While national climate change legislation was imploding this past summer, it looked like climate advocates were poised to also suffer another, even more disheartening defeat: the suspension of the most important state-level climate change law in the United States. A coalition of out-of-state oil companies and oil industry supporters had succeeded in qualifying Proposition 23 (more…)

General Motors is prepping for the year-end release of the Chevrolet Volt by supporting the rollout of charging infrastructure. The company selected automotive supplier SPX Service Solutions as its partner for residential EV charging equipment (known as EVSE). The charger is priced at $490, or less than half of what most competitors will offer. (more…)

Florida uses a ton of electricity, which explains the strong market for energy efficiency products. According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), Florida’s per capita residential electricity demand is one of the highest in the country… due to high air conditioning use during the hot summer months and the widespread use of electricity for home heating during the winter (more…)

South Africa has the space and the sunlight, so what better region to plan a 5-gigawatt solar park that could not only generate massive amounts of solar energy, but also serve as a field test for emerging technologies in PV energy, concentrating photovoltaic PV and concentrating solar power, or CSP.

The goal is ambitious, but the path (more…)

Last week Secretary Chu invited you to submit your questions on home energy efficiency and the response was tremendous. We sifted through your questions and recently discussed many of them with the Secretary.

Here are the resources that the Secretary referenced during the discussion:

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A market analysis of the U.S. solar industry predicts that nearly 1 gigawatt of added capacity will be installed in 2010, a 114 percent increase from last year. About 314 megawatts were added during the first six months of the year, according to the report by the Solar Energy Industries Association, a trade organization. And with a major concentrated solar power project and (more…)

Wind turbines stand tall and mesmerize with their motion. Solar cells bask in the sparkling sun. Meanwhile, hidden down in the dark dirty underworld, a compelling technology sits quietly and gets no respect. Once installed it largely goes unseen and, it seems, it’s equally invisible in the world of clean technology press, venture funding and government R&D funding. Yet this technology provides some of the most (more…)

As we reach the end of this year and the beginning of the next, the United States is bracing itself for the impending release of several new, mass produced electric vehicles. With so many models slated to roll out, each manufacturer is scrambling to prove why their electric vehicle is the one you should choose. For CODA, an independent electric vehicle manufacturer, (more…)

There is a saying that “You haven’t really recycled until you’ve bought recycled products.” This suggests that recycling is only the first step in a broader cycle where re-processing and re-manufacturing also play vital roles. In fact, the universal recycle symbol of “chasing arrows” represents the 3 stages of recycling: collection, processing and market (more…)

The variability of cloud patterns is a problem for solar power capturing, especially for larger solar farm operations. If grid operators could forecast or predict these changes before they occur, they would be in a better position to manage load on their grids.

Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories looked into the problem and (more…)