Green Options

Only 2% of companies are covered by the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act, but that 2% represents 70% of US emissions, says Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.), the bill’s co-sponsor.

Speaking at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today, U.S. President Barack Obama threw strong support behind clean energy and technology, touting America’s history of innovation and not shying away from problems.

The new green-themed Reclaim made by Samsung is more than your standard phone with slick green branding — though there’s a bit of that too.

What’s green (or blue), smaller than a deck of cards and will remind you to unplug the charger from the wall after charging? The Reclaim, the new green-themed smart phone made by Samsung for Sprint, is loaded with a bunch of green content, a handful eco-conscious accessories and an attention to sustainable packaging that make it more “green” than most other phones out there.

But you can’t just slap a case made from forty percent corn plastic, dip it in green paint and call it green, can you? The folks at Sprint sent me the new Reclaim so I could answer those questions myself.

Less than a week after switchable EV battery pioneer Better Place announced a newly expanded agreement with French car maker Renault, the company’s founder and CEO, Shai Agassi appeared as a guest on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report in hopes of getting that sought-after ‘Colbert Bump’.
The Colbert Bump, as it is known, is a phenomenon wherein people (places, companies, ideas) that appear on the Colbert Report receive a sudden boost in popularity for their cause.
The deal announced by Agassi in Frankfurt builds on an agreement reached between the two companies in August and will be to install the Better Place battery system (and build-out the charging network) for the Renault Fluence ZE for sale in Israel and Denmark. The Fluence ZE was one of four models in Renault’s new line of electric cars unveiled last week at the Frankfurt Auto Show.

The Optibike OB1 electric bike gets an equivalent of 2,287 MPG.* Could bikes like these be the future of transportation?
Ever wonder what happens when you cross the finest mountain bike components money can buy, an 850w brushless DC motor and a 20ah lithium-ion battery with motocross styling and sensibilities? You get the Optibike OB1, an electric bike that can get up to 45 miles on a nine-cent charge, and what is arguably the finest electric bicycle in the world.

In fact, the Optibike OB1 even found a spot in the California Academy of Sciences museum, touted as “the future of transportation.” There are only 24 OB1’s made per year. When one of them is bought, the owner becomes part of an elite club of enthusiastic riders. And for four fun-filled days in August, I was lucky enough to be a member of that club — or at least able to pretend like I was after being provided one for a short term test drive.

From green gadgets and gizmos, to DVDs and loose-leaf teas, I get the occasional product sent to me for a review.  In most cases, I like to give it a thorough once-over before I’m comfortable putting a stamp of (dis)approval on it.

If I take a long time to review a product, it is usually because: the product stinks and the manufacturer wouldn’t want me to publish anything anyway; the product really stinks and I don’t want to waste my time or my readers’ time with it, or; the product is actually quite good and the length of time spending reviewing it is extended because I’m trying to find something bad to say about it — but can’t. In the case of the DOT-it LED lights Sylvania sent me, the reason for my slow turnaround is definitely the last one. These lights are great.

The first of the two lights sent to me by Sylvania was the DOT-it Golden Dragon (pictured top). The ninja-sounding Golden Dragon is the Cadillac of Sylvania’s puck-style LED lights.

Duke Energy, the North Carolina-based electric utility announced on Wednesday it would be leaving the clean coal lobbying group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), over differences with the organizations opposition to clean energy and climate legislation being considered by Congress.

The long-awaited commercial deployment of the world’s most efficient solar technology looks like it will now be near Phoenix, in a 1.5-megawatt, 60-unit deployment of Stirling Energy Systems’ solar thermal collectors.

Announced late last week, the 60-dish Maricopa Solar project will be the first commercial-scale solar facility built using Stirling Energy Systems/Tessera Solar’s SunCatcher concentrating solar technology.

The SunCatcher consists of a solar concentrator in a dish structure that supports an array of curved glass mirrors. Iterations of the SunCatcher have been among the world’s most efficient machines for solar-to-grid electric conversion for twenty years, most recently breaking the record last year with the highest-ever conversion rate of 31.25%.

In many respects, the modern environmental movement was born in the colleges and universities that dot the American landscape. And that spirit and enthusiasm for green innovation continues to flourish today. But with all of the green claims made by government, the business sector and the mainstream media, it’s quite likely there will be some greenwash spilling from the windows of the the Ivory Tower.

To help us wade through all the green hyperbole, a growing list of sustainability ranking projects has emerged including the Princeton Review Green Honor Roll, the College Sustainability Report Card, and the Sierra Club’s just-released Cool Schools ranking. Each of the guides uses a different methodology but all of were helpful when formulating the following compilation of the top green colleges and universities in the United States.

Recognizing that defining the word ‘green’ can be problematic in its own right and that there are tons of colleges doing really great things in terms of sustainability, this list is certainly incomplete and/or inexact. Think we missed something? Have an example of campus sustainability that needs to be told? Tell the world in the comments section. In alphabetical order:

The Australian government’s ruling coalition has come to terms on an agreement that would quadruple the renewable energy target set by the previous government in 2001