Sunday, November 23rd, 2008
US Dept of Energy and Brazil to Commercialize Biofuels
NREL, a DOE Federally Funded Research and Development Center, is managed and operated by the Alliance for Sustainable Energy and Petrobras is the largest energy company in Latin America.The partnership between NREL and Petrobras hopes to solidify commercialized biofuels.
Is the Happiness Gene Inherited?
The old cliche that you can’t buy happiness may be true, but new findings show it looks like you can at least inherit it. A study of nearly 1,000 pairs of identical & non-identical twins found genes control half the personality traits that make people happy while factors such as relationships, health & careers are responsible for our wellbeing.
Candace Gingrich: A Letter to My Brother Newt Gingrich
I realize that you may have been a little preoccupied lately with planning your resurrection as the savior of your party, so I thought I would fill you in on a few important developments you might have overlooked. The truth is that you’re living in a world that no longer exists.
Carbon dioxide discovered on distant planet
Carbon dioxide, one of the telltale signs that a planet may be able to support life, has been spotted in the atmosphere of a gas giant orbiting a star 63 light years from Earth.
5 Reasons Why Your Company Should Generate Its Own Energy
Is this really the best time for your company to be thinking about generating renewable energy on-site? Yes!
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Friday, November 7th, 2008
The World’s Largest Concentrated Solar Project
Earlier today, concentrated solar company SolFocus announced that it has signed a deal to install over 10 MW of its systems in Spain for EMPE Solar. Upon its completion in 2010, the $103 million, multi-site project will be the largest concentrated solar deployment in the world. Provides energy for 40,000 homes.
New Coating= Solar Panels Harvest 96% of Available Sunshine
A new type of reflective coating can make solar panels far more efficient, soaking up nearly all available sunlight from nearly any angle. Current solar panels — which convert energy from the sun into electricity — absorb only about two-thirds of available sunlight.
Solar Cells Set New Performance Mark
Researchers are reporting the highest efficiency ever for one type of solar cells in a breakthrough that could lead to more widespread use of solar energy.
Trees Are Nature’s Climate Air Conditioners, Study Finds
If you’re reading this, I probably don’t need to waste my time trying to convince you that trees are great. They absorb carbon dioxide, they can be used to power small remote sensors and they’re pretty darn nice to look at too. Now a new study by a team of scientists from Germany and the UK has discovered another beneficial property…
Millennial Youth to Take Over America’s Environment?
Generation We is new to me. Have you heard of it? It’s the Millennial Generation of Americans born between the years 1978 and 2000. They are being hailed as the next “greatest generation.†I take just a liitle offense to that statement, being GenX myself.
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Sunday, August 17th, 2008
Ten paradoxical traits of the creative personality
Creativity is a central source of meaning in our lives. Most of the things that are interesting, important, and human are the result of creativity. What makes us different from apes–our language, values, artistic expression, scientific understanding, and technology–is the result of individual ingenuity that was recognized and rewarded.
5 Reasons Why Sleeping In Every Day Boosts your Productivity
There is no hope for a civilization which starts each day to the sound of an alarm clock. -Author Unknown Sleeping in is not lazy- many individuals would actually be more productive if they slept in versus waking up early.
Solar Efficiency Record Broken
When it comes to eeking another fraction of a percentage point of power out of a solar panel, we’re pretty good at not paying attention. I mean, what’s the difference between 40.7% and 40.8% anyway? Generally these efficiency gains aren’t all that important to the future of the solar economy.
Algae Gets Another Endorsement As Biofuel Of The Future
In the world of alternative fuels, there may be nothing greener than pond scum. Algae are tiny biological factories that use photosynthesis to transform carbon dioxide and sunlight into energy so efficiently that they can double their weight several times a day, producing oil in the process — 30 times more oil per acre than soybeans.
Save the planet? Buy it
Millionaires are purchasing entire ecosystems around the world and turning them into conservation areas. Their goal? To stop environmental catastrophe.
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Wednesday, August 13th, 2008
Office OpenXML A Dead End, Microsoft Will Back ODF
During the LinuxWorld Expo in San Francisco, I met with Bob Sutor, IBM’s vice president of open source and standards. We discussed document standards and the implications of ISO’s controversial decision to grant fast-track approval to Microsoft’s Office Open XML (OOXML) format.
Top 10 Cell Phone Etiquette Rules People Still Break
Do we really still need to talk about this? You’d think with over a decade of experience under our belts along with our inherent delusions of hyper sophistication that we’d have figured things out by now. But the sad truth remains: cell-phone baggery is worse than ever!
What would happen if we each used 10% less gas?
For starters, we’d save billions of dollars and keep billions of tons of carbon dioxide out of the environment. So, on that note, support proper tire inflation, not off-shore drilling.
Leaves, Twigs, and Bark: Cheap Biofuel Alternatives?
It seems like new reports are practically coming out daily about the next great gasoline alternative— furfural, algae, and switchgrass, just to name a few. Now 3 more contenders have entered the ring: leaves, twigs, and bark.
Colorado Creating World’s First Fossil Fuel-Free Community
Called Geos, the 25-acre area will have 250 homes from smaller 850 square feet to mansion-sized 3,500+ square feet placed in four neighborhoods. While that’s a whole lot of houses, they’ll be keeping a whopping 40% of the area as green space.
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Monday, June 2nd, 2008
Secrets of Stonehenge unearthed
Now that’s a pretty impressive tombstone. New research suggests that Stonehenge was used as a cemetery for more than 500 years, much longer than previously thought. The new findings also show that people used the area as a burial site long before placement of its trademark stones (or sarsen stones) was complete.
How to harvest solar power? Beam it down from space!
The satellites would electromagnetically beam gigawatts of solar energy back to ground-based receivers, where it would then be converted to electricity and transferred to power grids. The floating power plants could provide round-the-clock clean, renewable electricity.
Scientists Invent Machine to Suck CO2 & Fight Global Warming
Scientists say they have invented a machine that can suck carbon dioxide out of the air – potentially creating a vital weapon in the war against global warming. The blueprint for the CO2 ’scrubber’ raises the prospect of a generation of machines which would help reduce the billions of tonnes of greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere.
The Coming Energy Wars – A Bargain at $200
Oil prices could hit $200 a barrel in the next few months. How the spike changes everything. This spring, America hit a historic point. With average gas prices per gallon edging toward $4, America’s notoriously profligate ways started to change fast. Americans are driving less, using mass transit more, buying fewer gas guzzlers.
How Man-Made Noise May Be Altering Earth’s Ecology
The contamination of biophony may soon become a serious environmental issue — Scientist Bernie Krause says that man-made sounds are already wreaking havoc with animal communication. We worry about the carbon emissions from SUVs and airplanes; maybe we should be equally concerned about the racket they cause.
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Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008
Solar panels to go in 30% of Japanese houses by 2030
Under the government-mandated target, the number of solar-powered households would increase to 14 million from the current 400,000 and the capacity of such generation would expand 30-fold from the current 1.3 million kilowatts.
Top 5 Unusually Green Vehicles of 2007
As demand for environmental alternatives grows, some green-thinking automotive designers have gone above and beyond simple hybrid or energy-efficient cars to develop radically creative green vehicles in many senses of the word. Here are five of the most interesting, innovative, strange and downright bizarre green concept vehicles developed in 2007.
Where Does All the Carbon Dioxide End Up?
We imagine most of you, upon reading the post’s title, will have already (and accurately) guessed the short answer: the atmosphere and the oceans (for the most part). But, to delve further into the matter, where exactly in the atmosphere or the oceans does it all go?
How Denmark Kicked Its Foreign Oil Habit
With rising gas cost at the pump, violence in the Middle East and the upcoming Presidential Election, it’s no wonder that politicians are saying they have plans to make the United States independent of foreign oil. But can it be done? Here’s a country that has kicked the foreign oil habit: Denmark.
Are There Really Continents of Floating Garbage?
Are there really ‘continents’, or massive floating garbage patches residing in the pacific ocean? Apparently, there are and these unsightly patches are reportedly killing marine life and releasing poisons that enter the human food chain. One plastic patch is estimated to weigh over 3 million tons and covers an area twice the size of Texas!
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