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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

One of my son’s courses at college this semester is the History of the 1960s. Helping him prepare for a test just now reminded me of those days of political and social awareness – how a generation of young people alerted themselves to things they couldn’t tolerate, and courageously dedicated themselves to making a change. (OK, I know this is something of an idealization; they also smoked a mountain of pot.)

As I learn more about what lies at the core of our energy policy (or lack thereof), I’m beginning to realize that we need the same spirit today – a willingness to call out the bad guys – even at some level of personal risk.  It’s very clear to me that the energy “establishment” is betting quite heavily that we’ve become a population of uninformed and timid sheep.  (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

We’re starting to hear more about geoengineering, i.e., manipulating the planet’s climate as to undo the effects of greenhouse gases. No major actions have been taken to date, and the subject is so intensely debated that it is extremely unlikely that anything will happen soon; there are profound questions that need to be resolved in many different disciplines in politics, science, and ethics, for instance:

What agencies would be responsible? Who should control the Earth’s thermostat?
What exactly are the goals?
What is the best combination of methods to accomplish the goals?
Who will pay the costs?
How can we ensure that the cure’s not worse than the disease, i.e., that the risk of unintended consequences is justified? (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

A funny thing happened when we launched Renewable Energy Facts and Fantasies last week. Of course, I was hoping it would do well in the categories to which Amazon.com had assigned it: energy, engineering, and physics. And while it went to number one for a few days in both energy and engineering, it got massacred in physics.

It seems that Steven Hawking, by far the most famous physicist on Earth, had just launched his new book. And was there any controversy that may have spurred his book sales even higher than they otherwise would have been? (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Education construction jobs represent about 27 percent of all construction in the U.S. Despite a lagging economy, hundreds of millions of dollars are making their way into green school upgrades and new construction. Some $14 billion will be spent in 2010 building new schools (about 750 new schools are built in the U.S. per year), says School Planning & Management Magazine. Here is another interesting statistic – about one-fourth of the U.S. population spends a good part of each day inside a school building.

Greening of schools is a thriving enterprise. Leaders from all sectors of green schools will gather to share strategies, technologies and best practices at the Green California Schools Summit 2010 in Pasadena, California. The event, which will also feature an exposition of more than 100 companies with innovative products and services, will take place at the Pasadena Convention Center on December 8 to 10, 2010.  Eric Corey Freed, principal of organicARCHITECT and author of four books on green building, will be a keynote speaker.

Each week in the news, we find stories not only of green building initiatives but also green energy powering part or all of the school. Often there is an educational component that goes along with the installation and use of green energy (most often wind or solar.) Just a few examples from across the U.S. follows:

The San Diego Unified School District Board of Education approved a partnerships with AMSOLAR Corp, and 5.2 MW of (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

I don’t think of myself as overly suspicious of the motives of others. But I have to say that I recoil at the end of every PBS NewsHour when Jim Lehrer signs off and we’re told that the broadcast was sponsored by Chevron. The idea that the information I just received met the approval of an oil company, with its obvious interests vis-à-vis clean energy, is deeply offensive. It certainly makes me call into question the validity of everthing I just heard.

Why does Chevron target PBS? I think the answer it pretty obvious: (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

Am I the only one who was a bit stunned at Honda’s announcement today? CEO Takanobu Ito outlined the company’s plans to introduce both a mid-size plug-in hybrid and an electric commuter vehicle in the U.S. and Japan by the end of 2012. He told Reuters, “It’s starting to look like there will be a market for electric vehicles. We can’t keep shooting down their potential, and we can’t say there’s no business case for it.”

So what so weird about this?

In the first place, Honda’s longstanding commitment to its current alternate fuel vehicle, the hydrogen fuel cell F6 Clarity, which, of course, is an electric vehicle; batteries and fuel cells are simply two different ways of providing portable electrical energy. Perhaps Ito simply misspoke, but that strikes me as a mistake that the CEO of Honda would be most unlikely to make. (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

In his book What Technology Wants?  Wired Magazine’s Kevin Kelly tells us about the evolution of the “technium” – the ecosystem of technologies and the way they affect us — and each other.  I think this is directly relevant to our discussion here; in fact, I go out of my way to tune into discussions on the evolution of technology generally, and its effects on all of us socially, vocationally, and psychologically.  This is important to the trajectory of renewables, of course, as the cost of clean energy is constantly falling due to the thousands of discoveries and inventions that occur each month.  (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

When I get up every morning, I take my cup of coffee, sit down, and read the news in the energy sector – often including a few comments from bloggers. As one might expect, there are patterns that develop, a common one of which is exemplified below: the argument that free-market economics has determined that fossil fuels should be the dominant form of energy – with the counter argument that there is nothing truly “free” about “free-market economics.”

Person A: The price of crude oil, natural gas, coal etc will decide how and when people will switch to alternative energy sources, not cheerleading by solar energy industry.

Person B: In other words, the switch to alternative energy will be determined by what happens in terms of the billions and billions in government subsidies that keep the price of oil, natural gas and coal artificially low. (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

An opinion poll from Civil Society Institute (CSI) said this week that key poll results reveal Tea Party members have quite different views on clean energy than Independents. The CSI poll is fully independent and not financed, supported, commissioned, conducted or released by any company, group, candidate or party.

 Key findings include:

 Independents are more than twice as likely as Tea Party members to see global warming as a problem (62% vs 27%).

Tea Party members are more than twice as likely as Independents (34% vs 15%) to see no need for leadership on global warming.

70% of Independents but only 55% of Tea Party supporters agree that the US needs to be a clean energy jobs and technology leader.

  (more…)

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

I’m happy to announce that California voters soundly rejected Proposition 23 – a proposal that would have essentially killed the state’s clean air initiative. But exactly why? I’m not sure anyone will ever know.

Prop 23 was backed almost entirely by two out-of-state (Texas) oil companies. Voters don’t like being manipulated (in the few cases where they can see it coming so clearly).

The venture capitalists and hedge fund managers that profit from California’s tech sector backed a powerful “No on 23” campaign, outspending even the Texas oil billionaires. (more…)

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