Methanogen-- artifically produced methane

Methanobacterium palustre (methanogen), otherwise known as artificially manufactured methane seem to me to be the most eco-friendly of all the alternative fuels I have read about!

First off its production does not require a feed that other alternatives require. This chart exemplifies what I am talking about in regards to the conventional bio-gassses. It shows what feedstock yields in the way of biogas:

So the production of Methanogen will not affect food prices such as the production of ethanol and soy diesel do for instance.

See the production of Methanogen is done with the use of just only two products-- microbes called methanogen and electricity. According to Alfred Spormann, professor at Stanford, burning methane produced by these microbes, do not contribute to atmospheric carbon dioxide. The microbes use CO2 from air to form methane, hence, burning the fuel just returns the extracted gas. Whereas burning fossil fuels release CO2 previously trapped underground for millennia. So, this method of producing artificial methane would contribute absolutely zero to global warming.

Furthermore electricity from renewable resources such as solar and wind would make the entire process carbon neutral. This novel process was designed by Stanford in collaboration with Penn State, and I hope we soon see utility scale production facility that will be able to pump out millions of tons of Methanogen!

Trans Canada & Exxon are planning to build yet another pipeline

Trans Canada and Exxon are planning to build yet another pipeline in Alaska. But this pipeline will not carry crude, but will instead carry natural gas.

They have proposed two different routes for their pipeline-- one would have it going to Alberta (where it would link up with Trans Canada North America system), the other would have it going to the port city of Valdez, Alaska. While on its face going to Valdez may have you scratching your head, so I must explain further.

See LNG (Liquified Natural Gas) can be transported by ship. In fact my cousin worked for Conocophillips fur the Chinese in Qatar on the very plant which makes this possible. From my understanding of the process, they super-cool the gas down and then put it under tremendous pressure, and voila it can then be transported by ship, rail, and I am assuming truck.

What gets me about this is really quite simple. The fossil fuel industry is still trying rape American landscape of its natural wealth. And for what-- so that they can supply China and Asia with cheap natural gas?

Now Trans Canada has gone on record as saying Canada's suppliers of natural gas have curtailed production because the natural gas prices are so low-- then why do they want to take it from America while it is so low? Well I am certain they have their eye on the huge Asian market for this LNG. China in particular if I had to guess. So we will just wait and see what Trans Canada and Exxon do in this regard.

Wal-Mart is embracing alternative energy

This comes as no surprise to me, but Wal-Mart has been embracing alternative energy for now on four years.

It seem as though the many millions that the Waltons have is now being spent on things such as solar, wind, as well as fuel cell technologies. They currently have twenty six fuel cell projects underway, and plus they have a 1.1- megawatt wind turbine at a store in Red Bluff, California. The wind turbine is slated to come online within a month, according to a company spokesperson.

Wal-Mart, with 4,522 stores in the U.S., expects to have 1,000 solar-powered locations by 2020, Marty Gilbert, director of energy at the Bentonville, Arkansas-based company, said in an interview. The retailer gets about 4 percent of its power from renewable sources and plans to install another 100 solar systems by the end of 2012, demonstrating that renewable energy is economically viable to businesses. I can only say duh to the fact that they can make renewables profitable. I have been preaching that to people for years, but no one has taken me up on the idea.

Wal-Mart’s San Diego store is the 100th to get solar panels in California, the company said Monday in a statement. The company currently has 62 megawatts of panels installed at U.S. locations, and also operates fuel cells and wind turbines at some sites.

In addition to Wal-Mart, Apple and Ikea has joined in the effort of going green. Apple has a twenty five megawatt solar farm as well as a six megawatt fuel cell at their new data center in North Carolina-- an article I wrote March 12, 2012 detailed Apple's plans for what they termed Project Dolphin. But retail giant Ikea has also joined in this going green thing-- Ikea has solar projects at 26 U.S. sites and is planning to install 13 more, with total capacity of 38 megawatts.

This is exactly what we need. If more retailers can do this, it will make solar technology more affordable to the rest of us. Wal-Mart, Apple and Ikea mat be starting a new trend by doing this!

The MLP Parity Act could level the playing field

If you are like me you probably have never heard of a MLP. MLP stands for Master Limited Partnerships , and if the act, which was started by U.S. Senators Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), and could act to level the playing field for renewable energy.

You see MLPs have been used by the fossil fuel industry for years and passage of this act would allow renewables to also achieve the same tax advantages that the fossil fuel industry does right now.

Senator Coons said: “Despite all the political rhetoric about the need for an all-of-the-above energy strategy, our current tax code clearly picks winners and losers in the energy space.” He told press, “The MLP Parity Act helps level the playing field by giving investors in renewables and non-renewables access to the same highly attractive master limited partnership business structure. Congress should be setting a realistic and stable policy pathway to sustain innovations in domestic energy development, and help the market work to its fullest potential. That starts with leveling the playing field and giving renewable energy the same shot at market success as fossil fuels.”

This could be a huge step forward for the renewable energies companies. I so hope that the MLP Parity Act passes the congress and gets enacted by President Obama, because we really desperately need this!

Zinc Air Batteries to come in 2013!

Zinc-Air Batteries may indeed hold the key to EVs and HEVS (Electric Vehicles and Hybrid Electric Vehicles). Eos Energy Storage has recently unveiled a Zinc-Air battery that they plan to start production of next year (2013). And to give you a visual on what I am talking about here is a cross sectional diagram of such a battery:

And the key to this photo is:A:Separator, B: zinc powder anode and electrolyte, C: anode can, D: insulator gasket, E: cathode can,F: air hole, G: cathode catalyst and current collector, H:air distribution layer, I: Semi permeable membrane

It turns out that the folks at Argonne have been testing out said batteries as far back as the 1970's-- who knows, they have been experimenting with them longer than that.

Of course they are not placing all their effort on cars at the moment-- they are investing in this battery as a means for grid storage. Then after they are competent that their batteries are good enough to use for cars they will start producing such.

Right now their technology can last for over 2000 charges; but for cars they have set a target of 10,000 charges for that purpose. I sure hope they can reach it!

The best thing I have read about this technology is that it is about as easy as filling your gas tank-- I am assuming that they can handle even more amps than a lithium ion can. If it is really as easy as filling your gas tank. And even better than that, they purportedly only would cost just a little over $11,000!

But Eos is not the only company investing in such technology. ReVolt Technology is another firm working on zinc-air batteries. But their goal is not as lofty as what Eos' is. Revolt has concentrated on consumer devices and EVs, and are targeting between 500 and 2,000 charges per battery life, which is much lower that Eos targeted 10,000 charge cycles per battery.

I encourage your feedback on this article and these two companies. As well I will keep an ever vigilant eye on Eos Energy Storage systems and you will most likely be reading about them again here.

French automakers to go green with their government's help

That is correct, the French government, in coordination with their automakers have decided to go green!

The strategy for France's carmakers was unveiled by the Ministry for Industrial Recovery — a government department created by President Francois Hollande to put his plan to "re-industrialize" France into action.

The government said the decline of France's auto industry has been particularly marked: The country produced just 2.2 million cars last year, as compared to 2005's 3.5 million. It employs 800,000 people — 30 percent fewer people than it did 10 years ago.

Hollande's administration hopes France can carve out a space for its auto industry by driving hard into environmentally friendly cars — a sector the country's automakers are already prominent in. The plan includes a variety of measures aimed at rewarding companies that invest in green technology and drivers who buy environmentally-friendly cars.

It appears to me that the woes that we have felt here in America have spread far and wide. This is almost identical to what happened in the 1870's-1880's. That time period was what has become known as the long depression. So I guess you could think of all of our economic woes as long depression, part 2. But France is now setting its auto industry up for a come back.

GE's 5000th Evolution Series locomotive was just completed

GE's 5000th Evolution Locomotive just recently rolled off the show room floor. I know what you must be thinking-- so what, right? Well the Evolution Series of locomotives are the most efficient locomotives ever built in this world.

Beyond being the most efficient locomotive ever produced it is also the most environmentally friendly locomotive as well.

A little off the subject, are you aware of how a locomotive actually works? As probably is known by all they have enormous diesel engines. Many people have erroneously assumed that that is coupled to the drive train of the locomotive. But sadly nothing could be further from the truth.

A diesel engine as a prime motivator is not really a good thing at all. For one, it has to get up into its powerband before it can do much at all. The power band, for those of you who are unaware of what that is, is the operating RPM (revolutions per minute) where its peak torque is produced at. But guess what produces all of its peak torque off the line if you will-- that is correct, it is electric motors.

So for all of you that thought the diesel engine was the prime motivator of a diesel locomotive you were partially correct. You see the diesel motor turns an electric genrerator, which then in turn provides the power for electric motors in the traction system to operate. This is also the reason that the locomotive industry needs people like me-- both as an electrical engineer and as an IBEW Journeyman Wireman. I have worked with quite a few folks that worked for the railroad industry at one time.

So there you have it; the basic theory of operation of a diesel electric locomotive. And this is a story which prompted me to write about the 5000th GE Evolution Series Locomotive .

The Chinese scrap plans for a waste pipeline after their citizens went out in mass protests

Well if I understand this correctly, the Chinese government has been forced to scrap its plans for a waste discharge in Qidong. The people over there are getting ever more brazen in their opposition to such polluting projects. I say good for the Chinese people! Here is the video of this that I just watched:Hopefully they can work to get the worst polluters to clean up their game. Especially the American companies who have taken advantage of the laws over there instead of cleaning their act up over here. Power to the Chinese people I say!

A plug in hybrid with wheel motors on the rear wheels

Well while incessantly searching for news to write about for you, I ran across this video about a plug in hybrid equipped with wheel motors:Video is courtesy of MTSU
To be fair to the inventors of this technology, it is known as a retrofit kit. Meaning it should be adaptable to about every car out there. But Dr. Charles Perry is rather hesitant to say all, he just says something like 'nearly all cars'.

This invention that I am sure he probably shares with MTSU (Middle Tennessee State University) as well as his past partner in such endeavors, Paul Martin, who Perry says went to work in industry, but does not specify what type of industry.

They have apparently solved the problem with wheel motors, i.e. the problems with them breaking off. But the important thing to note is that this technology was developed with city driving in mind. I am guessing after you reach over 45 mph, the hybrid system becomes invisible to the car. Not really a big deal, but this is a huge step in the way of EVs goes, and perhaps we will see someone develop this further into a totally electric car.

Now I would like to take a moment to discuss horsepower and torque with you all. The first and perhaps the most important point to make about torque is that all electric motors, unless they are equipped with a variable frequency drive, develop 100% of their torque when you energize the motor. Furthermore, it maintains 100% torque up until it reaches its peak, then it falls off. Perhaps this visual will help you to understand the idea better:

As can be seen by this graph the torque does not begin to fall off for 'tq-1, tq-2, and tq-3' until approximately 590 or so. This graph does not specify what this measurement is of, i.e. nm, or ft-lbs! But you get the general idea. But horsepower is a function of said torque; specifically horsepower can be found by the formula: hp=(torque*rpm)/5252. Perhaps this image will make all of this a bit more clear for you:

So if we apply what Dr Perry says in the video (it is not real clear from the implications of what he says, for instance does the 200 ft-lbs of torque get produced by each motor individually, or is it 100 ft-lbs of torque per motor) at any rate we will assume that it is the latter and use the 200 ft-lbs of torque for our calculations, and 3600 rpms: hp=(200 ft-lbs*3600 rpm)/5252 which equals roughly 137 hp. Pretty good I would say, but we have 'guesstimated' quite a few things here, but again you get the general idea at least.

And if I understood Dr Perry correctly he already has an entity that is in the industry working with him to bring this patent to market, so time will tell where this goes; of course I will keep an ever vigilant eye on this technology and report back to you where it goes.

What is fracking, or hydro fracking all about anyway?

Well, the term fracking is used by the fossil fuel industry to describe a way to find oil and natural gas as well (to be fair this process can actually be used for water wells also). Sometimes fracking is described as 'hydrofracking'. The reason for this is quite simple-- they use a 'fluid' to do their fracking, thus making it hydro.

So why is the fossil fuel industry using this concept now to drill for oil and natural gas? Again the answer to that is quite simple-- we have already passed the days of peak oil, therefore all the major players in the fossil fuel industry such as Exxon etal are using hydro fracking to find more oil.

This technique goes by several names: fraccing, fracking, hydrofracking, or the real word for it, hydraulic fracturing. It was invented in like 1947 by Floyd Farris & J.B. Clark of the Stanolind Oil and Gas Corporation. So it is not by any means new technology, it is antiquated if you ask me; as everything else from that era really. But modern fracking was developed 1997, in the Barnett Shale area in Texas to extract shale gas.

To give you a visual on what hydraulic fracturing encompasses, here is a good diagram thanks to out friends at Wikipedia

Perhaps now you at least have a picture in your head of what hydraulic fracturing consists of. But to take a step back to the history of hydraulic fracturing; a patent on this process was issued in 1949 and an exclusive license was granted to the Halliburton Oil Well Cementing Company. That is correct, Halliburton has been relying on this technology for over sixty years!

Now I have to explain some terminology to you. A proppant is a material that will keep a induced hydraulic fracture open, during or following a fracturing treatment. The first use of proppant in fracturing was in the Soviet Union in 1952. Of course this technology was quickly spread to Western Europe.

While the main industrial use of hydraulic fracturing is in arousing production from oil and gas wells, hydraulic fracturing is also applied: To stimulate groundwater wells, To precondition or induce rock to cave in mining, As a means of enhancing waste remediation processes, usually hydrocarbon waste or spills, To dispose of waste by injection into deep rock formations, As a method to measure the stress in the earth, For heat extraction to produce electricity in an enhanced geothermal systems, To increase injection rates for geologic sequestration of CO2.

Now fracking has been in the news recently, mostly for good reason I would say. What is making the main stream media news is not the act of fracturing at all, but rather all of the chemicals that is being used in the fluid. Also of interest are the proppants which are being used. Why is this such BIG news-- because the fossil fuel industry is claiming that such chemicals which they used are covered under proprietary licenses. What does that mean you might ask-- it means a 'trade secret' in other words. And a trade secret that they say would harm them if they had to discuss what was in their proprietary blends.

Just like the fossil fuel industry to put profits way above lives! I mean they are more or less contaminating our groundwater with millions of gallons of their toxic, proprietary 'fluids'. It does not take much of the right chemical to contaminate millions of gallons of our water. That is right it is 'our' water, not theirs. But they have been haphazardly contaminating our groundwater for over sixty years. There is much more specific information which I could go into. If anyone has a question or desires to know more about this process, just leave me a comment on this story and I would be more than glad to answer it for you.

The US receives its first tidal power generator.

I just thought I would bring you this story about tidal power. What you see below is a picture of the USA's very first tidal powered generator:

Now I have known about tidal powered generation for several years now. And have been keeping an eye on the Scottish experimentations in the field of power generation from tidal power.

Evidently from the looks of this article that I have been reading they must have been a great success over there. Because we are now importing their technology to be used over here.

And from this article as well, this is just the first of many to come. This first tidal generation project is named 'TidGen Cobscook Bay' off of Eastport, Maine. It is further reported that 100 billion gallons of water that flows in and out of Cobscook each day, and they hope to eventually have 3 MW of tidal power generation after they get up to their end goal. This is supposedly enough power to run somewhere between 75 and 100 homes.

It is projects such as this that will be powering our future. We have the technology to now break the fossil fuel industry's grip on out nations energy. Tidal power is only part of the mix that includes solar, and wind energy as well. Plus with the recent advances in batteries we have had we can now store energy generated by 'green' means for future when it is needed.

Invisible Solar Cells, utilize roll-to-roll or sheet-to-sheet to drive the price down

Today I thought that I would bring to you this revolutionary PV technology talked about in this article.

As is stated in said article, their solar cells are more or less invisible. So what does this mean for me or the average American citizen you might ask? Well, this technology could be adopted by all window manufacturers making ALL widows PV's as well as being a window.

And, the best part about it is that this technology is ready to be produced in a roll-to-roll or sheet-to-sheet manufacturing. What that means is production on a mass scale, which means a lower overall cost to the end user!

Of course New Energy Technologies, Inc is who brought this new technology to market-- but New Energy has been working in collaboration with the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

The China Crud

Well, I just finished reading this article by Claire Tomkins where she talks about getting the 'China Crud'. See in this article she first explains how she and her husband were so taken by the Chinese and their effort to become a modern country. She talks about several of the attractions: the waterfront along the Huangpo River, the architecture it contains, the new art district, and the 'uber trendy bars and clubs' as she put it.

She recounts she was fine for the first week there. But then after that, she had become victim to what she labels as 'the China Crud'. What is the cause of this 'China Crud' one might ask-- well pollution of course. To be specific, air pollution to be exact. According to her the air over there is so polluted by particulates larger than 2.5 micros but smaller than 10 microns.

Everyone out there should take heed of these facts. Especially here in the USA, because we would have the same pollution if it were not for the first Earth Day which led to the development of the EPA. It was initiated on April 22, 1970 by none other than Gaylord Nelson, who was a United States Senator from Wisconsin.

That's right folks if it were not for the courage of people such as Senator Nelson, we would have never heard of the EPA. And furthermore, for all you ultra conservative or libertarian folks out there, this is a fundamental issue for we have to thank the EPA for-- giving us much cleaner air to breathe!

I for one am glad to say I live in the United States where we have an EPA, and much cleaner air than the Chinese do, what about you?

Ken Salazar says we need federal fracking rules

In this article Ken Salazar says we need federal fracking rules. Now along with this argument also come detractors of such a program. These detractors are using the old states right issue to further their purposes.

Now what is not so apparent here is that I believe the federal fracking rules would also require big oil to release the data on what their fracking fluid contains. Of course those on the right are saying that it is a propriety 'blend' if you will. They further contend that releasing this proprietary blend would go against them.

Well, the way I see it is they should have to release the information on their proprietary blend-- after all this proprietary blend is what they are polluting out waters with. The thing to keep in mind is if they should release this 'stuff' into our groundwater, it could potentially contaminate said groundwater for decades or even centuries to come. So if for no other reason than that, I believe they should release this information to us, the public so that we all know what they are polluting our ground waters with!

Nanophosphate EXT batteries by a123

Well battery manufacturer a123, while it has been plagued with problems in recent years, has just came out with a novel idea. See, up until now, all lithium battery technologies required the use of either heating or cooling to make the batteries last.

The heating was necessary on cold days when below freezing temperatures existed. This was easy enough to take care of by either installing a heater on your EV or alternatively by storing it in a heated garage.

The cooling became necessary on days like we have had around here up until this week, with ambient temperatures over 100 degrees outside. Add to this the internal heat that the batteries inherently produce through going through their discharge phase, cooling would become very necessary for the battery compartment as well.

Well, with the introduction of Nanophosphate EXT batteries, which have a different chemical composition of regular lithium ion batteries, a123 may just have the problem solved!

Why exactly do we not want pipelines that carry tar sands?

Well Keystone and Enbridge have been on my radar for nearly a year, but Michael Brune, of the Sierra Club has a hard hitting article on the subject that is rather damming!

Why is it that we here in America are driving some of the most fuel efficient cars ever thought of, yet the big oil companies want to shove these pipelines down our throats? The automakers are making these high mileage vehicles-- some even are making what is termed as zero gas mileage cars because they do not burn gas at all-- and our population is even buying them.

We are trying to move ourselves on a path to move us beyond oil. But then why does big oil, Exxon, BP and the likes seem so dammed determined to keep us hooked on the stuff for?

Pipelines have an abysmal record in this country. In 2010, more than 30 miles of the Kalamazoo River was transformed into an environmental disaster zone by a cracked tar sands pipeline and a tar sands pipeline company that neglected to turn off its pumps. Since then, a monumental $700 million cleanup effort has removed more than a million gallons of tar sands crude, along with 17 million gallons of polluted water, and 190,000 cubic yards of contaminated soil and debris. Last week, after two years, the EPA officially reopened the affected section of the river.

But that is not all. Tar sands are even worse to clean up due to the fact that the tar sand is heavier than water. This means in laymen's terms that skimming devices cannot be employed to aid in the cleanup effort. Instead, remediators must try and recover this toxic sludge from the bottom of any body of water that these pipelines pass over the top of.

This would be bad enough if such spills were rare occurrences -- but they're not. In the past two months alone, three separate tar sands pipelines have reported spills in Canada. Enbridge Inc., whose pipe leaked into the Kalamazoo, reported a spill of 1,450 barrels of oil-sand crude in eastern Alberta just last week, while two other companies cited spills of 3,000 and 5,000 barrels respectively, the former into a reservoir used by a nearby small town.

And Canadian tar sands spills are not limited to Canada. Since May 2011, three major tar sands spills have occurred in North Dakota, Montana, and Colorado. The North Dakota spill was the twelfth from TransCanada's Keystone I pipeline during its first year of operation.

Why are tar sands pipelines to accident prone one might ask? Well that is such an easy question to answer-- tar sands are not oil per say and require very high pressure in order to move them, plus you are effectively sand blasting the inside of the pipe the whole time you are moving it. Such a recipe ends up in a higher rate of failure than what oil pipelines have.

What makes it worse is that these tar sands pipelines have virtually no oversight at all. This can become apparent if you factor in that most of the leaks that have occurred on Keystone I etal have been reported by the public. That is correct, virtually no tar sands pipelines which had leaks were reported by their respective companies who own them. To me this is a very sad fact, because I know we possess the technology to effectively monitor these pipelines. So the question would be, why do these companies not employ such technology to effectively monitor their pipelines?

Who has the most green economy-- the Chinese of course

This seems like a no brainer to me that China is ranked number one in the world in green energy devices, as was detailed in this article.

According to the World Wildlife Fund. the author of said report, China is number one in the world for clean energy production. Denmark takes the top spot if you figure in their total economy's size.

The US was ranked second as far as total sales are concerned. But when viewed as a proportion to our economy, we ranked a dismal fifteenth. And they go on to blame our lawmakers for not passing legislation favorable to green energy technology. Mostly because the Republicans have but one thing in mind-- to deny our president a second term. As they put it, "U.S. policymakers in Washington seem to be content to let all the recent growth in the U.S. wither on the vine by not providing policy certainty and not going after growth opportunities."

The report found that U.S. cleantech manufacturing sales increased by 17 percent between 2010 and 2011, but notes that this pace is slower than the 28 percent seen between 2008 and 2010.

The U.N. recently announced that 2011 was a record year for global renewable energy investment. $257 billion was invested in 2011, with $147 billion of that going toward solar energy, according to the U.N. Environment Program report. $51 billion, or nearly 20 percent of global investment, came from the U.S.

As is the case with so many of the things I have reported on this year, only time will tell where we end up!

Could chemical exposure go on and on through our genetics?

I must first say that I am no specialist in the field of genetics. I know very little about it, other than what I learned in college. But I just read this article on epigenetics/

And according to its author, Bill Chameides, people such as my mother and grandmother, who are total 'neat freaks' have been poisoning their offspring ever since dupont etal have been making synthetic, petroleum derived compounds for the purpose of 'cleaning'.

Every one of those petroleum derived, synthetic compounds in your house are passed on to your offspring if you are pregnant at the time of your exposure to them. What this means in terms of your child and grand children, etc is that they can develop compromised immune systems! It is such a shame that we have thought for over sixty years that we were doing the right thing, but nothing could be further from the truth :(

Bsolar's double faced panels

Well today I figured I would bring you the news of bSolar's newest development in the world of photovoltaics. It seems as though they were able to effectively produce a double faced solar panel for the first time in world history. They were able to do so by adding boron instead of platinum to the substrate.

Now bSolar is an Israeli company. And their press release about it can be found here for those of you interested in reading about it.

Thin film solar-- it is the way of the future available today!

Okay, so I have read a virtual plethora of articles about thin film solar. I have also read another plethora of articles about its uses. Thin film stands to be the next HUGE thing in the solar market.

Furthermore thin film solar accesses several different types of solar cells. These include, but in no way are limited to: a-Si, a-Si/Ge, CIGS, and CdTe. I will now try to explain to you what each of these mean in the following paragraphs.

a-Si stands for 'Amorphorous Silicon' and is the non-crystalline allotropic form of silicon. See, silicon by its nature is generally tetrahedrally bonded to four neighboring silicon atoms. But in its amorphorous state, the silicon forms a continuous random network. The keyword here is random.

I cannot actually find what a-Si/Ge stands for but I am going to step out on a limb here and say that it is a composite of amorphous silicon and germanium, which makes total sense.

CIGS stands for 'Copper indium gallium selenide' (what a mouth-full there) and is also tetrahedrally bonded semiconductor.

And that brings us to the last one on the list, CdTe, which stands for from cadmium and tellurium, and is formed in a crystalline form.

Now the most important thing to note about each of these semiconductors is that they each have a varying amount of efficiency. Furthermore one can only guess that the higher the efficiency, the higher the price that each one is going to be.

Now I also read an article a few months back which said the highest efficiency of the solar world was one in which the substrate included arsenic. You know that lethal element, arsenic, but whenever put into a substrate it is considered to totally safe.

Now comes the uses for thin film, you can actually build a metal roof and cover it with thin film, plus it can also be used in shingles. This is not the limit of the uses for thin film and is just the start, but as u can plainly see from the examples which I supplied you with thin film solar totally eliminates the need for a mounting system, and even trackers. Now, it might not be as efficient as trackers are, but it sure would be sweet if everyone's roof were covered with thin film solar.

Here is a chart designed by GTM Research that details out major makers of thin film solar and what technology each uses.

And here is another graphic produced by GTM Research that details the estimated top thin film PV suppliers by production MW wise for the 2012 year.

And if anyone of you have any questions about thin film or the technology that makes them work, if you pose it to me I will try my best to answer it as quickly as I can.

Is Fuzzy Math Keeping Oil Company Profits High?

Well an entire dissertation could be written about this factual spike in gasoline, diesel fuel, and other fuels in general. In fact that is exactly what Simon Mui suggests in his paper on the subject. As we all are too well aware, in a capitalistic economy whenever supply outstrips demand the price should fall.

But the problem of the supply curve is that big oil has gotten used to the outrageous profits that they experienced in 2008 and do not want to let go of them.

Additionally there has been a virtual boom in America's production of oil, as well as natural gas. In the past three years, the number of rigs in U.S. oil fields has more than quadrupled to 1,272. Upping our output of this precious commodity.

But while we are producing more of said commodity, we are also exporting much more of it. Last year ended the fifty plus years of the US being a net importer of oil, to make us a net exporter of oil for the first time in fifty plus years.

So, how exactly are they keeping prices so high? Well the Koch brothers are in large part contributing the most that they can to keep prices high. They have a built a plethora of tanks near their headquarters out in Witchita, Kansas and are rat-holing oil in them! They are not without the support of other oil companies, as I detailed in this post a few months back.

SOFC-- Solid Oxide Fuel Cell

Well this came across my radar yesterday. It appears as if the folks at Harvard have successfully created a Solis Oxide Fuel Cell. Why is this important you might ask? Well, this SOFC works both as a battery and a fuel cell, thereby eliminating the need for batteries in the first place.

You can read about this breakthrough invention here. But I will break it down like this for you: This discovery comes in the face of a breakthrough in anode and cathode design. Previously they had utilized platinum for both the anode and cathode. But once this platinum at the anode was replaced with vanadium oxide the fuel cell went from lasting fourteen seconds to lasting three minutes thirty seconds, at an energy density of 0.2 mA/cm2. Not much but definitely a start in the right direction! I will leave any further description up to experts at the previously mentioned link.

Volvo is at it again with the assistance of Denygo

Yes you read that correctly-- Volvo and Denygo have teamed up to provide wireless transmission of power-- for electric vehicles of course.

Wireless power transmission is nothing new. It can trace its roots back to none other than Nikola Tesla. Wireless transmission could therefore be said to actually be older than the grid which we have become accustomed to in this country.

See, over one hundred years ago, long before the advent of lithium batteries, Tesla was working on an electric car. Rumor has it that his electric car was powered by the sun. See Tesla had a postulate that if he could ever figure out what frequency the sun's light resonated at, he would have a limitless supply of energy at his fingertips. incidentally I have pulled up all of Tesla's patents pertaining to this idea in the last ten to fifteen years. He was using rudimentary technology compared to what we now possess today to say the least!

Now this is not to say that others did not follow in his footsteps. Thomas Henry Moray also worked on devices which could power cars wirelessly. And apparently he too had success at it. But the patent office never would offer him a patent on said device because he was unable to specify where the power came from. And to my knowledge, to this date, his family has kept said patent application open-- in order to prevent someone from stealing his technology!

So we have to rather ingenious fellows here the purported to make this idea work. Then you might ask why we haven't heard of this before now-- well now you actually have to delve rather deeply into conspiracy theories-- and of course at the root of all conspiracies put forth are ALL oil companies; surprise surprise right?

And by the way in case you all were wondering what this latest development in wireless transmssion is called, it is the Rectanna. That being a word derived from the combination of rectifier and antenna. And you can read about it for yourselves right here.

The PTC for wind power?

You know I have been barraged by a virtual plethora of articles about the PTC for wind power. While at the same time I have gotten articles on a group of investors who are betting hugely on Wind in Michigan.

So my question is this are these just a set of investors who are hedging their bets, or do they in fact not care if the PTC is expanded. It is indeed a crazy world out there right now.

Now with all of this said, I am very much in favor of them extending the PTC. But at the same time I believe that congress should do this as a means to help out homeowners to help offset the costs of installing wind generation in their back yards.

What I do not want to see happen is a pro corporate PTC tax credit to being placed. For instance did you know or realize that after depreciating the cost of a turbine that said company can then sell the turbine to a second company, who can then use the PTC and depreciate it again! This type of nonsensical tax code does nothing but pad the pockets of the corporations. We need to end this practice once and for all-- only giving the PTC to landowners, not corporations!

Enviro Safe Refrigerant

Ok, so I thought today that I would tell you all about something I just discovered this weekend. That something is Enviro Safe refrigerant. Enviro safe has been around ever since about 1992. It is all made in the USA. And best of all it does not deplete the ozone nor contribute to global warming!

Now I know what you are thinking, because I was too, does it work as good as the halide refrigerants such as r12, r22, r134, r404, and r502? Well it turns out that it outperforms all the aforementioned. Here is a comparison chart for all of you nonbelievers out there:

So why hasn't anyone heard of such refrigerant? As is so typical with anything our government does, the switch to r134 benefitted guess what corporation-- the DuPonts of course. As they were the makers of r134, and profitted hugely by people switching to that refrigerant. R134 actually causes testicular cancer, but enviro safe is totally unregulated by any governmental body, and does not come with the side effects that r134, or r12 have.

Now I am trying out their refrigerant for car air conditioners at present. But they actually make replacements for r22, r404, as well as r502 for home sized units!

Now perhaps I should share my background with refrigerants with all of you, the readers of my blog. I have been dealing with auto air conditioners since I was twelve years old. Back then it was all totally done with r12, as most of you know. Well in about 1998 I switched over to r134 and have retrofitted quite a few cars since that time. That was long before I became an engneer, or environmentally conscious for that matter.

But I feel as though I should offer you a cautionary note here. It can actually be combined with both r12 and r134 requiring absolutely no retrofitting. But according to the federal law which covers refrigerants, you are not suppose to combine any refrigerant!

And for those of you who would be interested in such a refrigerant, you can read all about it here and buy it if you would like.

Pittsburg's pollution was once so bad that it blacked out the mid-day sun!

Following my article on the state of air pollution in China I figured it best that I showed you what it used to be like here in the 1950's since I referenced it in that article.

I was first made aware of this when I was in high school Algebra II class. See my teacher at the time was Charles Beck and he told my class how utterly terrible the pollution was in Pittsurg during his upbringing there. In fact he said it was so bad that just him walking to school would cover his face in black soot that he would have to wash up before school-- or anytime that he walked outside for that matter.

For everyone that does not know how bad it was there is a collection of pictures which depict it over at the Huffington Post Website. It actually became this way post World War II, because as I am sure you all must be well aware that Pittsburg was once the leader in steel production. Couple with that at the time there was absolutely zero pollution controls on powerhouse that made the electricity required for steel production-- not to mention the coke (low-ash, low-sulfur bituminous coal) that goes into the steel making process something that I know of no substitute for (if their is would somebody please tell me what it is)? Of course there was a booming auto industry whose automobiles made the pollution even worse.

But after seeing this you can see how bad the air must be in China right now. But the Chinese do not have to develop ways of keping their pollution in check-- us and Europe has already done it for them!