technology

The Big Green Bus rides again

Witness the Big Green Bus. Hard to miss, even amid the glaring sun and smog at Bonnaroo. I happened upon the crew of Dartmouth students at the festival last year and got just a few minutes to chat with them. This year, I sought them out on the festival grounds and then met up with […]

Is a lot more solutions like this

This is what the world needs more of: a focus on implementing soft technologies rather than a mania to design ever more complex ones.

Wacky dude makes cool stat-o-meter on what’s happening in the world

OK, so the guy who made this says he finds the “theory of global warming highly debatable,” but this thing is pretty cool: The World Clock. It lets you see a number of (likely somewhat flawed) stats about what’s going on in the world during the current year, month, week, day, or time period you’re […]

If you only read one book, pick this one

For years I've been looking for one book to recommend to people who want to get up to speed on what's happening in clean technology. I have finally found it: The Clean Tech Revolution: The Next Big Growth and Investment Opportunity, by Ron Pernick and Clint Wilder.

It is the only book I've seen that covers the whole gamut of the latest in clean energy -- including such cutting-edge areas as concentrating solar power and microalgae -- and isn't swept up in fads like hydrogen cars.

I was a bit worried when the index didn't have an entry for either "hybrids" or "plug-in hybrids," but that is only because the index is quite lame. In fact, the book "gets" plug-in hybrids, which I consider the acid test of any clean-energy book today.

It’s coming soon

Technology Review has an article on thin-film solar, mostly focusing on First Solar. This stuff is very, very close to competitive with conventional solar panels and on a clear path to being competitive with traditional fossil-based electricity sources. It’s an exciting time. Speaking of solar excitement: A team at the Univ. of Delaware has just […]

Here are some

Last week I discussed the basic arithmetic associated with population and economic growth, which will make it impossible to dramatically reduce greenhouse-gas emissions without major improvements in technology. (Some commenters protested, saying that current technology is sufficient, but they are mistaking the ability to reduce emissions based on current levels of income and population and what emissions will be as countries grow and economies expand.)

Interesting stuff on the hottest new green tech

I’ve been waiting for a good excuse to link to Earth2Tech, an interesting new project from internet legend Om Malik’s GigaOm family of blogs. It’s focused on clean tech startups, which as we all know are the hot new thing. I’ve also been waiting for a good excuse to post something about thin-film solar, which […]

Airliners are shaped the way they are for a reason

We took our Prius over the mountains a few weeks back. I was looking forward to testing it at the extreme end of its design envelope, with a bulky cargo carrier to boot. This gave me an opportunity to see how much highway mileage would be affected by aerodynamic drag. Yes, yes, I should have stuck to the speed limit, but by not doing so I preemptively squashed a bitching point leveled by hybrid hatas -- Prius drivers sticking to the speed limit are always getting in the way.

We nailed 40 mpg on the nose for a 260-mile trip that was 95 percent highway driving. I was pleasantly surprised. Just look at that blob on top of the car. I used the cruise control religiously and pegged the speed 5 mph over the posted limit whenever traffic allowed, which was most of the time.

Let’s go all the way

When David pointed out that plug-in electric hybrids (PHEVs) can reduce carbon emissions in all possible futures, two main arguments were raised in opposition -- practicality, and the possibility that they will provide too low a reduction, while blocking the path to something better.

The way commercial plug-ins look to be implemented within the next five years is that normal hybrids will be built with large batteries and the ability to plug into a socket in your dedicated parking space. They will travel the first twenty miles or so on electricity and then turn on their gasoline engine around the 21st mile or so. Even with our current grid, they will emit less CO2 per mile than when they switch to their gasoline engine.

Like hobbyists, who manually convert existing hybrids, these will have to be more expensive than a normal hybrid, because they have every expense a normal car has plus the extra battery cost. If gasoline prices rise high enough, I suppose they may pay for themselves in fuel savings, but mostly they will sell on the "cool" factor.

However, there is another way to implement plug-ins, one we could begin now with a large enough investment, which produces savings comparable to a full electric car -- and which, if run on wind, or sun, or other ultra-low-carbon electricity sources, could actually provide a 98 percent emissions reduction.