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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

Funride’s Director of Operations Pat Mahan discusses alternative fuel vehicles and the fantastic social and personal benefits of car sharing with me on a recent episode of the 2GreenEnergy Report. I’ve known about Funride for a couple of years, and I was delighted to have Pat on the show. Car sharing generally is a phenomenon that I expect to see enjoy a meteoric rise over the coming 10 – 20 years, and Funride’s “car sharing with a twist” (AFVs) is in prime position to lead the way.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

PhotobucketMany of the great consultants in green business practices have developed ways of introducing their clients to topics like LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design – the internationally recognized green building certification system) and biomimicry (taking lessons from the ways of nature and evolution in the development of our products and processes). Somewhat less frequently discussed is the so-called “precautionary principle,” i.e., the idea that if proposed action is suspected of containing a risk to public health and safety, the burden of proof that it is not harmful lies on those proposing to take that action.

Am I missing something, or are we as a civilization a million miles from this point currently – and getting further from it every day? The idea that our system of international business affairs, ethics, and justice could get us to a meaningful implementation of this idea requires a jolting suspension of disbelief.

Does anyone really think that there is no potential public harm in the chemically raised food we eat, the vigorous marketing of alcohol and prescription drugs, and the steady relaxation of moral standards in the television programming and movies we show our children? I could go on – and so could you; the list of threats that we openly welcome is large — and growing each year.

Of course, when we get down to brass tacks in the area of clean energy, the issue is even more obvious. Is anyone asking for the oil and coal companies to address the burden of proof that the energy policies they work so hard to protect do not bring with them tremendous threats to public safety? The Gulf oil spill is an opportunity to ask questions like these. Could it, perhaps, representing a turning point for our friend — the precautionary principle?

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Occasionally I write on political and philosophical points that have important but indirect effect on renewables. As a result, folks sometimes want me to link to their blogs in spaces that are off-topic to clean energy.

If you’re interested, here’s something that I wrote this morning on campaign finance reform and the First Amendment. As far as I’m concerned, these people are on the wrong side of this issue, but I wanted to acknowledge the work they’re doing on Free Speech anyway. To me, the idea that campaign contributions from corporatations should be protected under the first amendment is a gross perversion of its intent.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

I appreciate all the comments on my piece on the BP oil spill. Here’s a note that I just put up on Renewable Energy World on the Gulf tragedy.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bk2C60MmOE0&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x234900&color2=0x4e9e00&border=1]

Sam Smith discusses the use of renewable energy to fuel electric vehicles with me on a recent episode of the 2GreenEnergy Report.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Occasionally, we all run into people with a doctrinaire political opinion as to exactly how and why the world is going to hell in a hand-basket, and what specifically should be done about it.  Sometimes this comes from a leftist perspective, but often it’s essentially a transcript of a Glenn Beck show.

I don’t disagree with many of the talking points of the right – certainly that the federal government is bloated and that people today look to government for solutions where, in our grandparents’ day, they looked to themselves and took a greater level of individual responsibility.

But I’m always amazed at people’s tendencies to oversimplify and to take things out of context that support their personal belief system. An an example, one notices from the graph here is that neither Democrats or Republicans – despite their rhetoric – have done anything at all to change the trajectory of federal spending. Doesn’t that that makes for a very short discussion about which party – in reality – is the better bet for those wishing to see smaller government?

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In turn, this amplifies the notion that all this is not as simple as certain people would have you believe. That people should be held accountable does not imply that capital punishment is a necessary part of a civilized society. That people should not be expected to pay to keep the slobs who live on beer and cigarettes healthy does not imply that private, for-profit health care is a reasonable way to deal with the healthcare needs of a population. That too much government regulation becomes corrupt and abusive to private enterprise does not mean that leaving Wall Street and the Fortune 500 to their own ethical sensibilities is a good idea.

I suppose my conclusion is that people tend to like simplicity.  But in my view, we live in a world of tough realities, dealing with things for which there is no precedent.  When was the last time we had an oil spill of this magnitude?  How many times have the climate patters of the Earth changed?  To me, the right answers come more from discussion, humility, and listening than from knee-jerk reactions and force-fitting the world into a black and white frame.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

PhotobucketAuthor and ammonia-as-fuel advocate Greg Vezina writes:

As part of the research for my upcoming book, I include a complete analysis of the subsidies to all forms of energy. This took a lot of work. In today’s Globe, there is an editorial page article about the subsidies to coal, oil and gas which is now over a half  trillion dollars each year. Four international organizations – the International Energy Agency, the OECD, the WTO, and, remarkably, OPEC – are collaborating on a study of these subsidies to be presented at the G20.

No wonder most alternative energy and conservation solutions have a hard time entering the marketplace in controlled or supposed free market economies.

In the specific case of NH3, with equal treatment, it would be less than 35% the price of hydrocarbons, including all applicable taxes.

With full cost accounting principles applied, if Environmental, Health and Trade costs were included and a carbon tax or Cap amd Trade, then NH3 would be less than 20%.  The research also shows that using domestic feedstocks to make NH3 would create 5 times the net employment and tax revenue to governements.

Talk about a global solution. Food, energy, jobs and opportunity for all. Only a dream you might think, not so, in the next few months we will release definite proof for all.

Keep the faith people, the solution is coming soon.

Thanks, Greg.  Your thoughts and echoed here, to be sure, where we ceaselessly repeat our demand for a level playing field for renewables.  As suggested in my article linked above, I see this as inextricably linked to campaign finance reform and getting a grip on the bloat and corruption that permeates our governement.

Thanks for raising your voice so eloquently, and good luck on your book project. Please let us know when it becomes available.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Solar Thermal

Part of the reason that Bill Paul is so bullish on Northern Africa as a financial center for rrenewable energy is obvious: the Sahara Desert. Especially ripe for concentrated solar power, the desert is the solution to Europe’s thirst for electric power. The challenge, obviously, is transmitting that power under the Mediterranean.

But according to this Reuters report, a solution could be in place in the next five years.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Biomass

PhotobucketI know I’m not alone in my mistrust of the media. Yet I have to think that Time Magazine nailed the biofuels issue in their 2008 article on sustainability and the Amazon rain forest. Particularly telling is the revolting political behavior that forms the basic motivation to create huge biofuels programs – even those that represent a net negative effect on our fragile ecosystem. Once dominant forces become involved and the money to be made passes a critical mass, there is really no power on Earth that can re-insert a bit of reason into the process. Is this really a good idea? Are we causing more problems than we’re solving? No one dares to ask.

According to my understanding, the Chinese have seen through some of the fallacies that can be associated with sustainability — and this is one of them. In China, it’s a felony to convert land that can be used to grow food into space for biofuels. The Chinese want clean energy, and they’re investing heavily to get there, but apparently they’ve thought through some of the consequences of their actions, and they’re not moved by irrational herd-mentality, laissez–faire economics, and American-style back-office corruption that would rape their land and take us all a step further backwards.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

In the process of writing my book on renewables I read quite a few others, including Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air (2009) by Dr. David JC MacKay. This is a fanstically worthwhile project by a professor of physics at Cambridge with a wonderful sense of humor, who presents his case in an incredibly bright and witty manner.

The premise of the book is answering the question: Could the people of the UK sustain themselves with renewable energy generated within the UK itself? The discussion then proceeds to do what I thought about doing in my book, i.e., lay out all the basics of energy for a newcomer to the subject. It really is done in a most clever and entertaining way, yet it does not lack the rigor that one would expect from a professional of this calibre.

I tried to take a different tack in my book, however, insofar as, in truth, the question at hand is moot, for several reasons surrounding the economics and politics of energy. For instance:

To answer the question, don’t you first have to know what are you willing to pay for energy: financially, aesthetically, and ecologically? And isn’t that a factor of how you calculate the costs of our traditional energy solutions?

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Aren’t there special conditions in the UK (population density, latitude, average wind velocity, etc.) that would tend to produce a different answer to this question had the author been writing about the US, or China, or any other country/landmass in the world?

Of course.

Yet, trust me, this is a great read from a terrifically intelligent and insightful fellow. If everyone could just read his chapter on global warming, the world would be a much better place.

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