Rare earth metals are a key component in the clean technologies of today, with elements like neodymium, lanthanum, dysprosium essential to the creation of hybrid and full-electric vehicles produced by Toyota in the Prius line of vehicles and their competitors in the green car market, as well as for use in generators in wind and tidal turbines. But as the production of clean technology relies upon the use of these rare metals that we’re found little use for in the past, there’s a chance that the earth’s supply might be depleted before there is ample opportunity to take green technology to an all new level, far beyond where we are today.

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Picture: Offshore Algae Harvesting in Semi-permeable bags

NASA’s design calls for using large plastic bags, made of forward-osmosis membranes, and filled with sewage for offshore harvesting of algae for bio-fuel.

My earlier post about leveraging nanotechnology for increasing the commercial viability of Algal bio-fuel opened me up a fantastic world of realizations. The wonderful technologies being developed by NASA have been time and again used to improve the quality of life for the people who inhabit this world and not just the journeys and stays of astronauts in the space. And particularly, because I felt that my hope for algae as commercially viable source of alternate energy had an even greater chance of being realized because NASA researchers too are pitching their effots in the same direction.

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Russ Meyer, the Chief Strategy Associate for Landor Associates tells us that brands will need to integrate their commitment to sustainability into a larger message of efficiency, effectiveness, and value.

What can we expect to see in 2009?

As consumers look to cut spending, buying “green” may be a low priority in 2009; however, achieving sustainability is a long-term trend that will continue through the next decade. According to Russ Meyer, this trend will continue and even gain momentum globally as a consequence of the economic downturn.

Concurrently, President-elect Barack Obama’s commitment to sustainable energy may finally ensure the support of the world’s largest economy—and biggest consumer of energy—in the global shift toward green.

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Who better to know the real story of the future sustainability and cost of oil than the leaders of oil companies? In a recent study sponsored by the consulting firm Deloitte only 17% of 50 senior oil and gas company executives believe that fossil fuels will be the most sustainable fuel source in 25 years’ time; 23% think it will be the cheapest. In 25 years most oilmen place their bets on renewable energy as the cheapest and most sustainable fuel.

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On November 13th, the company announced that a 50 kilowatt wind turbine supplied by Entegrity Wind Systems of Boulder, Colorado was installed at its railyard in North Kansas City.  This wind turbine can generate an estimated 100,000 kilowatt hours annually, and is built with three 24-foot rotor blades mounted on a 100-foot tower.  This is enough energy to offset the electricity consumed by the pumps and controls for the treatment plant.

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There are three arguments against their construction: namely, their ineffectiveness per se as a means of generating energy; their apparent ruination of idyllic countryside by their very presence; and the debate as to whether they pose a real danger to wildlife.

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If such measures are put in place, the U.S. could see as many as one out of every four workers employed by a renewable-energy or energy-efficiency industry by 2030, according to a new report from the American Solar Energy Society (ASES). That’s promising for both U.S. employees and for anyone concerned about reducing greenhouse gas emissions and our dependence on fossil fuels. But it will happen only, as the ASES report says, under “an aggressive deployment forecast scenario.”

That means we, as citizens and consumers, are going to have to apply strong and steady pressure on legislators — local, state and national — to do the right thing. And that, we all know, isn’t easy.

Still, if — as the saying goes — money walks, green-collar types might see Beltway support grow as green industries expand their economic muscle, which means more dollars for lobbying and campaign financing. And, in that regard, the future looks bright.

In the U.S., renewable-energy and energy-efficiency industries are already generating 8.5 million jobs and nearly $970 billion in annual revenues, according to the ASES report. “To put this in perspective,” the report states, “(t)otal sales for Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil and General Motors in 2006 were $905 billion.”

While companies on the energy-efficiency side — things like better windows, efficient appliances and insulation — are making more of the money right now, the renewables side is growing more rapidly.

The ASES predicts the hottest, fastest-growing industries will involve solar power, wind energy, ethanol and fuel-cell technologies. With the right level of public support, it says, we could see up to 40 million people employed — as everything from accountants and biochemists to engineers, mechanics and truck drivers — in the renewable-energy and energy-efficiency sectors by 2030, with annual green-industry revenues of $4.5 trillion.

Getting there, though, will require much more than a business-as-usual approach, the ASES report warns.

“This scenario requires appropriate, aggressive, sustained public policies at the federal and state level during next two decades,” it states. Getting decision-makers to come on board might take oil shortages, fossil-fuel price increases, growing security concerns or a greater awareness of the impact of climate change. The fear of suffering economically at a global level might also be a motivator.

“If we fail to invest in (renewable energy and energy efficiency), the United States runs the risk of losing ground to international … programs and industries,” the report concludes. “For the United States to be competitive in a carbon-constrained world, the (renewable energy and energy efficiency) industry will be a critical economic driver.”

While some people tout better and more energy-efficient technology as one solution to our current fuel and climate challenges, their expectations might be overblown. A new study from the UK Energy Research Centre, for example, finds that improved efficiency sometimes creates a tendency to use more energy, or to engage in other activities that counteract the efficiency gains. It’s called the “rebound effect,” and it can work either directly or indirectly to reduce expected energy savings from improved efficiency.

Rebounds occur, for example, when someone who buys a more fuel-efficient car decides to take the occasional longer day trip because, “Hey, I’m not spending as much on gas anymore.” They can also happen when someone who’s improved his home insulation uses the money saved on heating and cooling to pay for a plane trip to Orlando.

Then there’s “backfire,” also known, somewhat bizarrely, as the Khazzoon-Brookes postulate. That’s the even worse effect that can occur when a new energy-efficient technology actually causes overall energy use to increase. It happened, for instance, after the steam engine came onto the scene. Nineteenth-Century Scotland saw its total coal consumption increase tenfold thanks to the steam engine, which made it possible to mine coal at a lower cost, which made it cheaper to produce iron, when then lowered the cost of steam engines and drove the development of the railway industry.

While backfires are uncommon, rebounds are not. A recent report from the InterAcademy Council noted that technology improvements over the past 20 years have helped drive a small decline in the world’s energy intensity — which compares energy consumption to economic output — but not in its overall energy consumption. And the United National Environmental Programme’s latest “Global Environmental Outlook” (GEO-4) warns that, while technology can help defend against environmental stresses, it’s sometimes important to look beyond the “technology-centred development paradigm.”

The UK rebound report concludes we could be overestimating our savings from improved effiency by anywhere from 10 to 50-plus percent. It adds that policy-makers need to start taking rebounds into effect now if they want to enact energy- and carbon-reducing measures that actually work.

"Lighting the Way: Toward a Sustainable Energy Future," a report released by the InterAcademy Council (a global association of national science academies) this week, points out that access to basic energy services can help halve extreme poverty, reduce hunger, improve access to potable drinking water and enable basic health and education services that can help poor people become self-sustainable.

"In brief, substantial inequalities in access to energy services now exist, not only between countries but between populations within the same country and even between households within the same town or village," the report stated. "In many developing countries, a small elite uses energy in much the same way as in the industrialized world, while most of the rest of the population relies on traditional, often poor-quality and highly polluting forms of energy."

Basic energy services as a solution to poverty makes sense when you consider the numbers: 1.6 billion of the world’s 6.6 billion people — almost one out of every four people — live without access to electricity. And a total of 2.4 billion — about 36 percent of the world’s population — relies on fuels like dung, charcoal, firewood and crop waste to cook their daily meals.

Compared to the benefits that would come from providing basic energy to the world’s poor, the overall global energy investment wouldn’t be overwhelming, according to the InterAcademy Council.

"Extending basic energy services to the billions of people who now lack access to electricity and clean cooking fuels, for example, could be accomplished in ways that would have only minimal impact on current levels of petroleum consumption and carbon dioxide emissions," the council’s report said. "Indeed, closer examination of the relationship between energy consumption and human well-being suggests that a more equitable distribution of access to energy services is entirely compatible with accelerated progress toward addressing energy-security and climate-change risks."

It sounds like a daunting task, but the InterAcademy Council report expressed hope that it could be done … if governments, businesses, NGOs, researchers and the media can all come onto the same page and work together to attack the problem.

"Aggressive changes in policy are… needed to accelerate the deployment of superior technologies," the report stated. "With a combination of such policies at the local, national and international level, it should be possible — both technically and economically — to elevate the living conditions of most of humanity, while simultaneously addressing the risks posed by climate change and other forms of energy-related environmental degradation and reducing the geopolitical tensions and economic vulnerabilities generated by existing patterns of dependence on predominantly fossil-fuel resources."

The biggest challenge, it seems, will be to make the possible probable.

The process for creating the cells is incredibly efficient. Implementing a technique by which the melted silicon is subjected to free fall, the cells are formed naturally by microgravity. This limits the amount of raw materials wasted by the final product.

Application for this type of technology is varied. For one, such geometric cells do not require tracking to source sunlight. Standard photovoltaic cells often have to be sited for maximum exposure or mounted on electronic tracking devices to keep optimization in line with the sun's path. Since spherical cells capture light from all angles, this wouldn't be much of a problem. Additionally, the cells are flexible, which — as I mentioned earlier this week — is something both the military, private sector, and Bush Administration are interested in backing.

There's a whole bunch of solar jargon and other wonderful details over at the WorldChanging article; including a great interview with one of the inventors. While the world may becoming more flat, it's nice to see solar technology embracing a new shape.