Alternative Energy

• Nuclear Energy and a Main Battle Tank

  Miracles take place in every war. The United States accounted for some of these during the Second World War, of which two were decisive. These were the construction of the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Navy, and just as important the training of the personnel to exploit these miracles. Before I transferred to the infantry, I worked with a Japanese engineer who told me about how he and his colleagues had examined an American bomber that had been brought down over his country, and was still intact. According to him, when their examination was completed, they concluded that Japan…

• Despite Fukushima, Russia’s Nuclear Industry is Open for Business

  Japan’s 11 March catastrophe at its six-reactor Daichi Fukushima nuclear power complex has had global repercussions, hardly surprising given the trillions of dollars invested in civilian nuclear energy over the last five decades. Ironically, just a year ago the nuclear power industry saw itself on the verge of a renaissance, with worldwide concerns about global warming causing many to reconsider the merits of nuclear energy, which produces no greenhouse gases. Events in Japan changed all that, and hit the “big three” exporters of civilian nuclear power technology hard – the U.S., France and the Russian Federation. While the first two…

• The Optimal Solar Solution: Stratosphere Solar Collection

  Very high altitude offers major solar advantages.  The stratosphere begins at 5 to 30 miles up, depending on where you look and the conditions at the moment.  The stratosphere is has about 3 times the solar radiation intensity than most ground level locations as much of the air absorption is avoided. That’s a pretty good motivator to examine the possible ways to get up there.  Getting up there is also far cheaper than going into full orbit.  Then the surface area involved is vastly diminished.  Best of all the connection between the collector and the surface can be hard wired. …

• Faux Commandos Breach Two U.S. Nuclear Power Plants

  Imagine you’re an engineer at a nuclear power plant that contains some of the most dangerous materials known to man.  Suddenly, commandos slip past security guards, killing some of your colleagues and blowing up key facilities, potentially leaking deadly radioactive substances into the atmosphere and putting surrounding communities at risk of contamination.  That’s exactly what has taken place at 24 of the United States’ 104 commercially active nuclear power plants.  The only thing is, none of it was real. In an effort by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to test security at the country’s nuclear power plants, mock raids are…

• France Gives Thumbs Up to Nuclear Energy with $1.4 Billion Investment

  France will invest €1 billion ($1.4billion) in its nuclear power programme, bucking the post-Fukushima trend away from nuclear energy. Announcing the energy funding package – which also commits a further €1.35 billion to renewables – French president Nicholas Sarkozy declared there is “no alternative to nuclear energy today”. The €1 billion will fund ‘fourth generation’ nuclear development and research into nuclear safety, the president said on Monday. The decision to boost nuclear power in France, which gets most of its energy from nuclear sources, goes against that of others in the region. Germany recently announced the phased shutdown of all…

• Google Study: Clean Energy Investments can Raise GDP by Billions and Employ Millions

  Google.org, the internet giant’s philanthropic arm, released a new study saying that new ideas and improvements in clean energy and related industries together with policies that encourage them can help the United States earn billions and employ millions. Presented on the company’s official blog, the study used economic models from consulting firm McKinsey & Company to pinpoint how much could new developments in clean technologies contribute to the country’s economic growth or in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The report concluded that new technologies can help the United States add $155 billion per year to its gross domestic product and create…

• Biofuels Could be the Savior of Sub-Saharan Africa

  800 million people live in Sub-Saharan Africa and a third of them don’t have enough food. By 2050, an estimated 1.95 billion people will be trying to live off the land in that region. Even if everyone in Sub-Saharan Africa were only to be fed as inadequately as they are today, the region would need to more than triple its food production over the next 40 years. For everyone on the continent to have enough to eat, food production would have to more than quadruple. _NYT SubSaharan Africa is desperately in need of industries which will provide both work for…

• The Largest Solar Rooftop Project in the World: Total Cost $2.6 Billion

  Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Prologis, and NRG Energy team up for the largest rooftop distributed solar project in the world. Rooftop solar energy is great for the home, but businesses are beginning to realize the potential of tapping into urban roof space for utilities-scale electricity generation.  Through a distributed approach—which links together several small-scale solar modules to essentially create a vastly dispersed solar farm—rooftop space can be taken advantage of for solar installation rather than building atop hundreds of acres of land.  That’s exactly the approach being taken by Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Prologis, and NRG Energy, who…

• Worldwide Nuclear Industry Woes Deepen

  The year 2011 will go down for the nuclear industry worldwide as an annus horribilis.First came the March Fukushima nuclear disaster, with operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) belatedly acknowledging that three of the facility’s six reactors did, in fact, suffer core meltdowns. On 20 June Moody's Investors Service obligingly cut its credit rating on TEPCO to junk status and kept the operator of Japan's crippled nuclear power plant on review for possible further downgrade, citing uncertainty over the fate of its bailout plan. TEPCO is Japan's largest corporate bond issuer and its shares are widely held by financial institutions.…

• What Manufacturers Don’t want you to know About Electric Cars

  Electric cars seem like the socially conscious, feel-good investment among environmentally friendly consumers. In corporate boardrooms, the innovation seemed well liked indeed. What’s not to like? Cars like the Nissan Leaf and Chevrolet Volt reportedly can drive for a day or more on a full electric charge. The Toyota Prius reduces a tank full of exhaust to the whir of a hybrid electric/ gas engine. The numbers are astonishing. The Nissan Leaf is considered the most fuel efficient vehicle in the U.S., tallying 106 mpg on the highway, and 92 in the city. The Volt gets 95/90. The Smart fortwo…