At a meeting on May 6 in São Paulo, Brazil, industry stakeholders formed ABRABA to spearhead development of aviation biofuels. The effort signals a growing concern for the growth of the industry within a carbon and oil constrained future.

Earlier this month, aviation companies, biofuel producers, and the sugar cane, algae, and jatropha industries came together to form the Brazilian Aviation Biofuels Alliance (Aliança Brasileira para Biocombustíveis de Aviação, or ABRABA).  As the aviation industry continues to feel the crunch from rising fuel costs and price volatility, ABRABA represents the latest multi stakeholder effort to ramp up biofuel production in the commercial aviation sector (see CAAFI). Continue reading… » 

President Obama chose the White House Rose Garden as the spot to sign an executive order establishing the first-ever vehicle emissions standards for big rigs and other heavy trucks beginning in the 2014 model year. The emissions directive also calls on the automotive industry to promote development of plug-in hybrids electric cars and other vehicles that utilize biofuels and natural gas.

“The disaster in the Gulf only underscores that even as we pursue domestic production to reduce our reliance on imported oil, our long-term security depends on the development of alternative sources of fuel and new transportation technologies,” the president said.

It was exactly one year ago that Mr. Obama, flanked by car company CEOs, announced the first Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards for cars and light trucks that took into account greenhouse gas emissions as a factor. Hailed as a revolutionary step by environmentalists, that move ordered a 30 percent increase in fuel efficiency by 2016, totaling a 35.5 miles per gallon average for both cars and light trucks. Friday’s directive ordered federal agencies to begin development of even more stringent standards for 2017 and beyond. Continue reading… » 

The practice of “commissioning,” in which an engineer monitors the efficiency of a building from its design through its initial operation, just may be the most effective strategy for reducing long-term energy usage, costs, and greenhouse gas emissions from buildings. So why is it so seldom used?

In a different world, it could be a reality television show — “Buildings On Trial,” with a street-savvy engineer going into skyscrapers, factories, offices and other commercial buildings to find the dumb mistakes that make them waste energy and produce a disproportionate share of the nation’s global warming emissions.

And in almost every case, even new buildings proudly displaying a LEED “green building” plaque by the front door, the engineer would come back out with a list of energy hog culprits: Here’s the ventilation system fan installed backwards, so it blows full force into another fan blowing in the right direction. Here’s the control system set up so heating and cooling systems both work at once, like driving with your feet on the brakes and the accelerator at the same time. Here are the stuck dampers that prevent the building from drawing on outside air when the temperature is right.

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J. Craig Venter, the genome pioneer, has created a “synthetic cell” by synthesizing a complete bacterial genome and using it to take over a cell. Venter’s breakthrough, reported in the online edition of Science, represents a preliminary step toward the goal of creating microbes from scratch in the lab and using them to make biofuels, vaccines, and other products.

Venter’s achievement could one day lead to a technology where, though engineering the genome, individual cells could be turned into their own miniature refineries for harvesting carbon dioxide and generating hydrocarbons.

In 2005, Venter — one of the first people to sequence the human genome, doing it faster and cheaper than government scientists — set up a company, Synthetic Genomics, to create synthetic cells, and the advance reported in Science represents a milestone for the company and for so-called synthetic biology. Continue reading… » 

Tony Seba is currently a lecturer in clean energy, entrepreneurship, finance and technology strategy at Stanford University. He is also an internationally known keynote speaker on the future of energy, entrepreneurship, innovation, and cleantech and high-tech market opportunities.

I recently sat down with Tony Seba to discuss his latest book, “Solar Trillions,” which is  about market and investment opportunities in the emerging clean-energy economy.

CleanTechies: What is the premise of your book?

Seba: The clean energy economy will provide the largest wealth-building opportunities in history. The world will spend $382 trillion in energy over the next 40 years and every aspect of this industry is up for grabs: from generation and transportation to storage and use. The race for dominance has already started and the entrepreneurs, investors, and countries who win will dominate the 21st century. The problem is that the whole conversation about energy is wrong. Continue reading… » 

(Reuters) – The Toronto Zoo has a solution to global warming: elephant dung.

Canada’s biggest zoo is inviting bids for a gasification plant that will turn its elephant, rhino and other large animal manure into clean electricity and heat.

“No other zoo in the world is doing this,” zoo conservation program head Dave Ireland said on Wednesday.

The zoo produces about 1,000 tonnes of manure and other organic waste each year. This will be fed into the biogas plant, to be built on land adjoining the zoo, where bacteria will munch through the waste and excrete methane gas.

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It’s likely that you’ve heard of EnergyStar and seen the recent headlines about US Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency efforts to ensure that appliances are as energy efficient as the blue EnergyStar label indicates. It’s less likely that you’ve heard of a parallel DOE effort to ensure that minimum energy conservation standards are being met.

Because mandatory efficiency standards apply to the manufacture of appliances and therefore are less noticeable to the consumer, standards don’t often make the six o’clock news. However, DOE is actively taking on the enforcement of standards as shown by the recent headlines on the website of the DOE General Counsel:
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BrightSource Energy, Inc., developer of utility-scale solar thermal power plants, has raised an additional $150 million in its most recent equity financing. The Series D round brings BrightSource’s total equity financing to more than $300 million and positions the company for significant growth.

New investors including Alstom and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) joined existing investors in this round, led by VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.

The additional financing will be used to support BrightSource’s 2,610 megawatts in contracts with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison to build 14 solar power plants in the US southwest by 2016. The funds will also be used by BrightSource to further its international expansion plans.

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With the BP Deepwater Horizon oil rig spill on its 28^th day and counting, some answers are finally beginning to emerge regarding how it happened and who might be responsible. Unfortunately, even the best answers raise more questions than they put to rest, and the worst seem to be the result of obfuscation, uncertainty, and outright collusion.

For example, a recent report from the Wall Street Journal indicates that the final showdown on procedure (before the blowout) was between Transocean’s rig manager, Jimmy Wayne Harrell , who reportedly got his marching order direct from BP, and Donald Vidrine, the top executive from BP aboard the oil rig.

Harrell said BP had given him precise instructions regarding taking out the drilling mud and testing for gas seepage before cementing the well. Vidrine reportedly told Harrell it was not the right way to go about closing off the oil pipeline. Continue reading… » 

A NASA-sponsored competition to design futuristic, fuel-efficient airplanes has led to a jet prototype that would burn roughly 70 percent less fuel than current aircraft.

Engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology designed what they called a D-series “double bubble” jet, which features a wide fuselage composed of two partial cylinders fused together in an aerodynamic shape.

The prototype also has a smaller tail, skinnier wings, and engines mounted on the rear of the fuselage instead of the wings, which allows the engines to suck in slower-moving air and increase efficiency. Continue reading… »