Through use of the new system being devised, the safety and reliability of essential transportation networks should be secured, making it better for those who make use of it. This is an answer to incidences of train wrecks caused by natural disasters such as the case during the tsunami of 2004 in Southeast Asia, when a Sri Lankan train was derailed. 1700 lives might have been saved.

The team, which includes Prof. Lev V. Eppelbaum of Tel Aviv University’s Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences, hopes to develop a platform using a connection of emerging technologies. This platform is aimed to be able to fit on any railway, passenger or freight carrier. While mainly created for predicting natural disasters, the platform could also be used against possible terrorist attacks.

Among some of the challenges the team faces in creating this platform is the change of climate, soil type and physical geography along the rail route. But the team continues to work towards the development of this platform. Ultimately, the outcome of the team’s work is expected to be adopted by the world’s railway systems. This becomes especially important in the work towards environmental sustainability as the trains serve as a viable alternative to transportation via car or plane. The significance of the work becomes even more apparent as at present, there is no monitoring system against natural disasters or terrorist attacks on the current railway system.

While travel by railway has been viewed by some as an old-fashioned way to get around, I believe that with the efforts of this consortium of researchers, it can be possible to modernize this mode of transportation. Take for instance the Bullet Train of Japan. By developing public transportation systems and making them more efficient and reliable, it can be possible to increase the popularity of this efficient and affordable mode of travel.

In comparison to wind turbines, tidal turbines operate underwater. While both flowing water and wind can be used to generate power, using the tide for energy has its benefits. One is that since the turbines are underwater, they are silent and placed out of sight from residential communities. Also, in places where tidal inlets with significant energy potential are, there are sure to be densely populated areas nearby that can benefit from the energy generated.

Due to the hurdles of technical logistics of deploying the turbines, tidal power only represents a fraction of the renewable energy that can be produced worldwide. So far, most of the tidal turbines currently in operation are experimental prototypes from Europe.

Atlantis’ CEO, Timothy Cornelius remarked that the future is bright for marine power if the project would receive support from all levels of government. He likened the unveiling of the turbine to the start of a new industrial boom, similar to the development of the North Sea oil and natural gas fields.

The AK1000’s turbines were developed to withstand the harshness of the North Atlantic with its robust design. At the same time, though, the turbines were also developed to turn very slowly, so they have zero impact on the surrounding environment.

Already, the prospect of producing clean, reliable power from tidal turbines has been drawing investors in. Because of this, the company faces competition in the race to develop affordable commercial-scale tide power.

This combination of sturdiness and care for the environment present in the AK1000 are what I believe to be the marks of a success in producing green energy. Investors should note that renewable resources will not only reduce consumption of fossil fuels, and reduce carbon emissions, but it has the potential to eliminate much of the collateral environmental damage that we’ve been seeing lately.

Interestingly enough, what served as an impetus behind the idea was an 800-pound sculpture of Benjamin Franklin and the Liberty Bell made entirely out of butter. Each year, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the state’s Farm Show commissions a work of art crafted out of butter. In 2007, organizers asked for suggestions for what to do with the masterpiece once the farm show ended. Dr. Haas submitted the idea of making biofuel out of it, and so he gained a source of raw materials for his research.

This project was done in collaboration with BlackGold Biofuels, a small company in Philadelphia that has developed a process of creating biodiesel fuel out of inedible, low-value fats, oils and grease. Since the rancid butter was a fat, it was possible to put the sculptures through BlackGold’s chemical conversion process to transform it into usable biodiesel fuel.

Usually, this process is reserved for cooking oil but through BlackGold’s flexible chemical conversion process, it was possible to create fuel out of the butter despite it being rancid. At the end, the 800 pounds of butter sculpture became 75 gallons of a mix of biodiesel fuel and a lower-grade bunker fuel.

Despite the success of converting the rancid butter into fuel, both the researchers and BlackGold do not advocate the diversion of the nation’s butter production into creating biofuel. But BlackGold considers the project as a success, as it demonstrates the robust technology and opens the possibility of converting all kinds of low-grade waste into usable fuel.

In fact, in California, a biodiesel plant that makes use of BlackGold technology has been put up to handle pan scrapings and brown grease from restaurants and turn them into fuel. This goes to show how little goes a long way when it comes to innovation. With more avenues with which to turn waste products into usable resources, we learn to introduce less waste into the environment and reduce our ecological footprint.

The principle behind “Natural Capital” is simply this: if we place efforts to protect our natural ecosystems, we can ensure the continuous flow of valuable natural goods or services into the future. For business enterprises, this can translate into the generation of huge profits.

The profitability of protecting biodiversity does not just stem from the conservation of valuable resources. A growing number of the world’s consumers are becoming more and more environmentally conscious. By shifting gears into a greener approach toward managing operations and delivering products and services, businesses can gain a larger consumer following. In fact, market opportunities for certified forest products, organic produce, and other conservation-grade products are estimated to grow by 200 percent, with chances of skyrocketing to 400 percent by 2020.

Integrating biodiversity and ecosystem services in business operations can also lead to substantial cost savings and new revenues. With the expenses for production cut without compromising quality control, companies can relegate the remaining budget toward improving business processes and creating more effective marketing strategies.

It seems there is nothing to lose in taking the initiative to protect our natural ecosystems. In addition to fulfilling their corporate social responsibility, companies can cut costs, earn more, and gain a vast marketability by applying more eco-friendly business practices. Business leaders from developing nations are getting into it because their economies rely heavily on their natural resources. The more businesses realize the benefits of sustaining “natural capital,” the higher our chances of saving the environment.

Haim Rabinowitch and research student Alex Goldberg, together with Boris Rubinsky at the University of California at Berkeley, found that by simply boiling the slice of potato before inserting zinc and copper electrodes into it, the battery can generate 10 times as much electricity as a regular potato battery. It also enabled the battery to work for days or even weeks.

This discovery can have a significant impact on the developing world. As the world’s top non-grain starch food commodity, potatoes are produced in 130 countries over a wide range of climates, making them available all year round. They are also cheap, have long shelf life and do not require refrigeration for storage. According to the researchers, these attributes make potatoes an ideal source of energy for developing countries.

Boiled potato batteries can produce electricity that is nearly half the output of AA batteries at a cost that that is 5-50 times cheaper. Unlike kerosene lamps, which are the typical light source of many remote communities in the developing world, potato batteries are also a sustainable energy resource, leaving no by-products that can be harmful to the environment.

With such simple, economical innovations as the potato battery, we can help provide power to those in need. Modern-day comforts, such as electricity and long-distance communication can be made available even to remote areas where power lines have no reach. Many lives are sure to change for the better.

For this project, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy Daniel Poneman announced an award of up to $122 million over five years for the team to establish an Energy Innovation Hub aimed towards the development of artificial photosynthesis. By finding a way to harness this innovative method of generating fuel, it may be possible to cut down dependence on oil and enhance energy security.

According to Senator Feinstein, the award for California’s top scientists would help them along the way to producing a fuel that can be put into cars without further processing, and thus make use of the excessive carbon dioxide in the atmosphere while at the same time, eliminating dependence on oil. This same project also hopes to generate an innovative industry in the heart of California, a state on the cutting edge of the clean energy movement.

Aside from the Fuels from Sunlight Energy Innovation Hub, there will also be two other hubs that will receive funding for the Fiscal Year 2010. One would be a hub dedicated to the modeling and simulation of nuclear reactors, established by a team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The other would be announced over the coming months.

“Finding a cost-effective way to produce fuels as plants do — combining sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide — would be a game changer, reducing our dependence on oil and enhancing energy security. This Energy Innovation Hub will enable our scientists to combine their talents to tackle this bold and highly promising challenge,” said Poneman.

This is not just a push for investments in science and finding breakthrough discoveries, it’s a way to turn theoretical science into practical technology by bringing together great minds from different industries. It’s a catalyst of change.

Adding to locations in Japan and Israel that are also developing or experimenting with charging stations, Berlin-Adlershof has recently been upgraded with a Yana Docking station, currently the world’s largest stand-alone solar charging station, where all kinds of EVs can be charged.

The station features a biaxial photovoltaic generator, which follows the direction of light coming from the sun and is able to generate up to 40 percent more electricity as a result. When the sun is not being cooperative, or at night, the power comes from a long-life vanadium redox flow battery. The battery stores 100 kWh, provides 10 kW, and allows for up to eight EVs to be charged at the same time.

Berlin-Adlershof, known as the “City of Science, Technology and Media,” is the home of Younicos AG. The area has been under heavy development for almost 20 years. It is now home to the Centre for Information and Media Technology, the Centre for Environmental, Bio and Energy Technology, and the Centre for Materials and Microsystems Technology, among others.

Now that the problems of affordability and speed have been resolved, relative mobility seems to be the only thing that’s keeping the EV from spreading like wildfire. This also creates a CO2 free solution for charging EVs. With recharging stations like these, EV doubters may run out of things to complain about and we can finally do what Younicos AG’s motto says and “Let the fossils Rest in Peace.”

A new Israeli company called Linum Systems has come up with ways to both cool and heat the home using traditional methods, combined with new technology. Linum, which was founded in 2009 by entrepreneurs Yuval Berson and Amir Hirshfeld, holds the patent for a solar cooling technology that will hit the commercial market in 2012.
As the term implies, solar cooling uses the sun to power air conditioners. The system, which will use a solar thermal collector, as opposed to photovoltaic cells, has yet to have a prototype out, but representatives from Linum Systems say that it could yield a return on investment (ROI) in a 3,000 square foot home in Texas or Arizona, for example, within three years.

One other major effect is that it will relieve power companies of much of the strain that they experience during peak temperatures in the summer. More than half of the electricity used in an average American home goes to heating and cooling. “In California as much as a recent 30 or 40% rise in electricity use is solely air conditioning oriented, and it’s a major issue for utilities to solve,” says Berson. The blackouts caused by such surges in power usage can cripple local economies and cause expensive damage to the power grid.

The climate control system developed by Linum will cater to houses ranging from 2,000 to 3,000 square feet. The consumer would decide how many solar thermal collectors to install. In an optimum setting, the company says its air conditioner can cut the cooling, heating and water-heating electricity bills by as much as 85%.

This Linum Systems is definitely one company to keep an eye on. It has already been identified by the non-profit California Israel Chamber of Commerce as one of the top companies from Israel worth meeting.

View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Israel.

Inspired by the late Egyptian natural building architect Hassan Fathy, Messinas will be heading a six-day architectural workshop from July 25 until August 1. The workshop, organized by the Greek-founded NGO Ecoweek, will involve workshops as well as practice sessions with some of the hottest green building architects in the world.

The guiding principle that motivates Messinas is that architects should be able to look to their surroundings in order to come up with suitable designs and materials for their buildings. As opposed to emulating Western designs for Eastern buildings, for example, local architects should work with appropriate technology, of which the late Hassan Fathy was a pioneer and advocate. “Young architects need to look at their community instead of looking at magazines,” says Messinas.

In Israel, the market for green buildings has allowed for some architectural firms to focus solely on green architecture, but the workshop aims to help put the Levant region of Israel and the Palestinian Authority on the green building map. Of the 120 people expected to attend the seminar, 15 to 20 of them will be fielded by the Palestinian Authority, which is run by the West Bank.

Though green architecture training is limited in the Palestinian Authority, the improvement of the economic and social reality of Palestinians in the last year has allowed for the resources required to develop and grow green building practices and the sustainable architecture industry.

Much of the world’s green technology was actually conceptualized in Israel. It’s only fitting that green technology is brought into the country’s urban setting.
View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Israel.

The answer, according to India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, is in solar powered cellphone towers. Cellphone towers are highly energy-intensive, and because of their remote locations, many are powered by diesel fuel.

The numbers are compelling to say the least. India has over 250,000 cellphone towers providing coverage to its vast number of mobile subscribers. Each of those towers consumes about three to five kilowatts (depending on the number of operators in the tower), and much of this power goes to air-conditioning for equipment in nearby hubs.

In order to maintain the power output, the towers collectively consume about 2 billion liters (or about 530 million gallons) of diesel in a year. With current gas prices, an investment in solar powered cellphone towers could produce savings of $1.4 billion a year, not to mention 5 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Currently, there are talks of making solar power mandatory for cellphone tower operators. This is in line with the ministry’s goal of generating 20,000 megawatts of solar power capacity by 2022.

India is making strides in other green tech areas as well. The country recently completed its first green housing project, and an Indian company is responsible for developing zero-waste toilets for people that do not have access to proper plumbing, especially in China and India.

View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Clean Energy.