Category Archives: advanced energy structures

Car Gets Over 2000 MPG – Well it is not really street legal but it is still amazing

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If we could all get this kinda performance out of a 50cc engine we would be…well geniuses like the ones at Cal Poly. It is a little cramped and probablely hot but 2000 miles is a long trip at 30 miles per hour. So while the headline is deceptive, this is an amazing accomplishment.

http://inhabitat.com/students-build-black-widow-supercar-that-gets-2752-3-mpg/

Students Build Black Widow Supercar that Gets 2752.3 MPG

by Ariel Schwartz, 02/19/10
Think claims of electric vehicles that get over 200 MPG are impressive? Try this on for size: a group of mechanical engineering students at Cal Poly have developed a vehicle that can get up to 2752.3 MPG — and it doesn’t even use batteries.
The Cal Poly Supermileage Team‘s wondercar, dubbed the Black Widow, has been under construction since 2005. The 96 pound car has three wheels, a drag coefficient of 0.12, a top speed of 30 MPH, and a modified 3 horsepower Honda 50cc four-stroke engine. It originally clocked in at 861 MPG and has been continuously tweaked to achieve the mileage we see today.Want to see the Black Widow in action? The car is being entered for a fourth time in the Shell Eco-marathon along with a new three-wheeled Urban Concept vehicle. Who knows? Maybe this one will break the 3,000 MPG barrier.

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Go there and read. Especially look at the pretty pictures. More tomorrow.

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Solar Power From Dyes – May the force be with you

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It’s a joke son..I say I say It’s a joke son. You know dyes and clothes. I know it is not that kind of dye but it is a joke.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/05/120510113719.htm

Solar Power to Dye For: Flexible Lightweight Inexpensive Dyes Could Harvest Energy from Sun

ScienceDaily (May 10, 2012) — Researchers at the University of Turku believe that flexible, lightweight and inexpensive dyes could be used to harvest the power of the sun rather than our relying on costly and fragile semiconductor solar panel that use crystalline silicon

Writing in the International Journal of Technology, Policy and Management this month, Jongyun Moon and colleagues Aulis Tuominen and Arho Suominen, explain that dye-sensitised solar cells (DSCs) are set to become a ubiquitous source of energy without the complex and expensive clean-room manufacturing processes associated with current solar panels. They point out that the rapid increase in research into novel solar energy conversion technology looks set to revolutionise the industry making electricity generation accessible to all without government or other subsidies.

Solar power is an essential part of the green energy mix, but adoption has been limited in many parts of the world where government subsidies and financial incentives have not been in place. However, as part of a sustainable approach to electricity generation, it offers a clear view of a future in which domestic supply relies less and less on grid power systems or else provides a localised grid for remote places, particularly in sunny climes. Photovoltaic solar cells based on poly-crystalline silicon are the most commonly used devices, having first been used as space satellite technology back in the 1950s and 1960s.

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Littlest Greenest Car – But it is way too much money

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I love things like the Smart Car, the Coopers and all the little electric cars I have reported on over the years so of course I like this one too. The thing that amazes me is how much money they cost. I mean you can argue that you are front loading your costs…yada yada blah. But noway I am paying that kinda money for a car period.

http://jalopnik.com/5910190/the-worlds-smallest-cars-are-back-on-sale-for-insane-money

The World’s Smallest Cars Are Back On Sale, For Insane Money

Contact Jason Torchinsky: jason@jalopnik.com

May 17, 2012 4:00 PM

Like an adorable, tiny zombie popping out of its tiny, adorable window-box grave, the Peel P50 and Peel Trident are back from the dead. Neither of the tiny, tiny cars has been built since 1966, but a new company, with funding from the BBC’s show Dragon’s Den, is starting production up once again, as announced earlier this year. They’re street legal in the UK and US, and you can buy them for an absurd price £10,000 ($16,000).

The Peel P50 is the World’s Smallest Car, most famously enjoyed (indoors and outdoors) by Jeremy Clarkson. The Trident is a sort of sportier-looking model, with the same mechanicals (original: 49cc, 4.2 HP) but swaps the cyclopian porta-potty look for a very 50s-modern bubble-topped futuristic fiberglass body. The Trident also can hold two, instead of the solitary seat of the P50.

The modernized P50 and Trident swap the old (reverseless) three-cog transmission for a CVT unit, and use a 3.35 HP motor (one of the few times the hundredths decimal place is important), which is enough to push the 198 lb Trident or 240 lb P50 to 28 mph (electronically limited— maybe you could go a bit faster?). There’s electric versions as well, with roughly the same specs, except instead of an amazing 118 mpg, you have a meager 15 miles between charges. Dead dinosaurs sure hold a lot of energy.

At 118 MPG, Peel advertises…

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Culture Wars – The geezers and the cranks against the future

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It is clear that we have to prepare for a future with only clean energy sources in it. Well we used to think everyone agreed with that. But now comes the rich billionaires who have taken over the Republican Party and sucked in all the people who can’t or won’t tolerate change. They want their incandescent lights back.

http://cleantechnica.com/2012/05/16/is-clean-energy-yet-another-culture-war/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+IM-cleantechnica+%28CleanTechnica%29

Is Clean Energy Yet Another Culture War?

May 16, 2012 By

Source: Clean Technica (http://s.tt/1c0hi)

David Roberts of Grist had a great post the other day portraying clean energy as a culture war. I think it’s highly worth a read, so I’m reposting it in full from Grist to make it easy as pie to not pass up (note: there’s also a Part II linked at the bottom of the post that is worth a read):

by David Roberts

Not that long ago, some folks were arguing that clean energy — unlike climate change, which had been irredeemably stained by partisanship (eww!) — would bring people together across ideological lines. Persuaded by the irrefutable wisdom of wonks, we would join hands across the aisle to promote common-sense solutions. It wouldn’t be partisan, it would be … post-partisan.

Some day, I will stop mocking the people who said that. But not today. The error is an important one and it is still made regularly, especially by hyper-educated U.S. elites. They think clean energy is different from climate change, that it won’t get sucked into the same culture war. They are wrong.

On clean energy, the material/financial aspects of the conflict are the easiest to understand. Wind, solar, and the rest threaten the financial dominance and political influence of dirty energy. Last week, the Guardian broke the story of a confidential memo laying out a plan to demonize and discredit clean energy, meant to coordinate the plans/messages of several big right-wing super PACs funded by dirty-energy money.

At the bottom of that same piece, though, is one of the best expressions I’ve ever seen of the cultural and psychological aspects of the conflict

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Nice To Have A Nuke In The Basement – Really the article is more hype than anything

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Still it is kind of interesting. I wonder why no one spilled the beans. Was it because the bulk of their workers were blind and totally dependent on Kodak. I do not know but it is an amusing tale nonetheless.

http://digg.com/newsbar/topnews/so_kodak_about_that_nuclear_reactor_in_your_basement

So, Kodak — about that nuclear reactor in your basement

It seems that, until 2006, Kodak had a basement that housed a nuclear reactor, complete with a cache of weapons-grade uranium. How did the company get away with that?

by May 14, 2012 11:16 AM PDT

Corporate America is a place of many layers.

Though fanciful movies made by drug-addled Hollywood directors sometimes suggest that corporations are behind wars, most believe that CEOs are just too harassed to find the time for that sort of action.

And yet, this morning Gizmodo has turned my head toward the explosive reporting of The Democrat and Chronicle, the local newspaper of the Rochester, N.Y., area — home to Kodak.

This paper reveals that between 1978 and 2006, Kodak had a nuclear reactor. No, not a picture of one. A real one — albeit a small one intended for research — housed in its basement.

Surely, you might think that there’s some exaggeration here. And yet it seems that this nuclear reactor contained three-and-a-half pounds of enriched uranium. Highly enriched uranium, indeed, which some might describe as “weapons-grade.”

I am sure that everyone in Rochester — not to mention, say, North America — will be pleased to hear that nothing ever went wrong with this reactor. No leaks. No strange explosions. It apparently bore no responsibility for Kodak’s own implosion, either.

Given that it was only dismantled in 2006, though, it is remarkable that few locals — or, indeed, Kodak employees — knew anything about this 14×24-foot bunker

 

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Smart Meters – Not as smart as you think

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Those crazy Brits. Always planning their regulations in advance. Here they are rolling out smart meters left and right and no one has made a peep about regulations. I am betting that that is going to hurt in the long run.

http://www.greenwisebusiness.co.uk/news/government-to-restrict-sales-and-marketing-around-smart-meters-3216.aspx

Government to restrict sales and marketing around smart meters

Energy efficiency news – by GreenWise staff
5th April 2012
Companies are to face restrictions around how they sell and market their products and around the data they can collect about their customers when mass rollout of smart meters gets underway.

Under new guidelines proposed today by the Energy and Climate Change Minister Charles Hendry, all sales will be banned during the installation of smart meters and installers will need the permission of customers before they visit if they want to market any products to households and businesses. There will be restrictions on data energy companies and other suppliers can hold about their customers. And, in a bid to help consumers save energy and cut their bills, smart meter installers will have to provide energy efficiency advice and all households will be offered an in-home display allowing them to see what energy is being used and how much it is costing.

The Government wants 30 million homes and small businesses to have smart meters installed by 2019. Smart meters give consumers access to accurate information and mean they no longer have to rely on estimated bills. But the cost of the rollout, set to start in 2014, has been estimated at £11.7 billion and consumer groups are concerned the programme could leave consumers short-changed and their privacy undermined.
“Tough guidelines”

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The Green Economy – It cares about everyone not just the rich

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I have written about the need for cookers in Africa and India…any third world country really that gets sunshine that is…before. In fact I wrote whole sections of posts on both gardening and sustainable cooking methods including canning. Do I do any of them? No. I am happy with natural gas. Some people do not have the luxury though.

http://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/glimpses/solar-cooker-kenya

Solar cooker (Kenya)

The solar-powered cardboard cooker, known as Kyoto Box, is a cheap cooker designed for use in rural countries. It is estimated that the Kyoto Box will prevent two tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per family per year by reducing firewood use-  thus saving trees and forests.

The Kyoto Box is constructed from easily available resources. It uses two cardboard boxes, one inside the other with aluminum foil and an acrylic cover that absorbs sun rays. It can be easily packed and distributed. The Kyoto Box costs just $5 to manufacture, and the design has already gone into production in a factory in Nairobi, with a capacity to produce 2.5 million boxes a month.

The Kyoto Box stove seeks to address health problems in rural villages as well as reducing deforestation and avoiding carbon dioxide emissions. By eliminating the need to use wood, it reduces the time spent gathering firewood, and cuts down on indoor air pollution and other fire hazards. It can also provide business opportunities. The project envisions a network of women distributing thousands of the flat-pack devices from the backs of lorries to families across Africa and the developing world.

The inventor is Jon Bohmer, a Norwegian-born Kenyan based entrepreneur. The Kyoto Box won the Financial Times Climate Change Challenge in 2009.

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The Green Economy – This site thinks it is only a matter of time

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This real cool site believes that because energy prices now must be factored into every business, the green economy is only a matter of time. I hope so.

http://www.thegreeneconomy.com/corporate-investing-in-a-time-of-record-cash/

Corporate Investing in a Time of Record Cash

How to invest in an evolving economy?

As businesses — many of whom have record levels of cash on hand —  look for new opportunities, readers and experts chime in on where to put corporate investments.

In a recession, business hold fast, reducing costs and overhead while waiting out the slow economy. The return of the economy heralds a return — often very much like to the one that existed before the recession — except with some new efficiencies.

The Great Recession is different.

By the start of this year, we saw businesses reaching the conclusion that business-as-usual was not going to happen. There is a realization that oil and energy prices are now fundamental to decision making at all levels. (One example is the auto industry, which fought fuel efficiencies for years. Now they are entering new markets with innovative cars, and bringing back buyers who have bought foreign for years.) Limitations in global outsourcing — including customer dissatisfaction and the costs of doing business abroad — are making board rooms re-examine policies once held as best practices. There is talk about supply-chain efficiencies that are broader and more complex than ever before. Companies with the technologies and skills to manage that process are becoming the new Google and the new Microsoft.

Amidst the on-going malaise at the federal level, states and local communities are moving ahead with water and air quality policies. Innovative leaders are leaping ahead of those regulations, developing new products that manage resources better, either in the manufacturing process or as used by consumers.

Yet, with all this opportunity, at the beginning of January, Reuters reported that Apple Computer (APPL) had $93 Billion in cash, as well as long and short term investments. In September of 2011, the Wall Street Journal reported that corporations had a higher share of cash on their balance sheets than at any time in nearly half a century, with the Federal Reserve reporting that non-financial companies had more than $2 trillion in cash and other liquid assets, up more than $88 billion from the end of March of last year.

 

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The Green Economy – Why the world passes the United States by

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I find this article to be both uplifting and sad. Uplifting for them and sad for us.

http://www.unep.org/greeneconomy/AdvisoryServices/SouthAfrica/tabid/79056/Default.aspx

South Africa’s Pathway to a Green Economy

National Green Economy Initiatives

South Africa’s New Growth Path announced in 2010 sets out critical markets for employment creation and growth, implying fundamental changes in structure of production to generate a more inclusive and greener economy over the medium to long run through macroeconomic and microeconomic interventions.

South Africa launched a US$ 7.5 billion fiscal stimulus package in February 2008 covering the period covering the period 2009-2011.  Around 11% of this stimulus package, representing US$ 0.8 billion was allocated to environmental-related themes.

The South African Government hosted a Green Economy Summit in May 2010, to set the stage for formulating a Green Economy Plan.

In November 2011, South Africa unveilled a Green Economy Accord to launch a partnership between the government, business community, trade unions and civil society.

The Green Accord is one in a series agreed under South Africa’s New Growth Path. It sets goals to create 300,000 new jobs in contribution to the New Growth Path’s objective of creating five million new jobs by 2020, and to double the country’s clean energy generation.

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Go there and read tons. It is a UN site after all. More tomorrow

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Utilities Go Trenchless – And cut costs

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This is great news for the safety of the industry.

http://trenchlessinternational.com/news/advances_in_utility_location/004594/

Advances in utility location

Jo Parker

Trenchless International — October 2009

Advances in underground utility location could mean enormous savings – in economic, environmental and social terms. Here Jo Parker from Watershed Associates discusses some of the latest technological research and development emerging from the UK.

There are over four million kilometres of buried assets in the UK. At present, utilities make information about their buried assets available in a variety of methods including via websites, through telephone or written application, with a paper plan sent in response, or by marking out the location onsite. Collating these records can be a time consuming exercise and often the information has to be transferred by hand to another CAD system.

Even when a utility company uses the latest techniques to map its new assets, information on legacy services – which may have been installed decades earlier by a predecessor organisation – may be inaccurate or even non-existent. Pipes in older cities may be over 150 years old. Poor mapping techniques used at the time of installation and the practice of recording the pipe’s location relative to a physical feature that may no longer exist means the exact location of many of today’s networks are unknown. Although current surface location and detection techniques have improved in recent years, they are still of limited use, being both unreliable and slow to operate. As a result the only way to reliably identify the accurate position of any buried service is to excavate a trial hole.

Economic disruption

The direct cost of trenching and reinstatement work of UK highways for utilities is in excess of £1.5 billion per year. Part of this is attributable to holes excavated in the wrong location and damage to third party assets, which is estimated to be as high as £150 million. Although direct costs are high they are significantly lower than the societal costs, such as delays to road users, disruption to businesses and environmental damage which may be as high as £5 billion per year.

Article continues below…

 

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Go there and read boatloads. More tomorrow.

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