Google Inc. says it is abandoning its ambitious program to drive down the cost of renewable energy, one of seven major initiatives canceled by the Internet giant this week as it looks to focus on its core projects.

Launched four years ago through Google.org, the company’s philanthropic arm, the so-called Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal (RE < C) initiative included a team of engineers dedicated to researching renewable energy technologies, with a focus on solar energy.

The Google program invested in Brightsource Energy and eSolar, companies working on concentrated solar power projects, and also invested in potentially breakthrough technologies.

“At this point, other institutions are better positioned than Google to take this research to the next level,” the company announced on its corporate blog. Google posted the results of its energy research online, encouraging other companies to use it to advance the renewables industry. The changes come as Google, the world’s top search engine, faces increasing competition in mobile phone technology and social media.

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

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Jordan’s growing economy has been hobbled by the fact that it currently imports 95 percent of its energy needs.

During the “Energy Security in the Middle East and the Gulf Region” seminar held in the capital Amman earlier this week, a number of analysts stated that the country could benefit by shifting its resources to embrace the renewable energy sector.

Ahmad Azzam, heading a World Bank-financed study estimating potential renewable energy sources and their costs for Jordan told attendees that Jordan’s theoretical potential to benefit from wind and solar energy surpasses that of the U.S., Britain, France, China and Russia combined, quipping, “So if we utilize our renewable energy resources, we may be able to secure a permanent seat in the UN Security Council,” the Jordan Times reported.

Energy Charter Secretariat senior expert Patrice Dreiski commented that Middle Eastern nations are “the most promising” in the field of renewable energy, emphasizing in particular solar power as a significant resource and “potential for cooperation,” observing, “Sunshine is abundant in Jordan. It offers great prospects as a resource that can be exploited.”

The seminar was organized by the Arab Institute for Security Studies, in partnership with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) and the Energy Research Program. KAS Resident Representative Martin Beck said that the purpose of the two-day forum was to survey regional examined energy problems from the region’s “point of view,” away from Western interests and influence.

Article by Charles Kennedy, appearing courtesy OilPrice.com.

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The U.S. Department of Energy will pump $151 million into 37 innovative energy-related research projects through a new federal agency modeled after the Defense Department program that helped commercialize microchips and the Internet.

The Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or Arpa-e, created in 2007 to support innovative and often-experimental projects, selected the first round of grant recipients from 3,600 proposals.

While many of the ideas may never lead to practical breakthroughs, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said some could have a “transformative impact.”

Among the first grant recipients are University of Minnesota researchers attempting to develop an organism that uses sunlight to convert carbon dioxide to sugars and diesel fuel; a Massachusetts Institute of Technology team developing an all-liquid metal battery that could better manage the output from intermittent energy sources such as wind and solar; and a United Technologies effort to capture carbon emissions from power plant stacks using enzymes.

The agency — which will target research projects by small business, universities, and corporations — will be led by Arun Majumdar, a scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

Article appearing courtesy of Yale Environment 360

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