Wall Street Journal Article on New Energy Sources

I have posted on this blog several times that when a mainstream media outlet becomes interested in Renewable Energy, it is more significant than any blog or specialized media talking about this. That is why, when the Wall Street Journal, Forbes or Businessweek look at RE, it is always a matter of importance. This article looks at both the advantages and the difficulties of harnessing three new forms of energy in a simple and easy to understand manner. The thing is that this will be read by businessmen - people working in the energy sector, financial sector professionals and so on. And, hopefully, some visionary businessman of the future is reading this as I type this here, taking notes, and thinking about how to make money from these sources of energy. As someone who believes in showing fossil fuel the fist, I say, please go ahead! And, thanks in advance . . .

Wikileaks: Saudi Arabia Cannot Pump Enough Oil to keep a Lid on Prices

I received this piece from The Guardian via Dr Mayraj Fahim which suggests a most alarming prospect - that Saudi Arabia's oil reserves might have been mis-stated by as much as 40% and that there is far less oil available in that country than was earlier presumed. In every sense, this news suggests that it is important for the world to look for alternative sources of energy as oil is going to run out at some point in time. This blog is not in the business of trying to forecast when the oil will run out - that is the job of experts, and, whenever one of them speaks about it, those views will be reported here. But, with China and India buying enormous quantities of oil and increasing their purchases as their economies grow, consumption in the future is certain to grow significantly over the past.

The shortage of oil in Saudi Arabia (and who knows what the situation is with other countries?) is worrying but some solid work has begun to wean the world off oil - the numerous electric cars, electric motorcycles and electric airplanes that are now being worked upon are an example of work that could minimize the shock from oil running out when that happens. The time to work hard to develop alternative sources of energy is NOW. Any delay and this would only cause monstrous problems when the oil does run out.

Canada's Globe and Mail Takes on Phantom Power

Onee thing that many of us don't realize is how much power we waste through not turning things like computers, televisions and DVRs off - the power consumed when these are on standdby mode costs hundreds of dollars a year (or whatever currency is used in other parts of the world) and all of this is money that could be saved merely by switching these devices off. Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper has this excellent piece that discusses this way of saving money and becoming more energy efficient. Yes, it doesn't fit in with the Renewable energy focus of this blog, but it certainly shows how less energy could be used, thereby showing fossil fuels (and all other kinds of fuels as well) the fist!

Nissan Designs a Relatively Cleaner Car Carrier

Visitors to this blog know how much I love the idea of making seafaring more efficient - yep, I have been beating the sailship drum for some time. But, there is a place for large fuel efficient fossil fuel powered cargo vessels compared to some of the dinosaurs that we have today. And Nissan, the first car company to have made a major leap with its Leaf electric car, has shown the way ahead with a fuel efficient roll on roll off car carrier to transport their Leaf cars. My hat's off to Nissan! I hope this aerodynamic design is also applied to container carriers and to dry bulk cargo carriers - the shipbuilding industry could do with savings on fuel costs and the world could do with less pollution!

Swedish Town Uses Waste Instead of Fossil Fuels for Most Public Energy Consumption

The New York Times has this article to brighten the Saturday morning news for everyone who - like this blogger - believes that there is a strong need to use less oil and coal: Link. By converting all of its kitchen waste into biogas and using this gas to heat homes as well as in public transport, the town has not only reduced public consumption of oil and coal to almost zero, it has also managed to slash its energy bills per year by almost half.

Cities with vastly larger populations - and there are many such around the world - could take note of this very successful experiment. More people means more kitchen waste and therefore more raw material to work with in order to extract biogas. Use the Terrabon Link catalytic system to convert sewage into fuel or use an alternative method that extracts gas from sewage, or an algae based system, and there is a strong possibility that far larger cities could be weaned off oil and coal. An ambitious way forward, no doubt, but the good people of Kristianstad started to work on a fossil fuel free future some years ago and successfully got there. It is time the rest of the world learns from their pioneering effort.

Canada's Globe and Mail reviews the Nissan Leaf and Gives Insights into Electricity Generation in the Country

As someone who always enjoys visiting Canada (and not just because he happens to have very close friends there) this blogger finds that our neighbors to the North have a lot of very interesting and eminently sensible ways of doing things that we overlook even over here in the USA. This article on the about to be launched for sale Nissan Leaf electric car talks about the anxieties that Canadians share with us Americans - range issues and fears over charges depleting faster in the winter. But then, there is a hugely positive fact that the review casually tosses out as if it were not even worth mentioning - 70% of Canada's electricity is generated from renewable sources. In three provinces - Quebec, Manitoba and British Columbia, that figure is 100%.

Why is this important? The Canadians have oil - a lot of it - and they make a lot of money sending it South to us. In a sense this is a good thing - it makes the USA less dependent on rogue nations like Saudi Arabia or Venezuela for one thing - it makes money for Canada selling a mineral resource overseas. The Canadians, themselves, use their earnings from the export of their oil to prepare themselves for more renewable energy to be locally used. Smart? You bet!

A powerful and wealthy nation like the USA with a host of problems might sometimes be too absorbed with its own issues to look at solutions in other countries. That said, I do think that it would be a mistake to ignore the Canadian example. Several experts have shown that it is well possible to generate 20% of the electricity that the USA uses from onshore wind. Use offshore wind and combined wind and tidal power both in the sea and off the Great Lakes and this percentage could rise even more. I've said this before and I'll keep repeating this as long as I can - everytime I walk along Lake Michigan, I am amazed at how violently the water heaves up and down several feet even on relatively calm days. All of that energy could keep the lights, HVAC systems and office equipment and home appliances running in most of the cities that dot the lake. In cities like Chicago and Milwaukee to name just two, it could also run cars.

Virginia Tech's Prototype Home for the Future

The New York Times has featured Virginia Tech's entry for a prototype energy efficient home for the future in an international design contest: at this link. While "concept" anything is usually impractical in the extreme, most concepts have some good ideas built into them which could be commercialized and used in conventional housing. Its been a long time since I featured any new low energy use housing on this blog and I hope that this post gives some of my readers ideas.