Mean Green

There is an increasing demand for energy across the globe, of which there are natural resources waiting for us to harness if for our use. We need to spend more time and money into research and seeking ways to make good use of this alternative energy, rather than using the old fossil fuels and creating more damage to the environment.

Wind power is an alternative energy resource that we harness with wind turbines. They are continually being developed with demand and are progressively becoming cheaper and more efficient in energy. There are many “wind farms” which can be seen, that are strategically placed so as not to jeopardise the bird population in their natural environment. The first wind turbines were not so well placed.

The most famous of all alternative energy resources is solar energy, which the majority of people are familiar with. There are lots of products on the market which use solar power, that people buy for home use: solar lighting, solar lanterns and fountains for the garden are a new innovation, etc. Solar cells are manufactured which collects the sun’s energy and focuses, so that it can be converted into electricity to light buildings and for heating, like hot water. Solar energy is like wind power in that there is zero pollution created, which is a positive for the environment.

Governments and investors see Ocean Wave Energy as having great potential for generating energy. In France, a generator of this kind has been operation for several years, deemed to be a great success. In Ireland and Scotland there are now facilities up and running in their experimental phase.

Hydroelectric power plants have been around for years and the powerful generators that have been set up, have proven to be much cleaner and better than power grids at producing electricity. There are, however, limitations as to where you can place one as you have to build a huge dam in a suitable location for the water. For this reason, there are new much smaller localised hydroelectric generators that have been set up recently in rivers, so that they can be localised to accommodate them.

Geothermal energy lies just under our feet directly and there is an abundance of it available. A few miles just below the surface of the earth, we can tap into this energy. The hot molten core of the earth heats the water on the surface, to produce energy, which is harnessed once it turns into steam. This steam is used to drive turbine engines so as to generate electricity. More research should be done on geothermal energy so we can tap into its resources and develop it more for use.

The waste that we produced is often disposed in landfill sites, which decomposes over time and so gives off methane. By using it before it gives off too methane which is damaging, we can create energy from it. It is mainly used as gas for fuel cells for use in standard gasoline generators.

Ethanol is a biofuel used as a substitute for gasoline. This alternative fuel is easy to make and process using such products as corn, grapes, sugar cane, wheat, wood cellulose and wood chips. It is still debatable as to whether it is economical as lots of arable land is required to grow the crops, and also concerns of the pollutants from use of this product. It is localised in some areas and technologies are still being refined for extraction and admixturing.

There is a lot of investment by entrepreneurs into Biodiesel energy which is created by many different plant oils such as palms, rapeseed, soybeans and sunflower oils. It is now competing with fossil fuels and many companies have shown a commercial interest as it is cleaner burning than oil based diesel and is environmentally friendly.

Atomic energy is being created by regenerating nuclear plants for a carbon free energy source with nuclear fission. A great amount of power can be generated which makes this type of energy very efficient. The concern from people is of the radioactive waste product of atomic energy, although there is very little it still takes hundreds of years to decay before it becomes harmless.

Algae Biodiesel Photo Bioreactors and Algae Harvesting

Bio Pioneers in green companies have developed algae biodiesel production and algae oil harvesting systems and equipment for growing algae and harvesting the algae in a very efficient manner for use in algae biofuels such as biodiesel from algae and algae ethanol.

Like other plants, algae stores energy in the form of lipids. Growing algae has potential for algae oil production due to its fast growth rate and the high oil content of some varieties. Some species of algae are so rich in algal oil that it accounts for over 50% of their mass, which means not counting the water, which is over 90% of the algae.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has identified approximately 300 species of algae, as varied as the diatoms (genera Amphora, Cymbella, Nitzschia) and green algae (genera Chlorella in particular) as potentially good sources of oil from algae. Diatoms, or Bacillariophytes, are unicellular, microscopic algae. These organisms are widespread in salt water where they constitute the largest portion of phytoplankton biomass. There exist approximately 100,000 known species around the world. More than 400 new specimens are described each year.

Properly engineered algae systems could produce annually between 2,000-20,000 gallons of biodiesel-worthy algae plant oil per acre. Algae biodiesel and algae ethanol stand as the great green hope of the clean biofuel revolution. For comparison, biodiesel produced from soybeans produces 50 gals/acre/yr. Biodiesel from palm oil yields 600 gals/acre/yr.

Some algae harvesting systems retail for $100,000 US dollars or more. Some algae systems can process one gallon of algae oil per minute from a fluid stream that is half algae/half water by mass & where half of the algae cell mass is oil.

Algae Biodiesel production and algae oil harvesting systems that work in a efficient manner (Use energy conservatively) for growing algae and harvesting algae into Algae biofuels will be the new and long lasting answer to our question of “World How do we reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.”

n than not, the phrase “frivolous lawsuit” is somewhat redundant. Such is the case with San Antonio-based fuel refiner Tesoro, which has filed a lawsuit in California to block a regulation that would boost ethanol consumption in the state by 2010.

The company, which operates refineries in Los Angeles and the city of Martinez, says “the new fuel specifications could conflict with the state’s push to cut greenhouse gas emissions and could have ramifications for the environment and U.S. food prices.”

The New Fuels Alliance, a group that includes the the California Renewable Fuels Partnership , calls the suit “a blatant attempt by Tesoro to try to use the regulatory and legal process to gain competitive advantage in the market place.”

A statement by the alliance continued, “Other oil companies are moving toward increased ethanol use to extend gasoline supply, lower cost, and even increase profits. Tesoro didn’t see this market shift coming and is now trying to gum up the works based on a feigned and disingenuous concern about climate change and food prices.”

The LA Times blog GreenSpace notes rightly that the “text of the lawsuit, filed in Sacramento Superior Court, says precious little about Tesoro’s worries over food supply and prices. Rather, the company’s core complaints are that California Air Resources Board’s new rule: takes effect too quickly, forces companies to pay for emissions offsets if they don’t meet the 2010 deadline, and requires expensive refinery modifications that might not be compatible with California’s still-evolving Low Carbon Fuel Standard.”

Reporter Elizabeth Douglass concludes, “The problem for Tesoro and other refiners is that the whole move to biofuels is eating away demand for its products. That might have something to do with the company’s sudden concern about ethanol’s impact on the environment and the nation’s food supply.”

Nice to see even the LA Times can see through this charade.

Post Update: Make sure to check out the post on the GreenSpace blog and add your comments as they are running 3 to 1 against Elizabeth’s observations.

In recent years, many people raise the idea of growing algae for biofuels. now, when alternative energy become a necessity, and biodiesel production and use is increasing, we would like to reconsider this option, here I’ll give five reason why growing algae for biodiesel instead of regular crops, might be a good idea.

1. price

growing algae is much cheaper than growing plants. all you need is a large water reservoir, sun light and some waste material. algae are very simple life form, and can grow more easily than plants. it is also cheaper and easier to harvest them.

2. speed

Algae grow much faster than plants, and we can produce biodiesel from their cell extracts, and not from the seeds, like we do with plants. Since we can grow unicellular algae like bacteria, in the right conditions, the rte of growth, and the production of oil per cell mass, is much higher than we can expect from plants.

3. ease of production

Since we produce the biodiesel, from total cell extracts, and not from purified oil, that was manufactured from seeds, we can save a lot of production stages, and reducing the production complexity and time.

4. efficiency.

The production of oil in algae is more efficient, considering the farmer needs. plants invest most of their harvested energy in production of many other biological molecules, use for building their bodies, flowers, roots, seeds and more. Algae use more of their energy to build simple cell membranes, composed from fats, that can be used for the production of bio fuel.

5. easy to genetic manipulate.

Since the genomes and body plans of algae are much simpler than those of plants, it is also very easy to genetically manipulate their photosynthesis and oil production apparatuses, to become more efficient. By doing so, we can expect a great advance in this field. Genetic manipulation of algae is also less dangerous than manipulating plants, since they usually do not use as food source.

To conclude, Algae seems like a good source of oil for the future, but it is still not completely ready for mass production. I believe that in a few years we will have the agricultural technology to make them a new renewable source of energy, for our oil thirsty planet.

Obama & Alternative Energy Sources

It will take several years to approve and fully implement comprehensive new alternative energy policies, however the Obama administration promises a new era of energy and environment policy for the United States. Obama expressed his intention to shift the U.S. away from petroleum as its primary energy source and towards alternative renewable energy sources, advanced biofuels and efficient, low greenhouse-gas-emitting technologies.

The key policy initiatives involve caps on emissions such as carbon dioxide and auctioning of greenhouse gas credits to motivate a fundamental shift from high emitting industries to low-carbon energy alternatives. Obama has stated that the policy would be broader than any other cap and trade system proposed or in place to date in the world.

In order to implement the policy, renewable energy, natural gas, plug-in hybrid vehicles and advanced electricity transmission are expected to receive substantial incentives. Obama has proposed drawing upon $150 billion from the emissions auction to finance low-carbon alternatives over the next several years.

Oil Companies, Windfall Profits Tax & Offshore Drilling

The process of reducing emissions would start by targeting the fossil fuel industry. Oil companies are concerned about policies such as windfall profits taxes. Oil industry proponents state that oil companies need to gain access to areas closer to the coastline. Obama has already altered his policy regarding offshore oil and gas drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf due to the recent spike in oil and gas prices.

However, Obama has stated that he disfavors extensive new domestic petroleum drilling. The Democratic-led Congress could reinstate portions of the moratorium on offshore drilling that expired in September 2008. To the extent that oil prices have dropped recently, there may be less political opposition to imposing new restrictions.

Renewable Energy Initiative

President Obama Alternative Renewable Fuels

It is likely that greenhouse gas-climate change legislation will be introduced in the near term. A renewable energy initiative will be central to reduce human impact on global warming. The president elect has stated goals of reductions of 25% by 2025 and 10% reduction in the near term.

Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) are state policies requiring an individual state to generate a percent of its electricity from renewable sources. Each state has a choice of how to fulfill this mandate using a combination of renewable energy sources such as wind, solar, biomass, geothermal or other renewable sources. Some RPS specify the technology combination, whereas others permit the market to drive the choices. This is preferable because each state has different renewable resources. For instance, Arizona has substantial solar resources compared to many other states and North Dakota has greater wind resources than many other states.

Several wind turbine companies have sought a federal renewable portfolio standard. These wind turbine manufacturers and solar firms will benefit substantially under a renewable portfolio standard.

Democratic leaders have stated that incentives to the renewable industry will generate substantial business and employment to help the U.S. recover from its current economic crisis. In the long term, the federal government will spend federal money to pay for carbon capture and sequestration technology.

Coal Industry and Clean Coal

The coal-fired power generators are the largest greenhouse gas emitters. The investment climate will be much more difficult under stricter environmental regulations. The coal industry is concerned that the focus on stringent greenhouse gas laws will severely curtail their industry. The fear is that the climate change policy would destroy the U.S. coal industry that has been a pillar of energy generation for many years.

The cap and trade legislation will motivate carbon capture and sequestration for coal-fired power plants. There is a basic risk that, absent such technology, new construction of traditional coal-fired power plants would not be possible. One critical problem is that long term predictions about submarine or underground sequestration or storage tightness are difficult and uncertain. The CO2 could leak from the storage and ultimately appear in the atmosphere.

Clean coal is an umbrella term used in the promotion of the use of coal as an energy source by focusing upon new methods to reduce its environmental impact. These efforts include chemically washing minerals and impurities from the coal, gasification, treating the flue gases with steam to remove sulfur dioxide and carbon capture technologies to capture the carbon dioxide from the flue gas. These methods and the technology used are described as clean coal technology. The coal industry and its supporters use the term clean coal to describe technologies designed to enhance the efficiency and the environmental tolerability of coal extraction, preparation and use, with no specific limits on any emissions, particularly carbon dioxide.

Some experts have estimated that commercial-scale clean-coal power stations (coal-burning power stations with carbon capture and sequestration) will not be commercially viable and widely adopted before 2020 or 2025. This time frame is of great concern to environmentalists because there is an urgent need to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.

A fundamental question is how the federal government will move the U.S. from petroleum and coal use without slowing the economy. Although Obama has mentioned that the transition to a low carbon economy will create up to 5 million jobs, he has not offered details.

Low carbon energy will in all likelihood increase manufacturing, transportation, and material costs because of higher energy prices and place U.S. goods and services at a competitive disadvantage compared to economies that lack these emission standards, including China, India, Russia and South American and Middle Eastern countries. Moreover, it appears unlikely that our government has the capacity to enact expensive climate change policies during this period of severe economic downturn and the need to focus on recovery from the U.S. recession.

Next Generation Fuels

To the extent that oil and coal industries will have a reduced portion of energy production, it is anticipated that a combination of biofuels, natural gas and nuclear industries could experience rapid growth.

In the biofuels segment, next-generation fuels such as cellulose and algae-based ethanol and biodiesel will be advanced under the new energy and environment policies.

One Biosphere  http://www.onebiosphere.com

Biodiesel becomes more and more popular every year. It’s popularity probably derives from the fact that biodiesel is so cheap and relatively easy to be made. You can make it in your own backyard or kitchen. It is far better than the original petro-diesel, it’s cleaner and better for the environment and your health. Let’s talk about the three options you have when running a diesel engine on biofuel.

All three options can be used with vegetable oils, animal fat or both (it doesn’t matter if you use fresh or used oils):

- You can use the oil as it is

- You can mix the oil with another chemical supplement like kerosene, or gasoline or petroleum etc.

- You can convert the oil to biodiesel

Using the oil as it is can be clean and effective. Not to mention cheap also. But you have to make modifications to the diesel engine so that it is optimized for vegetable oil. You can find pre-modified diesel engines where you can use petro diesel, biodiesel and pure vegetable oil in any combination. There are engines with separate fuel tanks and a switch, you fill one tank with vegetable oil and the other tank with original petroleum diesel. Then you just turn on the engine using the tank with the original petroleum diesel and after a while you switch to the tank with the vegetable oil.

Mixing the oil with other supplements is your second option. Because vegetable oil is thick you mix it with a different type of fuel to make it thinner so that it flows easily into the combustion chamber of your diesel engine. Remember that using petroleum or kerosene to mix the vegetable oil, is not a clean option though. You can make various mixes (for example 20% vegetable oil and 80% of another diesel fuel). Some claim that if you use such a mix you have to preheat the engine, others just start the engine and go without preheating.

Your final option (and by far the best, in my opinion) is to convert the vegetable oil into biodiesel. Because biodiesel works in any diesel engine without the need to make any conversion or modifications to the fuel system or the engine itself. Just fill and go. Biodiesel is a much safer, clean, ready to use fuel that’s well tested. This option unlike the other two is backed by thousands of short-term and long-term research and tests by scientists around the world.

South Park parodied hybrid car owners creating clouds of ‘smug’, but do they really have anything to be smug about? In the battle against man-made global warming and reducing pollution ethanol powered cars, not hybrids, are touted the way to go and politicians and the environmentally conscious alike are jumping on the bandwagon.

There is no doubt that ethanol burns far more cleanly than diesel or petrol – we could radically reduce the pollutants in our atmosphere by switching. Or can we? You see, to create ethanol, crops need to be grown. Because ethanol is not as potent as petrol, more ethanol is burned per kilometre. It takes between 75-90% of the energy yielded from ethanol to actually grow it – ploughing, harvesting, processing and shipping all add up – and ethanol still releases a lot of carbon dioxide. Then there’s the environmental destruction caused by the conversion of land to biofuel production. This either takes forests or fallow land, or removes land from the general agriculture pool which pushes up food prices. Both of these reduce biodiversity. Add to that the increased erosion, fertiliser pollution and waterway silting and the argument for ethanol is fizzling rapidly.

Even if we manage to eek out a saving using hybrids as opposed to ethanol, at best these cars get only marginally better fuel economy than, for example, a diesel VW Polo, and they take as much if not more toxic metals and fossil fuels to produce. The most we can hope for is a fraction of a percent reduction.

There is one radical change we can make, though. Cows, sheep, pigs and chickens account for a whopping 9% of GHG emissions, but 18% of the GHG effect (methane from farts is over 20 times more damaging than carbon dioxide in terms of its global warming potential). So, would a better solution to reduce greenhouse gases be to change to a diet of lentils and beans? Our own emissions might then match those of the livestock! It’s a no-win situation, then, so where’s my chicken sandwich.

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You would be forgiven if you thought that in these present times when world economies are slowing down due to a major banking crisis coupled with steeply rising energy and food prices that when a solution to a part of that problem is available the powers that be would support and promote it to ease the everyday burdens that now exist for us all.

For example there is a system which enables motorists to increase the fuel economy of their cars (or any vehicle) while literally steam cleaning the inside of their engines and hugely lowering carbon gas emissions to help save the environment and on top of all that leaves more of our hard earned cash where it belongs, in our pockets, thus easing the ever increasing higher daily costs of living; its called water to gas fuel conversion.

Instead of supporting the above system, governments including America and Brazil are pumping Billions into the production of ethanol,a so called wonder biofuel, (when Americans get it wrong they really do get it wrong.)

Consider this, even the President of the World Bank stated there could be a global disaster if the west continued to replace food crops with the crops for the creation of biofuels. He also stated that as a result of the doubling in the price of food over the last 3 years that this could result in 100 million people in the poor developing countries being pushed further into poverty.

How bad is the situation? The UK Guardian newspaper recently reported that in less than a year the price of wheat had risen 130%, soya by 87%, and rice by 74%, added to that is the U.N report that there are only 8-12 weeks of cereal stocks in the world, while supplies are at their lowest since the 1980 decade.

When you also take into consideration that a factory producing ethanol at the rate of 50 million gallons p.a. requires 500 gallons of water a minute, water that in some areas is a very precious commodity, you begin to realise what an all round disaster this production of biofuels from crops is.How much longer will they persist with this life threatening policy?

So why, why, why are governments not helping us utilize the water to fuel gas system for lowering fuel consumption, reducing carbon gas emissions to safeguard our environment and easing our financial burdens to make life that little bit easier?

Ohio is the heart of the Industrial Midwest, and America’s bellwether state, rocked in recent years by the collapse of the U.S. manufacturing sector. Auto salvage and recycling are big business here, and with labor unions—a major power in the state—now onboard with green job efforts, Ohio is rapidly engaging in all manners of environmental projects. Here is the latest in recycling and the environment for the Buckeye State.

Recycling To Be Expanded in Downtown Columbus

Ohio’s capital city is a bustling urban area. With more than 100,000 people working, living and shopping in downtown Columbus every day, solid waste is produced by the ton. With space beginning to look tight in the county’s landfill, and increased concerns about environmental damage, Columbus’ civil and business leadership has inaugurated an innovative new recycling program for the city’s downtown.

The Capital Crossroads Special Improvement District is working to provide recycling for 35 property owners in downtown Columbus. It offers a collectively bargained recycling pickup contract for the businesses, offering greater leeway and input as to who hauls the recyclables and when and how they go about doing it. Many wait to see how the unique public-private environmental partnership will go.

Ohio Gets Department of Energy Grant for Alternative Energy

Energy is at the core of many of our environmental problems, and Ohio’s history as a coal producing and coal burning industrial state has heightened awareness of energy’s precarity. With President Obama’s stimulus package in full effect, money for clean energy and other environmental improvements is raining down on the Buckeye State.

Federal stimulus money from the Department of Energy is matching funds raised by a state government initiative to increase Ohio’s utilization of renewable energies—at least $45 million for simply testing wind turbines. Recycling is also getting federal grant money, though auto salvage and recycling may or may not be involved. So-called biofuels—hydrocarbon fuels made from agricultural products such as corn, sugarcane and grasses—get a big boost, as does a new $30 million fund (to be maintained in part by revolving contributions from the DOE) to provide ongoing energy efficiency improvements around the state.

Cuyahoga River’s Comeback Making Waves

The New York Times came to Cleveland this month to report on what the EPA first declared—the Cuyahoga River has turned around. Cutting through downtown Cleveland and for years buffeted by heavy industry, the waterway had become perhaps the most polluted in America. The most famous image was from 1969 when the river actually caught fire and city firefighters struggled to put out the blaze. The Times reports that the iconic image of a river so polluted it could burn was a major inspiration to the nascent environmental movement.

Forty years later this month, things have changed. The EPA is cautious in its praise, noting that the improvements have been remarkable—fish are back, recreation on the river has increased and a fire would be impossible at this point. Things have changed, and with new environmental initiatives in the state, further improvement is anticipated.

One of the most exciting and promising new technologies in the search for new ways of fueling the vehicles of the future is definitely algae oil. Many people are quite surprised by the fact that the oil found in “pond scum” known as algae actually holds a lot of promise for being a potential new source of fuel. Indeed, with the growing concern over gasoline and its ever rising costs, as well as the amount of pollution it generates, researchers are turning more and more to algae oil as a real possibility and an answer to this sometimes troubling question.

Many people do not realize that almost 50 percent of algae’s weight is made out of oil. The oil is essentially a lipid form, and can easily be used to create biodiesel that can fuel many different kinds of vehicles, including cars and trucks. While electricity is very popularly talked about as a replacement for gasoline and regular oil, algae oil is considered to be potentially more feasible, as it is so abundant around the world and would not require people to have to recharge their vehicles.

Algae oil is a truly renewable energy source, unlike gasoline. While average, every day algae is found in ponds and other bodies of water all over the world, it can actually also be grown and farmed quite easily. Many people are already experimenting with growing algae in a much more efficient manner. While ponds have a set limit to how much of its surface is exposed to the sunlight needed by algae to grow, commercial farming techniques are being developed that can grow amazing quantities of algae in relatively little space.

Corn and soybeans are other examples of potential sources of biofuel; however, more algae can be grown and produced per acre than either one of these plants. The oils needed from algae are easy to extract, and they are much better for the environment that gasoline. Thanks to the exciting potential of algae oil, researchers are working at a feverish pace to try and come up with efficient applications of it so that the general public – and the world – can soon enjoy its benefits.

Most people know that it is very critical for the environment and the economy to come up with alternative energy sources than gasoline; indeed, exhaust from cars running on gasoline are one of the biggest contributors to pollution on the planet. It is hoped that algae oil can become a viable solution for this vexing and worrisome problem. Maybe some day, extracting oil from algae will be the most common method for obtaining fuel for our vehicles. It is certain that the benefits to the environment – and our wallets – will be huge.