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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

I’m really excited about our free webinar this month at 2GreenEnergy. At 1 PM EDT next Wednesday, May 18th, I’ll be interviewing senior physicist Dr. David Doty, who brings together quite a few key attributes into one package:

  • Extra-ordinarily deep understanding of the world energy scene and economic realities that put limits on potential answers
  • Great communication skills – can explain all this in a way that doesn’t make people’s eyes glaze over
  • Doesn’t leave the audience suicidal with pessimism – actually presents a credible solution

But exactly how credible is it? And how solid are his assumptions? (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

I was amused at the remarks of BMW’s spokesperson Tom Kowaleski when I talked to him two years ago about the company’s initial foray into the EV market with the Mini E. He snickered when I asked if he’d consider sponsoring the website I had recently joined as a junior partner, EVWorld.com. “Craig, I have about 800 of these cars to lease, the same year I’ll be trying to sell a thousand times that number with internal combustion engines. Where do you think my attention is?” he chuckled.

I got the joke instantly.  These guys didn’t get where they are by taking their eyes off the ball financially.  And here, it looks like BMW’s attention hasn’t moved too far in the intervening 24 months. According to Greenbeat,

“The ActiveE isn’t going directly on the market, like the Nissan Leaf or the Tesla Roadster — instead BMW will lease about 700 cars out for $500 a month over 2 years. …. BMW said the car can accelerate from 0 to 60 miles per hour in about 9 seconds. The Nissan Leaf, another plug-in electric car, can accelerate from 0 to 60 in about 7 seconds based on independent testing. BMW is known as a manufacturer of performance vehicles, so some critics question why the company didn’t create an electric car with more power….”

Sorry, guys, maybe I’m missing something, but it still doesn’t seem like you’re trying too hard.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

As I continue to organize my new book of clean energy, it looks like I’ll be opening with a bit of history. The truth is that the struggle to control the world’s energy supply has dominated the agendas of world leaders and captains of industry for more than a century; in fact, what we see here today is just the next logical battle in a war that has been raging since our great grandparents’ generation.

I want to begin with words like: “Sadly, only a few people know enough about world history to understand how deeply the world’s most powerful economic and political forces are tied to the energy scene.”  Then I want to present about 25 pages of material — enough to make the point and prove the case, but not so much to burden the reader with more on the subject than he needs or wants to know.

To develop this passage, I’d sure like to interview Robert Newman, the British historian, social critic, and comedian.  As I wrote last year here, if our civilization has a chance here, it will be because people like him had insight into the truth, had the guts to tell it, and possessed the talent to do it in a way that people actually enjoy.

For those who may not be aware of Newman’s contributions, pour yourself a cup of coffee, or a glass of good wine (depending on the time of day), click on the link above and settle in for 45 minutes that I promise you’ll never forget. My advice: be braced to laugh through the tears; Newman is hilarious, but be prepared to learn about the realities of the history of oil, and their terrible consequences to our modern world.

And if you happen to know the guy personally, please send him my way.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Wind Energy

I try to follow some of the international news scene on renewables, as well as what’s happening (or not happening) here, domestically. The common thread to most of this is that a great deal of the rest of the world has long since stopped bickering about climate change, and is actively embracing substantive actions to deal with its realities.

Earlier today, the UK’s Committee on Climate Change reported that renewable energy should “make a major contribution to decarbonising the UK economy over the next decades. (They) conclude that a renewable energy share of around 30% by 2030 would be appropriate, with scope for a higher share (e.g. up to 45%) depending on the extent to which renewable technology costs fall and possible constraints on deployment of low-carbon alternatives.”

Rather than moaning and calling one another names, the UK seems excited about the 50,000 new jobs that will be created as they build out a huge commitment to offshore wind.  They seem strangely united behind a cause. Go figure.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Solar Thermal

Thanks to all those who wrote in commenting, or requesting more information on Ahura Energy, the folks with the claim to breakthrough CSP cost/efficiency. I should have mentioned that I’m under NDA re: the technology. And, though the company’s founder and I have talked in vague terms about the “secret sauce,” I’m still not 100% clear on it. I hope to see a demo later in the month, and I’ll certainly provide as much information as I can asap.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Hydrokinetics

What’s going on in the U.S. with Hydropower?  

The Departments of Energy (DOE) and the Interior announced this month, in April 2011, that $26.6 million in funding to advance hydropower technology has been designated. The studies will focus on innovative and efficient systems that reduce costs and increase renewable power generation at sites not previously considered. This fits in with finding solutions for the aggressive plan to meet 80% of U.S. energy by 2035.

(more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Energy Storage

As a part of our recent discussion on energy storage, Larry Sobel wrote in, calling my attention to this fabulous lecture given by a brilliant and thoroughly entertaining chemistry professor at MIT, who calls upon his students to think differently and go against the grain with respect to developing solutions for grid-level energy storage. As the professor reminds us, storage is the key enabler for the deployment of renewables to make it to base load, as we need to address their intermittence.

The key point here in thinking differently is refusing to pay for attributes you don’t need, since cost is king here; batteries that were invested portable applications are not scaleable at cost; we cannot string together batteries that were invented for laptops, cell phones, or even electric vehicles. Cell phones need to be idiot proof, and to operate in a temperature range that is comfortable when held in one’s hand. Car batteries need to be crash-worthy.

But stationary batteries for utility scale storage need to have none of these characteristics. So what do you get when you throw away the attributes you don’t care about? I hope you’ll check out the lecture.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Energy Storage

Frequent commenter Frank Eggers is right as rain with his comments on my recent solar thermal piece in which he writes:

Superior (technology) would not solve the problem resulting from the fact that the sun is not always shining. …. Instead of concentrating only on the solar generation of electricity, 2GreenEnergy should also cover power storage systems without which solar power would remain impractical, (including) batteries, water pumped to a higher elevation, air compressed into underground caverns, flywheel storage, storing heat in tanks containing a mixture of KNO3 and NaNO3.

Thank you, Frank. While we try to cover storage technologies to some degree, there is no doubt that we could always do a better and more thorough job. And this subject will be increasingly important as the penetration of renewables grows over time. At under 2% (the current penetration rate), I really think it’s fairly meaningless. But yes, as we get into the teens and higher, it will be vital — and it’s never too early to start addressing the problem.

I believe you’ll be interested in this month’s free webinar, featuring Dr. David Doty, an extremely senior physicist whom I’ll be interviewing on this very subject. He has a unique approach and capability in synthetic (liquid) fuels that I find compelling. I hope you’ll agree.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

I thought readers may be interested in the response I got from two dedicated EV buffs (both partners of mine at EVWorld Associates – see bios here) when I asked them why they favored the electric version of the Ford Focus (to be released later this year) over the Nissan LEAF.

Mike Brace wrote:

All of the drivers’ reviews that I have read have had nothing but good things to say about it. Fit, trim, finish, electronics, all better than the Nissan. More importantly, the Focus is using water temperature-controlled batteries. That way they stay warm [while plugged in for charge] on cold days, cold on hot days and it serves a more effective means of temperature control than air-cooled batteries so it gets better range, especially on cold days. From what I have read it has a better BMS because of it. That system also offers a way to heat the cabin and draw less current doing so. I also like the regen-braking algorithm it uses to coach better driving techniques. I favor it for two more reasons (strictly my own preferences) a) I prefer the styling compared to the Nissan, and b) I have always been a Ford man.

I don’t think they gave it the hype that Chevy gave the Volt. As a matter of fact I have been surprised how they have managed to keep it off the TV and out of the press. But according to the industry it will be on the road by the end of the year.

….and Doug Nelson followed on:

I have a bit of knowledge about the EV powertrain in the Focus also. Magna E-Car systems and Magna Powertrain are sponsors of EcoCAR (and now also EcoCAR 2), and are the supplier of the motor/inverter system and transmission used in the Focus EV.  They recently had the components on display at both our spring workshop at EPA and then SAE Congress. They may supply some of the drive systems to teams for EcoCAR 2 – if they can get by the IP issues.　

I have talked with them about the systems, and they seem to be very good and capable.　 They also seem to know what they are doing – which is why Ford selected them. I want one too!!!

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Solar Thermal

My drive up to the Bay Area yesterday included a meeting with Ahura Energy CEO Fareed Sfard in the quaint town of Saratoga.  But what once was originally a sleepy stagecoach stop is now the home to a company that claims to have set the world on fire with a huge breakthrough in renewable energy.

In fact, Ahura’s innovation in the field of concentrated solar power (CSP) promises grid parity (an equivalence in price of electricity with that of coal, the dominant source of electrical energy in the US today) more or less immediately.  The secret sauce?  Proprietary low-cost actuators that track the sun through the sky without the expense of the electric motors and controls that normally go along with this set of technologies, eliminating the major cost components that hold back even our most advanced CSP system designs.  An enormous claim, to be sure.

“I have a saying that goes like this,” I joked with Fareed as we spoke; “It’s always cheap until you build it,” referring to the fact that, at this moment, most of Ahura’s technology is working only at far smaller scale than that necessary to prove real-world application.

My host smiled and nodded politely, undeterred by my remark, which he certainly could have taken as a cheap shot.  But I wasn’t worried about his taking offense; I had seen though our many previous conversations that he is a man of science, with a gracious bearing.

Further, let’s acknowledge two facts.  Here is:

1) A guy who ran 12 factories of the biggest contract manufacturer in the world (Solectron) which put more products into the market than anyone on the planet over a period of 3 1/2 years. I believe this is particularly relevant, as those were products with complexity and tolerance requirements with 3 or more orders of magnitude more complicated than what Ahura has here — which is “light assembly” (vs. real manufacturing).

and …

2) A bill of materials which truly is incredibly simple and inexpensive.

We’ll see what happens, but I actually am betting he can come up with the goods.

Please let me know if you’d like to learn more.

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