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State predicts bright future for jobs in solar energy
Joyce Pellino Crane and Chris Reidy, The Boston Globe
The number of jobs in the state’s solar energy industry nearly doubled from 2007 to 2008 – and the numbers are on pace to grow sharply again this year, according to Massachusetts officials.
Ian A. Bowles, secretary of the state’s Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, said he would disclose the numbers today at the trade show Cleantech Forum XXIII. The two-day show opened today at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center.
A survey of nearly 100 solar energy employers in Massachusetts showed the number of jobs in the sector grew from 1,086 in 2007 to 2,075 in 2008, Bowles said. The growth is “indicative of the health and welfare’’ of the local solar energy industry, he added.
Renewable energy initiatives – especially those that are solar-related – have been a key part of Governor Deval Patrick’s push to make Massachusetts a “green’’ energy leader. In June, the state said it plans to use $20 million in federal stimulus money to build about 16 megawatts worth of solar installations in Massachusetts. When Patrick took office, there were 3.5 megawatts of solar power generating capacity in the state. The governor has set a goal to have 250 megawatts of solar capacity by 2017.
(9 Sept 2009)
German Geothermal Project Leads to Second Thoughts After the Earth Rumbles
Nicholas Kulish and James Glanz, New York Times
LANDAU IN DER PFALZ, Germany — Government officials here are reviewing the safety of a geothermal energy project that scientists say set off an earthquake in mid-August, shaking buildings and frightening many residents of this small city.
The geothermal plant, built by Geox, a German energy company, extracts heat by drilling deep into the earth. Advocates of the method say that it could greatly reduce the world’s dependence on fossil fuels by providing a vast supply of renewable energy.
But in recent months, two similar projects have stirred concerns about their safety and their propensity to cause earthquakes. In the United States, the Energy Department is scrutinizing a project in Northern California run by AltaRock Energy to determine if it is safe. (The project was shut down by the company last month because of crippling technical problems.) Another project, in Basel, Switzerland, was shut down after it generated earthquakes in 2006 and 2007 and is awaiting the decision of a panel of experts about whether it can resume.
The Landau project will be allowed to continue operating while the review panel, which held its first meeting last Friday, deliberates. Geox officials initially denied any responsibility for the temblor and continue to dispute the government’s data linking the project to the quake. The panel will, among other things, have to sort through the conflicting data presented by the company and government scientists.
But some experts in the field say they worry that projects like the one in Germany, if the managers deny responsibility for inducing earthquakes or play down the effects on people’s lives, could damage the reputation of geothermal energy, even in highly environmentally conscious areas of the world like California or Western Europe.
(11 September 2009)
Trees could be the ultimate in green power
Colin Barras, New Scientist
Shoving electrodes into tree trunks to harvest electricity may sound like the stuff of dreams, but the idea is increasingly attracting interest. If we can make it work, forests could power their own sensor networks to monitor the health of the ecosystem or provide early warning of forest fires.
Children the world over who have tried the potato battery experiment know that plant material can be a source of electricity. In this case, the energy comes from reduction and oxidation reactions eating into the electrodes, which are made of two different metals – usually copper and zinc.
The same effect was thought to lie behind claims that connecting electrodes driven into a tree trunk and the ground nearby can provide a current. But last year Andreas Mershin’s team at MIT showed that using electrodes made of the same metal also gives a current, meaning another effect must be at work. Mershin thinks the electricity derives from a difference in pH between the tree and the soil, a chemical imbalance maintained by the tree’s metabolic processes…
(10 Sept 2009)
Renewables Transition 3: The Precautionary Principle
Jeff Vail, The Oil Drum
In the first two posts in this series (1 and 2), I discussed the requirements and challenges of transitioning our global economy to renewable sources of energy. My interim conclusion was that there are serious doubts about our ability to affect any significant transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. Much of this uncertainty is the result of uncertain systemic energy return on energy invested. In other words, when all inputs are taken into account—as must be done where we’re talking about shifting energy sources on a civilizational level—can a world powered by solar and wind power itself the way it has on oil, gas, and coal?
The key take away is precisely this uncertainty: we simply don’t know if renewables—either current or potential future technology—will be up for the job. Where does that leave us? This discussion—and many others related to Peak Oil—is really a matter of what is known as the “Precautionary Principle,” or what degree of consensus is required before we embark on a course of action that may result in irreversible harm. Because the Precautionary Principle has such broad application in discussions of Peak Oil, I’ve modeled this post as a discussion of the principle itself, using the issue of renewables transition as but one example of its application.
What is the Precautionary Principle? The simple definition states that if an action or policy might cause severe or irreversible harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of a scientific consensus that harm would not ensue, the burden of proof falls on those who would advocate taking the action
While the Precautionary Principle is traditionally framed in terms of proactive but unacceptably risky decisions, it can also be expressed in the converse as a need to avoid inaction. Principle 15 of the United Nations’ Rio Declaration states that “[i]n order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied by States according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”..
(15 Sept 2009)
Hawaii Tries Green Tools in Remaking Power Grids
Felicity Barringer, The New York Times
Two miles or so from this tiny town in the southernmost corner of the United States, across ranches where cattle herds graze beneath the distant Mauna Loa volcano, the giant turbines of a new wind farm cut through the air.
Sixty miles to the northeast, near a spot where golden-red lava streams meet the sea in clouds of steam, a small power plant extracts heat from the volcanic rock beneath it to generate electricity.
These projects are just a slice of the energy experiment unfolding across Hawaii’s six main islands. With the most diverse array of alternative energy potential of any state in the nation, Hawaii has set out to become a living laboratory for the rest of the country, hoping it can slash its dependence on fossil fuels while keeping the lights on.
Every island has at least one energy accent: waves in Maui, wind in Lanai and Molokai, solar panels in Oahu and eventually, if all goes well, biomass energy from crops grown on Kauai. Here on the Big Island of Hawaii, seawater is also being converted to electricity…
(14 Sept 2009)
Schwarzenegger orders more renewable energy — his way
Marc Lifsher, Los Angeles Times
The state’s electric utilities will be required to get at least a third of their power from wind, solar and other renewable resources by 2020, under an executive order signed Tuesday by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
“With this action, we will ensure that California remains the pioneer in clean energy and clean jobs,” the governor said in issuing the order.
But his call for California to set the nation’s toughest renewable energy standard didn’t generate much enthusiasm from Democratic lawmakers and environmentalist activists, who have labored for the last nine months to pass a pair of bills that they contended would boost the development of new “green” industries in the Golden State.
Schwarzenegger said Tuesday that he would veto the Democratic bills, which were backed by some but not all of the state’s utilities…
(16 Sept 2009)
