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Reading Amory Lovins’ Classic Soft Energy Paths
If you think or write about alternative energy now, there is no doubt that you’ve got some Amory Lovins in your DNA. He’s like the Genghis Khan of the alt energy tribe; almost every one of us is sort of a descendent. Hell, he even got made into a comic book character (above) in the [...]
“The Smoke Nuisance” and Copenhagen
“Viewed from the standpoint of the Smoke Inspector, the 1,600,000 people of Chicago are divided into two classes—First, those who create a smoke nuisance; Second, those who are compelled to tolerate a smoke nuisance. One class has radical champions who maintain that smoke is an irrepressible necessity; a concomitant of the commercial and manufacturing supremacy of Chicago; that smoke not only is not unhealthy, but that it is an actual disinfectant.”
A Summary of Green Tech’s Recent Deployment Problems
The Economist has a nice overview of the problems that green tech companies have experienced over the last year.
The industry suffered particularly badly in the credit crunch. Almost by definition, renewable energy sources have low running costs but high up-front costs. And because they are regulated assets with long-term pre-defined revenue streams, they are particularly [...]
Power, Nuclear Power, and White Males
Earlier today, I posted a link on Twitter to a poll showing that 66% of white men and only 35% of everyone else support “increased reliance on nuclear fuel.” People immediately started trying to draw conclusions from that data.
“So what does that mean?” asked @lostkiwi. “White males are the only ones rational enough to know [...]
More Links about Luz, Seed of the Solar Thermal Industry
Everybody Loves Solar Energy, But… – The New York Times
“The remaining 10 percent Federal energy tax credit is due to expire on Dec. 31, but Congress is considering a bill that would extend it for five years. Many legislators, however, see the measure as an unnecessary tax break for Luz’s power-plant investors. ”I don’t know [...]
Is there an energy consumption sweet spot? Yes.
People tend to argue about energy demand by saying “X is inevitable, therefore we should do Y.” Backed up with technical analyses and some historical facts, perhaps a curve or two, it sure seems convincing. One of the best energy lessons from the past is that people are tremendously bad at predicting Xs, and so [...]
Gallery: The World’s First Oil Field
“We have no language at our command by which to convey to the minds of our readers any adequate idea of the agitated state at the time we saw [the well]. The gas from below was forcing up immense quantities of oil in a fearful manner and attended with noise that was terrifying… When the [...]
Americans Use More Energy in 8 Hours Than All Pre-Farming Humans Did in a Year
“In view of the fact that the earth in its natural state could hardly support more than about ten million food-gatherers, the maximum consumption of energy by humans in preagricultural times probably amounted to no more than the equivalent of about four million tons of coal annually.”
— Harrison Brown, “Energy in Our Future” from the [...]
SERI Archive: 40 Cents a Watt Solar Power by the Year 2000 Or Bust
Document: Advances in Photovoltaics R&D: An Overview [Downloadable PDF]
Authors: L.L. Kazmerski (Larry Kazmerski)
Date: 1981
Notes: Reprinted from the Proceedings of the 16th Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, Vol. 2. NY: ASME.
Task Number: 1090.00
Abstract: A summary status of the advanced photovoltaics research and development is presented. These technologies cover two broad areas: (1) Thin-film intermediate efficiency (>10%) [...]
All You Need to Know About U.S. Energy R&D in Two Graphs
Both graphs are from Pacific Northwest National Lab analyst James Dooley’s excellent report, “US Federal Investments in Energy R&D.” It’s these ridiculously low levels of research spending that make me wary of writing off any particular technology. Say carbon capture and sequestration or enhanced geothermal or wave power. The truth is that we haven’t put [...]
Inventing Green by Alexis Madrigal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
