It is offering to lease the land, initially for 5 years of exploration and study at $295,000 annually representing $100 per acre per year, under a MOU regarding “Imperial Valley Geothermal Feasibility and Exploration” while it determines the feasibility of geothermal production there.

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Rather than discard that “geothermal” resource created by the process of oil extraction, the DOE is going to show the traditional energy industry how to tap into those waste fluids to power equipment at the site.

The renewable energy division (EERE) of Steven Chu’s energetic new Department of Energy is buying the waste heat geothermal unit from Ormat Technologies to do the demo. Ormat makes both geothermal and combined heat and power units.

The DOE’s Geothermal Technologies Program at the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) will collaborate with Office of Fossil Energy to make low temperature geothermal power from waste drilling fluids using a waste heat geothermal unit.

The electricity produced would be used to power field production equipment, which would offset purchased electricity. Because this would reduce the fossil energy needed to extract each barrel of oil, this would reduce the pollution costs the traditional oil industry would be liable for under new legislation pending.

If the Clean Energy Jobs & American Power Act passes, there will be an incentive to reduce carbon pollution.

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Iowa. In 2006, according to the Iowa Utilities Board, wind power provided 5 percent of the state’s electricity. Now, just three years later,  Iowa produces between 15 and 17 percent of its own electricity from wind power.

MidAmerican Energy, Iowa’s biggest utility, pays farmers $3,500 a year (plus 2% increase annually) to rent locations for 102 wind turbines. To scout the best locations, they paid $5 an acre to survey likely farmland, and will pay $10 an acre per year to keep those options open for future additional wind turbines.

Photo: Sonia Fridman

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“Our homes embrace the principles of eco-friendliness and cost-effectiveness, without sacrificing beauty. We can ensure that each dwelling achieves a gold or platinum LEED rating, depending on the particular finishes, building systems, and site design an owner chooses.” ~ Michelle Kaufmann Designs

Each Glidehouse home is solar ready with other renewable energy system options possible such as geothermal, wind generator or hybrid systems. Designed for clean, simple living. The Glidehouse is built in a factory, using the most modern and environmentally friendly building methods and materials.

Some eco features of the Glidehouse include:

• using healthy finishes such as non-toxic paints and formaldehyde-free cabinetry.
• it meets the Energy Star® program standards for energy efficient homes and meets the performance standards of the American Lung Association Health House program.
• it’s insulated with an air-barrier, open cell foam insulation, and all wood-to-wood framing joints are caulked, which makes the home airtight, energy efficient, and less likely to produce mold.
• it uses water-saving plumbing fixtures, on-demand water heaters, and a mechanical ventilation system that is 30% more efficient than typical forced-air systems.
• energy efficient, dual-pane glass windows and doors are placed throughout the home to maximize cross-ventilation and natural lighting, minimizing the need for artificial lighting and climate control.

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Coal power supplies most of the electricity that we use here in America. It’s been that way for a long time. Because of coal’s popularity as a source of power, mines, both active and abandoned, lay scattered across the nation. And now, with coal’s popularity waning, the number of abandoned mines could increase. Since 2001 alone, 100 coal-fired plants have taken their turn in front of the firing squad.

And it doesn’t seem as though it’s over. If the trend of extinguishing coal-fired plants continues, more and more mines will be shut down, not to mention mines that simply up and quit. But what is to be done with the abandoned mines? It isn’t as though we can just dispose of them at some hi-tech facility. These mines will become useless scars.

Two engineers from the University of Oviedo have an idea, though. In their research, which is being published in the journal Renewable Energy, Rafael Rodríguez and his colleague María Belarmina Díaz claim that mine shafts on the point of being closed down could be used to provide geothermal energy to local towns.

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The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported good news for renewable energy enthusiasts this week. Energy from renewable resources has increased significantly over the last year. It is now higher than energy produced from nuclear power.

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More money was distributed today by the Department of Energy. 141 million dollars to be more precise. This time Hawaii, Maine, Nebraska, New Mexico, the Northern Mariana Islands and Texas will play beneficiaries of the Recovery Act.

As a part of the Department’s State Energy Program, which has been apportioned $3.1 billion, states and territories propose plans to prioritize energy savings, create or retain jobs, increase the use of renewable energy, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. And that’s where this $141 million will be going. Each state receives funding according to its needs (population based), with Texas receiving more than half of the allotted $141 million dollars. They will receive $87.5 million.

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There is enough energy stored beneath the earth’s surface to power all of our energy demands thousands of times over. The problem is, it’s thousands of feet beneath us. Out of sight. Out of mind. But what if we could get to it? What if we could harvest that power?

That’s the task at hand for Jared Potter. Jared Potter, CEO of Potter Drilling, is developing technology that his father, Robert Potter, initiated over 30 years ago while working at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Robert Potter worked on developing Hot Dry Rock (HDR) heat mining, which, simply put, is a method of harvesting geothermal energy by pumping water into hot, crystalline rock via an injection well. The water is superheated as it flows through open joints in the hot rock reservoir, and is returned through production wells. At the surface, the useful heat is extracted by conventional processes, and the same water is recirculated to mine more heat.

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By the middle of next year, the nine campuses that make up the nation’s largest community college system plan to be completely energy self-sufficient.

It’s a huge step, and it will begin saving money immediately.

The Los Angeles Community College District (LACCD) started down this path in 2001, the year voters approved the first part of $5.7 billion in bond funding to renovate the campuses.

The LACCD Board of Trustees was thinking about much-needed modernization work and its first new construction in 35 years, but it was also thinking ahead. It passed a sustainable building policy mandating that all new buildings that use 50% or more of bond funding be LEED certified. The board had previously developed a renewable energy plan that aimed for a minimum 10% renewable energy standard.

At the time, the trustees were afraid that anything beyond that would be too costly, says Larry Eisenberg, executive director of Facilities, Planning and Development for the LACCD.

The system’s chancellor and the implementation team saw greater potential, though.

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Karl is just one of the many entrepreneurs and inventors profiled in the Discovery special who are creating new ways to power our planet — tapping sunlight, wind and water, and heat embedded in the Earth. Based on the companion book, The New York Times bestseller Earth: The Sequel, the show details the tremendous strides being made across the nation to solve the energy crisis and curb carbon emissions through new technologies.  From start-ups harnessing hydro-power from New York’s East River to solar power in New Mexico’s high desert, the show chronicles dazzling ingenuity and possibility.

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The Kremlin’s order to ramp up renewable energy has set targets of 2.5% by 2015 and 4.5% by 2020. That translates into 45.2 billion kiloWatt hours of renewable energy production by 2020, based on the country’s current electricity production.

To reach these goals, the government will fund small hydro, tidal, geothermal, wind, solar and biomass energy facilities. Wind energy, for instance, is slated to expand from 12 MW (2005) to some 7000 MW by 2020.

Developing Russia’s economically recoverable renewable energy could cut some 990 million tons of CO2 emissions a year, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). (PDF) To put that number in perspective, it would be the equivalent of preventing two-thirds of the CO2 emissions of the United States from entering the atmosphere. This estimate, as well as Russia’s renewable energy statistics, doesn’t take into account large hydroelectric projects, which already account for 21% of Russia’s total energy.

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Renewable energy is starting off right in the new year with the “Electric Power Annual 2007″ report from the US Energy Information Administration. According to the newly released report, non-hydroelectric renewable energy is now the leading source of new electric generating capacity in the US.

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Trade groups from the U.S. wind and solar industries were happy with the news, considering that the current economic environment for commercial credit has lowered all boats as it were, with all investment now endangered - not just investment in risky financial instruments, but even those investments in renewable energy that are essential to growing a stable economy.

>>See Also: Obama Stimulus Package May Include $25B in Energy Tax Credits

No other country, in any single year, has added the volume of wind capacity that was added to the US electrical grid in 2007 with both wind and solar growing well over 40%, but with the credit crunch affecting all sectors of the economy, new projects could drop by as much as 50%, without help from the Federal government.

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If it seems like the world is rallying around renewable energy, that’s because it is. And why not? With huge recent fluctuations in oil prices, the economy on its knees, and climate change at our doorstep, windmills and solar panels have become iconic symbols of energy independence, a new green-collar job sector, and a response to climate change. Now, an international agency is emerging to lead the charge on a global scale.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) will integrate regional clean energy progress into a coordinated, global effort. It will provide political recommendations and identify funding for renewable technologies. Moreover, IRENA will seek to even the playing field for countries that have had difficulty affording investment in renewable energy. To this end, the agency will fund its budget with contributions by member-countries on a sliding scale with unindustrialized countries paying less.

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Raser Technologies announced this week that it has completed construction of a plant on top of one of the United States’ largest geothermal hotbeds to be discovered in over 25 years—so large that Raser believes it could power one third of all homes in Utah.

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“As fossil fuel prices rise, as oil insecurity deepens, and as concerns about climate change cast a shadow over the future of coal, a new energy economy is emerging in the United States,” says Lester R. Brown, President of the Earth Policy Institute, in a recent release, “New Energy Economy Emerging in the United States” . “The old energy economy, fueled by oil, coal, and natural gas, is being replaced by one powered by wind, solar, and geothermal energy. The transition is moving at a pace and on a scale that we could not have imagined even a year ago.

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By Lester R. Brown

As fossil fuel prices rise, as oil insecurity deepens, and as concerns about climate change cast a shadow over the future of coal, a new energy economy is emerging in the United States. The old energy economy, fueled by oil, coal, and natural gas, is being replaced by one powered by wind, solar, and geothermal energy. The transition is moving at a pace and on a scale that we could not have imagined even a year ago.

Consider Texas. Long the leading oil-producing state, it is now also the leading generator of electricity from wind, having overtaken California two years ago. Texas now has nearly 6,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity online and a staggering 39,000 megawatts in the construction and planning stages. When all this is completed, Texas will have 45,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity (think 45 coal-fired power plants). This will more than satisfy the residential needs of the state’s 24 million people, enabling Texas to feed electricity to nearby states such as Louisiana and Mississippi.

• » See also: Solar Energy Rebates in Denver and Boulder, CO
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After Texas and California, the other leaders among the 30 states with commercial-scale wind farms are Iowa, Minnesota, Washington, and Colorado. And other states are emerging as wind superpowers. Clipper Windpower and BP are teaming up to build the 5,050-megawatt Titan wind farm, the world’s largest, in eastern South Dakota. Already under development, Titan will generate five times as much electricity as the state’s 780,000 residents currently use. This project includes building a transmission line along an abandoned rail line across Iowa, feeding electricity into Illinois and the country’s industrial heartland.

Colorado billionaire Philip Anschutz is developing a 2,000-megawatt wind farm in south central Wyoming. He already has secured the rights to build a 900-mile high-voltage transmission line to California. With this investment, the door will be opened to developing scores of huge wind farms in Wyoming, a wind-rich state with few people. Another transmission line under development will run north-south, linking eastern Wyoming’s wind resources with the fast-growing Colorado cities of Fort Collins, Denver, and Colorado Springs. Wind-rich Kansas and Oklahoma are looking to build a transmission line to the U.S. Southeast to export their wealth of cheap wind energy.

California is developing a 4,500-megawatt wind farm complex in the Tehachapi Mountains northwest of Los Angeles. In the east, Maine–a wind energy newcomer–is planning to develop 3,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity, far more than the state’s 1.3 million residents need. Further south, Delaware is planning an offshore wind farm of up to 600 megawatts, which could satisfy half of the state’s residential electricity needs. New York State, which has 700 megawatts of wind-generating capacity, plans to add another 8,000 megawatts, with most of the power being generated by winds coming off Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. And soon Oregon will nearly double its wind generating capacity with a 900-megawatt wind farm in the wind-rich Columbia River Gorge.

Wind appears destined to become the centerpiece of the new U.S. energy economy, eventually supplying several hundred thousand megawatts of electricity.

Solar power is also expanding at a breakneck pace. The nation’s wealth of solar energy is being harnessed by using both photovoltaic cells and solar thermal power plants to convert sunlight into electricity. For solar cell installations, California, with its Million Solar Roofs plan, is far and away the leader. New Jersey is also moving fast, followed by Nevada.

The largest U.S. solar cell installation today is a 14-megawatt array at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, but photovoltaic electricity at the commercial level is about to go big time. PG&E has entered into two solar cell power contracts with a combined capacity of 800 megawatts. Together, these plants will cover 12 square miles of desert with solar cells and will have a peak output comparable to that of a large coal-fired power plant. Solar power plants are appealing in hot climates because their highest output coincides with the peak demand for air conditioning.

Solar thermal plants that use mirrors to concentrate sunlight on a vessel containing a fluid–heating it to 750 degrees Fahrenheit to generate steam and produce power–have suddenly become an enormously attractive technology. The United States has the world’s only large solar thermal complex, a 350-megawatt project completed in 1991. But as of September 2008 there are 10 large solar thermal power plants under construction or in development in the United States, ranging in size from 180 megawatts to 550 megawatts. Eight of the plants will be built in California, one in Arizona, and one in Florida. Within the next three years, the United States will likely go from 420 megawatts of solar thermal generating capacity to close to 3,500 megawatts–an eightfold jump.

Along with wind and solar, geothermal energy is also developing at an explosive rate. As of 2008 the United States has nearly 3,000 megawatts of geothermal generating capacity, 2,500 of which are in California. Suddenly this too is changing. Some 96 geothermal power plants now under development in twelve western states are expected to double U.S. geothermal generating capacity. With California, Nevada, Oregon, Idaho, and Utah leading the way, the stage is set for the massive future development of geothermal energy. (See data at http://www.earthpolicy.org/Updates/2008/Update77_data.htm).

The new energy economy will be powered largely by electricity from renewable sources. Electricity will light, heat, and cool buildings. As we shift to plug-in hybrid cars, light rail transit systems in cities, and high-speed electric intercity rail systems like those in Japan and Europe, our transport system will also be powered largely by electricity.

It is historically rare for so many interests to converge at one time and in one place as those now supporting the development of renewable energy resources in the United States. To begin with, shifting to renewables increases energy security simply because no one can cut off the supply of wind, solar, or geothermal energy. It also avoids the price volatility that has plagued oil and natural gas in recent decades. Once a wind farm or a solar thermal power plant is built, the price is stable since there is no fuel cost. Turning to renewables will also dramatically cut carbon emissions, moving us toward climate stability and thus avoiding the most dangerous effects of climate change.

The shift also will staunch the outflow of dollars for oil, keeping that capital at home to invest in the new energy economy, developing national renewable energy resources and creating jobs here. At a time of economic turmoil and rising joblessness, these new industries can generate thousands of new jobs each week. Not only are the wind, solar, and geothermal industries hiring new workers, they are also generating jobs in construction and in basic supply industries such as steel, aluminum, and silicon manufacturing. To build and operate the new energy economy will require huge numbers of electricians, plumbers, and roofers. It will also employ countless numbers of high-tech professionals such as wind meteorologists, geothermal geologists, and solar engineers.

To ensure that this shift to renewables continues at a rapid rate, national leadership is needed in one key area–building a strong national grid. Although private investors are investing in long-distance high-voltage transmission lines, these need to be incorporated into a carefully planned national grid, the electrical equivalent of President Eisenhower’s interstate highway system, in order to unleash the full potential of renewable energy wealth.

And, finally, this energy transition is being driven by an intense excitement from the realization that people are now tapping energy sources that can last as long as the earth itself. Oil wells go dry and coal seams run out, but for the first time since the industrial revolution we are investing in energy sources that can last forever. This new energy economy can be our legacy to the next generation.

#     #     #

For more information on Earth Policy Institute’s plan to cut carbon emissions 80 percent by 2020, see Chapters 11-13 in Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, available at www.earthpolicy.org for free downloading.

Also see “Time for Plan B: Cutting Carbon Emissions 80 Percent by 2020,” available in pdf at www.earthpolicy.org/Books/PB3/80by2020.htm.

Financing Model is Key to Success

LACCD’s financing model is an important piece of the puzzle: It will allow the colleges to make the conversion to renewable energy without investing any money up front.

Banks are investing the capital, and the LACCD has agreed to pay back the loan with every kilowatt-hour by buying electricity out of the campus system for the next 25 years. Their rate for electricity will still be less than what they were paying the utilities, even with the capital cost, maintenance cost and bank profit margin rolled in.

The banks have the additional bonus of monetizing the depreciation of the equipment through tax write-offs, along with taking advantage of federal, state, local and utility incentives.

Eisenberg says that any entity, public or private, can do the same thing.

The LACCD is using a similar financing model for its energy efficiency measures, from which it hopes will reduce energy use by 15% to 20%.

Each campus has an ESCO (Energy Saving Company) that won the job in a bidding process. Among the nine campuses, there are five different companies including Chevron, Siemens and Ameresco. The ESCOs come in and do an investment-grade audit, recommending retrofits and other efficiency measures. They cover the cost of the upgrades, and the LACCD pays them back out of the energy savings achieved. The ESCOs guarantee a minimum amount of energy savings, so there’s almost no risk.

Community Colleges Leading the Way

“It’s interesting because people never thought of community colleges as being terribly innovative or cutting edge,” says Eisenberg. “We’ve demonstrated that we are. No one else is where we are in terms of renewables and financing. It’s made people stand up and take notice.”

The community college system has received recognition, and even signed a partnership with the Clinton Climate Initiative. It was also one of the first educational institutions to join the Climate Registry and the first community college district in the nation to report their greenhouse gases in accordance with the protocol set by the Registry.

“It goes back to the board of trustees in 2002,” Eisenberg adds. “They knew that someone needed to be first and provide a model that others can follow and that’s what this project is doing. It’s a model showing the technology and financing mechanism that anyone can use. It will hopefully lead to a rapid expansion of this technology across California and the U.S.“

The project has other benefits, as well, that go to the heart of its mission, as Eisenberg explains:

“It’s attracting students that want to learn about the technology and how to implement it. At the end of the day, we’re a learning institution and the more students we can train, the more of them will go out across the United States and implement this technology.”

Clark sees similar micro and macro importance to the project.

“The LACCD sees sustainable campuses as a key in the community for demonstrating how this can be done for other building complexes like shopping malls, office buildings, housing units, etc. and thus educating students, faculty and staff on the installation, operation and maintenance of renewable energy systems.

“Some scholars call this ‘The Third Industrial Revolution’, or how we – people all over the world – must change dramatically from ‘The Second Industrial Revolution’ that was totally dependent on fossil fuels, into an era that stops violating our environment.”

Image credit: Los Angeles Community College District

See also:

Start-Ups Rise to Push Solar on College Campuses

Interview with Nobel Prize Winner Woodrow Clark

Universities Start Tailoring Degrees to Green Jobs

Despite their tumultuous economy, Iceland is vying for one of the non-permanent United Nations Security Council seats going up for a vote tomorrow.

Iceland, which generates nearly all of its power from geothermal and hydroelectric sources, has emphasized their valuable experience in the fight against climate change and said they would represent the goals of all small countries with their position on the council.

Not every country has Iceland’s volcanoes, geysers, and hot springs to tap for electricity, but President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson is convinced that all nations possess the natural resources to cut their fossil fuel use and that doing so is vital for global security.

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Despite its recent foray into sustainable practices, the United States Army isn’t known as an environmental leader. Now the Army is trying to prove its greenness with the world’s strongest solar array. Yesterday, the Army announced that it plans to construct a 500 MW solar thermal plant in the Mojave Desert at Fort Irwin. Currently, the United States’ largest solar array is a 15 MW plant at Nellis Air Force Base outside Las Vegas.

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