22Jan

Wind Forecasters Request Lab Help

Filed in Energy | Environment

Three prominent weather forecasting companies took advantage of their podium positions to request laboratory support to help them provide better information to renewable energy projects, namely wind projects. The monthly Sustainable Energy and Atmospheric Sciences seminar series kicked off the new year January 21st at the National Institute of Standards (NIST) in Boulder, CO. Pascal Storck of 3Tier, Bruce Bailey of AWS Truewind, and Mark Ahlstrom of WindLogics spoke about the weather/wind forecasting process in the US and requested help in these areas:

1) Increased number of observation points to improve accuracy.
2) Independent evaluation of low profile observation instruments, such as LIDAR and SODAR, to increase adoption by the industry
3) High quality global and regional forecasts
4) Improved mathematical prediction models

It was the clear consensus that the US Labs are critical to providing the data needed to help wind projects successfully plan and use wind energy AND that the US Labs could do a lot more to help the forecasts being provided to the project operators. Today the European forecasts are often better at predicting weather over the western states than the forecast generated here. To insure the US meets the predicted increase in Wind Capacity from about 20 GW today to more than 300 GW by 2030, better information about the weather is critical.

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20Jan

Barack Obama – 44th President of the United States of America

Filed in Politics | USA politics

“America, in the face of our common dangers; in this winter of our hardship let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brace once more the icy currents. An endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s chirdren, that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end. That we did not turn back nor did we falter and with eyes fixed on the horizon and god’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.”

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15Jan

Solar Future at The daVinci Institute

Filed in Energy

Larry Kazmerski, from the National Research Energy Lab (NREL) in Golden, CO was the keynote speaker at this month’s Night with a Futurist put on by The DaVinci Institute. Kazmerski entertained the largest crowd to attend a Night with a Futurist event throughout his lecture while hitting on these 5 key points:

  • Solar is real – now
  • Investment in Policy and R&D are priorities
  • Cutting time from lab to manufacturing is key
  • Significant increase in science and technical workforce is needed
  • Balancing near and longterm R&D must be maintained

The highlight of the evening was a story from Kazmerski’s early days at NREL. A local newspaper reporter seemed uninterested in his description of the energy conversion properties of some of the PV cells they were testing. When the talk turned to the government officials visiting from Saudi Arabia, Kazmerski convinced the reporter the Saudi’s were investing heavily in solar energy and that they planned to sell the US sand for silicon production at $40 per barrel. This appeared in the the paper the following week and Kazmerski claims he still holds the record for fewest seconds between arrival at NREL and a summons to the director’s office.

13Jan

Google Searches and Boiling Tea Kettles…

Filed in Energy | Environment | Technology

So, how many Google searches produce the equivalent CO2 emissions as boiling a cup of water?   

A confusing question unless you been following the stream of posts generated by the Sunday Times of London quoting (or misquoting) Harvard University physicist Alex Wissner-Gross‘ study on the energy used by view webpages. IN the story, the Times reporters stated “Performing two Google searches from a desktop computer can generate about the same amount of carbon dioxide as boiling a kettle for a cup of tea, according to new research.” This seems to equate to about 7 grams of CO2.

Google immediately responded in a blog post stating “we have designed and built the most energy efficient data centers in the world, which means the energy used per Google search is minimal suggesting the number is closer to 0.02 grams per search.” And went on to state the energy used by the PC performing the search is greater than the search itself.

Meanwhile according to Tech News World, Wissner-Gross claims neither he nor the study mentioned Google or had anything to do with Google and certainly not with tea kettles. “They did that. I have no idea where they got those statistics,” Wissner-Gross said.

And in response to these back and forth discussions, more than a few bloggers have decided to weigh in:

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article5489134.ece

http://www.livescience.com/technology/090112-carbon-internet.html

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/01/seven-grams-per-google-search.php

So what do you think? How much water could you boil while searching for the amount of CO2 emitted from a Google Search? or something like that?

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05Jan

A brief history of wind power | Wind of change | The Economist

Filed in Energy | Environment

Wind Power installations to triple between 2007 and 2012 accroding to a brief history of wind power as reported in The Economist.

Globally, wind power installations are expected to triple from 94GW at the end of 2007 to nearly 290GW in 2012, according to BTM Consult, a Danish market-research firm. They will then account for 2.7% of world electricity generation, the company predicts, and by 2017 their share could be nearly 6%.

Well behind much of Europe in percentage of electricity generated from the wind, the US has 18% of worldwide wind power production following a year which saw an increase of 45% in wind power capacity.
Wind Power Pie Chart

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