Flex-Fuel Kits Convert Toyota Prius to E85 Ethanol (<$500)

Dutch firm Green Fuel Systems, along with several other companies, has developed flex-fuel conversion kits for the Toyota Prius that cost less than $1,000. Converting our existing fleet to second-generation ethanol could be the best near-term play to directly replace fossil fuels.

Although the concept of a hybrid/biofuel combo has been around for a while, it has (at least in our minds) mostly been in the form of diesel hybrids running on biodiesel (which isn’t going to happen). But what if we could take America’s most fuel efficient car and convert it to run on another domestically-produced renewable fuel: cellulosic ethanol?

It looks like that’s what Green Fuel Systems and a handful of other US-based companies want to do. Although ethanol has been beaten to a pulp by mainstream media, non-food based feedstocks (like switchgrass) are in the pipeline and could be seriously producing in the next five years. If you’re still not convinced, make sure to read this article: Dedicated Energy

Crops Could Replace 30% of Gasoline.

While details on Green Fuel Systems’ specific product are lacking (and it’s not even clear if this is coming to the US), two US-based companies selling the same thing, and their systems are cheaper.

For example, a 4-cylinder flex-fuel conversion kit from Change2E85 costs less than $500. They even have a simple video describing how to install it. We’ve also previously covered AAMCO’s promotion of Flex Fuel US’s kits, and the holy grail: Ford’s prototype flex-fuel Escape plug-in hybrid that gets 88 mpg running on E85.

Converting our existing fleet of vehicles to flex-fuel capability, along with building it into new models, is arguably one of our best plays to reduce fossil fuel dependence in the next 10 years. GM thinks so, which is why by 2012, 50% of their new vehicles will have this capability.

via Flex-Fuel Kits Convert Toyota Prius to E85 Ethanol (For Less Than $1000) – Gas 2.0.

Home Brew for the Car, Not the Beer Cup

WHAT if you could make fuel for your car in your backyard for less than you pay at the pump? Would you?

The first question has driven Floyd S. Butterfield for more than two decades. Mr. Butterfield, 52, is something of a legend for people who make their own ethanol. In 1982, he won a California Department of Food and Agriculture contest for best design of an ethanol still, albeit one that he could not market profitably at the time.

Now he thinks that he can, thanks to his partnership with the Silicon Valley entrepreneur Thomas J. Quinn. The two have started the E-Fuel Corporation, which soon will announce its home ethanol system, the E-Fuel 100 MicroFueler. It will be about as large as a stackable washer-dryer, sell for $9,995 and ship before year-end.

The net cost to consumers could drop by half after government incentives for alternate fuels, like tax credits, are applied.

The MicroFueler will use sugar as its main fuel source, or feedstock, along with a specially packaged time-release yeast the company has developed. Depending on the cost of sugar, plus water and electricity, the company says it could cost as little as a dollar a gallon to make ethanol. In fact, Mr. Quinn sometimes collects left-over alcohol from bars and restaurants in Los Gatos, Calif., where he lives, and turns it into ethanol; the only cost is for the electricity used in processing.

In general, he says, burning a gallon of ethanol made by his system will produce one-eighth the carbon of the same amount of gasoline.

“It’s going to cause havoc in the market and cause great financial stress in the oil industry,” Mr. Quinn boasts.

He may well turn out to be right. But brewing ethanol in the backyard isn’t as easy as barbecuing hamburgers. Distilling large quantities of ethanol typically has required a lot of equipment, says Daniel M. Kammen, director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. In addition, he says that quality control and efficiency of home brew usually pale compared with those of commercial refineries. “There’s a lot of hurdles you have to overcome. It’s entirely possible that they’ve done it, but skepticism is a virtue,” Mr. Kammen says.

To be sure, Mr. Quinn, 53, has been involved with successful innovations before. For instance, he patented the motion sensor technology used in Nintendo’s wildly popular Wii gaming system.

More to the point, he was the product marketing manager for Alan F. Shugart’s pioneering hard disk drive when the personal computer was shifting from a hobbyists’ niche to a major industry. “I remember people laughing at us and saying what a stupid idea it was to do that disk drive,” Mr. Quinn says.

Mr. Butterfield thinks that the MicroFueler is as much a game changer as the personal computer. He says that working with Mr. Quinn’s microelectronics experts — E-Fuel now employs 15 people — has led to breakthroughs that have cut the energy requirements of making ethanol in half. One such advance is a membrane distiller, which, Mr. Quinn says, uses extremely fine filters to separate water from alcohol at lower heat and in fewer steps than in conventional ethanol refining. Using sugar as a feedstock means that there is virtually no smell, and its water byproduct will be drinkable.

E-Fuel has bold plans: It intends to operate internationally from the start, with production of the MicroFueler in China and Britain as well as the United States. And Mr. Butterfield is already at work on a version for commercial use, as well as systems that will use feedstocks other than sugar.

Ethanol has long had home brewers, and permits are available through the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau. (You must be a property owner and agree to make your ethanol outdoors.) But there are plenty of reasons to question whether personal fueling systems will become the fuel industry’s version of the personal computer. ...

via Home Brew for the Car, Not the Beer Cup - New York Times.

NASA fires-up jet fuel that tastes like chicken

...  NASA is checking out biofuel made from chicken and beef fat.

The chicken fat fuel, known as Hydrotreated Renewable Jet Fuel, was burned in the engine of a DC-8 at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center as part of its Alternative Aviation Fuels Experiment that is looking at developing all manner of biofuel alternatives to traditional Jet Propellant 8, or JP-8. The DC-8 is used as a test vehicle because its engine operations are well-documented and well-understood, NASA says.

The researchers measured the fuel's performance in the engines and examined the engine exhaust for chemicals and contamination that could contribute to air pollution. According to NASA, it was the first test ever to measure biofuel emissions for nitrogen oxides (NOx) and tiny particles of soot or unburned hydrocarbon - both of which can degrade air quality in communities with airports. NOx contributes to smog and particulate matter contributes to respiratory and cardiovascular ailments.

NASA said that in the engine that burned the biofuel, black carbon emissions were 90% less at idle and almost 60% less at takeoff thrust. The biofuel also produced much lower sulfate, organic aerosol, and hazardous emissions than the standard jet fuel. Researchers will spend the next several months comparing the results and drawing conclusions, NASA said.

The Air Force too has been experimenting hydrotreated fuel. It has successfully flown a couple jets in its arsenal on 50-50 blends of Hydrotreated Renewable Jet fuel, or HRJ, and JP-8.

In the past the Air Force has stated it wants to fuel half its North American fleet with a synthetic-fuel blend by 2016. The Air Force is the single largest user of aviation fuel inside the Federal government, using an estimated 3 billion gallons per year, according to the Air Force. Each time the price of oil goes up $10 per barrel, it costs the Air Force an additional $600 million for fuel. ...

via Layer 8: NASA fires-up jet fuel that tastes like chicken.

New Car Engine Sends Shock Waves Through Auto Industry

Despite shifting into higher gear within the consumer's green conscience, hybrid vehicles are still tethered to the gas pump via a fuel-thirsty 100-year-old invention: the internal combustion engine.

However, researchers at Michigan State University have built a prototype gasoline engine that requires no transmission, crankshaft, pistons, valves, fuel compression, cooling systems or fluids. Their so-called Wave Disk Generator could greatly improve the efficiency of gas-electric hybrid automobiles and potentially decrease auto emissions up to 90 percent when compared with conventional combustion engines.

The engine has a rotor that's equipped with wave-like channels that trap and mix oxygen and fuel as the rotor spins. These central inlets are blocked off, building pressure within the chamber, causing a shock wave that ignites the compressed air and fuel to transmit energy.

The Wave Disk Generator uses 60 percent of its fuel for propulsion; standard car engines use just 15 percent. As a result, the generator is 3.5 times more fuel efficient than typical combustion engines.

Researchers estimate the new model could shave almost 1,000 pounds off a car's weight currently taken up by conventional engine systems.

Last week, the prototype was presented to the energy division of the Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is backing the Michigan State University Engine Research Laboratory with $2.5 million in funding.

Michigan State's team of engineers hope to have a car-sized 25-kilowatt version of the prototype ready by the end of the year.

via New Car Engine Sends Shock Waves Through Auto Industry : Discovery News.

Solar power without solar cells using hidden magnetic effect of light

A dramatic and surprising magnetic effect of light discovered by University of Michigan researchers could lead to solar power without traditional semiconductor-based solar cells.

The researchers found a way to make an “optical battery,” said Stephen Rand, a professor in the departments of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Physics and Applied Physics.

In the process, they overturned a century-old tenet of physics.

“You could stare at the equations of motion all day and you will not see this possibility. We’ve all been taught that this doesn’t happen,” said Rand, an author of a paper on the work published in the Journal of Applied Physics. “It’s a very odd interaction. That’s why it’s been overlooked for more than 100 years.”

Light has electric and magnetic components. Until now, scientists thought the effects of the magnetic field were so weak that they could be ignored. What Rand and his colleagues found is that at the right intensity, when light is traveling through a material that does not conduct electricity, the light field can generate magnetic effects that are 100 million times stronger than previously expected. Under these circumstances, the magnetic effects develop strength equivalent to a strong electric effect.

“This could lead to a new kind of solar cell without semiconductors and without absorption to produce charge separation,” Rand said. “In solar cells, the light goes into a material, gets absorbed and creates heat. Here, we expect to have a very low heat load. Instead of the light being absorbed, energy is stored in the magnetic moment. Intense magnetization can be induced by intense light and then it is ultimately capable of providing a capacitive power source.”

What makes this possible is a previously undetected brand of “optical rectification,” says William Fisher, a doctoral student in applied physics. In traditional optical rectification, light’s electric field causes a charge separation, or a pulling apart of the positive and negative charges in a material. This sets up a voltage, similar to that in a battery. This electric effect had previously been detected only in crystalline materials that possessed a certain symmetry.

Rand and Fisher found that under the right circumstances and in other types of materials, the light’s magnetic field can also create optical rectification. ...

The light must be shone through a material that does not conduct electricity, such as glass. And it must be focused to an intensity of 10 million watts per square centimeter. Sunlight isn’t this intense on its own, but new materials are being sought that would work at lower intensities, Fisher said.

“In our most recent paper, we show that incoherent light like sunlight is theoretically almost as effective in producing charge separation as laser light is,” Fisher said.

This new technique could make solar power cheaper, the researchers say. They predict that with improved materials they could achieve 10 percent efficiency in converting solar power to useable energy. That’s equivalent to today’s commercial-grade solar cells.

“To manufacture modern solar cells, you have to do extensive semiconductor processing,” Fisher said. “All we would need are lenses to focus the light and a fiber to guide it. Glass works for both. It’s already made in bulk, and it doesn’t require as much processing. Transparent ceramics might be even better.”

In experiments this summer, the researchers will work on harnessing this power with laser light, and then with sunlight.

The paper is titled “Optically-induced charge separation and terahertz emission in unbiased dielectrics.” The university is pursuing patent protection ...

via Solar power without solar cells: A hidden magnetic effect of light could make it possible.

My first word was "light".  I was in a supermarket. I looked up and pointed to a light and said, "light". But what I was really thinking was, "Light is a time traveler. Light is the secret key."

Chicken feathers suggested as basis for plastics

The millions of tonnes of chicken feathers discarded each year could be used in plastics, researchers say.

A study reported at the American Chemical Society meeting in the US suggests feathers could lead to more environment-friendly, lighter plastics.

The chemical recipe requires significantly less petroleum-derived material.

However, tests on a grander scale will be necessary to establish the idea's industrial feasibility.

Such "biowaste" materials have been proposed as components of plastic formulations before.

Feathers, like hair and fingernails, are made up principally of the tough and chemically stable protein keratin, and can lend strength while reducing weight in the mixtures of plastics chemicals known as composites.

Researchers at the US agricultural authority have even published research into the possibility of incorporating chicken feathers into plastics, as an additive in composites that are made largely of a chemical polymer.

But the work presented by Yiqi Yang, from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, takes this idea further and uses the chicken feather fibres themselves as a principal ingredient - making up 50% of the mass of the composite.

As a result, the plastics require less of the materials such as polyethylene and polypropylene that are derived from petroleum products.

via BBC News - Chicken feathers suggested as basis for plastics.

Stanford researchers use river water and salty ocean water to generate electricity

 

 



Stanford researchers have developed a battery that takes advantage of the difference in salinity between freshwater and seawater to produce electricity.

Anywhere freshwater enters the sea, such as river mouths or estuaries, could be potential sites for a power plant using such a battery, said Yi Cui, associate professor of materials science and engineering, who led the research team.

The theoretical limiting factor, he said, is the amount of freshwater available. "We actually have an infinite amount of ocean water; unfortunately we don't have an infinite amount of freshwater," he said.

As an indicator of the battery's potential for producing power, Cui's team calculated that if all the world's rivers were put to use, their batteries could supply about 2 terawatts of electricity annually – that's roughly 13 percent of the world's current energy consumption.

 

The battery itself is simple, consisting of two electrodes – one positive, one negative – immersed in a liquid containing electrically charged particles, or ions. In water, the ions are sodium and chlorine, the components of ordinary table salt.

Initially, the battery is filled with freshwater and a small electric current is applied to charge it up. The freshwater is then drained and replaced with seawater. Because seawater is salty, containing 60 to 100 times more ions than freshwater, it increases the electrical potential, or voltage, between the two electrodes. That makes it possible to reap far more electricity than the amount used to charge the battery.

"The voltage really depends on the concentration of the sodium and chlorine ions you have," Cui said. "If you charge at low voltage in freshwater, then discharge at high voltage in sea water, that means you gain energy. You get more energy than you put in."

 

Once the discharge is complete, the seawater is drained and replaced with freshwater and the cycle can begin again. "The key thing here is that you need to exchange the electrolyte, the liquid in the battery," Cui said. He is lead author of a study published in the journal Nano Letters earlier this month.

In their lab experiments, Cui's team used seawater they collected from the Pacific Ocean off the California coast and freshwater from Donner Lake, high in the Sierra Nevada. They achieved 74 percent efficiency in converting the potential energy in the battery to electrical current, but Cui thinks with simple modifications, the battery could be 85 percent efficient.

To enhance efficiency, the positive electrode of the battery is made from nanorods of manganese dioxide. That increases the surface area available for interaction with the sodium ions by roughly 100 times compared with other materials. The nanorods make it possible for the sodium ions to move in and out of the electrode with ease, speeding up the process.

 

Other researchers have used the salinity contrast between freshwater and seawater to produce electricity, but those processes typically require ions to move through a membrane to generate current. Cui said those membranes tend to be fragile, which is a drawback. Those methods also typically make use of only one type of ion, while his battery uses both the sodium and chlorine ions to generate power.

Cui's team had the potential environmental impact of their battery in mind when they designed it. They chose manganese dioxide for the positive electrode in part because it is environmentally benign.

 

The group knows that river mouths and estuaries, while logical sites for their power plants, are environmentally sensitive areas.

"You would want to pick a site some distance away, miles away, from any critical habitat," Cui said. "We don't need to disturb the whole system, we just need to route some of the river water through our system before it reaches the ocean. We are just borrowing and returning it," he said.

The process itself should have little environmental impact. The discharge water would be a mixture of fresh and seawater, released into an area where the two waters are already mixing, at the natural temperature. ...

via Stanford researchers use river water and salty ocean water to generate electricity.

Breakthrough 3-Dimensional Solar Cell Technology

I'm investigating DYI home solar panels and this looks interesting:

Solar3D, Inc. is developing a breakthrough 3-dimensional solar cell technology to maximize the conversion of sunlight into electricity. Up to 30% of

incident sunlight is currently reflected off the surface of conventional solar cells, and more is lost inside the solar cell materials. Inspired by light management techniques used in fiber optic devices, our innovative solar cell technology utilizes a

3-dimensional design to trap sunlight inside micro-photovoltaic structures where photons bounce around until they are converted into electrons. This next generation solar cell will be dramatically more efficient, resulting in a lower cost per watt that will make solar power affordable for the world.

via Solar3D - Breakthrough 3-Dimensional Solar Cell Technology.

February 23, 2011 – Solar3D, Inc. (OTCBB: SLTD), the developer of a breakthrough 3-dimensional solar cell technology to maximize the conversion of sunlight into electricity, today announced that its design will take advantage of low cost semiconductor processes to enable mass production.  ... Jim Nelson, CEO of Solar3D, commented, “In the solar industry, it is not enough to have high efficiency, you must also be low cost. We started our company with the mantra of ‘Breakthrough Product, Common Manufacturing,’ and I am pleased to report that we are right on track.”  ... “In the end, we intend to achieve what every solar innovator hopes for: More Power, in a Smaller Space, for Less Money.”

If I want to do it from scratch all the way, I need to figure out how to grow silicon crystals that are used in solar cells. There are many methods each with tradeoffs.

Here is an interesting video on manufacturing of Silicon computer chips.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWVywhzuHnQ]

Here is how solar cells are manufactured:



Let's see... I need some sand... some argon gas... a very high temperature heat source ... a crucible ... Hmmm. It is cheaper to just buy the cells.

Lights Out: Cities go dark as world turns off power for Earth Hour

Houses and businesses across Asia turned off power on Saturday in support of the so-called "Earth Hour". In Sydney, ferries blew their horns as the lights went out on the Sydney Opera House. China's "Earth Hour" kicked off on Saturday night with the tallest building in the capital Beijing - Tower 3 of the China World Trade Centre - turning off its lights. In India, lights at the India Gate were turned off and lit balloons released as a crowd holding candles watched. In Indonesia, the lights on several landmarks, were also turned off or dimmed, and in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi, young people gathered outside the city's opera house holding candles as lights went off.

YouTube - Lights Out: Cities go dark as world turns off power for Earth Hour.

My lights are out.

Need More Air? Artificial Trees to Convert Carbon Dioxide to Oxygen

Lee Speigel - It's not nice to fool Mother Nature. Or is it? If you're not getting enough air, you might want to spend time sitting under a newly designed artificial tree that converts carbon dioxide into breathable oxygen.

In the modern world of urban pollution, we can't seem to grow enough trees to naturally convert carbon dioxide into life-sustaining air -- the process of photosynthesis -- until now.

Researchers at New York's Columbia University, working with Influx Studio in Paris, have designed a faux or artificial tree. It's basically a machine fashioned to resemble a dragon blood tree, complete with wide branches and umbrellalike tops that are used as support for the large solar panels that will power the tree, according to PhysOrg.com.

This idea of faux trees has taken root in Massachusetts with an urban tree competition called Boston Treepods 2011. Sponsored by the SHIFTboston organization, teams of designers have developed proposals for synthetic urban trees that would essentially do what real trees do -- convert carbon dioxide into oxygen -- but without the need to be planted in soil or nourished by water.

"Influx Studio in Paris is currently pulling together the specifications and obtaining necesssary approval on specific patenting, and it should be finished by the end of April," Kim Poliquin, director of SHIFTboston, told AOL News in an e-mail.

"Following finalization of documents and approval in early May, SHIFTboston will put the Boston Treepod out to bid. We are hoping to obtain competitive pricing to produce the initial prototype," she added.

Composed of recycled plastic bottles, the treepods utilize a carbon dioxide-removal technique called "humidity swing" that helps clean the air.

These air-filtering faux trees look like giant futuristic urban lamps that light up at night in multiple colors. They can also generate energy via solar panels as well as kinetic energy created by young and old sitting on interactive seesaws attached to the base of the trees.

Purists might object to the idea of creating artificial trees, saying that all we need to do is plant more trees. At least these treepods would be up and running, so to speak, long before new trees can provide the same amount of oxygen to a geographic location.

via Need More Air? Artificial Trees to Convert Carbon Dioxide to Oxygen.

Wind and solar can reliably supply 25% of Oahu's electricity, study shows

Tara Hicks Johnson - When combined with on-Oahu wind farms and solar energy, the Interisland Wind project planned to bring 400 megawatts (MW) of wind power from Molokai and Lanai to Oahu could reliably supply more than 25% of Oahu's projected electricity demand, according to the Oahu Wind Integration Study (OWIS).

For the purposes of the research project, the OWIS released today studied the impact on the Oahu grid of a total of 500 MW of wind energy and a nominal 100 MW of solar power, though a good deal more utility-scale and customer-sited solar power is expected on Oahu.

The study found that the 500 MW of wind and 100 MW of solar power could eliminate the need to burn approximately 2.8 million barrels of low sulfur fuel oil (LSFO) and 132,000 tons of coal each year while maintaining system reliability, if a number of recommendations are incorporated, including:

* Provide state-of-the-art wind power forecasting to help anticipate the amount of power that will be available from wind;

* Increase power reserves (the amount of power that can be called upon from operating generators) to help manage wind variability and uncertainty in wind power forecasts;

* Reduce minimum stable operating power of baseload generating units to provide more power reserves;

* Increase ramp rates (the time it takes to increase or decrease output) of Hawaiian Electric's thermal generating units;

* Implement severe weather monitoring to ensure adequate power generation is available during periods of higher wind power variability;

* Evaluate other resources capable of contributing reserve, such as fast-starting thermal generating units and load control programs.

The study notes that assuring reliability will require further studies, upgrades to existing and new infrastructure, as well as specific requirements on the wind farms to be connected to the Oahu system. With these and other proposed changes, the technical analysis suggests, Oahu can accommodate increased wind and solar projects with minimal limits on output of renewable resources.

The Oahu Wind Integration Study was conducted by the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute (HNEI) at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, General Electric (GE) Company and the Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO). The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), part of the U.S. Department of Energy (US DOE), assembled a technical review committee with representatives of industry and academia which met throughout the project to review findings. NREL also contracted the private firm AWS Truepower to develop wind and solar power profiles that were used in the study. ...

via Wind and solar can reliably supply 25 percent of Oahu's electricity need, new study shows.

Italian scientists claim to have demonstrated cold fusion (w/ Video)

Few areas of science are more controversial than cold fusion, the hypothetical near-room-temperature reaction in which two smaller nuclei join together to form a single larger nucleus while releasing large amounts of energy. In the 1980s, Stanley Pons and Martin Fleishmann claimed to have demonstrated cold fusion - which could potentially provide the world with a cheap, clean energy source - but their experiment could not be reproduced. Since then, all other claims of cold fusion have been illegitimate, and studies have shown that cold fusion is theoretically implausible, causing mainstream science to become highly speculative of the field in general.

Despite the intense skepticism, a small community of scientists is still investigating near-room-temperature fusion reactions. The latest news occurred last week, when Italian scientists Andrea Rossi and Sergio Focardi of the University of Bologna announced that they developed a cold fusion device capable of producing 12,400 W of heat power with an input of just 400 W. Last Friday, the scientists held a private invitation press conference in Bologna, attended by about 50 people, where they demonstrated what they claim is a nickel-hydrogen fusion reactor. Further, the scientists say that the reactor is well beyond the research phase; they plan to start shipping commercial devices within the next three months and start mass production by the end of 2011.

The claim

Rossi and Focardi say that, when the atomic nuclei of nickel and hydrogen are fused in their reactor, the reaction produces copper and a large amount of energy. The reactor uses less than 1 gram of hydrogen and starts with about 1,000 W of electricity, which is reduced to 400 W after a few minutes. Every minute, the reaction can convert 292 grams of 20°C water into dry steam at about 101°C. Since raising the temperature of water by 80°C and converting it to steam requires about 12,400 W of power, the experiment provides a power gain of 12,400/400 = 31. As for costs, the scientists estimate that electricity can be generated at a cost of less than 1 cent/kWh, which is significantly less than coal or natural gas plants.

“The magnitude of this result suggests that there is a viable energy technology that uses commonly available materials, that does not produce carbon dioxide, and that does not produce radioactive waste and will be economical to build,” according to this description of the demonstration.

Rossi and Focardi explain that the reaction produces radiation, providing evidence that the reaction is indeed a nuclear reaction and does not work by some other method. They note that no radiation escapes due to lead shielding, and no radioactivity is left in the cell after it is turned off, so there is no nuclear waste. ...

via Italian scientists claim to have demonstrated cold fusion (w/ Video).

Study claims 100 percent renewable energy possible by 2030

New research has shown that it is possible and affordable for the world to achieve 100 percent renewable energy by 2030, if there is the political will to strive for this goal.

Achieving 100 percent renewable energy would mean the building of about four million 5 MW wind turbines, 1.7 billion 3 kW roof-mounted solar photovoltaic systems, and around 90,000 300 MW solar power plants.

Mark Delucchi, one of the authors of the report, which was published in the journal Energy Policy, said the researchers had aimed to show enough renewable energy is available and could be harnessed to meet demand indefinitely by 2030.

Delucchi and colleague Mark Jacobson left all fossil fuel sources of energy out of their calculations and concentrated only on wind, solar, waves and geothermal sources. Fossil fuels currently provide over 80 percent of the world’s energy supply. They also left out biomass, currently the most widely used renewable energy source, because of concerns about pollution and land-use issues. Their calculations also left out nuclear power generation, which currently supplies around six percent of the world’s electricity.

To make their vision possible, a great deal of building would need to occur. The wind turbines needed, for example, are two to three times the capacity of most of today’s wind turbines, but 5 MW offshore turbines were built in Germany in 2006, and China built its first in 2010. The solar power plants needed would be a mix of photovoltaic panel plants and concentrated solar plants that concentrate solar energy to boil water to drive generators. At present only a few dozen such utility-scale solar plants exist. Energy would also be obtained from photovoltaic panels mounted on most homes and buildings.

Jacobson said the major challenge would be in the interconnection of variable supplies such as wind and solar to enable the different renewable sources to work together to match supply with demands. The more consistent renewable sources of wave and tidal power and geothermal systems would supply less of the energy but their consistency would make the whole system more reliable.

Delucchi is from the Institute for Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis, while Jacobson belongs to Stanford University’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. They first began to study the feasibility and affordability of converting the world to 100 percent renewable energy sources in a Scientific American article published before the Copenhagen climate talks in 2009. ...

via Study claims 100 percent renewable energy possible by 2030.

I hope we get there. We have a few obstacles to avoid first, however.

Glowing trees could light up city streets

IMAGINE taking a midnight stroll, your route lit by row upon row of trees glowing a ghostly blue. If work by a team of undergraduates at the University of Cambridge pans out, bioluminescent trees could one day be giving our streets this dreamlike look. The students have taken the first step on this road by developing genetic tools that allow bioluminescence traits to be easily transferred into an organism.

Nature is full of glow-in-the-dark critters, but their shine is feeble - far too weak to read by, for example. To boost this light, the team, who were participating in the annual International Genetically Engineered Machines competition (iGEM), modified genetic material from fireflies and the luminescent marine bacterium Vibrio fischeri to boost the production and activity of light-yielding enzymes. They then made further modifications to create genetic components or "BioBricks" that can be inserted into a genome.

The team managed to produce a range of colours by putting these genes into the Escherichia coli bacterium. They found that a volume of bacterial culture about the size of a regular wine bottle gave off enough light to read by.

"We didn't end up making bioluminescent trees, which was the inspiration for the project," says team member Theo Sanderson, who is studying genetics. "But we decided to make a set of parts that would allow future researchers to use bioluminescence more effectively." The team presented its findings earlier this month at the iGEM Jamboree, held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

One major obstacle to harnessing bioluminescence is that the process relies on a class of compounds called luciferins. They emit light and are then converted into oxyluciferin, which cannot produce light. To counter this, the Cambridge team found a way to engineer BioBricks that would enable organisms to produce enzymes to recycle oxyluciferin.

Bioluminescent plants could appeal especially to people whose homes are not wired up to the electricity grid. These living lights have no breakable parts, and new lights can be made simply by growing more of them. The team calculates that for a bioluminescent tree to compete with a street light, only 0.02 per cent of the energy absorbed for photosynthesis would need to be diverted into light production. ...

via Glowing trees could light up city streets - environment - 25 November 2010 - New Scientist.

I hope we will see a large number of non-violent transformations like this as steps to becoming energy independent. Related:

Sweden has moved to the forefront of the world’s “green” nations by setting an ambitious goal to achieve a completely oil-free economy by 2020—and without building more nuclear power plants.

Motivated by global warming and rising oil prices, the Swedish government says it intends to replace all fossil fuels with renewable alternatives before climate change undermines national economies worldwide and diminishing oil supplies force astronomical price increases.

"Our dependency on oil should be broken by 2020," said Mona Sahlin, minister of sustainable development, in an interview with The Guardian newspaper. "There shall always be better alternatives to oil, which means no house should need oil for heating, and no driver should need to turn solely to gasoline."

Even Skeptics Cheer Sweden’s Goal to End Oil Dependency
Not everyone believes Sweden’s goal to free itself from oil by 2020 is achievable, but even critics applaud the country for setting such a compelling and motivating goal, which could also inspire other nations to make dramatic efforts to reduce their dependency on fossil fuels.

via About.com

 

Glowing trees could light up city streets

IMAGINE taking a midnight stroll, your route lit by row upon row of trees glowing a ghostly blue. If work by a team of undergraduates at the University of Cambridge pans out, bioluminescent trees could one day be giving our streets this dreamlike look. The students have taken the first step on this road by developing genetic tools that allow bioluminescence traits to be easily transferred into an organism.

Nature is full of glow-in-the-dark critters, but their shine is feeble - far too weak to read by, for example. To boost this light, the team, who were participating in the annual International Genetically Engineered Machines competition (iGEM), modified genetic material from fireflies and the luminescent marine bacterium Vibrio fischeri to boost the production and activity of light-yielding enzymes. They then made further modifications to create genetic components or "BioBricks" that can be inserted into a genome.

The team managed to produce a range of colours by putting these genes into the Escherichia coli bacterium. They found that a volume of bacterial culture about the size of a regular wine bottle gave off enough light to read by.

"We didn't end up making bioluminescent trees, which was the inspiration for the project," says team member Theo Sanderson, who is studying genetics. "But we decided to make a set of parts that would allow future researchers to use bioluminescence more effectively." The team presented its findings earlier this month at the iGEM Jamboree, held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

One major obstacle to harnessing bioluminescence is that the process relies on a class of compounds called luciferins. They emit light and are then converted into oxyluciferin, which cannot produce light. To counter this, the Cambridge team found a way to engineer BioBricks that would enable organisms to produce enzymes to recycle oxyluciferin.

Bioluminescent plants could appeal especially to people whose homes are not wired up to the electricity grid. These living lights have no breakable parts, and new lights can be made simply by growing more of them. The team calculates that for a bioluminescent tree to compete with a street light, only 0.02 per cent of the energy absorbed for photosynthesis would need to be diverted into light production. ...

via Glowing trees could light up city streets - environment - 25 November 2010 - New Scientist.

I hope we will see a large number of non-violent transformations like this as steps to becoming energy independent. Related:

Sweden has moved to the forefront of the world’s “green” nations by setting an ambitious goal to achieve a completely oil-free economy by 2020—and without building more nuclear power plants.

Motivated by global warming and rising oil prices, the Swedish government says it intends to replace all fossil fuels with renewable alternatives before climate change undermines national economies worldwide and diminishing oil supplies force astronomical price increases.

"Our dependency on oil should be broken by 2020," said Mona Sahlin, minister of sustainable development, in an interview with The Guardian newspaper. "There shall always be better alternatives to oil, which means no house should need oil for heating, and no driver should need to turn solely to gasoline."

Even Skeptics Cheer Sweden’s Goal to End Oil Dependency
Not everyone believes Sweden’s goal to free itself from oil by 2020 is achievable, but even critics applaud the country for setting such a compelling and motivating goal, which could also inspire other nations to make dramatic efforts to reduce their dependency on fossil fuels.

via About.com

 

Oil will run dry 90 years before substitutes roll out

At the current pace of research and development, global oil will run out 90 years before replacement technologies are ready, says a new University of California, Davis, study based on stock market expectations.

The forecast was published online Monday (Nov. 8) in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. It is based on the theory that long-term investors are good predictors of whether and when new energy technologies will become commonplace.

"Our results suggest it will take a long time before renewable replacement fuels can be self-sustaining, at least from a market perspective," said study author Debbie Niemeier, a UC Davis professor of civil and environmental engineering.

Niemeier and co-author Nataliya Malyshkina, a UC Davis postdoctoral researcher, set out to create a new tool that would help policymakers set realistic targets for environmental sustainability and evaluate the progress made toward those goals.

Two key elements of the new theory are market capitalizations (based on stock share prices) and dividends of publicly owned oil companies and alternative-energy companies. Other analysts have previously used similar equations to predict events in finance, politics and sports.

"Sophisticated investors tend to put considerable effort into collecting, processing and understanding information relevant to the future cash flows paid by securities," said Malyshkina. "As a result, market forecasts of future events, representing consensus predictions of a large number of investors, tend to be relatively accurate."

Niemeier said the new study's findings are a warning that current renewable-fuel targets are not ambitious enough to prevent harm to society, economic development and natural ecosystems.

"We need stronger policy impetus to push the development of these alternative replacement technologies along," she said.

via Oil will run dry before substitutes roll out.

Oil will run dry 90 years before substitutes roll out

At the current pace of research and development, global oil will run out 90 years before replacement technologies are ready, says a new University of California, Davis, study based on stock market expectations.

The forecast was published online Monday (Nov. 8) in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. It is based on the theory that long-term investors are good predictors of whether and when new energy technologies will become commonplace.

"Our results suggest it will take a long time before renewable replacement fuels can be self-sustaining, at least from a market perspective," said study author Debbie Niemeier, a UC Davis professor of civil and environmental engineering.

Niemeier and co-author Nataliya Malyshkina, a UC Davis postdoctoral researcher, set out to create a new tool that would help policymakers set realistic targets for environmental sustainability and evaluate the progress made toward those goals.

Two key elements of the new theory are market capitalizations (based on stock share prices) and dividends of publicly owned oil companies and alternative-energy companies. Other analysts have previously used similar equations to predict events in finance, politics and sports.

"Sophisticated investors tend to put considerable effort into collecting, processing and understanding information relevant to the future cash flows paid by securities," said Malyshkina. "As a result, market forecasts of future events, representing consensus predictions of a large number of investors, tend to be relatively accurate."

Niemeier said the new study's findings are a warning that current renewable-fuel targets are not ambitious enough to prevent harm to society, economic development and natural ecosystems.

"We need stronger policy impetus to push the development of these alternative replacement technologies along," she said.

via Oil will run dry before substitutes roll out.

US navy completes successful test on boat powered by algae

Suzanne Goldenberg - It looked like a pretty ordinary day on the water at the US naval base in Norfolk, Virginia: a few short bursts of speed, a nice tail wind, some test manoeuvres against an enemy boat.

But the 49ft gunboat had algae-based fuel in the tank in a test hailed by the navy yesterday as a milestone in its creation of a new, energy-saving strike force.

The experimental boat, intended for use in rivers and marshes and eventually destined for oil installations in the Middle East, operated on a 50/50 mix of algae-based fuel and diesel. "It ran just fine," said Rear Admiral Philip Cullom, who directs the navy's sustainability division.

The tests, conducted on Friday, are part of a broader drive within the navy to run 50% of its fleet on a mix of renewable fuels and nuclear power by 2020. The navy currently meets about 16% of its energy and fuel needs from nuclear power, with the rest from conventional sources.

The navy plans to roll out its first green strike force, a group of about 10 ships, submarines and planes running on a mix of biofuels and nuclear power, in 2012, with deployment in the field scheduled for 2016.

The green trend runs across all military services. The air force has been testing jet engines on a mix of conventional fuels and camelina, a crop similar to flax, and the Marine Corps recently sent a company to Afghanistan's Helmand province equipped with portable solar panels and solar chargers for their radio equipment.

Fuels made from algae oil burn more cleanly than fossil fuel, but preventing climate change is not a major factor in the Pentagon's calculations. "Our programme to go green is about combat capability, first and foremost," Cullom said. "We no longer want to be held hostage by one form of energy such as petroleum."

Over the last year, the Pentagon has become increasingly vocal about the burden of running oil convoys in battle zones. Fossil fuel is the number one import to US troops in Afghanistan, and the slow and lumbering convoys of oil tankers are an obvious target for enemy combatants. ...

via US navy completes successful test on boat powered by algae | Environment | The Guardian.

US navy completes successful test on boat powered by algae

Suzanne Goldenberg - It looked like a pretty ordinary day on the water at the US naval base in Norfolk, Virginia: a few short bursts of speed, a nice tail wind, some test manoeuvres against an enemy boat.

But the 49ft gunboat had algae-based fuel in the tank in a test hailed by the navy yesterday as a milestone in its creation of a new, energy-saving strike force.

The experimental boat, intended for use in rivers and marshes and eventually destined for oil installations in the Middle East, operated on a 50/50 mix of algae-based fuel and diesel. "It ran just fine," said Rear Admiral Philip Cullom, who directs the navy's sustainability division.

The tests, conducted on Friday, are part of a broader drive within the navy to run 50% of its fleet on a mix of renewable fuels and nuclear power by 2020. The navy currently meets about 16% of its energy and fuel needs from nuclear power, with the rest from conventional sources.

The navy plans to roll out its first green strike force, a group of about 10 ships, submarines and planes running on a mix of biofuels and nuclear power, in 2012, with deployment in the field scheduled for 2016.

The green trend runs across all military services. The air force has been testing jet engines on a mix of conventional fuels and camelina, a crop similar to flax, and the Marine Corps recently sent a company to Afghanistan's Helmand province equipped with portable solar panels and solar chargers for their radio equipment.

Fuels made from algae oil burn more cleanly than fossil fuel, but preventing climate change is not a major factor in the Pentagon's calculations. "Our programme to go green is about combat capability, first and foremost," Cullom said. "We no longer want to be held hostage by one form of energy such as petroleum."

Over the last year, the Pentagon has become increasingly vocal about the burden of running oil convoys in battle zones. Fossil fuel is the number one import to US troops in Afghanistan, and the slow and lumbering convoys of oil tankers are an obvious target for enemy combatants. ...

via US navy completes successful test on boat powered by algae | Environment | The Guardian.

Human waste turned into renewable gas to power homes

Next time you flush the toilet, you could be doing your bit for green energy. After being stored for 18 days, human waste will from today be returning to homes in the form of renewable gas.

Centrica is opening a plant at Didcot sewage works which will be the first in the UK to produce renewable gas for households to use.

National Grid believes that at least 15% of all gas consumed could be made from sewage slurry, old sandwiches and other food thrown away by supermarkets, as well as organic waste created by businesses such as breweries.

However, there are fears in the industry that the government's spending cuts could make it more difficult for companies to come up with the £10bn needed to develop the new plants and pipelines.

Because it is more expensive to produce renewable gas, companies say they need to be paid twice the market rate for it to make economic sense.

But a proposed subsidy, scheduled to come into force in April, has yet to be approved and there is speculation that the government could delay or scrap it.

The Didcot facility is a pilot project to demonstrate the technology and will supply about 200 homes with gas. The project is a joint venture between Thames Water, British Gas and Scotia Gas Networks. ...

Methane is produced and then it is purified ready for use. ...

via Human waste turned into renewable gas to power homes | Environment | guardian.co.uk.

A long time ago the US Congress considered human gas as a potential form of energy.  Flatulence is primarily methane, which unfortunately is a powerful green-house gas which contributes to global warming.

Methane (CH₄) is a greenhouse gas that remains in the atmosphere for approximately 9-15 years. Methane is over 20 times more effective in trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide (CO₂) over a 100-year period and is emitted from a variety of natural and human-influenced sources - epa.gov

When burned, methane produces  NO2 (a prominent air pollutant,) lower atmospheric ozone and the other components of smog.  Methane is already pumped into homes as natural gas and it could become a major energy source, but if it is improperly used,  it could devastate our environment.