Here is a good list to help you out, I also follow http://www.GoG2G.com ... the guy posts here under KonradImielinski...
Financial Nirvana
Renewable Fuels Association
Seeking Alpha
BioConversion blog
Natural Resource Investment Site
Alternative Energy in the 21st Century
Alternative Energy Stocks
Betray the Age
Cut Oil Imports
Enery Crisis Now!
Ethanol 360
Ethanol Alley
Green Car Congress
The Energy Blog
Alternative Energy Blog
Clean Energy Future
Cleantech Blog
Cleantech Investing
Environmental Economics
I want Clean Air
The Energy Blog
World Changing Blog
A good one I can recommend is http://www.renew-enery-blog.org which is moderated by RENEW Wisconsin (www.renewwisconsin.org). Disclaimer of bias: I generate a lot of the content on that blog.
I am of course an ethanol skeptic, but I don't believe that number. I have seen actual energy usage numbers from an operating ethanol plant in Illinois. The energy balance wasn't great, but it was positive. It is just not positive enough to justify making ethanol from corn.
Where I live in western Colorado, dead cows are composted by the county and used as soil fertilizer.
This is because the regional rendering plant went out of business a few years ago, and we were forced to do something environmentally creative for a change.
For at least part of it they have little choice. California had 29 million people in 1990 but 33 million in 2000 and is expected to hit 38 million in 2010. Even if per capita consumption remains the same that's a 31% growth in total consumption over 20 years, and California has not exactly been quick to add new generating capacity. In order to lower demand they would have to add constant conservation gains greater than the rate of growth, forever - an obviously impossible situation - or they have to stop population growth.
I came across something could possibly help, but -----
My hot water heater is getting older and I started to think about a replacement (rural Minnesota) and I got to thinking about our discussion of Heat Pumps and got to wondering if anyone had ever made a heat pump water heater? A quick "google" gave me the answer. Yes, but they were expensive. There was a gov effort to help develop one that would be affordable. Would use half or less of the electricity used by a standard electric water heater to heat the same amount of water. It would provide dehumidifing in the basement as a "free" side benefit.
With the high (and going higher) price of propane I sure would expend the extra bucks (up to double the price of a standard water heater) to go with a heat pump water heater. I am currently persuing info on availability, prices and COP.
More info here: http://www.ornl.gov/sci/btc/apps/hotwater.html
Since 1999, a heat pump based on CO2 technology has been providing a Norwegian company with many advantages:
* 22 kW heating capacity
* 5.5 measured co-efficiency of performance (COP)
* 80-90 C water temperature
* Economic payback of invested money in less than three years
Keep wrenching up the price of elecricity for heavy users,like they are doing. At some point, maybe people will move. Also, require that all new homes have PV, passive solar, and solar thermal. We have a crisis that will only exacerbate a bigger crisis if we give into those who want to expand supply with fossil fuels.
Any centralized supply increases should be wind/hydro/maybe nuclear/solar based.
I don't see much discussion about "mirror farm" type solar these days, compared to PV panel systems. (i.e. a series of heleostats that focus sunlight on to a central boiler tower)
While PV would seem to be the way to go for equipment installed on / at individual buildings the much lower cost (I would assume) and embedded energy of a mirror, as opposed to an active semiconductor device, would suggest that both in terms of $ cost and EROEI it could be being rolled out a lot more than it is.
What do folks know about the current state of mirror farm technology?
I don't have URLs handy but earlier this year a large plant using such technology was approved for building in California. After approval was received there, they applied for two more such plants, I believe in Arizona and Colorado, but I could be mistaken on that.
The technology is apparently in use and is likely to grow in usage from what I've seen. The interesting thing about the California plant that caught the eye of factory owners in the northeast was that the facility was willing to guarantee specific rates over much longer time periods than the fossil fuel fired generating plants were willing to do. Electricity price stability was cited as a key factor in determining where to build new factories and this stability suddenly made "green" power more attractive than traditional power.
A couple of days ago I read an article about the world's largest parabola mirror solar plant which will be now under construction in Andalucia, Spain. The in-feed-law in Spain meanwhile offers as well incentives to invest in this kind of technology. This will certainly sput invesntemnts in this technology, because spanish people are very enthusiastic about investing in renewable energy, first in wind, today in pv.
This project's name in Andasol 1. Technolgy comes from a german company which will install the 60 MW project.
Two further solar plants are already planned (for the people who can read german look here
Especially in the european or north american sun belt this technology will be much more feasible. Modern plants use melted salt for transporting the heat to the turbine. By night, this melted salt is being stored in a tank which can propel the water vapor turbine via a heat exchanger. So even in the dark night there is electricity available.
It is said, this technology can become a major technology in the North African areas, supplying this region with really abundant energy which can be transmitted via high voltage lines into the european grid (they say it will be 5 or 6 € cents per kwH including transmission). As well for providing thermal energy for desalination near the coast.
I don't have a link now, but I think in Marocco the king or prince is very fond of this and together with a a german group of scientists and companies they want to bring on this project.
From this document (2001) it is stated that the cost of concentrated solar power (mirrors to focus sun's energy followed by a thermal -> electric conversion stage)is roughly 0.12 - 0.14 $/KWh (solar trough). I have seen other sources suggest it is as low as $0.1/KWh.
The cost of PV is about 0.4 - 0.5 $/KWh according to this reference, although it is dated. No matter how one argues about the calculations for cost / KWh, PV has some way to go to catch solar thermal plants.
As fossil fuel costs rise, the 10+ cents/kwh for solar thermal will start looking pretty good! The deserts of the southwest could be turned into an energy goldmine.
Note: the efficiency of concentrated-solar power range from 20% for parabolic troughs to 30% for Sterling engine / parabolic dish setups!
There is not much activity in the way of large arrays of steerable mirrors aimed at a fixed central tower as at the installation at Odeillo in the French Pyrenees but there is activity with steered arrays of mirrored dishes focused on a Stirling engine that moves with the dish made by Stirling Energy Systems. They have a contract to provide a 300 MW solar power plant consisting of 12,000 Stirling solar dishes on approximately three square miles in the Imperial Valley of Southern California and another 500 megawatts plant in the Mojave Desert near Victorville, California. These convert solar energy to electricity at about 40% efficiency which has been, until recently, far above what could be achieved by photovoltaic systems but recently there has been great progress in photovoltaic concentrator systems.
Boeing-Spectrolab, under contract to NREL and the Department of Energy, have achieved a record 39% efficiency at a concentration ratio of 236 using triple stacked heterojunction cells and hope to soon push this to 41%. Arrays of tiny 5mm cells on a heat spreader behind fresnel lenses in the Flatcon system developed by the Fraunhofer-Institute for Solar Energy Systems or the system developed by Pyron Solar by allow efficiencies close to the Sterling system with the solar cells occupying only a fraction of a percent of the collecting area. One report on such a system in Spain gave an energy payback time of 8-10 months.
All tracking systems require clear direct sunlight and give very poor performance in diffuse light limiting the areas in the world where they can be used to advantage.
I think pursuing all forms of "alternative energy" is great, and should be done post haste. And I love the solar tower mirror stuff, I work in the optics industry and I'm a long-time amateur astronomer - I have a very nice 12" diameter parabolic mirror in my telescope!
But I think the collapse will render these large-scale projects impossible to carry off, and we'll be left with doing what we can on our own. I plan to find someone with a big TV satellite dish, line it with aluminum foil (I have some nice thick foil for the task), and use it to cook a pot of rice or something. Rig up a weight-driven equatorial mount to follow the sun. Perhaps something can be cobbled together to use it to generate some electricity too.
On another note, I haven't noticed much mention about Al Gore's "Inconvenient" book. Wow! The photos are amazing, and having read a fair amount about GW lately, he really nails it. I found the book to be even better than the "movie". Check it out, even just from a cozy chair at Borders...
We have seen just the first winds of the coming storm of oil prices !
I used this line at the recent Gentilly neighborhood group. I have been searching for good, effective cose words for Peak Oil.
About 70% approval of the 30 or so there; no strong opposition, juat uncertainity among the rest. No real denial.
I was talking about my plans for Elysian Fields; three streetcar tracks with the middle track being an express (stops every 1/2 mile at bus xfer points) in the Peak Direction. Bike paths on each side. Quite nice cityscape.
Strong approval. An apparent willingness to make this a priority for community block grants (leaving some streets in damaged shape or other post-storm damage unrepaired).
Alan,
Could you give a first person perspective on what the local people are saying and feeling about the recent charges filed against the doctor and nurses (and the threat of more charges against other health care practioners)who stayed behind at the cut-off hospitals.
Also, any thoughts from TOD land on how this might affect choices made by health care proffesionals in the next local,regional or national emergency?
Quite frankly, not as big a deal locally as it appears to be nationally. I have heard not one conversation on it. Watch and see what develops later, but really not a major story here.
I get more gasps from outsiders when I tell tham that I get mail two or three times a week (a triviality IMHO) than the more dire circumstance that an ambulance with a chainsaw accident victim aboard may take 15 minutes to unload at our makeshift "emergency room" or that fire protection is minimal. Minimal mental health care is SLOWLY emerging and the police have publically appealed for more (any retired mental health workers out there ?). We seem to have finally found all the dead bodies that we are likely to find (FEMA missed over 100 bodies in their "Search" and refused to pay for a second body search, so the the city has paid for it. We ran out of money at Christmas and restarted with sales taxes from Mardi Gras).
Outsiders seem to have VERY different priorities (gasps that I don't get daily mail delivery) and focusing on this one case; instead of focusing the systemic failures of the federal gov't (US Army & FEMA) than we do. Our priorities are on what is important more than what is sensational.
We do have the best local news I have EVER seen now. They have REALLY stepped up to the plate ! Expanded coverage, factual, hard questions, no "if it bleeds, it leads" on TV. Policy issues are almost always the lead, with gore #2 or #3 story. And even on bloody stories, they try to bring policy into the reporter questions. (Fire story ended with warning about storing paint thinner/stripper & other flammables used in restoration away from house. Buy what you will use in a day or two; not all at once with a smoldering house as a backdrop). Good editorials.
We live with and know people who have devastating losses and traumatic experiences. A relevant example, I know an orthopedic surgeon who stayed behind at Tulane Hospitak who evaced oin Wednesday (Charity Hospital, accross the street, evaced on Thursday). She and the nurses gave themselves IVs to stay hydrated whilst saving the liquids (including soft drinks from machines that they crowbared open) for the patients. Her comment was that IVs did nothing for thirst in 100+ F high humidity heat.
Most emergency workers will be heroes again, some will "bug out".
Yes, I posted it so that others might use it as they see fit.
I wanted a metaphor that was not too technical or threathening but was techically correct and could fit into a single sentence. I thought about it a while and it seems to work well.
Exact knowledge of Russian exports, Ghawar, HL and all that IS NOT NEEDED TO TAKE EFFECTIVE ACTION !
IMO, better action with limited knowledge than exact knowledge and no action. A problem here at TOD IMHO.
Yes, all the data is great for knowing the situation and feeling more comfortable with the conclusion, but at some point you have to break the analysis paralysis and take some actions to prepare.
This is a great thread, thanks Rebecca and Prof. Goose.
So that is east of Gateway ? Where the Red Line merges with the Blue ? (And soon the Green as well) I would have guessed west of Gateway, where it runs next to the Interstate Highway.
I will be staying at the Super 8 in Gresham, two blocks off of the Blue Line from July 29 to August 9th. Attending a hydro conference at the Rose Center, plus a few days after that (meet some people and vacation a copuple of days sinc eI am there anyway.
Perhaps a meeting ?
Your deep station that goes up to the zoo & arborteum (a hike ot the rose gardens) is QUITE neat and it's always cooler up there.
I've done that Oregon Zoo trip three times in the past month, riding up the elevator several hundred feet (it has a digital display of your elevation).
The photo was taken way west of Gateway. It's near Hwy 217, say close to Walker St. in Beaverton. Between the Beaverton and Sunset stations. Man, you might know MAX lines better than me. I had to look this information up!
I'd definitely like to meet up. Start putting faces on the posters to TOD. You can e-mail me at: windrummer [at] aol [dot] com.
Upgraded established tramways (with original dates)
Lille (1874) 1,000,900 191,164
Marseille (1876) 1,349,772 807,071
St. Etienne (1881) 291,960 183,552
The new tramways in France are :(from 1990):
Near Paris 9,644,507 2,147,857 :
T1 (St Denis Bobigny) open : June 30, 1992
T2 (Issy -La Défebse) open : july 1997.
Strasbourg : first line open : Nov 26, 1994; 427,245 267,051
Rouen : first line open : Dec 17, 1994; 389,862 108,758
Montpellier : first line open : July 1, 2000 287,981 229,055
Orléans : first line open : Nov 18, 2000 263,292 116,559
Lyon : first line open : Dec 8, 2000 1,262,223 453,187
Bordeaux : first line open : Dec 2003, 21 696,364 218,948
Future opening :
Mulhouse : Dec 2005 234,445 112,002
Valenciennes : June 2006 357,395 40,275
Le Mans : 2006 NA 150,605
Nice : 2006 888,784 345,892
Marseille : 2007 1,230,936 807,071
Toulon : 2009 519,640 166,442
Financial Nirvana
Renewable Fuels Association
Seeking Alpha
BioConversion blog
Natural Resource Investment Site
Alternative Energy in the 21st Century
Alternative Energy Stocks
Betray the Age
Cut Oil Imports
Enery Crisis Now!
Ethanol 360
Ethanol Alley
Green Car Congress
The Energy Blog
Alternative Energy Blog
Clean Energy Future
Cleantech Blog
Cleantech Investing
Environmental Economics
I want Clean Air
The Energy Blog
World Changing Blog
http://www.homepower.com/
http://www.otherpower.com/
Be sure to check out the Hamster-Powered Night Light With Custom Low-RPM Alternator, it's a hoot!
http://www.otherpower.com/hamster.html
http://gog2g.com/2006/07/26/scary-statistic.aspx
I don't necessarily trust this finding but until proven otherwise I'm sticking with it.
Cheers,
RR
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/D/DEAD_LIVESTOCK?SITE=7219&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAUL T&CTIME=2006-07-26-03-19-01
And let's say it here at TOD:
Global Warming has killed 56 people in California.
Happy motoring!
This is because the regional rendering plant went out of business a few years ago, and we were forced to do something environmentally creative for a change.
My hot water heater is getting older and I started to think about a replacement (rural Minnesota) and I got to thinking about our discussion of Heat Pumps and got to wondering if anyone had ever made a heat pump water heater? A quick "google" gave me the answer. Yes, but they were expensive. There was a gov effort to help develop one that would be affordable. Would use half or less of the electricity used by a standard electric water heater to heat the same amount of water. It would provide dehumidifing in the basement as a "free" side benefit.
With the high (and going higher) price of propane I sure would expend the extra bucks (up to double the price of a standard water heater) to go with a heat pump water heater. I am currently persuing info on availability, prices and COP.
More info here:
http://www.ornl.gov/sci/btc/apps/hotwater.html
More details here
http://www.tanklesswaterheatersdirect.com/shop/tanklesswaterheaters/aquastar/aquastarindex.htm
Good luck!
You will find out...
(OK, I'll spare you the anguish: no way it can properly regulate the temp mitigation)
Any centralized supply increases should be wind/hydro/maybe nuclear/solar based.
I don't see much discussion about "mirror farm" type solar these days, compared to PV panel systems. (i.e. a series of heleostats that focus sunlight on to a central boiler tower)
While PV would seem to be the way to go for equipment installed on / at individual buildings the much lower cost (I would assume) and embedded energy of a mirror, as opposed to an active semiconductor device, would suggest that both in terms of $ cost and EROEI it could be being rolled out a lot more than it is.
What do folks know about the current state of mirror farm technology?
The technology is apparently in use and is likely to grow in usage from what I've seen. The interesting thing about the California plant that caught the eye of factory owners in the northeast was that the facility was willing to guarantee specific rates over much longer time periods than the fossil fuel fired generating plants were willing to do. Electricity price stability was cited as a key factor in determining where to build new factories and this stability suddenly made "green" power more attractive than traditional power.
Stirling Energy Systems
http://www.stirlingenergy.com/
This project's name in Andasol 1. Technolgy comes from a german company which will install the 60 MW project.
Two further solar plants are already planned (for the people who can read german look here
Especially in the european or north american sun belt this technology will be much more feasible. Modern plants use melted salt for transporting the heat to the turbine. By night, this melted salt is being stored in a tank which can propel the water vapor turbine via a heat exchanger. So even in the dark night there is electricity available.
It is said, this technology can become a major technology in the North African areas, supplying this region with really abundant energy which can be transmitted via high voltage lines into the european grid (they say it will be 5 or 6 € cents per kwH including transmission). As well for providing thermal energy for desalination near the coast.
I don't have a link now, but I think in Marocco the king or prince is very fond of this and together with a a german group of scientists and companies they want to bring on this project.
cheers, marotti in berlin
The cost of PV is about 0.4 - 0.5 $/KWh according to this reference, although it is dated. No matter how one argues about the calculations for cost / KWh, PV has some way to go to catch solar thermal plants.
As fossil fuel costs rise, the 10+ cents/kwh for solar thermal will start looking pretty good! The deserts of the southwest could be turned into an energy goldmine.
Note: the efficiency of concentrated-solar power range from 20% for parabolic troughs to 30% for Sterling engine / parabolic dish setups!
Boeing-Spectrolab, under contract to NREL and the Department of Energy, have achieved a record 39% efficiency at a concentration ratio of 236 using triple stacked heterojunction cells and hope to soon push this to 41%. Arrays of tiny 5mm cells on a heat spreader behind fresnel lenses in the Flatcon system developed by the Fraunhofer-Institute for Solar Energy Systems or the system developed by Pyron Solar by allow efficiencies close to the Sterling system with the solar cells occupying only a fraction of a percent of the collecting area. One report on such a system in Spain gave an energy payback time of 8-10 months.
All tracking systems require clear direct sunlight and give very poor performance in diffuse light limiting the areas in the world where they can be used to advantage.
But I think the collapse will render these large-scale projects impossible to carry off, and we'll be left with doing what we can on our own. I plan to find someone with a big TV satellite dish, line it with aluminum foil (I have some nice thick foil for the task), and use it to cook a pot of rice or something. Rig up a weight-driven equatorial mount to follow the sun. Perhaps something can be cobbled together to use it to generate some electricity too.
On another note, I haven't noticed much mention about Al Gore's "Inconvenient" book. Wow! The photos are amazing, and having read a fair amount about GW lately, he really nails it. I found the book to be even better than the "movie". Check it out, even just from a cozy chair at Borders...
I used this line at the recent Gentilly neighborhood group. I have been searching for good, effective cose words for Peak Oil.
About 70% approval of the 30 or so there; no strong opposition, juat uncertainity among the rest. No real denial.
I was talking about my plans for Elysian Fields; three streetcar tracks with the middle track being an express (stops every 1/2 mile at bus xfer points) in the Peak Direction. Bike paths on each side. Quite nice cityscape.
Strong approval. An apparent willingness to make this a priority for community block grants (leaving some streets in damaged shape or other post-storm damage unrepaired).
Could you give a first person perspective on what the local people are saying and feeling about the recent charges filed against the doctor and nurses (and the threat of more charges against other health care practioners)who stayed behind at the cut-off hospitals.
Also, any thoughts from TOD land on how this might affect choices made by health care proffesionals in the next local,regional or national emergency?
I get more gasps from outsiders when I tell tham that I get mail two or three times a week (a triviality IMHO) than the more dire circumstance that an ambulance with a chainsaw accident victim aboard may take 15 minutes to unload at our makeshift "emergency room" or that fire protection is minimal. Minimal mental health care is SLOWLY emerging and the police have publically appealed for more (any retired mental health workers out there ?). We seem to have finally found all the dead bodies that we are likely to find (FEMA missed over 100 bodies in their "Search" and refused to pay for a second body search, so the the city has paid for it. We ran out of money at Christmas and restarted with sales taxes from Mardi Gras).
Outsiders seem to have VERY different priorities (gasps that I don't get daily mail delivery) and focusing on this one case; instead of focusing the systemic failures of the federal gov't (US Army & FEMA) than we do. Our priorities are on what is important more than what is sensational.
We do have the best local news I have EVER seen now. They have REALLY stepped up to the plate ! Expanded coverage, factual, hard questions, no "if it bleeds, it leads" on TV. Policy issues are almost always the lead, with gore #2 or #3 story. And even on bloody stories, they try to bring policy into the reporter questions. (Fire story ended with warning about storing paint thinner/stripper & other flammables used in restoration away from house. Buy what you will use in a day or two; not all at once with a smoldering house as a backdrop). Good editorials.
We live with and know people who have devastating losses and traumatic experiences. A relevant example, I know an orthopedic surgeon who stayed behind at Tulane Hospitak who evaced oin Wednesday (Charity Hospital, accross the street, evaced on Thursday). She and the nurses gave themselves IVs to stay hydrated whilst saving the liquids (including soft drinks from machines that they crowbared open) for the patients. Her comment was that IVs did nothing for thirst in 100+ F high humidity heat.
Most emergency workers will be heroes again, some will "bug out".
I wanted a metaphor that was not too technical or threathening but was techically correct and could fit into a single sentence. I thought about it a while and it seems to work well.
Exact knowledge of Russian exports, Ghawar, HL and all that IS NOT NEEDED TO TAKE EFFECTIVE ACTION !
IMO, better action with limited knowledge than exact knowledge and no action. A problem here at TOD IMHO.
This is a great thread, thanks Rebecca and Prof. Goose.
MAX train going through Beaverton, OR, on its way to Gresham. Lovely!
I located myself just a few blocks from the nearest transit center. MAX is the best way into downtown Portland, as far as I am concerned.
-best,
I will be staying at the Super 8 in Gresham, two blocks off of the Blue Line from July 29 to August 9th. Attending a hydro conference at the Rose Center, plus a few days after that (meet some people and vacation a copuple of days sinc eI am there anyway.
Perhaps a meeting ?
Your deep station that goes up to the zoo & arborteum (a hike ot the rose gardens) is QUITE neat and it's always cooler up there.
The photo was taken way west of Gateway. It's near Hwy 217, say close to Walker St. in Beaverton. Between the Beaverton and Sunset stations. Man, you might know MAX lines better than me. I had to look this information up!
I'd definitely like to meet up. Start putting faces on the posters to TOD. You can e-mail me at: windrummer [at] aol [dot] com.
-best
It seems that every French city of over 250,000 that "voted correctly" is getting a new tram line, and those over 500,000 are getting two.
The French are building at least as much Urban Rail as the US. But French Unions at SCNF seem to be keeping freight on trucks instead of rail.
From an old worksheet
City, Date Opened, Metro Population, City Populstion
Nantes (1985) 544,932 277,728
Grenoble (1987) 419,334 156,203
Upgraded established tramways (with original dates)
Lille (1874) 1,000,900 191,164
Marseille (1876) 1,349,772 807,071
St. Etienne (1881) 291,960 183,552
The new tramways in France are :(from 1990):
Near Paris 9,644,507 2,147,857 :
T1 (St Denis Bobigny) open : June 30, 1992
T2 (Issy -La Défebse) open : july 1997.
Strasbourg : first line open : Nov 26, 1994; 427,245 267,051
Rouen : first line open : Dec 17, 1994; 389,862 108,758
Montpellier : first line open : July 1, 2000 287,981 229,055
Orléans : first line open : Nov 18, 2000 263,292 116,559
Lyon : first line open : Dec 8, 2000 1,262,223 453,187
Bordeaux : first line open : Dec 2003, 21 696,364 218,948
Future opening :
Mulhouse : Dec 2005 234,445 112,002
Valenciennes : June 2006 357,395 40,275
Le Mans : 2006 NA 150,605
Nice : 2006 888,784 345,892
Marseille : 2007 1,230,936 807,071
Toulon : 2009 519,640 166,442
Planned :
Dijon 236,953 153,813
Tours NA 137,046