JRSE - Clean

Houston's Call for Electric Car Infrastructure

2010-12-07T18:21:56Z

Owning an electric car became a whole lot easier for Houston, TX, residents. The city plans to support these vehicles by issuing permits within hours for installing charging stations at home and designating special HOV lanes for electric cars. Additionally, the energy company, NRG Energy Inc., has announced that it will build a network of 150 charging stations for electric cars.

The stations will be dotted throughout the city in retail locations such as Best Buy and Walgreens stores and in public parking facilities. One third of the stations will be able to charge a vehicle in about 30 minutes; the rest will take about four to six hours.

Texas is one of the first states in the country slated to receive electric cars and Houston's charging network will be the first of its kind in the U.S. But NRG plans to build similar networks in other cities—next stop Dallas.

Plastic Convert Provides Recycling and Energy to the Developing World

2010-12-01T16:16:23Z

In many poor, rural communities, a severe imbalance in petroleum products degrades the economy and the environment. They have too much plastic waste and too little oil for cooking and heating. The Blest Company provides a possible solution to both problems: the Blest Machine.

Designed by Japanese engineer Akinori Ito, the Blest Machine converts plastic waste into oil, using a chemical-free heating process. At full speed, the Blest Machine can convert 1 kg (2.2 pounds) of plastic bottles into about 1 liter (4.2 cups) of oil at the expense of 1 kW of energy (which costs about 20 cents U.S.). The machine is about the size of a small trash can, and costs $9,500.

The machine doesn't release carbon dioxide during the conversion process, but burning the resultant oil for fuel will release CO₂. However, Ito believes that producing fuel locally shortens the supply chain enough to offset any carbon emissions from the fuel itself.

The process is not perfect, since the machine has no built-in way to deal with the chemical residue left from coloring and other additives in the plastic. But in the developing world, where economically enriching recycling programs are few and far between, a good solution like the Blest Machine today is better than the perfect solution tomorrow.

MIT Uses Green Grease To Help Brazilian Garbage Collectors

2010-09-29T19:39:57Z

While most of her fellow students spent the summer in career-advancing internships or in jobs that allowed for the most partying, Angela Hojnaki went to Sao Paolo, Brazil, to help collect cooking grease. That grease, when run through a special converter, will power the diesel engines of garbage trucks responsible for cleaning up the city's worst slums.

Hojnaki is part of a student collective called Green Grease at MIT, which is dedicated to finding environmentally sound ways to help Brazil's impoverished garbage collectors, known as catadores.

In August 2010, Hojnaki and her fellow students ran a workshop for the catadores, teaching them how to convert their engines to run on the very discarded cooking oil they spend all day collecting.

"They were hesitant at first," Hojnaki said. "But once they started burning it, they love it. They said it smelled like cooking."

Hojnaki presented the results of the Green Grease project on September 22nd, at a USAID/Scientists Without Borders sponsored forum at the United Nations. She said that the catadores spend 20 percent of their own money to pay for fuel, and that this project will help save them money and will simultaneously recycle vast amounts of waste.

Obviously, running a garbage truck on cooking oil is neither renewable nor sustainable. But every mile driven with cooking oil as the fuel represents fossil fuels that aren't being burnt. Moreover, it represents a practical and profitable way to start environmentally sound behavior. And in the developing world, any green initiative will be measured first by how well it helps alleviate poverty.

Alternative Energy for the People Who Need Cheap Power the Most

2010-08-20T18:11:41Z

With so many alternative energy technologies coming out of advanced industries and Western universities, it sometimes appears as though rich countries have a monopoly on renewable power sources. Energy Entrepreneurs, a video series on the website Globalpost.com, serves as corrective to that view, highlighting sustainable energy projects in the impoverishes nations that need them the most.

The videos post every Thursday, and cover topics from wind farms in Mexico to geothermal heating and cooling systems in the Palestinian territories. Not only does each video report from a different area of the world, but they look at different kinds of energy as well.

One of the most shocking aspects of each video is the DIY nature of many of the projects. In a video from Kenya, a student brings light to rural communities via small solar powered lamps he makes from scrap, not from giant solar panels lining acres of desert. Another story details how farmers in Oaxaca, Mexico, built wind turbines from spare wood and cheap hardware store parts, not space aged materials.

So far, GlobalPost has released 12 videos in what will become a 48 part series. While the Shell sponsorship of the series could cast the videos in a greenwashing light, GlobalPost has a proven track record of quality, independent reporting.

Undoubtedly, the communities featured in Energy Entrepreneurs have far lower energy demands than Western Nations. However, by showing how people with so little can produce carbon neutral, renewable energy sources, this series points shows how only a lack of ingenuity prevents richer counties from doing the same.

Solar-powered Mobile Phones Come to India

2010-07-29T15:25:21Z

Vodafone Essar Ltd. has unveiled solar-powered mobile handsets in an attempt to serve India's rural areas.

India currently has close to 600 million mobile subscribers with an additional increase of 20 million each month. Many of these folks are in areas where energy resources are either lacking or unreliable. However, there is plenty of sunshine to charge a phone.

The VF 247 Solar Powered phone will require about eight hours of charge time in direct sunlight for four hours of talk time. It can also be charged through a traditional electronic charger, when electricity is available. Available next month, the phone costs about 1,500 rupees, or approximately $32.

Last year, Samsung India launched its own solar-powered mobile handset, Solar Guru (Guru E1107). With every hour of charge time, Solar Guru provides 5 to 10 minutes of talk time.

As technology improves, these phones will no doubt functionally improve and cost less. For now, they're filling in a major infrastructural gap for those with no access to power grids.

Wind Energy May Be Coming to Long Island

2010-07-13T23:34:17Z

Here's some good news for New Yorkers who are tired of West NY getting attention for their (amazing) wind farms.

The New York Power Authority (NYPA) has applied to develop an off shore wind farm 24km off the coast of Long Island that would begin pumping 300 MW of energy into the region, but whose capacity would be 700 MW (to be achieved by 2016).

According to Newsday (subscription required), the project comes with a price tag of about $1.5 billion.

Not really a bad investment for the potential returns involved. I'm glad to see this moving forward without too much controversy... (I'm looking with with disdain in your general direction, Cape Cod).

Alternative Energy Goes To War

2010-07-01T20:46:56Z

A new voice calling for investment in alternative energy has joined the usual chorus of environmentalists, academic researchers and venture capitalists: the military. The trend has simmered for some time now, but during a June 22 panel on climate change and security at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, top brass from both the American and British navies signaled that finding alternative energy sources has jumped to the top of the Pentagon's to-do list.

During the panel discussion, both Rear Admiral Neil Morisetti of the Royal Navy, and Vice Admiral Dennis McGinn of the US Navy (ret.) discussed at length how the military needs to reduce its "carbon bootprint." In their minds, this is a matter of life and death. For civilians, a Prius means less pain at the pump, but for Marines, alternative fuel means more tanks or better-trained helicopter pilots responding to a firefight.

They both anticipate a future where rising gas prices either limit training capabilities, or absorb funding that might otherwise pay for the bullets, armor and batteries needed for survival on the modern battlefield. That's a future Morisetti and McGinn hope to avoid, and they have been pressuring their respective services to invest in green technology to do so.

This pressure may transform the military into a leader in alternative fuels, since, as Morisetti said, the armed forces can bear a higher price for technology than the private sector. Whether or not the armed services can respond in time to avoid facing fossil fuel-related problems is another matter. Morisetti and McGinn both fell back on a naval metaphor when discussing that point, comparing gasoline dependence to a large ship: hard to turn around, even with advanced warning.

The Incredible Edible Electric Potato

2010-06-25T18:24:45Z

Sometimes a blog entry writes itself. I mean, potato power? Spud lights? How much fun can we have?

Anyway, here's the story: Proffessor Haim Rabinowitch and his colleagues at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have reported a ten-times increase in the amount of power output from a potato in this article published in the current issue of JRSE¹

If you're not familiar with the basica concept of potato power, I suggest you read this informative article and then watch this silly demonstration.

Now that we're all caught up on the science... here's the neat stuff and the new research: the authors boiled (or electroporated) the potatoes, thus creating a method energy production that is 50 times cheaper than common AA batteries. The authors even calculate that by using the spuds to power energy-efficient LEDs, they can produce light more cheaply than a kerosene lamp.

As a sidenote, the authors used the Dutch bred potato (Solanum tuberosum) cv. "Desiree," which is apparently the world's most popular red skinned yellow flesh main crop potato, according to the 2009 European Cultivated Potato Database. Ok, aside from the cool research here, how fun is it to find something like a Potato Database? I'll answer for you: pretty darn fun.

¹Golberg, A., Rabinowitch, H., & Rubinsky, B. (2010). Zn/Cu-vegetative batteries, bioelectrical characterizations, and primary cost analyses Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, 2 (3) DOI: 10.1063/1.3427222

JRSE Is Now Indexed In Thomson Reuters Web of Science & Science Citation Index

2010-06-25T17:54:40Z

Thomson Reuters indexes journals in their databases each year according to a strict set of standards*. Accordingly, Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy (JRSE) has been indexed in the following databases:

Science Citation Index Expanded (Including the Web of Science)
Current Contents—Engineering, Computing & Technology

The change includes all published content back to our first issue, which premiered in January 2009.

This means that JRSE now will be included in future Journal Citation Reports. Here at AIP, we are proud of the journal we've created and we know that this inclusion will expand our audience and increase the influence of this important journal.

In other exciting indexing news, AIP applied physics journals top the Thomson Reuters rankings again in 2009.

*From Thomson Reuters: Thomson Reuters' editors use a number of tools for assessing the scholarly merit of a journal being evaluated for coverage. Among the criteria they have established are timeliness of publication, adherence to international editorial conventions, and the use of peer review and English language bibliographic information. They also examine the journal's editorial content and the international diversity of its authors and editors.

Our Oil Spill

2010-06-16T13:17:41Z

It's nearly impossible to talk about energy and not mention the BP oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. On April 20, 2010, Deepwater Horizon, an offshore drilling rig owned by Transocean Ltd (an offshore drilling contractor) and leased to BP, exploded and killed 11 crew-members. Deepwater Horizon sank and since then millions of gallons of oil have been gushing into the water, making this event the largest off shore spill in U.S. history. The extent of the economic and environmental damage is yet to be seen but we all know that the effects be massive.

For now, most of us are left with the images of the oil-drenched pelicans as a symbol. And each time we see such a sight, we start pointing fingers at BP for cutting corners, taking risks, and not implementing safety measures, among other things. I've walked by protests held at BP gas stations, seen friends post anti-BP rhetoric on Facebook and Twitter and have read many articles on the topic.

In addition to BP, many are blaming the government for loose regulations and insufficient oversight. Then there's the President, Haliburton, and Transocean Ltd, to fault, each one for a different reason.

Then there's me. Yes, I blame me for the spill. If I didn't give so much money to oil companies—through gas for my car, transportation for food grown elsewhere, and petrochemicals for my clothes and other goods—there wouldn't be a need to produce as much oil.

I look forward to a day when alternative sources supply a good portion of our energy needs but until then I'll think twice before buying something I don't need or taking a car instead of public transport. And if I falter—which will be more often than not—the images of the pelicans deeply etched into my mind should be a good reminder.

Congress Considers Cow Power, Other Technologies

2010-06-02T15:19:37Z

Alternative energy technologies you've never heard of.

Jun 1, 2010

By Phil Schewe and Devin Powell
Inside Science News Service

This story is taken from AIP's Inside Science News Service (ISNS), and the original story can be found here.

According to the estimates from one company, four dairy cows could produce enough energy to power a small apartment.

WASHINGTON (ISNS) — Legislators attending this year's Congressional Energy and Energy Efficiency Expo and Forum in Washington, DC, last week were quick to point out the problems with fossil fuel — from cave-ins at coal mines to the oil spill in the Gulf.

View full-size image
(image from insidescience.org)

"We've never been injured by a photon spill," said Rep. Jay Inslee of Washington State, referring to the virtues of solar energy.

The expo featured a roomful of vendors selling technologies based on renewable sources and energy efficiency, as well as a dozen or so members of Congress from both parties and representatives of the executive branch who support these types of alternative energy ventures.

"The road to energy independence begins in South Carolina,” said South Carolina Rep. Bob Inglis, who proudly recited a list of the energy companies in his state. He argued that the “externalities,” the sometimes-overlooked hidden and indirect costs of various energy-production methods, had to be considered in order to let the marketplace operate efficiently and “to deliver us from the bondage of oil.”

Maryland Chris Van Hollen underscored the principal aims of energy-climate legislation: enhancing national security by reducing dependence on oil imports, protecting the environment, and helping to create new jobs and rebuild the economy by encouraging innovative, green companies.

Van Hollen is a co-chair of the House Renewable and Energy Efficiency Caucus, a group in the House of Representatives interested in renewable energy. The complexity of the green energy enterprise can be seen in the roster of other mostly bipartisan caucuses represented at the expo, which included those devoted to sustainable energy and environment, high performance buildings, energy from algae, hydropower, green jobs, hydrogen and fuel cells, and even green schools.

Solar and wind energy companies displayed their latest designs — from roof shingles with built-in photovoltaic cells to new wind turbines that look like giant flywheels. Manufacturers of light-emitting diodes, or LEDs — which light the office of Maryland Rep. Roscoe Barlett — hawked bulbs that use 60 percent less energy than fluorescent bulbs, which are in turn much more efficient than traditional incandescent bulbs.

Sprinkled in among the headlining technologies represented at the expo were small companies with ideas you may never have heard of, technologies that have found their way into niche markets and that are described below. As congressional staffers questioned the representatives from these companies, cost was one of the primary concerns. Again and again, the salespeople made the same pitch: their technologies, which tend to be more expensive up front, would pay for themselves in the long run.

Cow-o-Watts On The Farm
How many dairy cows does it take to make a kilowatt of electricity, enough to power a small apartment? Four, according to GHD, Inc. The company, based in Chilton, Wis., makes methane from cow poop using a technique called anaerobic digestion. Four cows make about 64 gallons of manure a day. This manure can be fed to bacteria that once lived in a cow's gut. These microorganisms break down undigested fatty acids in the manure over weeks to make methane gas. Methane is then burned onsite at the farm to make electricity that can be sold to utility companies. To be economical the operation needs about 600 cows, and the largest operations include more than 10,000 cows.

Tiny Hydropower In Irrigation Canals
In the 1930s, engineers tapped the mighty flow of the Colorado River with the Hoover Dam, which sends water over a 500 foot drop to provide power for 1.3 million people. A new hydropower device on display was inspired by such dams but works on a much smaller scale. It is designed to tap the irrigation canals that carry water from the Colorado River hundreds of miles to keep the lawns in places like Phoenix, Ariz. green year-round.

How does it work? Natel Energy, Inc. of Alameda, Calif. has designed a way to harvest the energy from the fall of water in short (10-20 foot) drops along the canals as the water flows. This process, borrowing from the design of airplane wings, has been installed in Buckeye, Ariz., where it captures 87 percent of the water's energy and produces enough energy to power five homes.

Viewing The World Through Tinted Glass
At Century College in St. Paul, Minnesota, the windows of the university's library can change from transparent to tinted with the push of a button. The glass, manufactured by SageGlass in Faribault, is meant to improve energy efficiency. When tinted, the glass reflects sunlight away to keep the interior cool. When transparent, it allows heat in on cool days.

The windows, which cost 2-5 times more than a standard window, are made of ordinary glass coated with very thin ceramic materials that darken when exposed to an electrical current.

Forklifts That Run On Hydrogen
When you think of forklifts, you probably don't think high tech. But forklifts have become one of the first emerging markets for hydrogen fuel in the United States, according to Geoffrey Bromaghim of the National Hydrogen Association. Forklifts, which require significant energy to lift heavy boxes, often run on large lead-acid batteries that take time to recharge and can produce toxic fumes.

Hydrogen fuel cells, which produce electricity from hydrogen, are more expensive but recharge faster and reduce the labor costs of changing batteries, said Bromaghim. The market is still small, though — out of the 28,000 forklifts operating the U.S., only 200 run on hydrogen fuel cells.

Back To Basics
Rep. Vern Ehlers of Missori, a former nuclear physicist and the son of a preacher, celebrated the technologies on display. But he also delivered what he described as a sermon, asking those in attendance to start with even simpler money-saving ways to improve energy efficiency. Living in a cold place, he said, made him appreciate insulation. He invested in halting the heat leaks in his own home and was rewarded immediately when his next energy bill dropped by 30 percent.

Texas Leads the Way in Meeting Renewable Energy Goals

2010-05-18T21:32:10Z

After much debate, I have decided that Texas is awesome. They've managed to meet their renewable energy goal of having 10,000 megawatts of renewable energy capacity, which is a respectable goal. And they did it 15 years earlier than expected. To quote the royal mystic Rasputin,* "What the...?"

According to this report, which links to a .doc filed by the Electronic Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the Lone Star State was able to pull off this feat with our old friend wind.

Ninety nine percent of the energy, in fact, comes from wind. Apparently west Texas is pretty darn windy. Hold onto your hats cowboys...

And there's more good news: According to a report (PDF) by the Center for Energy Economics at University of Texas, Austin, "...another 50,000 Megawatts of wind power projects are being considered by various developers."

Some might think that Texas is riding a gravy train with biscuit wheels, but this is obviously not Texas's first rodeo.**

*Reader beware: I'm actually pretty sure that Rasputin did not actually say this...
**Reader beware: I'm not from Texas and I hope this makes sense to everyone.

ARPA-E Expo at Farmingdale State University

2010-05-14T14:49:01Z

A group of ladies and gentlemen gathered around Steve Israel as he arrived at Farmingdale State University on Tuesday, May 11th. Mr. Israel was the center of attention for more than just being the 2nd District of New York's congressional representative—he is also a member of the House of Representative's Office on Science and Technology... more to the point, he was there looking for people who were looking for money. He came to the right place (and at the right time, too).

Dr. Mujamdar looks on as Representative Israel talk about our country's "Sputnik moment"

Israel began the proceedings with a bit of a history lesson: on October 4, 1957, the Russians launched Sputnik into space and Americans are left feeling that they somehow had became technologically behind. Now, Israel contends, we are facing a similar predicament. A "Sputnik moment" as he calls it. Only this time, the threat comes not from Russia, but from China. China is realizing that to be able to fuel their massive economy, they will need to rely on using clean and sustainable energy technologies. Israel then invoked the voice of John F. Kennedy by saying that we need to develop a new energy model, not because it is easy, but because it is hard. From here, it became an introduction of the ARPA-E program.

Despite his motivational speech, the entirety of the day did not actually belong to Israel. The head of ARPA-E, Dr. Arun Majumdar, was on hand to talk about funding new energy start-ups and development of "risky" energy technologies. Dr. Majumdar gave a brief overview of the successes the program has had in the past year, of the companies that have been funded on Long Island, and finally, the plans to increase funding for 2011.

And with that, the panel discussion was on. The panel was comprised of:

Leo Guthart, who is manages Long Island's Topspin Partners and is currently a Trustee of the Stony Brook Foundation and of Cold Spring Harbor Labs.
Micah Kotch, who heads up New York City Accelerator for a Clean and Renewable Economy (NYC ACRE), an initiative started by the Polytechnic Institute of NYU. The initiative is designed to help create and foster NYC's clean businesses and start-ups.
David Norman, the co-owner of Kitchen Public Relations, spoke about the importance of PR and using the internet and social media to raise brand awareness and business results.

There were some very specific questions about garnering funding, securing intellectual property rights, and other technical details. And then, the meeting was over. Poof... it was so quick.

In the meantime, around Roosevelt Hall, exhibits were set up to display some of Long Island's interesting new tech start-ups, which also happened to include LI favorite Brookhaven National Labs.

Here are a few pictures:

Some of the interesting new technology exhibited at FSU on Tuesday afternoon—this wind turbine is more compact and less intrusive than traditional models.

Some of the interesting new technology exhibited at FSU on Tuesday afternoon—these solar panels are available for small homes and have become quite affordable in the past year or so.

Thin Capacitors Give Batteries A Run For Their Money

2010-04-28T14:01:06Z

There are really only two choices for energy storage: batteries, which store a lot of electricity in toxic chemicals, and capacitors, which store far less electricity than batteries, but do so between harmless metal plates. But now, a new type of ultracapacitor utilizes computer chip production techniques to provide almost as much electricity as batteries, but with safety and longevity of a capacitor.

Developed by materials scientists at Drexel University in Philadelphia, the ultracapacitor consists of a Greek key design etched into a carbon film. Each bend of the key serves as a capacitor panel, enabling vast numbers of capacitors to be printed onto thin films. Thanks to the high volume and low size enabled by the etching process, these carbon film ultracapacitors can store three-times as much energy as conventional ultracapacitors (but still far less energy than a battery).

However, even though this ultracapacitor doesn't store as much electricity as a battery, it stores enough to serve as the energy source in a number of important technologies. For one, these capacitors could be printed directly onto the back of solar cells, replacing heavier and more toxic batteries in portable, solar powered electronics. Also, since the ultracapacitor resides on a thin carbon sheet, it forms the ideal power source for printed and flexible electronics.

With battery technology advancing as well, it is unlikely that capacitors will ever overtake batteries as the primary electricity storage medium for most devices. But as this development demonstrates, ultracapacitors may become the energy source of choice for the small, flexible, low-energy devices increasingly present in so many products.

The U.S. Navy Launches a Biofueled Jet on Earth Day

2010-04-21T19:21:45Z

On the 40th anniversary of Earth Day, the U.S. Navy is planning to break the green barrier. The F/A-18 jet, Navy's fuel guzzler, will take to the skies and go supersonic on biofuel blend—50 percent of the fuel is made up of oil from Camelina sativa plant and 50 percent will be jet fuel.

The move comes as an effort on the part of the Defense Department to use less fossil fuel. Currently, their consumption accounts for 80 percent of the government's energy usage. But the goal is to have 25 percent of this energy come from renewable sources by 2025.

What's especially good about such government investments is they can drive changes in civilian life. When big money goes into building the infrastructure for creating renewable energy, we then can use the same infrastructure for our everyday needs. As commercial aviation increases, so does greenhouse gases emissions.

It's estimated that using biofuels could decrease emissions related to flights by up to 80 percent. Transportation, after the industrial sector, is the second largest energy user in this country. If we can make our flights run on biofuel, hopefully we can do the same for our cars, trains and ships.

Sara Goudarzi is a freelance writer based in New York City.
Her website is saragoudarzi.com