 3, back to Anaheim for Game 5, back to Ottawa for Game 6, back to Anaheim for Game 7 and then, finally, home. That is six cross-continent flights, which is a lot of jet fuel…. But if this were an ecologically-sound 2-3-2 final, Ottawa would fly to Anaheim for Game 1, home for Game 3, back to California for Game 6 and then back to Canada’s capital when it’s over. Two trips would have been averted….

The NHL, Farber points out, used the 2-3-2 format exactly twice before in the mid-1980s, but abandoned it – as it tends to do with most innovations, stuck forever in an old-school mentality that hockey purists prefer. Farber believes Al Gore is the sport’s best hope for a green change.

Canada generally seems to get behind green initiatives, so perhaps the Stanley Cup finals could be the next step. Or at least one of the next steps, for as Farber reasons, there’s always room for environmental ingenuity:

My next thought: fuel-efficient Zambonis.

By Ecotality writer Bill Hobbs. Originally published May 22, 2007.

It’s not going to be the most scintillating beachside reading this summer, but a new guide coming out in June from Duke University Press could help prevent rising seas from obliterating your favorite beach.

It’s called Harnessing Farms and Forests in the Low-Carbon Economy: How to Create and Verify Greenhouse Gas Offsets, and is described as “the first how-to manual for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the United States through changes in land use and farming practices, and turning those reductions into verifiable credits for trading in carbon markets, is about to hit bookshelves.”

John Grisham it ain’t, but the book may help bring some rationality and credibility to the whole “carbon offsets” business. The book is a technical guide for farmers, foresters, traders and investors. You can see a preview of the guide here. According to the Duke University press release, the book explains how farmers and foresters can convert their land’s carbon dioxide storage capacity, and reduce emissions of potent greenhouse gases such as methane and nitrous oxide, into revenue-generating “offsets” that can be bought and sold in future carbon markets.

Duke’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions developed the guide in collaboration with the nonprofit advocacy group Environmental Defense, with input from scientists at Texas A&M, Colorado State, Rice, Princeton, Kansas State and Brown universities.

More from the press release:

Lawmakers at the federal and state levels are paying increased attention to the role of such offsets as legislation to reduce U.S.greenhouse gas emissions is being developed.

“We know land-use practices can give us more options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions over the next 20 to 30 years and flexibility for companies adjusting to a U.S. carbon cap once it is enacted,” said Nicholas Institute Director Tim Profeta. “But farmers and foresters have needed specific guidance, and lawmakers need to know that the reductions can be verified. This book gives us that information and assurance.”

A number of agricultural groups are realizing the potential for new revenue streams through greenhouse gas-sequestering alterations to farming practices, such as “no till” farming where soils are not turned up after every season and manure-management practices that capture methane and use it as an energy source. “This is a comprehensive road map that paves the way for agriculture as a verifiable, measurable carbon sink,” said Dick Wittman, a member of the Agricultural Carbon Market Working Group and former president of the Pacific Northwest Direct Seed Association.

“Recent studies by Kansas State University and others have indicated that carbon could be an $8 billion market for agriculture,” Wittman said. “This document proves that specific agricultural conservation tillage practices are a legitimate method to store carbon. Should policy-makers embark on a cap-and-trade policy to curtail carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions, agriculture has the potential to be a cost-effective solution.”

VCARS, a website to help Brits find new and used cars, has compiled a listing of "The Greenest Cars on Earth." The list contains real-world info that’s important to not only the green-minded, but also the consumer at large; CO2 emissions, MPG combined, engine type, transmission type, BHP/torque, weight, NCAP rating (European New Car Assessment Programme), top speed, 0-62 MPH, warranty info…

Cars are categorized by hybrid, electric, biofuel, and future green cars. The bonus here is that every auto is accompanied by a photo, tre-cool in the future green cars category.

Winner of the most interesting name? The Venturi Fetish (shown in photo).

Though lawmakers passed a measure in 2005 to replace diesel school bus engines nationwide, the results have been paltry. Thus school children nationwide are still traveling on antiquated buses that produce pollutants some believe to be five times dirtier than outside air.

The issue: money. State officials are struggling to budget in the clean school bus initiatives, while Congress has yet to deliver the $1 billion it promised over five years to assist states in cleaning up diesel-powered vehicles – which includes school buses.

“I think at one time or another all our kids are going to be on a bus breathing that harmful air, and that should bother everybody,” said Karen Slay, a Lubbock, Texas, mother of four boys who have ridden buses. “In the big scheme of things, it doesn’t seem to be that expensive, to me, to retrofit these.”

High concentrations of diesel emissions (called particulates) are the cause of minor concerns like headaches, wheezing and dizziness. But recent studies indicate that particulates are also linked to asthma and lung cancer.

Filters of two different designs can reduce emissions on older buses: diesel particulate filters, installed in place of mufflers for $700 a piece, reduce tailpipe emissions by a whopping 85 percent; closed crankcase filtration systems, placed under the hood but with a staggering $7,500 price tag, reduce particulates by nearly 90 percent. Buses can be fitted with one or both types of filters.

An estimated 390,000 diesel school buses are on the road in the U.S., according to the EPA. Most newer buses were manufactured to meet stricter emissions guidelines and do not need filters. But about one-third of the nation’s diesel school bus fleet, or more than 100,000 buses, were manufactured before 1990 and are big polluters, according to the EPA.

California is leading the charge on this issue, as voters in that state last year approved $200 million to refurbish its school bus fleet.

Stop the presses! In the biggest environmental news since Bill Hobbs pulled his Norma Rae routine with the nation’s napkin workers, Spinal Tap will reunite for a performance at London’s Wembley Stadium as part of the Live Earth concerts scheduled worldwide for July 7.

As everyone (but Bill and his gang of Sheryl Crow bashers, presumably) knows, Spinal Tap is a mock heavy metal group immortalized in the 1984 mockumentary, This is Spinal Tap, directed by Rob Reiner. Original members David St. Hubbins ( vocals, guitar), Nigel Tufnel (lead guitar), and Derek Smalls (bass) will all be back to help save the world from global warming. It is unclear who the unlucky drummer will be.

A new 15-minute film directed by Reiner on the band’s reunion will also play at the opening night of the Tribeca Film Festival in New York on Wednesday. The slate for the opening gala, to be hosted by Al Gore, was previously announced, excepting the Reiner short.

Opening the festival will be a screening of several global warming-themed short films, all produced by the SOS (Save Our Selves) campaign. SOS is organizing the Live Earth concerts, set to be held across seven continents.

“They’re not that environmentally conscious, but they’ve heard of global warming,” said Reiner, whose other films include “When Harry Met Sally” and “Stand By Me.” “Nigel thought it was just because he was wearing too much clothing — that if he just took his jacket off it would be cooler.”

This is but the latest of several reunions for Spinal Tap, whose last album was 1992’s Break like the Wind. For this auspicious occasion they have produced a new single entitled “Warmer Than Hell.”

Rising global temperatures due to greenhouse gases will affect the continent of Africa more than any other, and as such African governments must seek ways to adapt, urge the authors of a United Nations report. The 1,500-page report, in the works for more than five years, has been presented to policymakers charged with the power to battle the effects of catastrophic climate change.

“At least 0.6 degrees (centigrade) of global warming appears unavoidable given how much greenhouse gas has accumulated in the atmosphere,” said Guy Midgley, a chief scientist of South Africa’s National Biodiversity Institute.

“The unavoidable regional warming is closer to one degree. Adaptation is going to be necessary,” he said, during a regional briefing on the landmark Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change’s fourth assessment report.

This warning is consistent with previous ones that predicted the world’s least fortunate would be most vulnerable to the effects of global warming. Africa’s natural resources are already under significant strain, suffering from droughts, floods and famine as agriculture is ravaged by rising temperatures.

Pauline Dube, one of the report’s authors, believes the reduction of water as a viable resource represents the most pressing threat to the region.

“South Africa and Botswana experience water stress. The city of Gabarone is severely handicapped and often construction has to stop. The city has to recycle water,” said Dube, a senior lecturer in the University of Botswana’s environmental science department.

by Ecotality blogger Bill Hobbs

Sign seen in front of Al Gore's mansion in the posh Belle Meade section of Nashville Thursday, indicating Gore is moving forward with plans for solar panels to help power his mansion. Here's a link to the the Belle Meade Board of Zoning Appeals meeting agenda - there are no details on the size of the solar panels, how much power they'll generate, or whether or not they'll be tied into the grid via a "net metering" arrangement so Gore can sell excess power to the grid through a "net metering" arrangement.

Tennessee is not a mandatory "net metering" state, though the local electric utility that serves Gore's house does offer the option for customers who generate their own power. But Nashville Electric Service does offer the Tennessee Valley Authority's "Generation Partners" program, which purchases customer-generated power from solar panels or wind turbines at a rate of 15 cents per kilowatt hour.

No word on whether Gore himself will be at the zoning board meeting to make the case for why he should be allowed to put solar panels on his house.

I've given Gore a lot of well-deserved grief - on this blog over his use of "carbon offsets" to present himself as "carbon neutral" even as he continues to consume large quantities of carbon-based energy, but he deserves praise for trying now to "walk the walk" and live the way he has long urged others to live in terms of using clean, renewable energy.

If solar power is going to play a significant role in the energy equation of the future, there must be advances in technologies to store that power and more investment by manufacturers, concludes a new federally funded study by University of Massachusetts Amherst scientist Erin Baker. But in New Zealand researchers have developed new solar energy-collecting dyes that promise to make solar energy much easier and less expensive to collect.

The UMASS researchers’ report “explores the viability of sun-fueled technologies through a combination of evaluations by experts and economic modeling, allowing the researchers to look at solar power’s role in the electricity sector in 15-year chunks through 2095,” says the UMASS-Amherst news release.

Baker has been invited to submit the article to Energy Economics as part of a special issue on Technological Change and Uncertainty in Environmental Economics. It is the first in a series; future reports will assess technologies that harvest wind, biofuels and carbon capture. The U.S. Department of Energy awarded $347,000 to Baker’s team last year to investigate the costs and benefits associated with investing in alternative energies.

The research report might be interesting reading and should be released to the public for free, not stuffed into a research journal that can only be accessed with a subscription or fee. After all, you already paid for it as it was funded by tax dollars. Still, I wonder about the value of the report’s economic predictions for solar power given that economists can’t predict human ingenuity.

The same day that the solar economic forecast report hits the news comes news of yet another solar technology breakthrough.

Researchers at the Nanomaterials Research Centre at New Zealand’s Massey University have developed synthetic dyes hat can be used to generate electricity at one tenth of the cost of current silicon-based solar panels. The dyes work similar to natural photosynthesis - and even work in low-light conditions. Researchers say they soon will be able to be cheaply incorporated into common products, turning those products into generators of electricity. Think: roofing materials and window panes. Or clothing.

Here’s how the Manawatu Standard reports the breakthrough:

This means teenagers could one day be wearing jackets that will recharge their equivalents of cellphones, iPods and other battery- driven devices. The breakthrough is a development of the university’s Nanomaterials Research Centre and has attracted world-wide interest already - particularly from Australia and Japan. Researchers at the centre have developed a range of synthetic dyes from simple organic compounds closely related to those found in nature, where light-harvesting pigments are used by plants for photosynthesis.

Science Daily sheds more light on the potential of the “porphyrin dye” technology. Turns out that not only may the new porphyrin dye solar sells may not only be better at generating electricity from sunlight, even the manufacturing process to make , the itself be more environmentally friendly than making silicon-based solar cells:

Dr Campbell says that unlike the silicon-based solar cells currently on the market, the 10×10cm green demonstration cells generate enough electricity to run a small fan in low-light conditions - making them ideal for cloudy climates. The dyes can also be incorporated into tinted windows that trap to generate electricity.

He says the green solar cells are more environmentally friendly than silicon-based cells as they are made from titanium dioxide - a plentiful, renewable and non-toxic white mineral obtained from New Zealand’s black sand. Titanium dioxide is already used in consumer products such as toothpaste, white paints and cosmetics.

”The refining of pure silicon, although a very abundant mineral, is energy-hungry and very expensive. And whereas silicon cells need direct sunlight to operate efficiently, these cells will work efficiently in low diffuse light conditions,” Dr Campbell says.

“The expected cost is one 10th of the price of a silicon-based solar panel, making them more attractive and accessible to home-owners.”

I’m going to make a prediction based not on economic modeling and data-crunching, but on 42 years of observing humans at work and more than a decade as a business and policy journalist: solar power is going to play a much larger role and much sooner than the UMASS-Amherst report predicts, and it will happen largely because innovators and entrepreneurs will make it happen.

By Ecototality blogger A Siegel. Originally published on Thursday, March 29.

Austin’s Mayor, Will Wynn, is a serious plug-in hybrid vehicle supporter. And, he has been a strong advocate of PHEVs (Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle) from Austin to Washington, DC. ”We have made our intentions clear that we want to pave the way for the plug-in hybrid …”

In short, the concept is to develop

• A concentration of plug-in hybrid vehicles plugged into
• A smart(er) grid that enables powering the hybrid vehicles or, as necessary (and according to owners’ desires), draw power from the battery back into the grid to
• Help balance out renewable power intermittency.

Austin currently receives six percent of its electricity from wind sources. As this increases, the issue of covering power requirements when the wind isn’t blowing becomes an ever more serious issue. With enough penetration of PHEVs plugged into a smart(er) grid, the car batteries can serve as storage for the grid, storing power when the wind is blowing and feeding power back into the grid when the wind isn’t blowing (and the sun isn’t shining).

As Wynn puts it,

“Really, the true beauty of this system is the fact that vehicles charged by the electric system will run on alternative energy sources, such as West Texas wind, instead of Middle East oil”

Austin plans to give $1000 to the first 1000 PHEV purchasers in the city.

Wynn is approaching this truly as a campaign. His goal is “a mafia of 50 like-minded, large U.S. cities that are fed up with pollution and high fuel costs. … Armed with commitments for fleet orders … to buy the first round of vehicles … this mafia will tell automakers that the time for change is now.”

For more information, check out Plug-In Austin.