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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

I’ve been lucky enough to derive so much pleasure from business travel – and to conduct so much business during personal trips — that I long ago ceased to try to separate the two.

Case in point: this trip back East for Christmas, where I carved out an hour and a half to meet with the CEO of Momentum Dynamics, less than an hour’s drive from my family’s home in the suburbs of Philadelphia.

Momentum Dynamics offers breakthrough technology in inductive (versus conductive) charging. For those scratching their heads here, we find this concept implemented in today’s electric toothbrushes, which are charged miraculously by merely replacing the brush – sans metal contacts — back into its base unit. Unbeknownst to the user, it sits there next to a modulating magnetic field that induces an electric current to flow into a conductive circuit within the toothbrush, recharging the battery. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Nuclear

Global nuclear capacity has remained flat in growth in the last decade, the worldwide operational installed capacity increased insignificantly from 370 GWe at the end of 2005 to 375 GWe at the end of 2010. Nuclear capacity in the OECD countries peaked in 2006 at 2,259 TWh and declined to 2,136 TWh in 2009. A severe earth quake and tsunami in March 2011 that ravaged the pacific coast of northern Japan resulted in devastating incident in Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Following this incidence several countries have announced safety reviews of their nuclear power programmes. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

Over a cold beverage during the holidays, my brother Geoff (terrific person) came to ask me about my level of satisfaction with what I’m doing here at 2GreenEnergy. “It’s a mixed bag,” I told him, candidly. “It’s a combination of experiences that, depending on which day you ask me, could be:

• Deeply rewarding, as we’ve helped move countless cleantech deals forward – in fact, many more than I’m directly aware of,

• Fantastically frustrating, in that this project – and the adoption of cleantech generally — is moving far more slowly than I possibly could have imagined given the urgency, or  (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Are you familiar with our surveys here, in which we ask readers to weigh in on the important topics of the day?

Please consider and comment on the following set of ideas, which I’ll send out as soon as I get it finalized, to get your take on where we’re headed as a species.  I intend to get folks to provide their level of agreement on a scale of 1 – 5, on the following propositions:

◊ The global economy will probably recover after the resolution of the U.S. recession, the European debt crisis, and other immediate woes — and a period of sustained growth is likely to follow.

◊ Technological innovation will outpace population growth, the depletion of resources, and man’s impact on the natural environment.

◊ Mankind will gain a better understanding of the impact it’s made on the natural environment, which will significantly raise awareness of our need to reduce, re-use, and recycle – as well as drive innovation in clean tech.

◊ We’re likely to enter an indefinite period of negative economic growth, created by our civilization’s having “hit the wall” with respect to scarcities in energy, water, and food, which are likely to have horrific consequences in the forms of wars, social chaos, and class divisiveness.

◊ Yes, such scarcities are likely, but they will force everyone, rich and poor, to do more with less. But that’s really not such a bad thing, as it will force us all closer to nature, hard work, and the roots of true happiness.

◊ We’re very likely to experience one or more cataclysms of Biblical proportions between now and 2015: a huge nuclear accident, clear evidence of a runaway rise in Earth’s temperature and sea levels, a complete meltdown in the international banking system, “World War III,” or something of that scale.

◊ Though things may get bad, human dignity and kindness will prevail, as exemplified by the aftermath of 9/11, where the incidence of mutual support was hundreds of times greater than that of looting. I.e., in situations like these, people are far more likely to help one another than to take advantage of them.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

To wrap our wits around where we truly are as a species and who we need to be to avoid the brunt of the catastrophes heading our way in the 21st Century, let’s observe: How do we actually behave with respect to our consumption of energy?

The answer, generally, is that only a very small minority of people have gotten the  message that what they’re doing matters.  Almost no one thinks before turning on a light:  “I can flip this switch if it’s really too dark to see, and it’s OK to spend that energy if I need to.  But if I don’t need to, I shouldn’t, because the world will be a slightly better place if I don’t.”   Or: “I could open this (petroleum-derived) plastic container of creamer for my coffee, but isn’t there an open jug of milk within easy reach?”  Or: “Walk or ride?” “Bike or car?” — or the dozens of other choices we make on a  minute-to-minute basis.  Very few people have gotten the message that their personal decisions to use energy actually matter — that they come at a cost to all of us — and worse, that this cost is far higher than we had previously imagined.

Perhaps we can liken this behavioral issue to littering.  (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

On the cover of the current edition of Bill McKibben’s “Eaarth” is this quote from Barbara Kingsolver:  “Read it, please.  Straight through to the end.  Whatever else you were planning to do next, nothing could be more important.”  That’s quite a statement, but I have to say that I agree.  As close to all this as I am, I have to admit that I didn’t realize how convoluted — yet at the same time, so critically important — these issues of international relations are as they relate to environmental sustainabililty.

It may be too late to get back the Earth we had 100 years ago (thus the moniker “Eaarth”), but it’s not too late to avert the utter catastrophe that we’re most certainly facing if we pretend that our current energy-related practices can be continued indefinitely.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

To my shame, I’m just now getting around to Bill McKibben’s masterpiece “Eaarth.”  It’s one of those works one reads and wishes there were a way to make required reading for everyone.  Not only is he arguably the most visible and important environmentalist of our times, he writes in a supremely warm and accessible way — engaging, but at the same time precise.  If you haven’t picked up a copy, I urge you: don’t let another day go by.  

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

My family and I are out of here tomorrow morning, and back on the 27th. It’s our annual pilgrimage back to Philadelphia, cradle of the Union – ironic to be sure, given my recent writing on how sadly corrupt has become the democracy we so treasure.

I’ll be driving my rent-a-car north from the airport just east of the Liberty Bell when I’ll hear Ben Franklin calling through the centuries:

The bravest and brightest of us here in the late Eighteenth Century worked hard to establish a democratic republic for your liberty and prosperity. We struggled mightily amongst ourselves for quite a while to draft and approve a Constitution that we thought would protect you forever from greedy criminals.  Yes, we knew that there would be a never-ending procession of ruthless and increasingly powerful people who we knew would never tire in their attempts to exploit this freedom, at the expense of turning mankind back in the direction of the Dark Ages, rather than forward to even greater lights of wisdom, justice, and happiness for all.

Until recently, I believed that we had succeeded, but now it appears we fell short.  Looks like that Citizens United decision was the nail in the coffin.  I still can’t believe that happened.  If you can’t overturn that somehow, it looks like I will have failed you. Sorry.  Over and out.

Having said that, there is hope. And it lies in you and me. Let’s never give up. Stand up for what you believe.  Do it for yourself, your countrymen, for Ben.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

Frequent commenter Glenn Doty writes:

What would really be nice is an infographic comparing the cost of mitigating CO2 with various alternatives… just to put the different alternatives into proper perspective.

For instance, how much more does it cost to abate CO2 emissions by setting up a rooftop solar panel in NJ as compared to installing additional insulation in an office building in Texas or setting up a wind farm in the Dakotas?

This would be extremely instructional to your readers in terms of what policies would make more sense… and it would be fun to look at how you graph the negative CO2 abatement value of EV’s.

I respond:

Ha! I was reading along here, wondering when you were going to make your point about EVs, and lo! (a good word for the season), there it was.

Seriously, please send me a high-level treatment of your reasoning.

At a minimum, there are two things I don’t get. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

I’ll be in Europe from April 26th through May 10th, 2012, attending conferences, meeting colleagues known to me now only through Skype, and conducting interviews for my third book, “Renewable Energy – Following the Money.” In fact, including a robust European presence in the book is vital to telling the story.  Where investors may be sitting on the sidelines in the U.S., this is most certainly not the case elsewhere in the world. Europe is proving to be a critically important part of the world in this regard — both for implementing existing clean energy technologies, and as a breeding ground for innovation as well.

Let me take this opportunity to ask you for suggestions. I’ll have plenty of time between conferences and strolls up the Champs Elysees. If you have any connections to people who are in the process of making a difference in the deployment of renewables in Europe, please let me know, and I’ll try to arrange to meet them.

I plan to start in Paris, then head east and south, winding up in Rome.  Having said that, detours are always possible.  I’d like to speak with entrepreneurs, investors, leaders in government, executives in the energy and automotive industries, top consultants and industry analysts, as well as those directly related to finance and the economy.  Tres bien.

 

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