Green Options

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

Shell has announced that a new service station in Ottawa, Ontario will quietly begin selling cellulosic ethanol blended into regular gasoline. The biofuel is made locally from wheat straw, and is the first time cellulosic ethanol has been made publicly available. More on this story here.

In 2009 it is expected that 1 billion [...]

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

While the Obamas and the Sarkozys have been celebrating the anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, this past weekend, Chrysler has its own D-Day to deal with. Indiana pension funds and consumer groups asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Sunday to stop the sale of bankrupt automaker Chrysler LLC to a group led by Italian carmaker Fiat,  while they challenge the [...]

Welcome to the Carnival of the Green! This is the 182nd edition of Treehugger’s weekly roundup of eco links from around the blogosphere.

Welcome to Green Building Elements where home owners and LEED accredited professional alike can learn about advances in green and renewable building materials, current projects in sustainable architecture and progressive urban planning, and local guidelines for creating green structures in [...]

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

There is no gold left in California. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is threatening to layoff fire, police, and teachers. All of this is certain to further  increase unemployment and foreclosure rates. Schwarzenegger is now considering releasing nonviolent prisoners, shortening the school year, legalizing and taxing marijuana. Fred provides a unique perspective on the [...]

Last week, at the C40 Large Cities Climate Summit in Seoul, Autodesk, Inc., a world leader in 2D and 3D design and engineering software, announced that it will collaborate with the Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) and the Microsoft Corporation, to provide visualization technology for Project Two Degrees. Project Two Degrees is an Internet-based application that provides cities with a set of tools to measure, compare, and reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at a local level.

Autodesk joins forces with the Clinton Foundation to build sustainable cities
Autodesk will provide the technology, initially based on Autodesk MapGuide Enterprise, that will act as the model-based visualization environment used to view, evaluate and compare the results of analysis and monitoring in the C40 city. Autodesk MapGuide Enterprise software is a powerful mapping solution for delivering information more quickly, easily, and cost-effectively via the web.

Green Building Elements had a chance to speak with Brett Smith of Autodesk and Olivia Ross of the Clinton Foundation.  Here is what they had to say.
GBE: How does the software track emissions?

Brett Smith (Autodesk): The Project 2° Emissions Tracker is designed to measure as many municipal and corporate activities as possible. Users enter data on emission producing activities such as fuel and electricity consumption, vehicle traffic, waste production, industrial processes and air and sea vessel fuel use. The software then converts the data into greenhouse gases, including tons of CO2 equivalent, taking into consideration the source and type of activity.

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

For a while it looked like Google might actually bailout the newspaper industry by buying a stake in newspapers that have been struggling with debt and declining ad revenues.  However, it appears that this plan ha been called off.

Meanwhile, the Treasury department has committed $ 7.5 billion in aid to GMAC, the auto lender [...]

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

Last weekend, the biggest players in the health care industry announced that they would put together a cost-cutting plan to present to the Obama Administration.  The expectation is that the measures will save a family of four $500 a year in the first year, and  $2,500 a year by the fifth year.

Federal [...]

GE’s hybrid locomotive battery
GE partners with New York state to create a $ 100 million manufacturing facility for a new sodium based battery technology in the Capital region.
Who imagined that ordinary table salt could be the secret to storing energy?
GE is once again bringing the notion of a technology based economy home, this time with ordinary kitchen ingredients like table salt. Today, the company announced a plan to locate a new, sodium battery manufacturing facility in Upstate New York’s Capital Region.
The sodium battery was developed in GE’s Global Research Center. Made of ordinary table salt and nickel, the sophisticated technology already has about 30 patents blocking the intellectual property in its space.
GE has already invested more than $150 million to develop advanced battery technologies, including this high energy density, sodium-based chemistry battery that is designed to store huge densities of energy in a relatively small space. The first application will be GE’s hybrid locomotive, which will be commercialized in 2010.  The investment in sodium battery technology complements GE’s investment in A123, a leading supplier of lithium batteries for plug-in electric passenger cars.

A public-private partnership in New York State
New York Governor David Paterson, is intent on making his state, the capital of the global clean energy economy. He and Dennis Mullen, President of the Upstate Empire State Development Corporation, have shown strong support for GE’s sodium battery project from the outset.

This column highlights the top economic stories of the week.

Just as Swine flu looked like it was on the mend, the USA announced the death of two Texas residents and one in Washington state. The disease has been linked to poorly managed factory farms in Mexico.

The results of the bank stress tests were release this week. Nine banks got a clean bill of [...]

Economist, James Galbraith, on bank stress tests

The results of bank stress tests released this week, do not bear good news. The bottom line is that at  total of $75 billion needs to be raised from 10 major banks to prop them up for losses that could come from a deepening recession.
Here is a Top 4 summary of who needs what in the next six months:

Bank of America (BAC) will have to raise $33.9 billion;
Wells Fargo (WFC), $13.7 billion;
GMAC (GJM), $11.5 billion; and
Citigroup (C), $5.5 billion

The question people are asking is whether this is the worst news yet? Or whether it is news that the worst is over?

There is no easy answer. The truth is that if unemployment continues to rise, housing prices continue to fall and the economy continues to shrink, then much more money might be needed as problem bank loans could be on the rise.