Al Gore’s $100K Electric Karma Fisker Car Flop and $50 Lightbulbs Coming to a Home Depot Near You (updated March 14, 2012)

Posted by Kristina Bruce ⋅ March 9, 2012

http://cuttingthegordianknot.wordpress.com/2012/03/09/al-gores-100k-electric-karma-fisker-car-flop-and-50-lightbulbs-coming-to-a-home-depot-near-you

As if half billion dollar government guaranteed bankruptcies like Solyndra weren’t enough. That disaster, which most likely begat the latest big “green” project, the $1.4 billion (which of course is another DOE partial loan guarantee) Project Amp and largest rooftop solar project ever devised, it’s got to be a boondoggle somehow. For all that investment they’re going to install solar panels on 88,000 buildings and creating 1000 jobs. That means one guy is only going to do a total of 88 buildings in the life of this project? How many days work is that? A year if he’s on a lot of coffee breaks? I know I’m comparing big apples to little ones here but on the continent of Africa195 barefoot solar trained grandmothers electrified 12,700 houses in 170 villages for about $1.2 million! Do you get the feeling that maybe we’re getting ripped off… again? Time will tell on this one I suppose. I just had to show the film of the Barefoot college project because it’s pretty amazing and everyone should see it.

http://youtu.be/Khgdpf1hkOU

Now on to the spectacle of watching Al Gore’s electric car die on a Consumer Reports test lot! Yes Fisker Automotive, a company headed by Danish born Henrik Fisker and backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers a venture capital firm in which Al Gore is a partner. The company was made possible by a Department of Energy’s Advanced Technologies Vehicle Manufacturing Loan Program. Yes we the people guaranteed another $528 million for a fancy hybrid car costing in excess of $100K a pop and get this!!! They’re being built in FINLAND! Yes that’s right folks. The cars they promised would be build in Delaware are being produced in the land of the Lapps then shipped over here. Gore must be laughing his ass off at pulling this one off.

http://youtu.be/bS_5iOEO6U8

Anyhow, so Consumer Reports buys one of these wind up Aston Martin rip offs for $117K and bring it back to their testing facilities only to have the thing completely lock up on them and stuck in the neutral or park position. They can’t get it to go so the dealer had to send a flatbed to come pick it up. Consumer Reports representatives say they have never in their history had a car that became completely undriveable before testing was completed. Considering the amount of money the tax payers guaranteed for this thing, over a half billion dollars, the fact that the car isn’t being produced in the U.S., the production is more than 2 years behind schedule, only 200-300 vehicles have come off the assembly line and the fact that an end product model which was bought and paid for from an authorized U.S. dealer couldn’t even run for 70 miles without falling apart, my guess is we’re looking at another huge tax payer write off in the not too distant future. Oh and I almost forgot! Forbes magazine calculated the Karma’s fuel efficiency including use of the electric motor to be only 19 MPGe! Are you getting mad yet?

http://youtu.be/Ivhp-i6i3vE

So I’ll leave you with this, the $50 light bulb. Yes I did say half a Benjamin to buy a 10 watt LED bulb that is about good enough to replace a 60 watt conventional bulb in your half bath. You know they’ll be taking those bulbs away from you in another couple of years. If you’ve not noticed the100 watt conventional bulbs are already gone. Next it will be your 75′s and then the 60′s. Get ready to feel ripped off again here. Last year the government gave a $10 million prize for a “green” LED bulb that would supposedly help to transition away from incandescent bulbs and give you an alternative to those biohazard mercury filled, radiation emitting compact fluorescent bulbs (CFLs) we’re being forced into buying from China. Well the grand L Prize Winner of that award was none other than Phillips corporation. Like they needed $10 million in tax payer money to develop a light bulb! It’s their business for crying out loud! Can’t we have a free market and not throw more public money at corporations which already make billions a year? Anyhow their bulb hits the market in a few weeks where it’s sure to sit on the shelves costing double what other LEDs already in stores do and even worse costing 50x that of 60 watt old faithfuls which we’ve had for 100 years and are still thankfully sitting on the shelves. Stock up now while you still can.

As a closing thought, I have to mention the electric car project which GM killed almost well over a decade ago. It was a great car. The 3,000 or so people who got to test run them loved them. They were called the EV1.

GM EV1

Production years 1996 – 1999. It had an effective range of 70 – 100 miles per charge dependent on use of lights and air. If you think about it though, in an average day, how many of us rarely drive more than 10 miles let alone 70 or a 100. For a run around town car it would have worked and there were a heck of a lot of people who wanted them even with the limited range. Thousands wanted it. GM killed it though and sold off the battery technology to Texaco. There isn’t a working model of it or the battery left to even study. Every singe car was crushed like it was Cash for Clunkers. Cars hauled away as the folks who were lucky enough to test them cried and petitioned GM to let them buy their leased vehicles.

There’s a really great documentary about the whole thing which was made in 1999 when those folks were still pretty sore about their cars being taken away. It really makes you want to scratch your head. As a matter of fact this entire article makes one want to bang your head up against a wall.

UPDATE: March 14, 2012

I had to laugh when I saw this video today of a Senate hearing March 13, 2012 where Energy Director Chu is being practically chewed up over Solyndra, Fisker and $50 light bulbs! Poetic justice!

Forbes even commented on it

Published on Friday, March 9, 2012 by Common Dreams

Confirmed: Fracking Caused Ohio Earthquakes

- Common Dreams staff
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/03/09-1

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) has confirmed that a series of earthquakes in the state were caused by injecting leftover fracking fluids, "brine," deep into wells.

ODNR stated today:

Geologists believe induced seismic activity is extremely rare, but it can occur with the confluence of a series of specific circumstances. After investigating all available geological formation and well activity data, ODNR regulators and geologists found a number of co-occurring circumstances strongly indicating the Youngstown area earthquakes were induced. Specifically, evidence gathered by state officials suggests fluid from the Northstar 1 disposal well [a deep injection well primarily used for oil and gas fluid waste disposal] intersected an unmapped fault in a near-failure state of stress causing movement along that fault.

A number of coincidental circumstances appear to make a compelling argument for the recent Youngstown-area seismic events to have been induced.

The ODNR report notes that in 2011, the Youngstown, Ohio area experienced 12 "low-level seismic events," and that the 2011 earthquakes were unique because of their proximity to a deep disposal well, known as Northstar 1, used to inject fracking fluids.

The report adds that "before 2011, [Ohio Seismic Network] had not recorded earthquake activity with epicenters located in the Youngstown area."

From April 26 to Dec. 15, 2011, state geologists and regulators investigated a possible link between the well injections and the earthquakes, but were unable to obtain enough necessary data.

In Dec. of 2011 equipment and assistance was provided by the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and after obtaining more seismic data, the ODNR director stopped operations at the well.

Based on the data, the report states:

A number of coincidental circumstances appear to make a compelling argument for the recent Youngstown-area seismic events to have been induced.

Based on the new information, Ohio is not banning fracking, but has new regulations for fracking fluids disposal.

With more than 144,000 Class II wells injecting more than 2 billion gallons of leftover fracking fluids every day in the United States, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Ohio’s Class II disposal well regulations meeting or exceeding EPA regulations, questions linger about the potential for fracking-induced earthquakes elsewhere.

Reinventing Fire
Bold Business Solutions for the New Energy Era

By Amory Lovins and Rocky Mountain Institute
Forewords by Marvin Odum, President, Shell Oil Company; and John W. Rowe, Chairman and CEO, Exelon Corporation
Pub Date: November, 2011
http://media.chelseagreen.com/reinventing-fire

How U.S. businesses can lead the nation from oil and coal to efficiency and renewables by 2050, and profit in the process

Oil and coal have built our civilization, created our wealth, and enriched the lives of billions. Yet their rising costs to our security, economy, health, and environment are starting to outweigh their benefits. Moreover, the tipping point where alternatives work better and compete purely on cost is not decades in the future: it is here and now. And that tipping point has become the fulcrum of economic transformation.

A global clean energy race has already emerged with astounding speed. The ability to replace fossil fuels with efficient use and renewable supply, swiftly and scalably, will define winners and losers among firms—and among nations.

The United States’ capital, technology, and entrepreneurship equip it for success in this race. Yet it’s been held back by lack of coherent vision, pervasive political gridlock, and shorting the scope for dynamic business leadership. Now, in Reinventing Fire, Amory Lovins and Rocky Mountain Institute offer a new vision to revitalize business models, end-run Washington gridlock, and win the clean energy race—not forced by public policy but led by business for durable advantage.

This independent and rigorous synthesis—peer-reviewed and documented on a technical website—offers market-based solutions integrating transportation, buildings, industry, and electricity. It maps pathways for running a 158%-bigger U.S. economy in 2050 but needing no oil, no coal, no nuclear energy, one-third less natural gas, and no new inventions. This transition would cost $5 trillion less than business-as-usual—without counting fossil fuels’ huge hidden costs.

Reinventing Fire’s business case is so compelling that its execution wouldn’t require new federal taxes, subsidies, mandates, or laws. The policy innovations needed to unlock and speed the transition can be implemented with no Act of Congress—often at state level, where utilities are already largely regulated and where the key automotive step, feebates, could readily be adopted.

Whether you care most about profits and jobs, or national security, or environmental stewardship, climate, and health, Reinventing Fire makes sense and makes money. Written for all of America’s leaders, it’s a story of astounding choices and opportunities for creating the new energy era.

Read praise for this book

“My friend Amory Lovins knows that the most important question of the 21st century is the ‘how’ question—how we tum good ideas into working solutions. Reinventing Fire is a wise, detailed and comprehensive blueprint for gathering the best existing technologies for energy use and putting them to work right now to create jobs, end our dependence on climate-changing fossil fuels, and unleash the enormous economic potential of the coming energy revolution.”
—President Bill Clinton

“Reinventing Fire crackles with fresh perspectives and compelling insights about our energy past, present, and future. Drawing on the logic of economics, physics, geology, national security, and just plain common sense, Lovins and his colleagues blaze a trail toward an energy future that is cleaner, cheaper, and safer. A ‘must read’ book for business leaders, policymakers, environmentalists, academics, and anyone else who cares about our planet’s future and our nation’s prosperity.”
—Dan Esty, director, Center for Business and the Environment at Yale University, and author of Green to Gold

“Amory Lovins and his team of extraordinary professionals provide an analytically sound, detailed, compelling plan for transforming our national use of energy—and for saving $5 trillion in the process! Reinventing Fire is a towering work, a page-turning tour de force of compelling wisdom that deserves a permanent place on the desk—nay, in the mind—of whoever holds the chair in the Oval Office.”
—Robert C. McFarlane, national security advisor to President Reagan; co-founder and co-chair of the United States Energy Security Council

“A brilliant, thorough, innovative plan for a complete and profitable restructuring over the next four decades of how we use and supply energy for transport, electricity, buildings, and industry. RMI’s new fire will transform everything we do, and will especially help us see our way out of the massive problems caused by our dependence on oil and coal.”
—R. James Woolsey, venture partner, Lux Capital; former director of Central Intelligence; chairman, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

“America’s business leaders have long waited for a practical vision of how innovation and entrepreneurship can drive the shift from fossil fuels to efficiency and renewables. Now, in Reinventing Fire, that profit-led path is here, clear, and compelling.”
—Gerald D. Hines, founder and chairman, Hines

“If you wanted to bring America happiness and prosperity, and address unemployment, government gridlock and climate change, and create meaning in a world rife with contradictory views and ideologies, you can do one thing: read Reinventing Fire…and then see to it that it is read by every decision maker in the land. This is a stunning work of enormous dimension. Reinventing Fire outlines an eminently practical path to a durable and meaningful future by reimagining how we use and produce the lifeblood of civilization—energy in its myriad forms.”
—Paul Hawken, author of Blessed Unrest; co-author, Natural Capitalism

“A must-read ‘new baseline’ analysis for innovators and policy makers.”
—Bill Joy, partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers; cofounder, Sun Microsystems

“A compelling call for action. From one of the brightest and most practical thinkers in America—straight from the heart, bold advice to America on how to handle energy, reduce the budget deficit, and create millions of jobs. Amory Lovins has written the definitive prescription for the twenty-first century American economy. Take these prescriptions on energy, and the rest of America will do quite nicely in the years ahead. Ignore these recommendations, and we’ll find ourselves in a darkening struggle for our prosperity, our future, and our way of life.”
—Retired General Wesley K. Clark, former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Europe

“This is hardly environmentalism as guilt trip, or as a moralistic imperative to be hot in the summer and cold in the winter. In this disciplined, yet inspiring, detailed, yet visionary book, Amory Lovins tells us how we can, by 2050, end our oil addiction without a reliance on nuclear energy; how we can improve our products and services even as we increase profits; how we can save our ecosystem even as we save ourselves and our economy.”
—Jay Ogilvy, cofounder, Global Business Network; former dean, The Presidio School of Management

“In crisp and vivid language, Amory Lovins sets out a blueprint for a much-improved future in the generation and use of energy. We can all learn from reading this clear statement from a real expert.”
—George P. Shultz, former Secretary of State and Secretary of the Treasury, distinguished fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, former president of Bechtel

About the Author

Amory Lovins, a consultant physicist, is among the world’s leading experts in energy and its links with resources, security, development, and environment. He has advised the energy and other industries for four decades as well as the U.S. Departments of Energy and Defense. His work in 50+ countries has been recognized by the “Alternative Nobel,” Blue Planet, Volvo, Zayed Future Energy (Runner-Up), Onassis, Nissan, Shingo, Goff Smith, and Mitchell Prizes, the Benjamin Franklin and Happold Medals, MacArthur and Ashoka Fellowships, 11 honorary doctorates, honorary membership of the American Institute of Architects, Foreign Membership of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, honorary Senior Fellowship of the Design Futures Council, and the Heinz, Lindbergh, Jean Meyer, Time Hero for the Planet, Time International Hero of the Environment, Popular Mechanics Breakthrough Leadership, National Design, and World Technology Awards. A Harvard and Oxford dropout and former Oxford don, he has briefed 20 heads of state and advises major firms and governments worldwide, recently including the leadership of Coca-Cola, Deutsche Bank, Ford, Holcim, Interface, and Wal-Mart. He cofounded in 1982 and serves as Chairman and Chief Scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute, an independent, market-oriented, entrepreneurial, nonprofit, nonpartisan think-and-do tank that creates abundance by design. His most recent visiting academic chair was in spring 2007 as MAP/Ming Professor in Stanford’s School of Engineering, offering the University’s first course on advanced energy efficiency (www.rmi.org/stanford). The latest of his 30 books are Small Is Profitable: The Hidden Economic Benefits of Making Electrical Resources the Right Size, an Economist book of the year blending financial economics with electrical engineering, Winning the Oil Endgame. An anthology from his 1968–2010 work, The Essential Amory Lovins, is being released this year. He is also the co-author of the sustainable business classic, Natural Capitalism. In 2009, Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and Foreign Policy, one of the 100 top global thinkers.

BOOK DATA
ISBN: 9781603583718
Year Added to Catalog: 2011
Book Format: Hardcover
Book Art: Full Color Throughout
Dimensions: 7-1/2 X 9-1/8
Number of Pages: 352
Book Publisher: Chelsea Green
Pub Date: November, 2011
Retail Price: U.S. $34.95 / Canada $38.50
Category: Green Building & Renewable Energy

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

3M Invests in Novel Silicon Anode for Lithium Ion Batteries

3M Research to Pioneer the Future; Company Expands Manufacturing

3M has a number of product solutions and a broad based technology portfolio targeting lithium ion batteries including 3M(TM) Battery Anode, 3M(TM) Battery Cathode and 3M(TM) Battery Electrolyte.  

ST. PAUL, Minn. – March 15, 2012 – 3M, the leading United States (U.S.) battery materials supplier, is investing in research and manufacturing of novel Silicon (Si) based 3M anode materials. The technology enables advanced batteries for reliable power that is required to keep up with the global increase of mobile societies and electric vehicles.

3M was recently granted another U.S. patent, 8,071,238 for its Silicon anode compositions that can increase cell capacity by over 40 percent when matched with high-energy battery cathodes. The company has invested resources and expertise toward commercialization of battery technology for the past 15 years.

3M’s investments into the high-energy metal based anode for lithium ion batteries include matching a recent U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) grant for $4.6 million as part of efforts to build more energy-efficient vehicles. The research will help to develop and integrate new cell materials that will make a transformative change in energy density and in cost in lithium ion batteries used in electric vehicles. Especially critical to the project success is 3M’s Si based anode material. The 3M investment in research and development includes putting in 3M’s best battery materials technology for cathode, anode and battery electrolyte additives into the project.

“3M has a proven track record of being an innovator in battery materials, and we are committed to supporting the growing U.S. and global lithium ion battery industry,” said Chris Milker, business development manager for 3M Electronic Markets Materials Division. “Our investment into research and development, coupled with our experience and portfolio of more than 40 core technologies – including nanotechnology, adhesives, precision coating, fluoromaterials – give us the tools and confidence in our ability to develop next-generation materials for better cells.”

The new research efforts deepen 3M’s rich history of sustainability and in making a global impact through innovation. The research expands upon the company’s long-standing initiatives in the battery market to commercialize battery technology for electric vehicles and consumer electronics.

In addition to its investment in robust research and development, 3M recently completed the first phase of Silicon anode manufacturing capacity expansion in early 2012 in its Cottage Grove, Minn., facility. The expansion included the installation of large-scale manufacturing equipment specialized to 3M and its proprietary anode chemistry. The U.S.-based facility will provide Si anode material to 3M’s global battery customers.

3M is well ahead of its time in pioneering research for lithium ion battery materials, which began in the 1990s for early auto market applications. Lithium ion batteries are a common source of power for laptop computers and electronic handheld devices and emerged as a power source for battery powered hand tools. In addition, 3M lithium ion technology is emerging for transport applications including the hybrid vehicles market. Because of the company’s consistent investment into the industry, 3M has uniquely developed three critical battery materials used in lithium ion batteries. These include silicon anode chemistry, novel cathode technologies (nickel, manganese, cobalt) and electrolyte (salts and additives). 

Besides battery cathode, anode and electrolyte technologies, 3M also offers tapes and adhesives for assembly of consumer electronics and fluids to manage heat during the manufacture of electronic devices. Using its broad portfolio of battery materials, 3M has the unique capability to integrate these materials to solve customers’ battery problems.

For more information about 3M battery materials, visit www.3m.com/batterymaterials

About 3M

3M captures the spark of new ideas and transforms them into thousands of ingenious products. Our culture of creative collaboration inspires a never-ending stream of powerful technologies that make life better. 3M is the innovation company that never stops inventing. With $30 billion in sales, 3M employs 84,000 people worldwide and has operations in more than 65 countries. For more information, visit www.3M.com or follow @3MNews on Twitter.

# # #

Contacts:

Colleen Harris

3M

651-733-1566

Stephani Simon

Orange Communications

(612) 677-2021

ssimon @ orange77.com

From:

3M Public Relations and Corporate Communications

3M Center, Building 225-1S-15

St. Paul, MN 55144-1000

Polynoid spot for hybrid sports-car Infiniti EMERG-E

http://vimeo.com/38444234

Year: 2012
Client: Nissan

Agency: TBWA ELSE
Creatives directors:Adam Mandelstam & Fabian Braun
Creative team: Miles Jeffreys, Kirk Williams & Eric Haugen
Agency producer: Emilie Prud'homme

Production company: Passion Paris Productions
Executive Producer: Marc Bodin-Joyeux
Producer: Emilie Walmsley

Directon / Art Direction / Animation: Polynoid

CG Artists:Fabian Pross, Csaba Letay, Ilija Brunck, Jan Bitzer, Heiko Schneck, Falko Paeper

Sound: Michael Fakesch (designingsounds.com)

PRIUS c LAUNCH KICKS OFF WITH STRONG SALES

Prius Family Sales Nearly 10,000 in First Half of March

TORRANCE, Calif. – Toyota’s subcompact Prius c five-door hatchback, the newest member of the Prius family of hybrid vehicles, is off to a quick start since going on sale March 12.

In its first three days on the market, it sold 1,201 units, making it one Toyota’s fastest-selling vehicles and eclipsing Chevrolet Volt and Nissan Leaf sales for the entire month of February.

“A number of factors drive the auto market, and fuel prices is one of them,” said Bob Carter, group vice president and general manager of the Toyota Division.  “With 53 miles-per-gallon in the city and priced under $19,000, the timing for Prius c couldn’t be better.”             

During the first half of March, the four-member Prius Family, including the new Prius c, roomy v, third-generation Liftback and new Plug-in Hybrid, accounted for sales of 9,821.  Last month Prius sales totaled 20,593 and 32,593 year-to-date.

http://www.toyota.com

Harvey Wasserman

Nuclear power's green mountain grassroots demise

March 16, 2012

In the wake of Fukushima, grassroots citizen action is shutting the worldwide nuclear power industry. 

A Solartopian tipping point is upon us in the US, Europe and Japan which will re-define how the human race gets its energy. 

States rights and local democracy are at the core of the battle. 

The definitive breaking point looms in Vermont. 

By mid-March a state board is likely to deny the Yankee reactor licenses to operate or to create radioactive waste. 

If that happens, a Vermont shutdown could mark a critical moment in establishing state power over an atomic reactor. A critical domino would fall---as it has in Japan and Europe---and we will begin taking down old reactors all across the US. Four new reactors barely under construction will go down with them, making inevitable the end America's age of atomic power. 

In Vermont, the New Orleans-based Entergy bought the Yankee reactor in 2002. Entergy agreed to shut it if the state's Public Service Board denied it a Certificate of Public Good to continue to operate and generate radioactive waste. 

That decision is due by March 21, the forty-year anniversary of the reactor's 1972 opening. 

Entergy has horrified many of its staunchest Green Mountain supporters. One of its cooling towers has simply collapsed from ancient rot and basic negligence. It has leaked tritium and other radioactive isotopes from pipes the company has said---under oath---do not exist. 

Entergy sued Vermont after the legislature voted (26 to 4) to shut the reactor. When its lawyers won in federal court, Entergy demanded the public pay it $4 million in legal fees. 

But the company miscalculated. It welcomed federal Judge Garvin Murtha's ruling that the legislature could not shut Yankee (the state is appealing). But Murtha also upheld the right of the Public Service Board to deny Entergy those operating and waste production permits. 

So after lauding the decision, Entergy's lawyers now want Murtha to change it. Entergy has also asked the Public Service Board for a stay in its expected denial of the permits. 

The case is clearly headed to the corporate-owned US Supreme Court. But for Entergy to win, the Roberts majority would have to rule that the company was temporarily insane when signed its agreements with the state, and that a state agency can be forced (against its will) to issue reactor operating and waste creating permits. 

The history of US courts denying states the right to shut reactors dates back to the 1954 Atomic Energy Act. But deferral to the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission's bent for keeping rust-bucket reactors on line is rapidly eroding. The Commission granted Vermont Yankee a license extension one day before the Fukushima disaster. A state-mandated shut down could seriously impact the political calculus for an industry whose grassroots opposition has become a full-on tsunami. 

New York's Indian Point reactors are under assault from Governor Andrew Cuomo, whose father cut the 1988 deal that forced Long Island's Shoreham reactor to shut without ever achieving commercial operation. 

Cuomo is being pushed by a fierce grassroots anti-nuke groundswell. Entergy does need state permits that would let two remaining reactors at Indian Point (Unit One went down long ago) continue heating and irradiating the Hudson River. New York could demand Entergy build extremely expensive cooling towers, which may force it to shut down for economic reasons. Similar forces are at work in New Jersey and other states. 

In Florida, botched multi-billion-dollar repairs to the Crystal River reactor near Tampa have forced a brutal grassroots battle over soaring electric rates which must be approved by increasingly beleaguered state regulators. It is highly likely that reactor will never operate again. 

At Pilgrim, Massachusetts is strongly intervening against a license extension. Both remaining reactors are currently shut at California's San Onofre (Unit One there also went down long ago), where grassroots activists---including local surfers---are in pitched battle against re-opening. Ohio's Davis-Besse is having its containment dome sliced for the fourth time. Two reactors in Nebraska are still recovering from major flooding. 

All across the country, dozens of rust-bucket nukes stagger on their last legs even as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission hands them extended licenses in the face of escalating state and local opposition. Once the firewall against recourse from the states is breached, a flood of shutdowns could well follow. 

In Japan, utilities must have permits from a host prefecture to re-open after refueling or repairs. Of 54 licensed reactors nationwide, only two now operate. Both could be shut soon, rendering Japan nuke-free for the first time in four decades. 

Germany has shut 8 reactors and will take down 11 more by 2012. Except for Great Britain and a number of eastern holdouts, the "nuclear renaissance" has been all but abandoned in Europe, with an escalating cascade of elderly nukes going cold and proposed new projects being abandoned. 

The accelerating revolution in renewables has allowed solar, wind and other green sources to outstrip atomic reactors in cost, time to build, ecological impact and safety. As billions pour into Solartopian sources, private investment in atomic energy has all but disappeared---except where there are massive taxpayer subsidies. 

Even that's not enough. In 2011, President Obama handed $8.33 billion in federal loan guarantees to the builders of two reactors at Georgia's Vogtle. But Peach State ratepayers are already being soaked for billions more in pre-payments, and the cost of the project is soaring. A parallel financial disaster looms at the Robinson site in neighboring South Carolina. Though the industry assumes these four reactors will eventually be finished, economic realities may say otherwise. 

Cost estimates for new nukes have been soaring even before construction begins. Even with federal money, the builders still demand that state ratepayers foot the bill as the process proceeds, meaning consumers are on the hook for multiple billions even if the reactors never open. Pitched battles over this Construction Work in Progress scam have already been won by consumers in Missouri and are being fought in Iowa and elsewhere. As the years of building drag on, costs will escalate while renewables continue to become cheaper. Sooner or later, construction is likely to stop, as it did at numerous projects in the 1970s and 1980s which were never finished. 

Today the Department of Energy still sits on some $10 billion in available guarantees without a recipient ready to build a new nuke. For the first time since early in the George W. Bush years, there has been no executive request for additional reactor construction loan guarantees. 

In Finland and Flamanville, France, new reactor projects are years behind schedule and billions over budget. 

With new construction virtually abandoned, and the continued operation of old reactors under intense attack in Japan, Europe and the US, only China and India remain as likely sites for large numbers of new nukes. Russia is doing its best to peddle them throughout the Third World. South Korea wants to sell reactors to the United Arab Emirates. 

But grassroots resistance in India has been fierce. China is still mulling a post-Fukushima decision on whether to proceed with reactors already under construction. Signs of a popular uprising against rampant pollution---including nuclear reactors---indicate growing public opposition. 

But here in the US, we are at the fall-off-the-cliff moment for atomic energy, new and old. 

Entergy, says Deb Katz of the Citizens Awareness Network, has been "blinded by its arrogance and contempt for the state of Vermont." The company, she says, "is attempting to establish that corporations are more powerful than the states they operate in." 

If the citizens of Vermont can shut Yankee, a dam will be breached and the post Fukushima power of a rising grassroots tsunami will be made tangible. 

Solartopia will be that much closer. And the grassroots No Nukes campaign will begin to take its place as one of history's most successful popular movements. 

Let's just make sure these shut-downs happen before the next Fukushima irradiates us all. 

--

Harvey Wasserman's Solartopia: Our Green-Powered Earth is at www.solartopia.org. He edits www.nukefree.org and broadcasts at www.progressiveradionetwork.com. Originally published by www.freepress.org.

http://www.fairfield.edu/press/pr_index.html?id=3382

Fairfield University event to explore the impact of electric vehicles

Electric vehicles (EVs) are already being successfully produced by major automobile manufacturers, and even more companies are catching up in the race to make them.

Fairfield University's School of Engineering will present a free, public talk exploring their importance, entitled, "Charging Infrastructure and Impact of Electric Vehicles," on Tuesday, March 20 at 5:30 p.m., in the Kelley Center.

Fairfield alumni Michael Scala, president of Shelton, Conn.-based LEX Products, and Tyrone Mellon, the company's lead electrical engineer, will deliver a talk and answer questions. Their presentation will compare vehicle operation differences between EVs and internal combustion engines, the environmental impact of EVs, and the charging technologies.

Space is limited. Please confirm your attendance by sending your name, organization and number of attendees to ASME.Fairfield.University @ gmail.com

In 2006, Scala joined LEX, an industry leader in both commercial and military power distribution markets due in large part to continuous innovation, award-winning customer service, and world-class manufacturing techniques. He earned his MBA from the Dolan School of Business. Mellon is lead electrical engineer at LEX Products and is responsible for the development of new technologies and products, including EVs as well as the compliance of products to safety standards. He received his M.S. in Electric and Computer Engineering from Fairfield.

The event will also present an opportunity for attendees to network.

Sponsors include the ASME student chapter of Fairfield University, Engineering Student Society (ESS) of Fairfield University, ASME Fairfield, ASME New Haven, ASME Hartford, the Society of

Manufacturing Engineers (SME), the Inventors Association of CT (IACT) and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, IEEE.

For further information, please contact christian.ford@..., neil.rodrigues @ student.fairfield.edu, or Dr. Shahrokh Etemad, at setemad @ fairfield.edu

To visit the School of Engineering's website, go to http://www.fairfield.edu/soe/index.html.

Media Contact: Meg McCaffrey, (203) 254-4000, ext. 2726, mmccaffrey @ fairfield.edu

Fear after Fukushima to push up carbon emissions

8 March 2012 by Fred Pearce and Sara Reardon, Fukushima Legacy
Magazine issue 2855

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21328553.300-fear-after-fukushima-to-push-up-carbon-emissions.html

One of the less-noted consequences of the nuclear disaster at Fukushima is the effect on carbon dioxide emissions. Two of the world's six largest emitters are switching off their nuclear power stations, leaving them needing to source energy from elsewhere.

Germany has permanently shut eight of its older nuclear reactors and promised to close the remaining nine by 2022. The decision was cemented in September, when Siemens, which built all of Germany's nuclear plants, withdrew from the nuclear industry. It also seems increasingly unlikely that Japan will restart the more than 50 nuclear reactors that have been closed for safety checks since the accident. Last week, the cities of Osaka, Kyoto and Kobe told utility companies that they no longer wanted nuclear power.

Elsewhere, the impact has been lower than many anticipated. The US and UK still intend to resume building nuclear power after a long pause. China, India and France all aim to carry on as before. Italy and Switzerland have decided to abandon plans for future plants, but existing plants will live out their remaining lives.

So what do the German and Japanese decisions mean for carbon emissions? Germany's energy gap is unlikely to be met by renewables. A large expansion of wind and solar power is already built into the country's energy plans, and it is unlikely to be able to churn out more. Other options are to burn more coal, import more gas or import more electricity.

German gas mostly comes from Siberia, a dependency the country is keen to avoid. Importing electricity from neighbours like nuclear-powered France is more attractive. The World Nuclear Association, an industry body, says this is the only way for Germany to keep its promise to cut CO₂ emissions by more than 20 per cent by 2020.

But coal is cheap. It already provides most of Germany's electricity, and more is available within the country's borders. Even before the Fukushima disaster, German companies were building new coal-fired power plants.

Some analysts say the shutdown will push up German CO₂ emissions by between 40 million and 60 million tonnes a year - about 6 per cent - depending on what replaces them.

In Japan, a permanent shutdown would boost annual CO₂ emissions by 60 million tonnes - or more than 5 per cent - as the nation draws extra power from burning fossil fuels, according to the country's Institute of Energy Economics.

All told, that is nearly a billion-tonne jolt to the planet's climate by 2020, and more beyond. That is small compared with global CO₂ emissions - likely to be more than 400 billion tonnes in the same period. But it would send the wrong signal from two of the world's largest emitters. And anyone involved in climate negotiations will tell you that cuts aren't easy to agree on. The additional German emissions alone could add up to more than 300 million tonnes by 2020, which, according to the World Nuclear Association, would "virtually cancel out the 335-million-tonne savings intended to be achieved in the entire European Union by the 2011 Energy Efficiency Directive".

March 18, 2012
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57399210/spacex-entrepreneurs-race-to-space
(click for video)

SpaceX: Entrepreneur's race to space

With the end of the U.S. space shuttle program, there is only one way for an American astronaut to get to the space station: onboard the Russian Soyuz rocket, where a round-trip ticket costs $60 million. Internet entrepreneur Elon Musk - of PayPal and Tesla Motors fame -- wants to change all that and hopes his company, SpaceX, will be the first private U.S. company to build and launch a manned spacecraft. And Musk has even bigger dreams than that, including interplanetary travel for all of us. Scott Pelley reports.

The following is from the script "SpaceX" which aired on March 18, 2012. Scott Pelley is the correspondent. Harry Radliffe, producer.

60 Minutes Overtime

In the history of space flight - only four entities have launched a space capsule into orbit and successfully brought it back to the Earth: the United States, Russia, China and Elon Musk.

Mr. Musk is a wealthy, Internet entrepreneur who has vowed to revolutionize space exploration by bringing down the astronomical costs. And that can't happen fast enough for NASA which retired the shuttle last summer and now has to pay its old rival, Russia, to fly American astronauts into space. Musk is one of the contenders vying for a NASA contract to build America's next manned spacecraft -- a contest he believes he has the right stuff to win.

When the final shuttle mission ended last July, for the first time in three decades, the United States had no way to launch astronauts into space. It was the end of one era and the beginning of another. Instead of NASA designing the next manned spacecraft, the White House decided that private industry should design, build and fly it -- opening space to commercial development. One of the companies vying for that contract is SpaceX. Elon Musk is the founder and CEO.

Scott Pelley: Is what we are experiencing, at this moment in time, the turning point in man's reach for space? Going from governments to private companies like yours?

Elon Musk: I think we're at the dawn of a new era and it's-- I think it's going to be very exciting. What we're hoping to do with Space X is to push the envelope and provide a reason for people to be excited and inspired to be human.

Musk is 40 years old, a naturalized American citizen, and reportedly worth nearly $2 billion. He isn't your typical corporate CEO. As a teenager, he wrote computer games in his native South Africa before immigrating to the U.S. - and to Silicon Valley where he was one of the most successful Internet entrepreneurs - the cofounder of PayPal.

Despite a chorus of skeptics, Musk built a car company called Tesla that turns out 5,000 high-end, all electric cars a year. Another Musk company sells solar power systems. But his lifelong passion is space. And when eBay bought PayPal in 2002, Musk started looking for ways to launch his new fortune into orbit.

Elon Musk: I went to Russia to look at buying a refurbished ICBM which is a very trippy experience. It was very bizarre. Yeah, when I tell people that-- they have to, like, what?

Musk made three trips to Russia trying to buy an intercontinental ballistic missile called the Dneiper. His plan was bizarre: put a greenhouse on the rocket, land it on Mars and beam back the pictures.

Elon Musk: It would get people really excited and that would recharge human space exploration. That was--

Scott Pelley: You just wanted to get people interested in space again?

Elon Musk: Yes. Yes.

Scott Pelley: Capture the imagination.

Elon Musk: Yes. That was the idea.

Turns out the Dneiper was so expensive his idea never flew. So, Musk decided that the only way to get an affordable rocket was to build it himself. And he started SpaceX.

Elon Musk: The odds of me coming into the rocket business, not knowing anything about rockets, not having ever built anything, I mean, I would have to be insane if I thought the odds are in my favor.

Scott Pelley: Why even begin?

Elon Musk: When something is important enough you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.

Scott Pelley: How much of your personal fortune have you poured into this?

Elon Musk: $100 million.

Scott Pelley: And $100 million into something that you did not believe would work at the beginning?

Elon Musk: Yes.

Musk truly believes - that low-cost space exploration is essential to the survival of mankind.

Elon Musk: I think it's important that humanity become a multi-planet species. I think most people would agree that a future where we are a space-faring civilization is inspiring and exciting compared with one where we are forever confined to Earth until some eventual extinction event. That's really why I started SpaceX.

SpaceX is housed in a sprawling factory near Los Angeles where fuselages for Boeing 747s used to be built. From its beginning -- 10 years ago -- its goal has been revolutionary change in rocket and spacecraft manufacturing.

Scott Pelley: Now tell me what's that big piece right up there?

Elon Musk: That's the second stage of a Falcon Nine rocket.

Instead of multiple companies building parts all across the country, SpaceX builds most of its rockets and spacecraft "in-house" - based on Musk's belief that it's more efficient and lowers costs. Fourteen-hundred engineers and skilled technicians work here --building engines, rockets, space capsules - creating, mostly from scratch, the thousands of components that are the guts of a rocket.

Elon Musk: So what that means is raw metal comes in and then we build the engines, the frame, the electronics and we integrate all of that together and that's all done more or less under one roof.

Scott Pelley: At SpaceX, metal comes in one end of this factory, spaceships come out the other?

Elon Musk: Yes.

Final assembly takes place at the Cape Canaveral launch pad.

[Elon Musk: If the margin is there and we don't have margin to the fourth power, then it's fine.]

Musk has college degrees in business and physics, but SpaceX is his first venture in aerospace. He bills himself as chief designer and chief technology officer.

Scott Pelley: How did you get the expertise to be the chief technology officer of a rocket ship company?

Elon Musk: Well, I do have a physics background. That's helpful as a foundation. And then I read a lot of books and talked to a lot of, a lot of smart people.

Scott Pelley: You're self-taught?

Elon Musk: Yeah. Well, I-- self-taught, yes, meaning I didn't, I don't have an aerospace degree.

Scott Pelley: So, how did you go about acquiring the knowledge?

Elon Musk: I read a lot of books, talked to a lot of people, and have a great team.

His "team" is a mixture: there are newcomers -- mostly 30-something engineers, some of them straight out of college -- and then there are the skilled technicians and aero space veterans. Former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman spent three months aboard the space station and flew on one of the final shuttle missions. He was brought in to help oversee the company's manned space work.

Scott Pelley: You know, I'm curious. You have so much background in engineering, such a long and enviable career at NASA. You could have easily gotten a job at Boeing or at Lockheed, but you came here and I wonder why.

Garrett Reisman: If you had a chance to go back in time and work with Howard Hughes when he was creating TWA, if you had a chance to be there at that moment when it was the dawn of a brand new era, would-- wouldn't you want to do that? I mean, that's why I'm here.

And that's why most of the engineers we met are here. Building spaceships is the chance of a lifetime.

Scott Pelley: If you reach the point of having a successful manned flight, what will you have proven?

Kevin Brogan: We're not doing it to prove anything. You know, we know it can be done. I think, we're just trying to do it a little bit differently, a little bit faster, and to push the fence a little bit farther out.

Steve Davis: And--

Scott Pelley: And--

Steve Davis: And then we can all go-- I mean, I want to go into space. I assume most people here do as well. So, there's that as well.

Scott Pelley: How many want to ride? OK. Everybody wants to go--

Steve Davis: Caroline wants--

Caroline Conley: I-- I'm-- I'm not so sure.

Four years after starting, SpaceX rolled out its first rocket: an unmanned booster called the Falcon 1.

[Voice: Falcon has cleared the tower.]

But the first three test flights failed to reach orbit.

[Voice: We are hearing from the launch control center that there has been an anomaly on the vehicle.]

Scott Pelley: When you had that third failure in a row, did you think, "I need to pack this in"?

Elon Musk: Never.

Scott Pelley: Why not?

Elon Musk: I don't ever give up. I mean, I'd have to be dead or completely incapacitated.

It turned out that the third failure was caused by a two-second glitch in the timing. Eight weeks later, Musk bet the company on another flight.

[Voice: We have lift-off.]

And this time around, everything worked.

[Voice: Perfect]

Elon Musk: If that fourth launch hadn't worked, that would have been it. We would have not had the resources to mount a fifth.

Scott Pelley: You couldn't have gone on at that point?

ELON MUSK:

Yes. Death would have been, I think inevitable because we did not have the resources to mount a fifth launch."

Scott Pelley: This is a tricky business.

Elon Musk: Tricky. Yeah, the-- with-- yeah. I wish it wasn't so hard.

[Voice: M-VAC ignition confirmed. 3.2 kilometers per second]

In 2010, SpaceX tested a larger more powerful, nine-engine rocket called the Falcon 9 and an unmanned cargo capsule known as Dragon. It was the first privately developed rocket designed to carry cargo and eventually astronauts to the space station.

In its first test flight, the Dragon capsule performed flawlessly, orbiting the earth twice before splashdown in the Pacific -- the first time a private company had launched and recovered its own spacecraft.

Scott Pelley: And this is a historic spacecraft.

Elon Musk: It is, yeah.

We came across the Dragon capsule while Musk was showing us around.

Scott Pelley: You know, what I noticed about your cargo ship is that it has windows.

Elon Musk: The windows are there in case there's an astronaut onboard who wants to look up.

Scott Pelley: But people don't put windows in cargo ships.

Elon Musk: That's right. Exactly.

Scott Pelley: So what that tells me is that this was never intended to be only a cargo ship.

Elon Musk: No it-- no, the Dragon was always designed to carry astronauts.

Musk says that a manned version of the Dragon capsule will be safer than the space shuttle and a lot cheaper. Engineers are already designing escape rockets, life support equipment and computer guidance systems. They were studying seating for seven when we were there.

Scott Pelley: Do you believe that your rocket will be the next American rocket to take an astronaut into space?

Elon Musk: I believe that is the most likely outcome, yes.

That sort of confidence has not exactly endeared him to the space establishment or to his competitors.

Scott Pelley: There are people who've been in the rocketry business for decades who say about you that you don't know what you don't know.

Elon Musk: Well, if-- I suppose that's true of anyone. How can anyone know what they don't know?

Scott Pelley: But when critics say, "You can't do this," your answer to them is?

Elon Musk: We've done it.

He's done it -- in partnership with NASA -- which has given SpaceX technical advice and a contract worth up to $1.6 billion, mostly for 12 cargo flights to the space station. But SpaceX's lack of experience bothers some NASA legends like Apollo astronauts Neil Armstrong and Gene Cernan. They've testified to Congress that the Obama administration's drive to commercialize space could compromise safety and eventually cost the taxpayers.

[Gene Cernan: Now is the time to over rule this administration's pledge to mediocrity.]

Scott Pelley: You know, there are American heroes who don't like this idea?

Elon Musk: I--

Scott Pelley: Neil Armstrong--

Elon Musk: Yeah--

Scott Pelley: --Gene Cernan have both testified against commercial space flight and the way that you're developing it, and I wonder what you think of that.

Elon Musk: I was very sad to see that because those guys are-- yeah. You know, those guys are heroes of mine, so it's really tough. You know, I wish they would come and visit, and see the hard work that we're doing here. And I think that would change their mind.

Scott Pelley: They inspired you to do this, didn't they?

Elon Musk: Yes.

Scott Pelley: And to see them casting stones in your direction?

Elon Musk: Difficult.

Scott Pelley: Did you expect them to cheer you on?

Elon Musk: Certainly hoping they would.

Scott Pelley: What are you trying to prove to them?

Elon Musk: What I'm trying to do is to make a significant difference in space flight, and help make space flight accessible to almost anyone. And I would hope for as much support in that direction as we, as we can receive.

President Obama made his support clear when he visited SpaceX's launch site just before Falcon 9's first test flight. As this animation shows, Elon Musk's next flight will be far more ambitious, carrying cargo all the way to the space station. It was scheduled to fly in February, but it's taken longer than expected to perfect the flight software. The flight will be a complicated rendezvous with a space station that is moving 17,000 mph, 240 miles above the Earth.

[Voice: OK, so it looks like our burn performance is nominal.]

In the SpaceX mission control, flight simulations are continuing. And if all goes well, SpaceX will begin routine space station cargo deliveries later this year. But the big prize is winning the NASA contract to build America's next manned spacecraft. And Elon Musk is facing stiff competition.

Elon Musk: I'm probably not the guy that most people would bet on. Usually--

Scott Pelley: Who wins?

Elon Musk: It's like a little kid fighting a bunch of sumo wrestlers. Usually, the sumo wrestlers win. We're a little scrappy company. Every now and again, the little scrappy company wins. And I think this'll be one of those times.

Recent segment on CNN covering Lightning Motorcycle:
http://youtu.be/s2MiAX8XMJM  

Richard Hatfield, Present of Lightning Motorcycle, is featured on "Start Small, Think Big" special report on CNN Morning News.

http://www.idtechex.com/electric-vehicles-usa-12

ELECTRIC VEHICLES LAND, SEA & AIR USA 2012

The only event covering all forms of EVs and their parts for land, sea and air

27-28 March, 2012

DoubleTree Hilton Hotel

2050 Gateway Place

San Jose, CA 95110

USA

Most major breakthroughs in design and technology appear in other electric vehicles before they appear in cars. Whether by land, sea or air, electric vehicles need motors, controls, batteries and often supercapacitors plus advanced structural composites. Just over 1.6 million electric cars will be sold worldwide this year, including hybrids. But the total number of all types of EVs sold will be much greater - reaching over 39 million. In terms of units sold, that will mostly be e-bikes and vehicles for the disabled, but industrial/commercial vehicles will have four times their market value. Serious players must look at all of this - and IDTechEx now makes this possible.

Toyota Motor, Mr Greg Glander, Government Sales & Advanced Technology Vehicle Manager

Tuesday March 27, 2012
10:45 - 11:10 "Toyota Sustainable Mobility - Toyota's 2012 line-up of advanced technology vehicles"
Toyota's 2012 line-up of advanced technology vehicles

LiTHIUM BALANCE, Mr Tunji Adebusuyi, Research & Development

12:00 - 12:25 "High Performance Battery Management using Distributed Intelligence Architecture"
Safe, efficient and cost effective energy storage is key to the electrification of transport
Energy and investment continue to pour into battery development and battery management has to keep up
LiTHIUM BALANCE are using a new methodology to create the next generation BMS to be truly universal, usable by OEMs and aftermarket producers alike but at an affordable price point both in prototype quantities and volume.

OXIS Energy, Dr Mark Crittenden, Customer Brand Manager

12:25 - 12:50 "The Dawn of a New Era in Rechargeable Battery Technology - Why Polymer Lithium Sulfur is no Longer a Theory for Electric Vehicles?"
OXIS's Polymer Lithium Sulphur is the breakthrough technology required for the Worldwide electric vehicle markets
OXIS can explain this breakthrough by demonstrating how it has overcome the challenges of Lithium-Sulphur electrochemistry
OXIS can demonstrate its technology powering applications safely in the vehicles and the defence sectors

PREVIOUS EXHIBITORS INCLUDE:

Tesla

BMW Group

German E CARS

DLR

E Wolf

Polaris

Animatics

Solar Water World

Hawkes Ocean Sport

Aradex

ETH

Future Transport Systems

Vector

BSM

DHBW Engineering

Ekolo

Novisim

Peraves

Solar Gard

Animatics

ESP IN-Core Systems

FEC

LEVA

ELV motors

KillaCycle

KleenSpeed Technologies

Levant Power

Currie Technologies

Deepflight

CONFERENCE CONTACTS

Teresa Henry

Event Manager

+44 (0)1223 813703

t.henry @ IDTechEx.com

Dr Peter Harrop

Chairman

+44 (0)1256 862163

p.harrop @ IDTechEx.com    

EXHIBITION & MEDIA CONTACTS

Thomas Keenan

Sales Account Manager, Electric Vehicles

+44 (0)7528 559 397

t.keenan @ IDTechEx.com

Cara Harrington

Event & Marketing Manager

1 617 577 7890

c.harrington @ IDTechEx.com

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/03/human-bird-wings
From WIRED magazine: "According to Smeets’ calculations, he needed approximately 2,000 Watts of continuous power to support his roughly 180-pound frame and 40-pound wing pack. His arms could only really provide 5 percent of that, so the rest would have to come from motors. His arms and pecs would basically serve to guide the device and to flap the wings."

http://www.humanbirdwings.net/press  

The Hague, Netherlands,

20th March 2012

Dutch engineer is the first man in history to fly like a bird with selfbuilt wings

Engineer Jarno Smeets (31) is the first man in history to have made a successful short flight with his self-built wings modeled on the movement and structure of real bird wings. Assisted by an electronic system of his own design, Smeets took off from the ground in a park in The Hague last sunday 18th of March 2012. The flight of an estimated hundred meters lasted about a minute, after which Smeets landed safely.

VIDEO link to testflight:
http://youtu.be/GYW5G2kbrKk

Wii controller & HTC smartphone

Until now people had assumed that it was impossible to fly with bird-like wings using human muscle power. Smeets designed his own system to solve this problem, using two Wii controllers, the accelerometers from a HTC Wildfire S smartphone and Turnigy motors. This combined mechanism provided Smeets with extra power to move his 17m2 wings and allowed him to move his arms freely without any risk of breaking them. The system is a wireless (haptic) concept. The wing itself was built out of a kite and carbon windsurf masts (as flightpins).

Human Bird Wings is an independent project initiated from the personal ambition and vision of Dutch engineer Jarno Smeets. “Ever since I was a little boy I have been inspired by pioneers like Otto Lilienthal, Leonardo da Vinci and also my own grandfather”. Six months ago Smeets started researching. Smeets has developed and realized his wings with support from an independent team assembled under the Human Bird Wings project, sharing his progress through a well documented blog and YouTube channel. He has offered his followers an open source concept in building bird wings. Aided by helpful suggestions of his audience he was able to successfully finish his bird wings concept.

With this project Smeets has proven that modern technology and robotica can create realistic futures from seemingly impossible engineering dreams to fly like a bird

If you'd like more information about the project or contact Jarno Smeets directly you can call this

Phone number +31 618369328 or send an e-mail to humanbirdwingsproject @ gmail.com

For photos and background information, please consult my projectwebsite:

Website: http://www.humanbirdwings.net/press

YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/jarnosmeets80

Twitter: www.twitter.com/jarnosmeets80
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jarnosmeets  

http://ctgreenscene.typepad.com/ct_green_scene/2012/03/fairfield-university-explores-impact-of-electric-cars.html   

March 15, 2012

Fairfield University explores impact of electric cars

Electric vehicles (EVs) are already being successfully produced by major automobile manufacturers, and even more companies are catching up in the race to make them.

Fairfield University’s School of Engineering will present a free, public talk exploring their importance, entitled, “Charging Infrastructure and Impact of Electric Vehicles,” on Tuesday, March 20 at 5:30 p.m., in the Kelley Center.

Fairfield alumni Michael Scala, president of Shelton-based LEX Products, and Tyrone Mellon, the company’s lead electrical engineer, will deliver a talk and answer questions. Their presentation will compare vehicle operation differences between EVs and internal combustion engines, the environmental impact of EVs, and the charging technologies.

In 2006, Scala joined LEX, an industry leader in both commercial and military power distribution markets due in large part to continuous innovation, award-winning customer service, and world-class manufacturing techniques. He earned his MBA from the Dolan School of Business. Mellon is lead electrical engineer at LEX Products and is responsible for the development of new technologies and products, including EVs as well as the compliance of products to safety standards. He received his M.S. in Electric and Computer Engineering from Fairfield.

Space is limited. Please confirm your attendance by sending your name, organization and number of attendees to ASME.Fairfield.University @ gmail.com.

The event will also present an opportunity for attendees to network.

Sponsors include the ASME student chapter of Fairfield University, Engineering Student Society (ESS) of Fairfield University, ASMEFairfield, ASME New Haven, ASME Hartford, the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME), the Inventors Association of CT (IACT) and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, IEEE.

For further information, please contact christian.ford @ student.fairfield.edu, neil.rodrigues @ student.fairfield.edu, or Dr. Shahrokh Etemad, at setemad @ fairfield.edu.

Trade Decision Is In: U.S. Will Place Tariffs On Chinese Solar Products

To view the mobile or web version click here.

313 South Patrick Street, Alexandria, VA 22314

Pentagon: Trillion-Dollar Jet on Brink of Budgetary Disaster
By David Axe
Email Author
March 21, 2012

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/03/f35-budget-disaster

F-35B test aircraft BF-3 flies with weapons bay doors open in March 2012. Photo: Lockheed

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the supposed backbone of the Pentagon’s future air arsenal, could need additional years of work and billions of dollars in unplanned fixes, the Air Force and the Government Accountability Office revealed on Tuesday. Congressional testimony by Air Force and Navy leaders, plus a new report by the GAO, heaped bad news on a program that was already almost a decade late, hundreds of billions of dollars over its original budget and vexed by mismanagement, safety woes and rigged test results.

At an estimated $1 trillion to develop, purchase and support through 2050, the Lockheed Martin-built F-35 was already the most expensive conventional weapons program ever even before Tuesday’s bulletins. The Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps are counting on buying as many as 2,500 F-35s to replace almost every tactical jet in their current inventories. More than a dozen foreign countries are lined up to acquire the stealthy, single-engine fighter as well.

In its report the GAO reserved its most dire language for the JSF’s software, which agency expert Michael Sullivan said is “as complicated as anything on earth.” The new jet needs nearly 10 million lines of on-board code, compared to 5 million for the older F-22 and just 1.5 million for the Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornet. “Software providing essential JSF capability has grown in size and complexity, and is taking longer to complete than expected,” the GAO warned.

Software delays plus continuing mechanical and safety problems prompted JSF program chief Adm. David Venlet to back away from a firm schedule for the new fighter’s frontline introduction. When the F-35 was conceived in the late 1990s, it was expected to begin flying combat missions as early as 2010. Lately military officials have mentioned 2018 as a likely start date. In his Congressional testimony, Venlet declined to even mention a possible timeframe for the JSF’s service entry.

The GAO predicts the JSF’s $400-billion combined development and production cost will grow later this year, once the Pentagon computes a new program “baseline” — something it’s already done no fewer than five times since 2001. Aside from a 400-plane reduction in 2003, the Pentagon has always opted to increase the program’s budget rather than cut production numbers. That’s no longer possible, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley told Congress. “To the extent that there continue to be cost growth or challenges … we’ll have to take down the number of aircraft,” he said.

Air Combat Command, which oversees most of the Air Force’s fighter squadrons, seconded Donley’s view. “We cannot simply buy our way out of our problems or shortfalls as we have been able to do in the past,” the command stated in a report last week.

If cuts do occur, the U.S. will be in good company. Australia, Canada and Japan have already begun backing away from the troubled JSF as the new plane has gradually exceeded their budgets. For these countries, alternatives include the Super Hornet and an upgraded F-15 from Boeing, Lockheed’s new F-16V and the European Typhoon, Rafale and Gripen fighters. But so far the U.S. military prefers the F-35, even if the stealthy jet is more than a decade late, twice as expensive as originally projected and available in fewer numbers. “We will remain committed to the long-term success of the F-35 program,” Air Combat Command asserted.

Solar Powering Cars without Batteries

March 22, 2012 By Nicholas Brown

http://cleantechnica.com/2012/03/22/solar-powering-cars-without-batteries

Fraunhofer ISE has inaugurated a new hydrogen refueling station demonstration project. The refueling station is publicly accessible, providing one more place for fuel cell electric vehicles or vehicles with hydrogen-burning combustion engines to get their hydrogen fix.

Solar-Powered Hydrogen Refueling Station - Obtained from Fraunhofer.de

Different types of fuel cells that can utilize different fuels, but this refueling station is just for hydrogen fuel cells, which generate electricity that then powers the electric vehicles’ motors.

Due to the intermittency of wind and solar power, it is good to find ways in which these renewable power supplies can be utilized without energy storage systems such as batteries, compressed air (CAES), etc. One way is the production of hydrogen via electrolysis, which is what the Fraunhofer hydrogen refueling station does. At this refueling station, electricity form the solar panels is used to power an electrolyzer, which passes an electric current through water, causing it to liberate hydrogen. (If you don’t remember, water (or H2O) is made up of water molecules, each of which contains 2 hydrogen atoms and 1 oxygen atom. During electrolysis, hydrogen bubbles out of the water at the cathode, and oxygen bubbles out at the anode.)

The hydrogen produced while the sun is shining is stored in tanks for later use at night, or during cloudy weather.

Apart from the above, the solar panel system Fraunhofer is using for this station is a grid-tie setup, meaning that the solar panels supply electricity to the power grid and reverse the electricity meter to offset the power consumption of the station. The Fraunhofer setup only partially offsets its power consumption, but it is a start. Innovatively, the solar panels also act as the roof and ceiling of the station.

The main components of this hydrogen station are an electrolyzer that operates at a pressure of 30 bar (435 psi), a 700-bar (10,152 psi) hydrogen compressor, puffer storage at two different levels, and hydrogen pumps.

Hydrogen fuel (when produced by renewable and clean energy) certainly has some advantages over battery electric vehicle technology, but it has its downsides as well. Hydrogen fuel cells are extremely expensive, but reasonably efficient; combustion engines, which hydrogen can power, are affordable, but inefficient and unreliable.

What do you think of this new refueling station and hydrogen-fueled combustion engine vehicles?

Source: Fraunhofer.de
Photo Credit: Fraunhofer.de.

Meet the Super-Efficient LED Light Bulb the Tea Party Wants You to Hate

Brian Merchant
Energy / Energy Efficiency
March 12, 2012

http://www.treehugger.com/energy-efficiency/introducing-super-efficient-led-light-bulb-right-wants-you-hate.html

This LED bulb gives off warm, incandescent-like light, lasts 30 years, and is super-efficient (10-watt instead of 60-watt). Parts will be manufactured in America, it will create American jobs, and will save Americans money. America! But the right is bashing it. Why?

This is how a meme is dressed up for the Tea Party:

1. A respectable news outlet like the Washington Post runs a story with a decidedly politicized headline (Government-subsidized green light bulb carries costly price tag) and skewed take on the subject matter: a $50 light bulb.

2. A distressingly erroneous claim is made in said article: That buying the efficient light bulb is more expensive than using inefficient incandescents. In an infographic, the piece claimed that over its lifetime, the LED bulb would cost 5$ more than regular bulbs.

3. Conservative-baiting statements are included (emphasis mine): "the expensive bulb won a $10 million government prize meant to foster energy-efficient affordability is one of the curiosities that arise as the country undergoes a massive, mandated turnover from traditional incandescent lamps to more energy-efficient ones," the Post piece reads. Seemingly exorbitant sums! Government programs! Mandates!

4. The Tea Party media took the bait. Conservative blogs and columns noisily took aim. Gateway Pundit best exemplifies the bunch, with a headline reading “It’s an Obama World… Gas Reaches $5 a Gallon & “Green” Light Bulbs Cost You $50 Each.”

Brace yourselves for the '$50 Lightbulb' meme to proliferate on Fox News, Tea Party forums, GOP politicians' speeches, and beyond.

But here's the thing. That graphic was made with the strange assumption that the going rate for electricity is $0.01 per kilowatt-hour. The national average is closer to $0.12. Brad Johnson pointed this out at Think Progress Green.

Obviously, when the correct math is used, the LED bulb is much, much cheaper, over the years. With electricity included, it will cost a consumer $83 over its 30 year lifespan. Over 30 years, it would cost $228 to replace all the incandescent bulbs and pay for the higher electricity consumption they incur.

These super efficient bulbs, in other words, save us over $140 each. But that doesn't matter now. The right has its talking point, and like rising gas prices and Solyndra before it, the facts are secondary to how well the new 'blunder' fits into an ideological narrative.

But still. That narrative is bizarre. It holds that investment in better, cleaner technologies is dumb. That efforts to nurture new American enterprises in forward-looking arenas is foolhardy. Johnson writes:

"One of the strangest phenomena of modern-day politics is the right-wing antagonism toward American clean-energy manufacturing, a consequence of the fossil-fuel industry’s stranglehold on our nation’s conservatives. The Washington Post shouldn’t be aiding and abetting this ugly trend."

It is an ugly trend. One that supposes Americans would rather spite the government than live in a world where technologies continue to improve. The relentless race to find new items to stuff into the 'Obama is a green socialist' narrative overpowers genuine technological breakthroughs. Talking heads would rather serve up Tea Party-friendly talking point bile than demonstrate that they are capable of conducting a rather simplistic cost-benefit analysis.

So get ready to hear a lot more about the $50 lightbulb, and how ridiculous it is that Obama wants us to put these in our homes. Get ready to hate the $50 lightbulb.

(Note: the Washington Post updated its erroneous infographic, but never issued a correction)

Deformable Nanotube Transistors Can Take a Crumpling and Keep on Ticking

Derek Markham
Technology / Gadgets
March 7, 2012

 http://www.treehugger.com/gadgets/deformable-nanotube-transistors-can-take-crumpling-and-keep-ticking.html

© American Institute of Physics
Researchers in nanotechnology keep bringing us ever smaller, ever more versatile devices, and the latest invention is a transistor which can be folded or otherwise deformed, while continuing to do its job.

Shinya Aikawa and fellow researchers at the University of Tokyo and Tokyo University of Science have been able to make deformable transistors from carbon nanotubes that are both incredibly thin (just 15 micrometers thick), and that can also be folded or crumpled while still working, according to Discovery News. And as an added plus, these transistors are also transparent.

The transistors can stand up to repeated folding or crumpling, but are reported to have some loss of performance after about 100 times.

"We fabricated polymer-laminated, transparent, all-carbon-nanotube field-effect transistors (CNT-FETs), making use of the flexible yet robust nature of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs). All components of the FET (active channel, electrodes, dielectric layer, and substrate) consist of carbon-based materials. The use of a plastic substrate that is considerably thinner than those used in other flexible CNT-FETs allowed our devices to be highly deformable without degradation of electrical properties. Using this approach, flexible, transparent CNT-FET devices able to withstand a 1 mm bending radius were realized." - Applied Physics Letters

If this technology can make it from the lab into our gadgets, at some point we may be able to have electronic devices which can take quite a bit of abuse and still work. And that might make a big difference in the number of new gadgets that need to be manufactured each year just to replace the broken ones.

MIT Slows Light To Absorb And Generate Energy

EarthTechling.com Staff
Technology / Clean Technology
March 22, 2012
http://www.treehugger.com/clean-technology/mit-slows-light-absorb-and-generate-energy.html

MIT/via

Reducing the speed of light using nanotech could lead to new ways to generate electricity, say MIT researchers.

A paper about to be published in the forthcoming issue of the journal Nano Letters describes the creation of a “metamaterial” that promises much more efficient absorption of a wide range of light, which the researchers say could lead to a new generation of highly efficient solar cells and light bulbs as well as devices for generating electricity from heat—by actually reducing the speed of light.

The intriguingly named metamaterials are a new class of extremely thin artificial nanotech substances with properties unlike anything found in the natural world. Because they are created from the atom up, they can be perfectly engineered for any purpose by designing functional materials that interact with light in unconventional ways.

MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering lead author Nicholas X. Fang says that his international team was able to slow light to less than one-hundredth of its normal speed in a vacuum, making it much easier to trap inside the material. “When something is going very fast, it’s difficult to catch it,” he says, “so we slow it down so it’s easier to absorb.”

A lot of work has been done in engineering nanomaterials to more fully capture light to improve solar absorption. Some we’ve covered recently include Anorexic Silicon Wafer Could Slash Solar Cost, and Solar ‘Nanotrees’ Key To Clean Hydrogen Fuel? and Nanowire Mesh Could Be Solar Window Coating. Fang’s design uses a pattern of wedge-shaped ridges whose widths are precisely tuned to slow and capture light of a wide range of wavelengths and angles of incidence.

MIT/via

Because their material would be both a very efficient absorber and emitter of photons, it could be used to either capture or emit electromagnetic radiation for very particular wavelengths, such as microwave and terahertz frequencies. It could be be made sensitive to just one specific range of wavelengths, but most have been limited to a very narrow range of wavelengths and angles of incidence, says MIT.

This means that, in addition to more efficient solar cells that so many are working on, it could also be used make devices for generating electricity from heat, and to make lightbulbs that use a fraction of the energy used today.

“We can selectively enhance the material’s interaction with infrared light at the wavelengths we want,” Fang says. The metamaterial wedges harvest photons at different depths, in rather the same way that our hearing works to sort sound frequencies.

“Our ears separate different frequencies and gather them at different depths,” he says.

Metamaterials also have the potential to be very cheap. They are super thin, saving both materials and cost, and yet can easily be fabricated using equipment that is already standard in conventional photovoltaic-cell manufacturing.

The paper by Nicholas X. Fang, the Brit and Alex d’Arbeloff Career Development Associate Professor in Engineering Design in MIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, was co-authored with researchers at Zhejiang University and Taiyuan University in China, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and was funded by both the Chinese and the U.S. governments.

Their preliminary version of the study at Nano Letters describes their initial computer simulations, and the team is now working on lab experiments to confirm their findings.

Robot jellyfish extracts hydrogen fuel from water as it swims

Mar. 22, 2012 (7:14 am) By: Ray Walters

http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-cetera/robot-jellyfish-extracts-hyrdogen-fuel-from-water-as-it-swims-20120322
http://youtu.be/U2OSJQhHQp8

Depicted in the video above is Robojelly–an underwater robot created by a research team at the University of Texas that is going to be used in rescue efforts as well as surveillance.

"Robojelly" is the work of researchers at Virginia Tech's Bio-inspired Material and Devices Laboratory and the University of Texas at Dallas Nanotech Institute.

The creators of Robojelly have presented their results 21 March, in IOP Publishing’s journal Smart Materials and Structures.

In yet another case of science borrowing from nature, the team decided to create their robot in the form of a jellyfish since it has one of the most efficient swimming and propulsion systems in the world’s oceans. While this project has been underway for sometime, there has recently been a breakthrough in the area of how it powers itself while in the water. Using platinum coated carbon nanotubes, Robojelly generates its fuel from the abundance of hydrogen molecules in the water that surrounds the robot.

The extraction of the hydrogen fuel from the water is accomplished by the natural motion of the robot’s artificial muscles as it swims. Just like a real jellyfish, Robojelly draws water into its body area, then expels it to create propulsion. As the robot draws water in, the aforementioned nanotubes create an exothermic reaction as the mixture of hydrogen and oxygen in the water passes over and through them. The heat generated by this reaction is then converted into usable energy, theoretically allowing it to run indefinitely since it can create its own fuel. Of course, there are several real-world dynamics that would hinder that process, but it’s an interesting concept nonetheless.

There’s no word on when the robot will be ready for real-world use, but the project serves as an excellent stepping stone when it comes to renewable energy production and robot’s that can run for very long periods of time without interaction.

Read more at The Verge and The Institute of Physics

The robot is powered by heat-producing chemical reactions between the oxygen and hydrogen, which were injected from fuel tanks, and the platinum on its surface. The heat given off by these reactions is transferred to the artificial muscles of the robot, causing them to transform into different shapes.

This green, renewable element means Robojelly does not require an external power source or the constant replacement of batteries.

At the moment, the hydrogen-powered Robojelly has been functioning whilst being clamped down in a water tank. The researchers admit that the robot still needs development to achieve full functionality and efficiency; however, the potential can be seen in this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2OSJQhHQp8) where the robot is powered by electricity.

theNthAndrew says:

This (and the BBC source article) is not accurate. The jelly fish robot does not generate fuel from the seawater, and cannot run forever. Thermodynamics!! Even if it could generate hydrogen from the seawater, this would be a losing proposition efficiency wise and eventually whatever catalysis process was going on would reach equilibrium. According to the paper (which is free with registration), a fuel source for creating hydrogen is stored onboard which is reacted with ambient oxygen in the water to produce water and heat. This heat is captured used to power the artificial muscles propel the robot.