Published on January 6th, 2010
Wineries are notorious for using large amounts of water, with estimates ranging up to 20 gallons of water needed to produce a singe gallon of wine. Jackson Family Wines is one wine maker that has found a high tech way to put a billion-gallon dent in its own annual water consumption, and the implications could be enormous for wine rich, water poor states like California.
Jackson Family’s new water recycling system has just completed a “proof of concept” pilot run certified by the University of California at Davis. Once in full swing, the system will involve about 70% of the winery’s water use, which primarily goes to rinsing barrels and tanks. The new system will recycle 90% of that water for up to ten rinses but wait, there’s more: the recycled water also keeps 75% of its heat, which will save a significant amount of energy that would otherwise be needed to warm up cold water.
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Published on January 5th, 2010
The first round of federal ARPA-E funding for future energy kick-started a stunning range of 37 different projects last year, from fuel-secreting bacteria to liquid batteries and a way to create solar energy by mimicking photosynthesis. Now the agency has launched a new round that narrows the target down to just three carefully defined areas.
ARPA-E is the federal agency created by Congress in 2007 to propel the U.S. into a new energy future, whereupon the previous administration promptly allowed it to languish. That was then, this is now: breathing life into ARPA-E has been a top priority of the Obama administration. To introduce the new round of funding ARPA-E has called for the U.S. to move away from fossil fuels and “change course with fierce urgency,” so let’s take a look at how that goal dovetails with the new target areas.
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Published on January 5th, 2010
Lanner, a business software specialist, just launched a new version of its WITNESS software suite in order to help companies evaluate how their decisions will affect the environment.
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Published on January 5th, 2010
According to a new study, solar-powered irrigation systems have significantly enhanced both the household incomes and the nutritional intake of villagers in sub-Saharan Africa.
“Significant fractions of sub-Saharan Africa’s population are considered food insecure,” wrote Jennifer Burney, a scholar with the Program on Food Security and the Environment and the Department of Environmental Earth System Science at Stanford. “They frequently survive on less than $1 per person per day, and … they still spend 50 to 80 percent of their income on food”
The two-year study found the pumps installed in the West African nation of Benin were a cost effective way to deliver water, especially during the dry season. Only 4-percent of the cropland in sub-Saharan Africa is irrigated, most communities rely on rain-fed agriculture. Read the rest of this entry »
Published on January 3rd, 2010
Energy efficient light bulbs are cool already, but they are getting a whole lot cooler. The new LED EcoBulb by Seokjae Rhee raises the green bar with innovative features to save more energy.
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Published on January 3rd, 2010
Like some 21st-century version of The Blob, a thick, gooey tide of glycerin is overwhelming world markets. A large part of the glycerin glut comes from biofuel refineries, which put out enormous quantities of crude glycerin as a byproduct. Though high grade glycerin is used to make products like soaps, cosmetics, foods and pharmaceuticals, vast quantities of crude glycerin are simply disposed as waste, sometimes illegally.
Somewhat ironically, glycerin may be riding to its own rescue and helping out the biofuel industry at the same time. A growing number of companies are scrambling to find uses for the abundant stuff. One is Glycos Biotechnologies, Inc. , which is commercializing glycerin-gobbling microorganisms developed by researchers at Rice University. The hungry bugs are at the heart of an energy-efficient bioconversion process that turns waste glycerin into fuels and other products.
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Published on December 30th, 2009
Highways, train stations, and even dance floors: the world is full of vibrating surfaces that could yield a rich trove of clean, sustainable energy. It’s called piezoelectric energy, formed by the conversion of mechanical strain into electrical current. Now a team of researchers in Europe has developed a micro-scaled piezoelectric device that could harvest energy from machinery as well as from infrastructure and buildings.
The tiny devices are ideal for use in powering remote sensing equipment, for example to monitor bridges or machines for early signs of deterioration. In that case they could play a key role in more energy efficient maintenance for wind turbines and other renewable energy infrastructure, while lowering human risk.
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Published on December 28th, 2009
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have come up with a new photovoltaic cell no bigger than a flake of glitter, but it packs a big punch. The new cell uses 100 times less silicon to generate the same amount of electricity as conventional solar cells. While still in the development stage, the new solar particles could lend themselves relatively easily to commercialization because they are made of crystalline silicon and use the same micro-manufacturing processes typical of modern electronics.
The new cells can be made from available silicon wafers of any size, without some of the quality control problems involved in conventional solar cell manufacturing. The Sandia researchers also expect them to be less expensive, more durable and more efficient that conventional solar collectors, and they could open up an exciting new range of applications.
Published on December 27th, 2009
Mass Megawatts Wind Power, Inc., is testing new wind turbine equipment that could help boost the efficiency of the company’s Multi-Axis Turbosystem wind power generators. The tests are under way at a wind power installation in Hunter, New York.
If successful, the technology could start appearing soon at ski resorts in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania. Last spring the principal owner of one major ski facility in the region, Camelback Mountain Resort, took an equity position in a licensed manufacturer of the Multi-Axis Turbosystem. It appears to be a first step toward introducing sustainable wind power to ski resorts on an industry-wide scale.
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Published on December 24th, 2009
Mission Viejo, California has become the latest in a string of cities to try out a new sustainable street-scale solar powered trash compactor called the BigBelly Solar Compactor. In partnership with its waste hauler Waste Management, the city hopes to cut trash pickups from street containers by up to 80%, which in turn would help cut greenhouse gas emissions, reduce fuel use, and shave some costs off the city’s waste hauling budget.
The city is starting with two BigBelly solar compactors at its Civic Center, and it anticipates a successful trial. Solar technology and battery storage technology are rapidly approaching the point where solar equipment can operate without the need for direct sunlight every day, so look for more urban street fixtures to go solar in the near future.
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