NewNergy

Brief Analysis of Climate Change Report

May 07, 2007

Here’s a brief analysis of and comments on the recent IPCC working group report on Mitigation of Climate Change released from Bangkok, Thailand as it relates to alternative energy. The summary is provided on the following sections:

1. Energy Efficient & Net Zero Energy Buildings
2. Alternative Energy = Energy Security
3. Transport Policy & Fossil Fuels Subsidies
4. Research and Development + Technology Transfer

Read the full summary from here @ Alternative Energy Blog

Original working group report here (PDF)

Labels: climate-change, environment, research

Turning Black Coal Green - Zero Emissions Coal Plants

February 02, 2007

Sooty coal hardly seem like the future of energy, but that’s exactly what the U.S. Department of Energy predicts. Coal’s growing dominance need not spell doom for the environment, according to an executive at American Electric Power (AEP), a large American utility company which is building the first near-zero-emission coal plant by 2012. The 275-megawatt facility will serve as the model for a new generation of high-tech coal facilities, it is hoped

Source of article: AltEng post

Labels: climate-change, coal, environment, fossil-fuels

Fertilising the Oceans - Thin Soup and a Thin Story

2 May 2007 @ Real Climate

A firm called planktos.com is getting a lot of attention for their bid to create a carbon offset product based on fertilizing the ocean.

In certain parts of the ocean, surface waters already contain most of the ingredients for a plankton bloom; all they lack is trace amounts of iron. For each 1 atom of iron added in such a place, phytoplankton take up 50,000 atoms of carbon. What could be better?

Phytoplankton biomass does not last forever, any more than tree biomass does. The trick therefore is to get the carbon to sink out of the surface ocean into the depths, generally in the forms of snot and poop. Once it reaches a depth of a kilometer or so, it can decompose to CO2 again but the water will be isolated from the atmosphere for decades, maybe centuries.

Sounds like a great idea? May be yes, may be not...read the detailed post here @ Real Climate to know more

Labels: climate-change, ocean, research

James Lovelock, the Gaia Hypothesis Theorist Foresees Crises

We are on the edge of the greatest die-off, and will lucky if 20% of us survive what is coming. We should be scared stiff, feels James Lovelock.

Lovelock, famous for the Gaia Hypotheses which maintains that life on Earth regulates its environment keeping it in a remarkable state of balance, not unlike the way a body regulates its own metabolism, now believes that human activities have set off reactions that will knock the biosphere out of it's present balance into one with substantially higher temperatures. The melting of permafrost above the arctic circle will release huge quantities of methane and carbon dioxide, while melting ice reduces the surface albedo and causes less sunlight to be reflected back into space, he feels.

Read more about this and the author's analysis of Lovelock's hypothesis from this post @ Green Future

Labels: climate-change, environment

Agrichar for Better CO2 Sequestration & to Reduce Global Warming?

May 07, 2007

The first meeting of the International Agrichar Initiative convened about 100 scientists, policymakers, farmers and investors with the goal of birthing an entire new industry to produce a biofuel that goes beyond carbon neutral and is actually carbon negative.

Agrichar is the term not for the biomass fuel, but for what is left over after the energy is removed: a charcoal-based soil amendment. In simple terms, the agrichar process takes dry biomass of any kind and bakes it in a kiln to produce charcoal. The process is called pyrolysis. Various gases and bio-oils are driven off the material and collected to use in heat or power generation. The charcoal is buried in the ground, sequestering the carbon that the growing plants had pulled out of the atmosphere. The end result is increased soil fertility and an energy source with negative carbon emissions.

Interesting, read the full story from here @ Truthout

Via: Madison Peak Oil Group post

Labels: climate-change, environment, inventions

UK push for biofuels may harm environment, campaigners say

19 Mar 2007 bbj.hu

A UK plan to help tackle global warming by increasing the use of biofuels such as palm oil and rapeseed may do more harm to the environment than good,
environmental campaign groups said.

Fuel suppliers will have to ensure that from April 2008 a certain percentage of their sales come from biofuels, under a UK Department for Transport program. The proposal could see businesses producing biofuels by destroying rainforests and wetlands, threatening endangered habitats and species and releasing more carbon into the atmosphere, according to Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, WWF and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. The groups said the government should tighten rules to ensure biofuel producers meet minimum standards on greenhouse gas emissions, and establish "environmental audits” of the entire life-cycle of the fuel, from cultivation through transportation to combustion.

Read the full report from here @ BBJ, Hungary

Labels: climate-change, co2, environment

Europe Tightens CO2 Standards with Two Directives

The European Commission has proposed two directives to combat CO2 emissions from cars.

The first proposal will force carmakers to cut CO2 emissions from new cars by 18% by 2012. Carmakers would be responsible for getting emissions down to 130 grams of CO2 per kilometer (g/km) through technology improvements.

The second proposal, which updates a fuel-quality directive from 1998, outlines new fuel-quality standards that aim to achieve, by 2020, a 10% reduction in CO2 emissions throughout the whole product life cycle.

Read the full report from here @ The American Chemical Society web page

Labels: climate-change, co2, environment

Cutting the Carbon Impacts of Waste

A clearer picture of how waste can be managed to reduce its impacts on climate change emerges in new research published today.

The reports anticipate the greenhouse gas effects of the UK’s main waste streams between 2005 and 20311, and assess the different ways of dealing with household garden and food waste2,3.

The ERM report shows that recycling has significant benefits over landfill, particularly in terms of reduced greenhouse gas emissions.

Read the full news report from here @ The A to Z of Building

Labels: climate-change, waste

Going green to save the white stuff

By Tom Gardner, Associated Press, March 26, 2007

The ski industry in the USA is going green to help offset the pollution that feeds global warming -- a phenomenon that challenges the resorts' very existence with the threat of later snowfalls and earlier snow melts.

Fifty-five resorts in 14 states are buying renewable energy to offset part or all of their power needs, according to the National Ski Areas Association. Of these, 26 are operating 100 percent on green energy.

Read more from this report @ Casper Star Tribune

Labels: climate-change, renewable

How Green is Nuclear Power?

By Mark Clayton, The Christian Science Monitor

Nuclear Power is an idea that may be catching on. At least 11 new nuclear plants are in the design stage in nine states, including Virginia, Texas, and Florida, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute website.

But that carbon-free pitch has researchers asking anew: How carbon-free is nuclear power? And how cost-effective is it in the fight to slow global warming? asks this article from CSM, read the full article here @ KVOA, Tucson

Labels: climate-change, costs, environment, greenhouse-gases, nuclear

Total Launches the First Integrated CO2 Capture and Geological Sequestration Project in a Depleted Natural Gas Field in SW France

Press release

February 12, 2007

Total announces the launch of a pilot CO2 capture and sequestration project in the Lacq basin in southwestern France. The project, which leverages a technique considered among the most promising in the fight against climate change, calls for up to 150,000 metric tons of CO2 to be injected into a depleted natural gas field in Rousse (Pyrenees) over a period of two years as from end-2008.

Read the full press release here @ OilVoice

Labels: climate-change, co2