Electric vehicle charging stations are now headed home, literally.
GE Energy Industrial Solutions has joined with Lowe’s to offer consumers its new GE WattStation Wall Mount Electric Vehicle (EV) Charging Station. The station will charge EV’s in less time than standard overnight chargers and will soon be available for both home and commercial use, the company says. Keep reading →
In American Electric Power v. Connecticut (AEP), several states, New York City, and some nonprofit land trusts had sued five major electric power companies. The plaintiffs contended that the power companies were committing a public nuisance with their unrestricted use of fossil fuels. The plaintiffs faced a multitude of legal and evidentiary hurdles. On June 20, the Supreme Court ruled against the plaintiffs 8-0. As losses go, however, it was not nearly as damaging as it could have been.
Lower court judges had divided about whether suits of this type were even within the jurisdiction of the federal courts. Some district judges said the suits were nonjusticiable “political questions,” and the defendants also argued that the injury to the plaintiffs was too diffuse, speculative, and indirect to give them standing to sue. Keep reading →
Over the last few days, experts in fields from neuroscience to music to energy came together to share ideas at the TEDGlobal 2011 conference. With Shell one of the conference sponsors, there was extensive discussion of the energy sector and the industry’s future.
Among the speakers was Pavan Sukhdev, an energy economist who worked at Deutsche Bank for 15 years before writing a groundbreaking report, The Economies of Ecosystems and Biodiversity.” Sukhdev chairs the Global Agenda Council on Biodiversity and Ecosystems for the World Economic Forum. Keep reading →
A growing number of communication firms are looking towards fuel cell technology as a reliable source of energy generation, providing potential backup in case of transmission interruptions.
AT&T has joined Google and Cox Enterprises as one of the communication companies that will utilize Bloom Energy’s fuel-cell technology to power their operations. AT&T plans to install Bloom Energy Servers, known as Bloom Boxes, at 11 sites in California providing the company with 7.5 MW of reliable onsite power and also reduce carbon emissions by approximately 50% compared to the grid. Keep reading →
Producing oil from algae is cool, its green, its clean and it may also allow coal plants to continue producing emissions-intensive electricity.
In an interview with Breaking Energy, OriginOil CEO Riggs Eckelberry said that with its high consumption of CO2–it takes two tons of carbon dioxide to feed one ton of algae–the green species can be a major asset in the effort to curb carbon emissions. Keep reading →
Recent research has shown that cities produce lower amounts of greenhouse gas emissions than suburbs do, on a per capita basis. The thinking here, broadly speaking, is that dense residential buildings and public transit systems are more energy efficient than large personal dwellings and private transportation modes. According to a new study conducted by a pair of Finnish researchers, this approach is flawed because it fails to account for all emissions related to “consumer behavior.”
Jukka Heinonen and Seppo Junnila of Aalto University in Finland performed a life-cycle comparison of emissions in two metropolitan areas: Helsinki and Tampere. Each area has a dense urban core as well as two surrounding suburban regions. The researchers included typical variables like building and transportation energy use in their analysis, but also added consumption factors such as leisure goods and services. Keep reading →
North American cities are building on their leading position as efficient energy users amid accelerating urbanization in the US and around the globe.
A new Green City Index sponsored by Siemens measured 27 major American and Canadian cities cities in nine different categories to assess their energy economy. It shows that while American cities are often lagging behind European cities in implementing energy policy, they are not waiting for Washington to lead on environmental and energy policy. Keep reading →
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shocked Texas generators on Thursday by unexpectedly including the state in its new rule on reducing SO2 and NOx emissions from power plants.
The EPA issued its final Cross-State Air Pollution Rule which, together with other state and EPA actions is intended to reduce SO2 emissions by 73% from 2005 levels by 2014, and will cut NOx emissions by 54%. Keep reading →
Biomass has a problem: It burns.
Biomass-fueled electricity has an image problem created by its use of a combustion technology; biomass power plants burn something, emitting pollution from a smokestack. This fact has framed the debate over whether power from naturally-grown renewable fuels are truly green or simply greenwashing. Keep reading →
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defended its proposed rule to cut emissions of mercury and other toxic air pollutants from coal- and oil-fired power plants, saying the plan will result in widespread health benefits that heavily outweigh the costs to generators of compliance.
In written responses to questions from Breaking Energy, the agency said the rule would provide $5-$13 in benefits of not breathing polluted air for every dollar in additional cost. Retail electricity prices would rise by about 3.7% in 2015 and 2.6% by 2020, and could be offset by adopting energy-efficiency policies and individual practices, it said. Keep reading →
