A 19th-century idea might lead to cleaner cars, larger-scale renewable energy.
Some engineers are dusting off an old idea for storing energy—using electricity to liquefy air by cooling it down to nearly 200 °C below zero. When power is needed, the liquefied air is allowed to warm up and expand to drive a steam turbine and generator.
mattOzan writes “When data centers first opened in the 1990s, the tenants paid for space to plug in their servers with a proviso that electricity would be available. As computing power has soared, so has the need for electricity, turning that relationship on its head: electrical capacity is often the central element of lease agreements, and space is secondary. While lease arrangements are often written in the language of real estate, they are essentially power deals. ‘Since tenants on average tend to contract for around twice the power they need, Mr. Tazbaz said, those data centers can effectively charge double what they are paying for that power. Generally, the sale or resale of power is subject to a welter of regulations and price controls. For regulated utilities, the average “return on equity” — a rough parallel to profit margins — was 9.25 percent to 9.7 percent for 2010 through 2012.’”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
cylonlover writes “Millions of years have evolution has resulted in plants being the most efficient harvesters of solar energy on the planet. Much research is underway into ways to artificially mimic photosynthesis in devices like artificial leaves, but researchers at the University of Georgia are working on a different approach that gives new meaning to the term ‘power plant.’ Their technology harvests energy generated through photosynthesis before the plants can make use of it (abstract), allowing the energy to instead be used to run low-powered electrical devices.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Disruptive technological changes are at work but utilities are hamstrung by outdates business models and regulations.
A homeowner who puts solar panels on his roof immediately slashes his monthly electricity bill and gains a measure of independence from the utility. As more distributed energy technologies take hold, utilities in the U.S. are wondering out loud what their future holds.
A novel chemical pathway could address the high cost of transporting cellulosic materials to make diesel fuel.
Within a year, a pilot plant in Indiana will start converting the stalks and leaves of corn plants into diesel and jet fuel. The plant will use a novel approach involving acid as well as processes borrowed from the oil and chemical industry, which its developers hope will make fuel at prices cheap enough to compete with petroleum.
On April 5, we reported that Fisker automotive had laid off 75-percent of its workforce, with a lawsuit following a few days later over the last-minute nature of the mass layoffs. The auto maker had run into a string of problems, and appeared to be making some last-ditch efforts to avoid bankruptcy. In light of
Fisker just can’t catch a break. As if enduring the layoffs of three out of every four employees and the resignation of its founder wasn’t unsettling enough, it’s now come to light that the Department of Energy recently confiscated the company’s $ 21 million reserve account in an attempt to recoup some of the government’s loan. Fisker’s first payment on the $ 192 million federal loan was due Monday, but the Energy Department revealed that it actually took the money 12 days beforehand, simply due to the company’s high risk of default — a move it characterized as an “appropriate action on behalf of taxpayers.” If you’re thinking the writing’s now on the wall, you’re correct… the WSJ reports that Fisker has hired a bankruptcy attorney, and the company admits that it’s actively in search of a new owner. Will luck swing in Fisker’s favor next time around? Place your bets.
Filed under: Transportation
Via: TNW
Source: WSJ
At the OpenStack Summit last week, Tuesday’s keynote opened with Dope’n’Stack E.N.T.E.R.P.R.I.S.E, a video that symbolizes the arrival of a new force of disruptors who see riches in building software and systems that will displace the legacy systems of old. It’s not a question anymore. OpenStack has the momentum to win, and it can thank this young group of developers and feisty systems gurus for making it happen. Companies that have long controlled the enterprise software and systems market are now at a distinct disadvantage. Their proprietary, closed-stack integrations don’t play in the new open cloud world that emulates the success of Internet-scale companies, such as Amazon Web Services, Google and Facebook. And this group of technologists knows it, making it abundantly clear last week in Portland. Cloudscaling CTO Randy Bias summed up OpenStack’s place in the market in a presentation this week, titled “The State of the Stack.” The presentation reviews the findings of a survey done with OpenStack users and relevant data about the overall community. State of the Stack April 2013 from Cloudscaling, Inc. OpenStack is as much a stack as is Linux or Java. That points to a future where it has a chance to become a standard for building out cloud infrastructure. It has the attention of startups and large enterprise companies. Successes have come with customers such as Bloomberg, Comcast, Best Buy, CERN Laboratories and the NSA, all which have built core technology on OpenStack. It has served as a stack to try new technologies, such as the Ceph storage system and any number of new networking technologies. What hypervisor OpenStack users deploy is one of the most telling signs of the shift and the adaptive role that older, more established companies have had to take on. According to an OpenStack survey, KVM has become the hypervisor of choice due to its open-management platform. It has no licensing fees and allows for free choice in how it is used. KVM is backed by Red Hat. Xen, it should be noted, became part of the Linux Foundation last week with the support of Amazon Web Services, which will have definite impacts on the market. Until this point, Citrix maintained a community edition of Xen, similar to the way Red Hat treats KVM. Other supporters include AMD, Bromium, Calxeda, CA Technologies, Cisco, Citrix, Google, Intel, Oracle, Samsung, and Verizon. AWS uses the Xen hypervisor. It is also believed that Google
TechCrunch
Google tries to use its buying clout to prod utilities to offer renewable energy option.
Google has spent more than $ 1 billion in solar and wind energy projects but it ultimately has no control over the fuel that produces the electricity that powers its data centers. Google today is proposing a new tariff to buy renewable energy directly from utilities, a model it hopes will help scale renewable energy for data centers and other big energy consumers.
cylonlover writes “Just over a week ago Gizmag reported that Philips’ 22 W LED light bulb, designed as a like-for-like replacement of a 100-W incandescent light bulb, was the first LED bulb of its type to receive the stamp of approval from Energy Star. But looking at the Energy Star requirements reported by Philips in its press release, it seemed a little strange that Philips’ product is the only one to have been certified – given that products long on the market appear, at face value, to meet those requirements. Since then, Gizmag has spoken to LED light bulb makers Switch Lighting and other industry players to find out why they’re apparently playing catch-up.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
We take them apart and measure frequency response to find out. [Read more]
CNET News
The Department of Homeland Security has a warning for organizations that post a lot of business and personal information on public web pages and social media sites: Don’t do it.
Computerworld News
Editor’s note: Derek Andersen is the founder of Startup Grind, a 40-city community bringing the global startup world together while educating, inspiring, and connecting entrepreneurs. As an Electronic Arts’ intern eight years ago, I asked Bing Gordon then the chief creative officer and the only remaining early founding team member, a question about vision. “How can I know where the puck is going to be?” While he delivered a satisfactory response, two weeks later I received an email from Bing saying, “I answered that question poorly a few weeks and I wanted to try again.” A few weeks ago Bing joined me at Startup Grind in Silicon Valley where he delivered some great advice that has become one of his trademarks. In 2010 Mark Pincus called KPCB general partner Bing Gordon (look for a bald guy on the front row) one of the world’s “great CEO coaches” supporting founders on the boards of companies like Amazon, Zynga, Klout, and Zazzle. Here are some excepts from our recent interview. Derek: Tell us about your family and where you grew up? BING: So I grew up in a suburb of Detroit. My dad was a first generation Scotsman and his dad was a janitor. And he was somebody that believed the grass was always greener and didn’t have, kind of, context or resources. Thanks, Dad! We were the first to move in to a subdivision built out of farmlands surrounding Detroit, so I grew up kind of in the creek. Playing sports with my brother who remembers growing up in the House of Pain. So I had a good Midwestern upbringing. I didn’t work in an office before going to Stanford business school, but I did think I was a pretty damn good teenage caddy. I played hockey and lacrosse at the university level and played both, kind of, for most of my adult life. Derek: What was your plan heading to college? BING: Well I went to Yale thinking I was going to be a math major and a writer, and I got there and Yale was lousy at math and it seemed socially irrelevant, so I kind of became an athlete-near-college-dropout. I realized I was flunking a third of my classes going into the final. My proud accomplishments in college other than sports achievements was I wrote poetry. Kind of light verse, in a coffee shop, and Peter Faulk when he was doing Columbo came, and liked it so much he took
TechCrunch
Today Apple has updated their environmental page collection and have issued a new Facilities report, showing that at this point in history, global corporate facilities inside the Apple family are at a whopping 75% renewable energy use. Apple also reports that many of their facilities are running on 100% renewable energy, including data centers in
The tech giant says three quarters of its energy needs are now renewable, with some facilities now at 100 percent. [Read more]
CNET News
Hugh Pickens writes writes “Thomas K. Grose reports that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that greenhouse gas emissions in the US have fallen 8 percent from their 2007 peak to 6,703 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, due largely to the drop in coal-fired electricity which in 2012 generated 37.4 percent of US electricity, down from 50 percent in 2005. But don’t celebrate just yet. A major side effect of that cleaner air in the US has been the further darkening of skies over Europe and Asia as US coal producers have been shipping the most carbon-intensive fuel to energy-hungry markets overseas. US coal exports to China were on track to double last year and demand for US metallurgical coal, the high-heat content coking coal that is used for steelmaking, is so great in Asia that shipments make a round-the-world journey from Appalachia as they are sent by train to the port of Baltimore, where they steam to sea through the Chesapeake Bay, then south across the Atlantic Ocean and around Africa’s Cape of Good Hope to reach Asian ports. The Tyndall Center study estimates that the burning of all that exported coal could erase fully half the gains the United States has made in reducing carbon emissions and if the trend continues, the dramatic changes in energy use in the United States — in particular, the switch from coal to newly abundant natural gas for generating electricity — will have only a modest impact on global warming, observers warn. ‘Without a meaningful cap on global carbon emissions, the exploitation of shale gas reserves is likely to increase total emissions,’ write Dr John Broderick and Prof Kevin Anderson. ‘For this not to be the case, consumption of displaced fuels must be reduced globally and remain suppressed indefinitely; in effect displaced coal must stay in the ground (PDF).’”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
An anonymous reader writes “The Obama Administration has put forth a proposal to collect $ 2 billion over the next 10 years from revenues generated by oil and gas development to fund scientific research into clean energy technologies. The administration hopes the research would help ‘protect American families from spikes in gas prices and allow us to run our cars and trucks on electricity or homegrown fuels.’ In a speech at Argonne National Laboratory, Obama said the private sector couldn’t afford such research, which puts the onus on government to keep it going. Of course, it’ll still be difficult to get everyone on board: ‘The notion of funding alternative energy research with fossil fuel revenues has been endorsed in different forms by Republican politicians, including Alaskan senator Lisa Murkowsi. But the president still faces an uphill battle passing any major energy law, given how politicized programs to promote clean energy have become in the wake of high-profile failures of government-backed companies.’”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Companies showed off their latest clean energy innovations at the ARPA-E Summit.
The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy funds R&D in energy technologies that are too early for private funders to pick up. It’s funded hundreds of projects since it was first funded in 2009 in areas including carbon capture and storage, power electronics, and solar power.
MIT’s Moniz wants action on climate change, but can also work with the fossil fuel industry.
Ernest Moniz, President Obama’s pick to replace Steven Chu as secretary, is a pragmatic choice. An MIT professor of physics and engineering systems and the head of the MIT Energy Initiative, Moniz believes climate change is a problem and he has the support of the Environmental Defense Fund. Yet he can work closely with the fossil fuel industry—MITEI’s founding members are major oil and gas companies—BP, Shell, Eni, and Saudi Aramco. And Moniz is no stranger to Washington, having served as associate director for science in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Elon Musk, Tesla‘s CEO, stated at the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy’s summit today that the company will repay the loans it received from the Department of Energy ahead of time, giving a time frame of half the time it was given for doing so. This puts the payoff completion date sometime around 2015,
Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, has been the focus of many headlines lately due to a certain, well-documented kerfuffle with The New York Times. Today, however, the automotive company’s chief isn’t questioning any reviews. Instead, he’s taken to the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy summit to share his belief that Tesla Motors will pay off that $ 465 million loan from the US Department of Energy well ahead of when it’s expected to — in five years, rather than ten, to be precise. Musk’s comments shouldn’t come as a surprise, however, given that the Model S maker has been paying its DOE-borrowed cash on time and before the deadlines — something it’s been able to accomplish despite being far from a money-making machine at the moment. For the Department of Energy, meanwhile, this all sounds like music to the ears, especially since it knows that not all EVs always work out as planned.
Filed under: Transportation
Source: Technology Review
Obama is calling for a doubling of energy R&D funding, but where will he find the money?
Last week, President Obama spoke during his State of the Union about the need to address climate change and proposed doubling federal R&D spending, including funding for clean energy. This week he faces a more pressing issue—the automatic spending cuts scheduled to go into effect on March 1 that would cut defense-related energy R&D spending by 7.6 percent and other energy R&D by 5.1 percent.
rtoz writes “Ohio State students have come up with a scaled-down version of a power plant combustion system with a unique experimental design–one that chemically converts coal to heat while capturing 99 percent of the carbon dioxide produced in the reaction. Typical coal-fired power plants burn coal to heat water to make steam, which turns the turbines that produce electricity. In chemical looping, the coal isn’t burned with fire, but instead chemically combusted in a sealed chamber so that it doesn’t pollute the air. This new technology, called coal-direct chemical looping, was pioneered by Liang-Shih Fan, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and director of Ohio State’s Clean Coal Research Laboratory”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Was the power failure during the Super Bowl a reflection of the aging grid infrastructure? Probably not, but it didn’t stop people close to energy to search for deeper meaning.
Somehow a media and sporting event turned into an energy event. The power outage during last night’s Super Bowl brought out a wide range of opinions and reactions, often revealing the person’s point of view on energy.
During a cyberattack on the agency’s computers and servers, the personal data of employees and contractors is stolen, but, reportedly, no classified data is leaked. [Read more]
CNET News
Cuts and a decade of stagnation loom ahead for renewed clean energy funding.
As a result of impending mandatory spending cuts known as sequestration, the first 100 days of President Obama’s second term couldn’t be more different from those of his first. If sequestration kicks in, federal support for clean energy, which received a $ 90 billion jolt from the stimulus package four years ago, is likely to decrease, even though the need for energy breakthroughs to cut carbon dioxide emissions is clearer than ever (see “Solving Global Warming Will Require Far Greater Cuts than Thought”).
After a few technology U-turns, startup Promethean Power moves ahead with thermal battery to overcome unstable grid at Indian dairies.
Most people think of a battery as a device that stores electrical energy. Startup Promethean Power has developed what it calls a thermal battery that will first be used to cool milk in Indian villages.
Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed a solid electrolyte to replace flammable ones used in lithium-ion batteries.
An electrolyte developed by researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory could enable lithium-ion batteries that store five to 10 times more energy and are safer than the ones that recently caught fire on Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner.
Awesense attaches clamps to power lines to pinpoint sources of electricity theft, which costs utilities billions of dollars a year.
Billions of dollars worth of electricity is pilfered every year, sending power to individual homes and businesses as well as more large operations, such as marijuana farms.
Tablets will be rated based on the Energy Star specification in the future.
Computerworld News
As a group, clean-tech startups are struggling. Here are some of the technology and business trends that will shape startup activity this year.
It’s no secret that times are tough for funding clean technology startups. But innovators are adapting to the many things that have changed since the go-go years of the mid-to-late 2000s.
Notable advances in renewable energy pale compared to the impact of shale gas.
Although renewable energy made impressive advances this year, its impact has been dwarfed by the changes caused by the surplus of cheap, abundant natural gas made possible by hydrofracturing—fracking—of shale deposits. It will also be hard for renewables to equal the impact of shale gas in the coming years.
Ducted turbine promises significant advances but delivery remains to be seen.
When it comes to wind power, unconventional schemes to boost power and cut costs have never been wanting. Quiet Revolution offers a vertical axis turbine that looks more like a blender than a power generation device. WhalePower proposes mimicking on turbine blades the tubercles found on whale fins to increase power production. Meanwhile Altaeros Energies is developing a flying donut to harness increased wind speeds found at higher elevations.
Solar installer SolarCity, which is expected to go public soon, shows the potential—and risks–of using new business models to advance mature technologies.
Amid the stream of news about solar company failures, SolarCity plans to do the seemingly improbable: raise money by going public on the stock market.
One security company thinks it can stop malicious intrusions by monitoring for subtle power-consumption changes.
Detecting computer viruses or other malware is traditionally a matter of scanning a computer for signatures of known threats—leading to a perennial game of catch-up that includes an initial period when a new attack goes undetected (see “The Antivirus Era is Over”). Deeper threats—such as hardware that has been modified to add back doors for spying—can’t be detected at all by antivirus products.
This week Inhabitat reported live from the Los Angeles Auto Show as we brought you the hottest new green cars — beginning with the 2013 Fiat 500e electric vehicle. We’re also eagerly awaiting the unveiling of BMW’s new i3 Coupe concept. In other green transportation news, JR Tokai unveiled Japan’s new lightning-fast 310 MPH MagLev train, while Amtrak announced that trains traveling between Chicago and St. Louis were cleared to accelerate to 110 MPH on a short stretch of track. It’s no MagLev, but we’ll take it! Designer Jeffrey Eyster also unveiled the MRV-1, a recreational vehicle that doubles as a sustainable nature retreat.
A group of hackers leaked email contact information of experts working with the International Atomic Energy Agency after breaking into one of the agency’s servers.
Computerworld News
The U.S. will still need more big breakthroughs to eliminate the need for imported oil.
The United States could see a surge in oil production that could make it the world’s leading oil producer within a decade, according to a new report from the International Energy Agency. But that lead will likely be temporary, and it still won’t allow the United States to stop importing oil. Barring technological breakthroughs in oil production and major reductions in consumption, the United States will need to rely on oil from outside its borders for the foreseeable future.
Google just announced that it has invested $ 75 million in a 50 MW wind farm in Rippey, Iowa, a small town an hour outside of Des Moines. This is Google’s second wind energy investment in the state. In 2010, Google entered a long-term contract to buy green energy for its Iowa data center, but this is the company’s first direct investment into an Iowa wind project.
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