Alternative Energy HQ solar power for homes, wind energy, and bio fuel issues

It’s never a bad thing to have the leader of the free world in your corner. And President Barrack Obama made clear again last week that he’s with energy efficiency. At a Walmart in Silicon Valley, Obama laid out his next round of green energy expansion plans. Sexy solar got much of the play in the media coverage. But staid …

-On Geothermal Day, GEA calls for GEA Honors 2014 entries- Washington, D.C. (May 2, 2014) – On Monday, May 5, the geothermal industry will recognize Geothermal Awareness Day in California (#GeothermalDay2014) with a slate of activities in Sacramento and beyond, including a call for entries for GEA Honors, the Geothermal Energy Association’s annual awards program. “There is a growing need …

Infusing more energy efficiency into the US economy could ease pressure on coal states that feel under attack by pending federal greenhouse gas rules, says a new study. The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy outlines four energy efficiency strategies that could reduce carbon dioxide emissions 26 percent below 2012 levels in Change is in the Air: How States Can Harness Energy Efficiency …

Is an Electric Car Right for You? Operating a car without needing to visit a gas station is intriguing idea to many American drivers.  After all, the pumps can be a painful place—gas prices have been on a roller coaster ride the past few years.  But in the minds of many American, electric cars are nothing more than glorified golf …

 Industry needs early funding, risk mitigation to thrive Last week, the Geothermal Energy Association hosted the GEA International Geothermal Showcase, bringing together 250 participants from 36 countries and representing more than half of all geothermal projects worldwide. Together, these projects could mean over 10,000 MW of new geothermal power and would represent around $45 billion in new investment.   “The …

Report commissioned by LABC Institute encourages incentives to share benefits of emerging commercial solar market with low-income areas throughout Los Angeles; many local programs already benefiting from the LADWP feed-in tariff   A significantly expanded commercial rooftop solar program in Los Angeles would create thousands of new jobs and spur hundreds of millions of dollars in new investment, with particular …

More than a decade ago, Ruihong Zhang, a professor of biological and agricultural engineering at the University of California, Davis, started working on a problem: How to turn as much organic waste as possible into as much renewable energy as possible. Today, on Earth Day, the university and Sacramento-based technology partner CleanWorld are officially unveiling the UC Davis Renewable Energy …

Environmental Advocate Shares Affordable Gadgets that Shrink Your Footprint – and Your Bills   Just as intended, the 44th annual celebration of Earth Day is surrounded by talk of our environment, our impact on it and what we can do to better live in harmony with it. “We’re seeing more and more people who realize that, if each of us …

Nearly 70 years after Ball State University installed its four coal-fired boilers, school employees have stopped shoveling and the old system has gone cold as the university embraces renewable energy with world’s largest district closed geothermal energy system. Jim Lowe, director of engineering, construction and operations, watched the historic event. He’s overseen the $80 million geothermal project — consisting of …

New Worldwatch Institute analysis examines the trends in global biofuel production In 2012, the combined global production of ethanol and biodiesel fell for the first time since 2000, down 0.4 percent from the figure in 2011. Global ethanol production declined slightly for the second year in a row, to 83.1 billion liters, while biodiesel output rose fractionally, from 22.4 billion …

CLEAN ENERGY VICTORY BOND PUSH IN CONGRESS WOULD GENERATE $150 BILLION IN FINANCING, 1 MILLION JOBS Updating WWII “War Bond” Model to Spark Job Creation, Energy Security, Clean Energy, and Increased Energy Efficiency WASHINGTON, D.C.///April 8, 2014///Clean energy boosters on Capitol Hill are borrowing a page from World War II “war bonds” by introducing today a new bill – the …

Being a China watcher always involves parsing official statements to figure out who has the upper hand in Beijing and, if someone has some clout, what that person’s stand on an issue is. So I have been watching statements by Minister of Science and Technology Wan Gang and Minister of Industry and Information Technology Miao Wei to figure out where each stands and who …

Though the first official assessment that climate change was caused by human activity came in 1988, with NASA scientist James Hansen’s famous testimony to the U.S. Congress, the “carbon neutral” concept, which refers to achieving net zero carbon emissions, is a relatively new one. The non-profit Climate Neutral Network, which developed the Climate Neutral Certification, was incorporated in 1999; the …

Marc Lopata says his job is to uncover the dark side of microgrids. And that’s just what the president and principal engineer for Microgrid Solar is doing in a project that combines energy storage and solar energy at Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T). The project is located at the “Solar Village,” which consists of multiple houses built by …

Light-absorbing, water-repellent material could quell neighbors’ solar panel spats   All that’s gold does not glitter, thanks to new work by UC Irvine scientists that could reduce glare from solar panels and electronic displays and dull dangerous glints on military weapons. “We found that a very simple process and a tiny bit of gold can turn a transparent film black,” …

RGS Energy, a nationwide leader of turnkey solar energy solutions for residential, commercial, and utility customers, and GRID Alternatives, the nation’s largest non-profit solar installer, have launched a new partnership to help bring solar power to low-income communities across the country. RGS Energy employees will volunteer throughout 2014 to install solar for 10 low-income families in California, Colorado, New Jersey and New York, while …

Geothermal power potential in California still largely untapped, says industry group As the California Air Resources Board (CARB) is examining their new scoping plan for implementing the state’s ambitious climate law, the leading geothermal industry group has issued a status report on California’s geothermal resources that says they are still largely untapped. Geothermal power is “a viable, cost effective, and …

Image Caption: By placing colonies of E. coli engineered to produce pinene into test tubes containing glucose, researchers were able to determine which enzyme combinations produced the hydrocarbon most efficiently. Credit: Georgia Tech/Rob Felt John Toon, Georgia Institute of Technology Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the Joint BioEnergy Institute have engineered a bacterium to synthesize pinene, a hydrocarbon produced …

Asia Drives Global PV Installations to 46 GW, IHS Predicts Global solar photovoltaic (PV) installations will grow by a robust 22 percent in 2014, largely as a result of recent policy changes in the two largest markets, China and Japan, according to IHS Inc. (NYSE: IHS). Worldwide installations in 2014 will rise to 46 GW (gigawatts), 5 GW higher than …

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) announced last week that March 26 saw a new wind power record: 10,296 MW at 8:48 PM. This represented close to 29% of the nearly 36,000 MW of electricity on the power grid at that moment, and smashed the record set only weeks ago by 600 MW. No issues concerning integration were reported. According to the …