China to replace coal by wind and solar energy, by 2030
China has already demonstrated what’s in store by reducing the cost of solar PV modules so much that they are now commonplace on roofs across the mortgage belt suburbs of Australia. Between one-in-10 and even as much as one-in-three households now have solar PV systems installed in the outer metropolitan suburbs of Sydney, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and Melbourne as well as several regional cities. Such an outcome wasn’t even dreamt about by the most wildly optimistic greenie just four years ago.
What Japan did for home entertainment equipment, China will do for clean energy
Wind & solar outpace coal in China by 2030 – Bloomberg Tristan Edis 28 Aug 13, Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) has released analysis which finds renewables will make up more than half of new power capacity growth in China to 2030, across a variety of plausible scenarios. By 2030 total installed capacity of renewable energy power plants will equal that of coal.
This study sought to examine how technological and economic changes might realistically alter the make-up and growth of China’s power sector. They found that coal’s dominance will be challenged by:
– faster technological improvement and cost reductions achieved by renewable energy technologies;
– increased social concern and, consequently, government regulation over environmental pollution;
– the prospects of shale gas, and;
– a potential price on carbon emissions. Continue reading
America could get to 75% renewable energy quite quickly
Billions of solar panels and millions of wind turbines
The good news is we are already getting these.
With An ‘All-Out’ Federal Renewable Energy Strategy, How Long Before We Could Be 100% Renewably Powered?, Forbes, Mark Rogowsky, Internet Entrepeneur, 22 Aug 13, Probably 20-30 years to get to 70-80%, but 80 years to get the last 20-30%.
Let’s clarify that the assumption here is that the United States actually decides to do this per the hypothetical. That means that for whatever reason, the politics has shifted massively from where it currently stands. There are a lot of roadblocks to 100% renewable energy, but relatively few toward mostly renewable energy — assuming you’ve solved the politics problem. Here’s what you need:
An integrated long-distance grid
You’ll be carrying a lot of wind from the Midwest, possibly from offshore in the East, and tons of solar from the Southwest long distances. So you’re going to want much better long-distance power lines, maybe even with superconducting trunks. This will let you use Arizona’s 5 pm sun to power Florida’s air conditioners at 8 pm. Is this trivial? No. Is it technologically impossible? Absolutely not.
Millions of electric cars
We use a lot of non-renewable fuel for transportation. We’re going to need electric vehicles to fix that. Continue reading
Solar energy shiningin Japan, amidst its nuclear nightmare
Japan Adds 2+ Gigawatts Of Solar PV by Energy Matters, 22 Aug 13, Japan’s love affair with solar blossoms while a massive radioactive contamination threat still looms large.
Renewable energy facilities that commenced operations during Japan’s 2012 fiscal year (1 April 2012 to March 31 2013) totaled 2.08 gigawatts capacity, equivalent to two nuclear reactors, said the nation’s Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry.
Of the 2.08 gigawatts, 1.98 gigawatts was contributed by residential, commercial and utility scale solar PV.
The Ministry describes Japan’s shift towards a renewable future as “smooth”, with an additional 1.28 gigawatts of renewables added to the nation’s energy infrastructure in April and May this year.
All told, the amount of renewable capacity approved between July 2012 and March this year was 21.09 gigawatts, meaning far more is yet to be built.
While solar is enjoying smooth sailing, the country’s nuclear industry is experiencing anything but; with crisis after crisis occurring at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power station…… http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3905
Breakthrough in solar energy storage battery
No Mem-Brainer Flow Battery Delivers Big http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3904 23 Aug 13, A palm-sized experimental flow battery developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers has the potential to solve intermittency challenges in utility-scale renewable energy systems.
The MIT team has engineered a prototype flow battery storage system without the expensive membrane usually required. Continue reading
Contrary to mainstream media propaganda, renewable energy is growing fast
national media sentiment towards the renewable energy industry is overwhelmingly negative and neglects the voice of the industry. I should imagine similar findings are likely in Australia.
Fundamentally, a green future is inevitable and the next industrial revolution will be low carbon. Why? Because clean technology is fast becoming recognised as lower cost financially, socially and environmentally than carbon dense alternatives. The sooner it’s recognised as the low cost political road too the better.
Has Europe pulled the plug on renewables? http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2013/8/21/renewable-energy/has-europe-pulled-plug-renewables#ixzz2cjFBwgch
First, Peiser is incorrect to say that green growth is dwindling. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Continue reading
Wind turbines getting quieter, cleaner, and cheaper
Quieter Wind Turbines = More Power http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3898 20 Aug 13 GE has been conducting research into new low-noise wind turbine blade design. It’s not about addressing infrasound – which has already been shown not to be an issue in areas surrounding wind farms – it’s all about producing more power.
“There’s no question, aerodynamic noise is a key constraint in wind turbine blade design today”, says Mark Jonkhof, Wind Technology Platform Leader at GE Global Research.
“By using high-performance computing (HPC) to advance current engineering models that are used to predict blade noise, we can build quieter rotors with greater blade tip velocity that produce more power. This not only means lower energy costs for consumers, but also a significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.”
Aerodynamic noise refers to the “swooshing” sound created as the leading edge of a turbine blade moves through the air. GE predicts that a mere one decibel drop in this sound would lead to an annual two percent increase in power per turbine. With an estimated 240 gigawatts of wind power to come online globally over the next five years, GE says this would be the equivalent of 5 gigawatts of added wind energy capacity.
The company currently uses wind tunnel technology to test the noise levels of its wind turbines, as well as on-site acoustic tests at wind farms; but new computer modelling has advanced these techniques.
The GE team partnered with Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico, spending three months running high-fidelity Large Eddy Simulations (LES) on a single wind blade section with the lab’s Red Mesa supercomputer. The LES system and resulting analysis provided fresh insight about airflow over wind turbines and will play a key role in building the next generation of quiet turbine blades.
“Having access to Sandia’s supercomputer was invaluable in our ability to conduct these experiments and make discoveries that will bolster wind power’s potential. Access and availability to HPC resources offers a critical advantage to companies trying to compete in a global environment.”
Every 4 minutes A Solar System Is Installed in the US
A Solar System Is Installed in the US Every 4 Minutes http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/america-installs-a-solar-system-every-four-minutes The industry will soon install one solar system every minute and a half. STEPHEN LACEY: AUGUST 19, 2013
A lot happens in America every four minutes. During that short time period, 30 babies areborn, 4,080 McDonald’s Big Macs are consumed, and 48,000 tons of CO2 are emitted.
And as it turns out, the U.S. is now installing one solar photovoltaic (PV) system every four minutes as well. If market growth continues at its current pace, the American solar industry could be installing a system every minute and twenty seconds by 2016. That’s a dramatic difference from 2006, when installers were only putting up one system every 80 minutes. Shayle Kann, vice president of GTM Research, documents the accelerating speed of solar deployment in the chart below:
It may not quite match Big Mac sales yet, but solar is on an extraordinarily fast growth trajectory. According to figures from GTM Research, two-thirds of all distributed solar in the U.S. has been installed over the last 2 1/2 years. And by 2016, cumulative installations of distributed PV will double.
That means the U.S. will hit 1 million cumulative residential solar installations by then — making the market in 2016 ten times larger than it was in 2010. For more information on American solar trends, check out the U.S. Solar Market Insight Report from GTM Research and SEIA.
Japan buying lots of solar panels
REC Supplies 15,000+ Panels To Japanese Solar Farms, by Energy Matters. 20 Aug 13, REC is continuing to make its presence felt in Japan, with 2 new solar farms using REC Peak Energy Series solar panels.
The 2.5 MW Toyobo Mie (Kusu) C-Energy plant; located in Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture, started operation last month and is expected to generate 2.5 million kWh of electricity annually.
The second REC-based installation is a ground-mounted 1.3 MW array situated at the Research Institute in Ohtsu City, Shiga Prefecture. Construction of that facility began last month and will be completed in December.
Japan is becoming a lucrative market for REC, with 29 percent of REC’s solar panel shipments heading to the nation in the second quarter of 2013….. http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3897
Reliable and cheap renewable energy storage
Rechargeable flow batteries could be cheaper solution to renewable energy storage http://www.treehugger.com/clean-technology/rechargeable-flow-batteries-could-be-cheaper-solution-renewable-energy-storage.html Megan Treacy August 19, 2013 Researchers at MIT have developed a battery that could bring us reliable and cheap large scale energy storage. Based on flow battery technology, the researchers took out the costly membrane and created a battery that has a power density that is an order of magnitude higher than lithium-ion batteries and three times greater than other membrane-less systems.
MIT reports, “The device stores and releases energy in a device that relies on a phenomenon called laminar flow: Two liquids are pumped through a channel, undergoing electrochemical reactions between two electrodes to store or release energy. Under the right conditions, the solutions stream through in parallel, with very little mixing. The flow naturally separates the liquids, without requiring a costly membrane.”
The reactants used are liquid bromine and hydrogen fuel, which is cheap, but also has had issues with breaking down the membrane in other flow batteries. By taking out the membrane they were able to speed up energy storage and extend the life of the battery.
“Here, we have a system where performance is just as good as previous systems, and now we don’t have to worry about issues of the membrane,” says Martin Bazant, a professor of chemical engineering. “This is something that can be a quantum leap in energy-storage technology.”
As we bring more renewable technologies like wind and solar into the grid, affordable and reliable energy storage is increasingly important. While solar and wind energy output varies based on weather conditions, large scale energy storage systems can smooth out the power delivery from those technologies by storing any excess energy when it’s produced and using it when the output is lower or demand is higher.
“Energy storage is the key enabling technology for renewables,” says Cullen Buie, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering. “Until you can make [energy storage] reliable and affordable, it doesn’t matter how cheap and efficient you can make wind and solar, because our grid can’t handle the intermittency of those renewable technologies.”
MIT says, “Braff built a prototype of a flow battery with a small channel between two electrodes. Through the channel, the group pumped liquid bromine over a graphite cathode and hydrobromic acid under a porous anode. At the same time, the researchers flowed hydrogen gas across the anode. The resulting reactions between hydrogen and bromine produced energy in the form of free electrons that can be discharged or released.
The researchers were also able to reverse the chemical reaction within the channel to capture electrons and store energy — a first for any membraneless design.”
Now that the team’s experiments have lined up with their computer models, they’re focused on scaling up the technology and seeing how it performs. They predict that the technology will be able to produce energy costing as little as $100/kWh, which would make it the cheapest large scale energy storage system built yet.
Renewable energy creates many more jobs than there are in fossil fuel energy
Debunking the Renewables “Disinformation Campaign”, Mother Earth News, Despite vast evidence supporting the advancement of renewable energy, various media outlets insist on denying its progress, blurring the lines between inefficient reporting and deliberate lying. By Rocky Mountain Institute August 19, 2013 “……..a recent study commissioned by Germany’s Federal Environment Ministry found that the renewable energy sector provided around 382,000 jobs in 2011, up four percent in a year, and more than doubled in seven years. More jobs have been created than lost in Germany’s energy sector—plus any jobs gained as heavy industry moves to Germany for its competitive electricity.
Yet a myth persists that countries lose more jobs then they gain when they transition to renewables. This upside-down fantasy rests largely on a 2009 study from King Juan Carlos University in Spain, by an economist reportedly tied to ExxonMobil, the Heartland Institute, and the Koch brothers. His study asserted that, on average, every renewable energy job in Spain destroys 2.2 jobs in the broader Spanish economy. This story was picked up by news media around the world and is still promoted by U.S. anti-renewables groups. But its methodology and assumptions were promptly demolished by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Spanish government, among others. A 2012 report for the International Labour Organization (ILO) even cites Spain, which built a renewable export industry, as a counterexample: “The green economy presents a good opportunity to increase competitiveness, promote the creation of quality employment and reduce the economy’s environmental impact,” says Joaquín Nieto, who heads the ILO Office in Madrid, especially “when Spain needs to kick-start its economy.” Sure enough, despite new electricity taxes and a halt to subsidies for new renewable projects, Spain’s latest solar projects continue to be built to compete without subsidy.
The disinformation campaign about job creation is not limited to Europe. A Cato Institute article claimed that if people believe a commitment to renewables will fuel job growth “we’re in a lot of trouble.” Yet in 2012 alone, more than 110,000 new U.S. clean-energy direct jobs were created, and in 2010, the U.S. had more jobs in the “clean economy” than in the fossil-fuel industries. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that direct employment in May 2012 totaled 181,580 for oil and gas extraction, 87,520 for coal mining, and 93,200 for iron and steel production. BLS doesn’t similarly classify solar or wind jobs, but reputable analysts have determined from bottom-up industry surveys that in September 2012, for example, the U.S. had 119,016 direct solar jobs (89 percent full-time, the rest at least half-time), up 27 percent in two years—more than in steel-making or coal-mining. Had you heard that before? Why not? …….. http://www.motherearthnews.com/renewable-energy/debunking-the-renewables-disinformation-campaign-zm0z1308zsal.aspx#axzz2cYi1w7VS
Europe to develop cross-border electrical grids, as renewable eneergy grows
Demand for renewable energy will drive Europe transmission market 08/08/2013 By Editors of Electric Light & Power/ POWERGRID International
Key European countries, including Germany, France, U.K., Norway, Italy, Ireland and France, will spend substantial sums on grid expansion and upgrade programs in order increase security of electricity supply, deploy smart gridtechnology and accommodate new sources of power generation — particularly renewable energy……..
“Europe is expected to invest heavily in the establishment of transmission infrastructure as it strives to create cross-border grid interconnections and harness the energy generated from renewable sources around the continent,” http://www.elp.com/articles/2013/8/demand-for-renewable-energy-will-drive-europe-transmission-market0.html
President Obama finally allows return of solar panels to the White House
Finally: Obama Green Lights Solar Panels on White House
Details are not yet final, but President Obama has finally allowed retrofitting the White House roof to allow for solar panels. No, this is not a plot from HBO’s hit series Veep: it is finally happening. The final total of panels will range between 20 and 50 solar panels according to Think Progress and the Washington Post—perhaps enough to power a few flat screen TVs or power the equivalent of 15 seconds of flight on Air Force One.
It is a step that is surely attracting all kinds of buzz in and outside of Washington, DC, one either seen as a token effort, a sign of leadership on sustainability, or as a yawner. The installation falls on the heels of a 2010 promise Obama had made to install a rooftop solar system. http://www.enn.com/green_building/article/46324
Germany- a World Leader in Solar, Wind and Health
Germany is leading the charge to economic self sufficiency through a massive nationwide network of wind and solar, recycling, high efficiency cars, self-grown food, cultivating wild plants (weeds), respecting nature and sensible living. Raw Food speaker Markus Rothkranz takes you on an inspirational tour of one of the world’s cleanest, most mature advanced countries, on a 200 mph train!
Clean wind power to help boost dirty nuclear weapons in USA
Nuclear Wind The government’s largest wind farm is to be used to generate electricity for atomic bombs. TIME By Mark Thompson @MarkThompson_DCAug. 14, 2013 The Obama Administration is building the nation’s biggest wind farm to generate electricity to help…assemble the nation’s nuclear arsenal.
It’s boasting of the great environmental stewardship the project represents – breezes for bombs? — and has contracted with Siemens USA, the American subsidiary of a German company, for the wind turbines at the heart of the operation.
The government broke ground Tuesday for the Pantex Renewable Energy Project. When finished next summer, it will include five 2.3 megawatt wind turbines on 1,500 acres of government-owned property east of the Pantex plant in the Texas panhandle…….
The wind farm “will be funded by the energy savings guaranteed by Siemens,” Pantex says – an estimated $50 million over 18 years.
Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/14/nuclear-wind/#ixzz2c5WBzzzc
Solar powered drone flies for 9 hours
Weighing just under 6 kilograms, the drone features ultra thin and light gallium arsenide solar cells manufactured by Alta Devices.
“Our integration of this cutting-edge technology dramatically increases Puma’s current flight endurance using a clean, renewable power source,” said Roy Minson, AeroVironment senior vice president and general manager, Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS).
The new battery extends Puma AE’s non-solar endurance to more than three hours.
The solar Puma AE is a hand-launched vehicle designed for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) operations. While its military and law enforcement applications are obvious, it also can be used to assist in environmental monitoring, fire-fighting and search and rescue efforts…… http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=3888
1 This Month
petition to oppose the rapid increase of space-military industry threatening Jeju Island and the region.
[Petition by April 19th (KST)] Stop the joint military-Hanwha Systems-Jeju Provincial Government Sea Launch!
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
of the week–London Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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