Category Archives: burning reduction methods

Plug Monitors Save Energy – I did not even know they existed

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For someone like me that has been at this for so long, you get a little lazy about keeping up with the new stuff so this caught me off guard.

 

http://www.treehugger.com/clean-technology/the-power-monitor-top-tools-for-watching-your-home-energy-use.html

 

The Power Monitor: Top Tools for Watching Your Home Energy Use

You can reduce electricity use by 15 percent without trying. Sound too good to be true? It isn’t. For those consumers using power monitors, this these are typical reductions. Just by being aware of where and when electricity is used, you’re far more likely to off a few devices or flipping a few light switches that might have been left on before, and can make a big dent in their energy consumption. IBM just solidified this statistic with their recent smart meter pilot program, and those households who really put in the effort showed as much as a 40% reduction on energy use. When looking at ways to monitor the energy consumption in a home, power monitors fit in three big buckets: checking the consumption of single devices or appliances, monitoring the energy use of a whole house, and online dashboards that link up with utility companies as part of a smart grid. The steady advance of smart grid technologies will bring more and more user-friendly options to the table. But for now, here are the three umbrella categories, and a few of the top tools under each that are helping people shrink the amount of electricity they use.

Plug Load Power Monitors

Kill A Watt is a classic example of a plug load monitor. These are power monitors that plug into a wall outlet, and then the device is plugged into them. They monitor how much energy the device is sucking up. They’re a great way to know which devices are power sippers, and which need to be unplugged. Other examples are the Watts Up Pro, which is similar to, but bulkier than the Kill A Watt; and the Brultech ECM-1220, which can monitor not only plug-in devices but also things that are wired into the home or the plug isn’t accessible (like dishwashers or ceiling fans) thanks to a current sensor that clamps onto the cord of the device.

 

The price range is significant, from about $35 for a Kill A Watt, to about $120 for a Watts Up, to about $250 for a Brultech ECM-1120. So your investment can vary, and really depends on how involved you need your basic plug load monitor to be.

You can check out a couple of these reviewed by Jon Plowman, the former head of BBC Comedy, along with some from the next category

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Residential Solar Leasing – There are 2 sides to this in the United States at least

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Holy Cow. There are really two sides to this issue and opinions are very strong. I think it actually depends on the company and their integrity but maybe that is just me. I start with the NO sayers and next week I will post the YES sayers.

 

http://solarleasedisadvantages.com/

 

Solar Leasing

 

FACT: If you owe federal income taxes, then there’s absolutely no such thing as a $0 down solar lease or PPA.

And here’s why: A mandatory condition of both of these rental programs is that you forfeit the 30% federal tax credit and any cash rebate to the solar lease or PPA company.

The 30% federal tax credit alone is typically worth anywhere from $3,500 to well over $10,000.000 at the leasing company’s much higher pricing.

Before signing any contract, always demand to be shown, in writing, both the amount of the tax credit and any rebate that you’re providing as a down payment as well as the total system price.

If your solar lease or PPA salesman refuses to provide you with this information, then it is in your best financial interest to ask your salesman to leave.

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Sequestration’s Partial Failure Causes Some Doubts – Of course it was never going to be the answer

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I find this article troubling because what you are talking about here is the creation of a substance that only exists on the two gas giants in our solar system. That would be CO3 and that would be on Jupiter and Saturn. Now I have to admit that if the liquid were released from that pressure (in a total failure where it burst to the surface) it would probably convert to CO and CO2 those gases are lethal. And the resultant cloud would kill everything in its path.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2014/0527/Can-we-hide-carbon-dioxide-underground-Algeria-site-offers-note-of-caution

 

Can we hide carbon dioxide underground? Algeria site offers note of caution.

Scientists want to capture carbon dioxide underground to slow global warming. But a test in Algeria is showing that the sunk CO2 can do some surprising things.

By , Staff writer / May 27, 2014

A facility in Algeria that captured carbon dioxide on an industrial scale – and locked it up deep underground – is yielding this lesson for researchers exploring ways to deal with global warming: Select a site with care, because the unexpected can happen.

A new study that aims to explain why sequestered CO2 was moving surprisingly quickly through rock formations beneath In Salah, a natural-gas extraction site in central Algeria. In Salah hosted the second-largest industrial-scale sequestration demonstration project after Norway’s Statoil, which has been conducting a sequestration demonstration at the Sleipner field in the North Sea since 1996.

The new study of In Salah’s effort identifies the injected CO2 itself as a key culprit. The facility was injecting the unwanted greenhouse gas at a rate that boosted the pressure of the CO2 stored in a sandstone formation more than 6,000 feet below the surface

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Energy Conservation The Corporate Way – If Excelon is getting on board every one will be eventually

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While they do not mention residential programs per se, I suppose a homeowner could always ask.

http://www.constellation.com/business-energy/pages/energy-efficiency.aspx

Lower Consumption, Lower Costs

Managing total energy cost over time requires an energy strategy focused on quantity as well as price. Energy conservation measures can go a long way toward lowering consumption and associated costs while achieving sustainability goals and meeting regulatory compliance, like LEED certification.

However, financing for these projects is often an obstacle.

Constellation connects power customers with conservation benefits through Efficiency Made Easy – a unique bundled commodity and energy efficiency solution. Businesses with sustainability goals or mandates can save money and reduce energy consumption by baking in the cost of efficiency projects into a power contract.

– See more at: http://www.constellation.com/business-energy/pages/energy-efficiency.aspx#sthash.4Iqb8ya6.dpuf

Lower Consumption, Lower Costs

Managing total energy cost over time requires an energy strategy focused on quantity as well as price. Energy conservation measures can go a long way toward lowering consumption and associated costs while achieving sustainability goals and meeting regulatory compliance, like LEED certification.

However, financing for these projects is often an obstacle.

Constellation connects power customers with conservation benefits through Efficiency Made Easy – a unique bundled commodity and energy efficiency solution. Businesses with sustainability goals or mandates can save money and reduce energy consumption by baking in the cost of efficiency projects into a power contract.

– See more at: http://www.constellation.com/business-energy/pages/energy-efficiency.aspx#sthash.4Iqb8ya6.dpuf

Energy Efficiency

Develop Strategies to Save Energy & Improve Reliability

Industries We Serve

Commercial Real Estate

Develop comprehensive, energy efficient management strategies.
Learn More ›

Education

Customize an energy management strategy to meet fiscal and strategic priorities.
Learn More ›

Government

Reach financial and environmental goals and achieve internal effectiveness.
Learn More ›

Healthcare

Develop effective energy strategies that will allow you to focus on patient care.
Learn More ›

Hospitality

Pursue an integrated approach to energy cost management with comfort and ease.
Learn More ›

– See more at: http://www.constellation.com/business-energy/pages/industries-we-serve.aspx#sthash.mBWPVA8u.dpuf

Well this should be a short post. Excelon will not allow me to borrow any of their page to post here so you will just have to go there and see it. But here is the general page if you are interested in something more than Commercial Buildings.

http://www.constellation.com/business-energy/pages/industries-we-serve.aspx

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Coal Plants And Nuclear Plants Shutting Down – We are winning the war

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I have a saying. If you can’t make it work under capitalism and socialism is already leaving you voluntarily then you are pretty much done for this world. It looks like coals time has come and gone and it is the same with nuclear power too. Thank the gods that be. Now the question is, is it too late? We are walking a tight rope on that one. If we can come up with some remediations we just might pull out of this very steep climate dive. It is going to be close.

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/flurry-of-coal-power-plant-shutdowns-expected-by-2016-17086

Flurry of Coal Power Plant Shutdowns Expected by 2016

  • Published: February 19th, 2014

Bobby Magill By

A flurry of coal-fired power plants — major sources of climate change-fueling carbon dioxide emissions — could be closed by 2016, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration forecasts.

New emissions regulations and low natural gas prices, partly because of the fracking boom throughout the U.S., are leading utilities to shut down coal-fired power plants and open new ones that burn natural gas. With new Environmental Protection Agency emissions standards limiting mercury, acid gases and toxic metals from coal-fired power plants taking effect in 2015, there is even more impetus for utilities to retire older coal plants, according to the EIA.

Because of those new standards, the EIA forecasts that 90 percent of the power plants expected to shut down by 2020 will actually be shut down by 2016. Those new standards include coal-fired power plants likely having to install flue gas desulfurization equipment, or “scrubbers,” which cost hundreds of millions of dollars each, depending on the size of the plant.

Utilities may decide to shutter a coal-fired power plant if coal prices, wholesale electricity prices and the costs of installing scrubbers do not make economic sense, according to the EIA.

Coal-fired power plants are feeling the heat about carbon emissions, too. Concern about coal plants’ carbon emission contributing to climate change are driving the EPA to write new carbon emissions rules unrelated to the new mercury standards. The EPA has proposed new regulations aiming to curb carbon emissions from future coal-fired power plants and is in the process of proposing similar regulations governing existing coal power plants.

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Mist Fracking, Foam Fracking And Gas Fracking – These are things I did not know

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But it sounds nasty to me. And then there is the use of Acid. This is really ugly stuff.

 

 

Today (Sunday, 12/8/13)  is Day 24 of the Comment Period of IDNR.   We’re almost half-way through the comment period.  Please keep making your comments daily!

Today’s Topic: Non-water and partial water fracks must be regulated based on risk, not volume

Comment:

The law defines “high volume” fracking based on the number of gallons of base fluid” (at least 80,000 gallons per stage and 300,000 gallons total).   While this definition may be applicable if the fracking base is a fluid such as water, it leaves a gaping hole when gas (e.g. nitrogen, carbon dioxide) or a mixture of gas and water (foam fracks, mist fracks), are used.  And defining high volume fracking this way is especially critical in relation to Illinois’ New Albany shale where other bases are likely to be used; nitrogen gas and mist fracking is already occurring just across the border in Kentucky’s New Albany shale.

Problem: Gallons are units of volume used to measure liquids.  But what if a liquid isn’t used in fracking?  Not all fracking base material can be measured by gallons.  If non-water base fluids are accounted for as liquid gallons, the gallonage total will fall below the threshold whereby the fracking operation will be considered “high volume hydraulic fracturing”, even though the operation is comparable in scale – and therefore risk – to a high volume water-based frack in terms of chemical use, pressures, or other measures.

Revisions Needed:

The Department needs to come up with an appropriate means to express the threshold of applicability as it applies to non-water fracks. The key parameter for developing a comparable threshold should be identifying comparable risk. Simply converting the water-based thresholds from gallons to cubic feet or another unit of volume appropriate to measure gases would be completely arbitrary and wholly divorced from the real environmental and health risks posed by such non-water fracks. Thresholds for gas-based fracks must be developed independently based on an evaluation of risk and field data from gas-based fracks.

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Solid State Lighting – Why state of the art energy solutions are not applied

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Residential energy conservation has stagnated somewhat in the last 3 or 4 years. I do not know what the dampers are, whether it is price or attitude for instance. New houses are a lot more efficient but the efforts to improve existing housing stock have stalled. Here is an article about those latest techniques.

http://www.nyserda.ny.gov/Energy-Efficiency-and-Renewable-Programs/Residential/Emerging-Technologies-and-Accelerated-Commercialization.aspx

Emerging Technologies and Accelerated Commercialization (ETAC) in the Residential Sector

Opportunities to achieve energy-efficiency gains in the residential sector beyond traditional building and retrofit techniques have been limited by underutilization of emerging technologies that are commercially-available, but face barriers to widespread adoption in the industry. Technologies and techniques such as solid state lighting, lighting controls, home energy management systems, smart-grid integration, micro-combined heat and power, and super insulation have proven benefits. But they have seen limited market adoption, due to obstacles such as upfront costs, consumer and builder awareness and the lack of infrastructure support, including activities such as supply chain development, sales training and installer certification.

The ETAC initiative seeks to address the barriers to market acceptance by facilitating in-field demonstrations and the subsequent technology transfers. Widespread, large-scale demonstrations will incorporate these technologies into energy-efficiency projects, where the savings potential will be monitored and validated. In parallel, other marketplace needs will be addressed, such as the development of a training curriculum for designers and specifiers, installer-certification standards, consumer-education materials, and maintenance processes. Following the demonstration period, results will be communicated to the marketplace via various means such as case studies, presentations, and webinars.

While this specific initiative is focused on emerging technologies in the residential sector, NYSERDA will also demonstrate emerging technologies for the multifamily and commercial/industrial sectors through parallel ETAC initiative

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Syracuse Goes Green – Grows a shopping center out of a brownfield

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This was sent to me by the Destiny USA management. I agreed to run it because they seem to have done a good job. CES can not endorse comercial endeavors nor should this be considered a commercial advertisement as we have received no money to perform this task. When folks do good for the planet we reserve the right to talk about it.

http://www.destinyusa.com/green

History of Destiny USA LEED® –Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design LEED® Tenants City and Federal Commitments On-site Green initiatives

History of Destiny USA

 

Carousel Center opened its doors on October 15, 1990 after several years of land redevelopment and renovation on the shores of Onondaga Lake in Syracuse, NY. The super-regional shopping center was developed on a former Brownfield site; one so ravaged by environmental negligence that the New York Times[m1]   called it “a kind of monument to 20th century environmental arrogance, its future written off by government and business alike.”

Robert Congel and Pyramid Management Group welcomed the responsibility of this cleanup after drawing up plans to build a new shopping center in Syracuse. Originally, plans were created for a different location but Mr. Congel redirected his attention to “Oil City.” It was an opportunity to cleanup the lakefront disaster and make it the thriving economic engine that it is today.

Destiny USA is continuing to build upon Mr. Congel’s history of projects that improve Syracuse environmentally. This project is taking a path of leadership in the commercial retail industry by cooperating with the United States Green Building Council (USGBC, USGBC on Destiny USA)[m2]   to get its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) for Core and Shell certification. After meticulous work, the USGBC deemed the 1.3 million square foot Core & Shell expansion its LEED® Gold Certification on February 6, 20

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Vermont Nuclear Closes – One down and 105 more to go

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Unfortunately the plant will sit there in “safe mode” for 60 years until it cools down enough to begin to dismantle it. Hopeful by then a safe disposal site will be designated for the whole US so that the site can be returned to greenfield status. This country should have started a glassification program a long time ago, but besides getting the idea of nuclear power all wrong for cold war purposes, we have got the whole process wrong to make it at least feasible ever since. What a waste of time and money this last 60 nuclear years have been. Our grandchildren will look back on our time as a sad one indeed.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/27/vermont-yankee-nuclear-plant-closure/2707987/

Vermont nuclear power plant to shut down in 2014

Terri Hallenbeck and Tim Johnson, Burlington (Vt.) Free Press

Company said the plant is no longer economically viable.

BRATTLEBORO, Vt. — Entergy Corp. will close Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, which it had fought so vigorously to keep open, by the end of 2014, the company said Tuesday.

Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin called the shutdown “the right decision for Vermont” and pledged to help the plant’s workers find new jobs.

Entergy (ETR), which bought Vermont Yankee in 2002 from eight Vermont utilities, made the decision Sunday to shut down the 600-megawatt nuclear power plant just outside of Vernon, Vt., on the Vermont-New Hampshire border about 2 miles north of the Massachusetts border but informed the Vermont governor of its decision Tuesday morning

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Should SolarCity Change Its Name – Changing their name to EfficiencyCity

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I mean really if they are going to drop their insistence on solar panel installations as part of a retrofit then why keep the name? Are they now a software company or are they now a software and then install whatever company? Good questions with no answers. It would be like Tide if it were to stop making soap and started making dishwashers. Would they keep the name and why?

http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/a-peak-at-solarcitys-new-energy-efficiency-software?

Has SolarCity Created the Amazon 1-Click for Energy Efficiency?

 

“We believe SolarCity has the best database of residential energy use of anyone in the world.”

 

Stephen Lacey: June 28, 2013

 

After SolarCity shifted its energy efficiency strategy and pulled back from doing residential retrofits in-house, the solar services behemoth is moving straight into intelligent efficiency.

 

GTM’s Eric Wesoff recently reported on SolarCity’s evolving business plan and the resulting changes that company executives say will scale residential efficiency in the same way solar services have scaled residential solar.

 

But solar is very different from efficiency. For the most part, solar is very standardized and installations are uniform from home to home. Efficiency retrofits encompass an extraordinarily broad category of activities and skills. Incentives are also quite different for efficiency, making it more complicated from a financial perspective. That’s why only a handful of U.S. solar contractors have offered efficiency as an in-house service.

 

SolarCity decided that doing the retrofit work itself was not the best way to scale. Instead, it has turned from manpower to the power of big data.

 

The secret sauce is a “simulation engine” that shows homeowners exactly how much they’re spending on energy everywhere in their house. The initial database was created using information from 16,000 home energy audits performed over the last five years. It relies on an algorithm developed at the Department of Energy that crunches 100 million calculations per home for each individual energy efficiency audit (which is still performed by SolarCity when installing solar).

 

“The simulation software looks at every component in a home in relation to one another,” said SolarCity COO Peter Rive. “Every ten minutes, it thinks about what one thing is doing and about its effect on the rest of the systems within the home.”

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