For anyone who didn’t watch 60 Minutes this last Sunday, I’ll explain why you should watch the video.

The Bloom Box is a fuel cell designed to provide homes electricity from a box the size of a stack of 15 cd/dvds that costs about $3000.  The fuel cell does emit CO2 when fueled by carbon based fuels, but it creates twice as much electricity as traditional natural gas generators. This means that substituting these methane powered fuel cells for coal power plants could cut CO2 emissions by 75%. Deploying small, off grid Bloom devices further reduces transmission loses and grid costs associated with delivering power.  A successful Bloom Box, could have a huge impact on on a world increasingly run on electricity.

Will it work? Well they’ve got systems running at Google, eBay and FedEx in northern California and they’re funded by Kleiner Perkins, et. al. for $400 Million. That makes it seem like it’s coming soon. If this works, my only question is could we capture enough methane, from bio sources to power society without continuing to add CO2 from burning “mined” fuels?

Check out this video:

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Panasonic, the giant Japanese based electronics manufacturer and marketer has launched an LED lightbulb, for the US market at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.  The bulb, which was first launched in Japan in september, is known as the EverLed, requires no change of lighting equipment, fitting in standard screw in fixtures for incandescent light build.  Consumers will be able to swap out a 60watt traditional bulb with a 6.9 watt “bulb” with several LEDs.  Panasonic has branded the bulb, which are expected to last 19 years, as the “EverLed” and they currently sell for approximately $40 USD. The bulb can be expected to save 8200 kwh or about over $500 of electricity at 7 cents per/kwh.

It’s been said that “There are liars, lies and statistics”, which those who don’t know anything about statistics have led them to infer that statistics aren’t useful, which is wrong. We’ve heard all about the hacked emails that show English climate researchers, at Univ. of East Anglia talked about manipulating data and the reaction who question the existence of a global warming crisis. What we haven’t heard much of is an explanation as to why this isn’t the smoking gun that the right wing media portrays it to be.  If Glenn Beck, Hannity and the rest of the folk don’t understand how science works, and they are the only ones “explaining” the meaning of this, the whole rational world is in trouble.

First of all, science itself, by definition, is a practice that is designed to avoid just the very problem of the “Cheating Scientist”.  The first two requirements of science are “results that are both measurable and repeatable”. if this scientist and his associates fudged his numbers then the 100s or 1000s of other researchers wouldn’t have found the evidence of climate change that they’ve already documented.  Granted, some people may have used the manipulated data series, but the fact is that researchers in many different fields have done experiments within their areas of studies and most support the idea that their is a climate change crisis.  If all the scientists are wrong, because of one group in the UK, there is a lot more wrong with the world than global warning.

Whatever your opinion on the health care debate, i think you’ll agree, that it’s pushed most other public policy issues off the table. The fight against global warming is no longer a top priority.  In fact any legislation bringing in a carbon cap, doesn’t charge the largest emitters for their carbon credits and it sets the levels much higher than science suggests they need to be to stop and turn back Global Warming.  I personally think that if this is the sort of “carbon cap and trade” system that comes about, it will have little or no impact on the way most Americans live.  With or without cap and trade, it’s time to put a carbon tax on gasoline and other non-renewable fuels. What is needed now is a consumer movement toward greener products and adding a tax to gasoline, to fund green energy, via tax credits.  A movement toward renewable electricity will not only help the environment, but will also create new jobs in research, development, manufacturer, installation and maintenance of these systems

Cash for clunkers is the current raging political debate in the US.  Let’s cut away all the BS and look at what is happening: the cars being bought are on average about 10 mpg better than the clunkers (heard this on CNBC yesterday).  That means for an increase of about 40% for cars and 60% for trucks.  For a vehicle driving 20,000 miles a year, at 25mpg would use 800 gallons of fuel a year, saving about 600 gallons of fuel or 6 tons of CO2. If a car is used for 10 years (much more than average) the newer car would reduce CO2 emmissions by about 60 tons.

Yesterday, US carbon credits on the CCX traded for 40 cents, yes  $ 0.40, per ton.  So the US government is giving a $4500 rebate to protect the environment from $24 worth of CO2, about 200 times more than the market price.  So, if folks want to keep the program growing for the sake of ramping up car sales, that’s great.  Just don’t think the environmental benefit is worth the cost.

Is a ‘Smart Grid’ a good idea?  While some people wonder about benefits of this new technology, most of us just want to know what they are talking about.  Simply put, the Smart Grid is a power system that is more computer controlled. The Smart Grid connects computerized appliances, computerized meters, power generation and transmission networks together to optimize the production and use of electricity. This Smart Grid would allow the power companies to see where the use is highest, to increase rates or use interrupting services to manage demand.  In fact it would allow power companies to alow the pricing of power according to demand and discounting use in order to reduce the need to build reserve capacity.

Imagine a USA with only rechargeable cars, every family needing to recharge a couple of cars everyday.  Well during hot summer days we already seen demand outstripping supply in California a few days every  summer.  Government research labs say that off-peak generation capacity can power 73% of the vehicles in a world of electric cars.  When you put this all together it means the smart grid would let you plug in the car when you come home and let the smart meter decide when to charge it based on how much you are willing to pay. Your washer and dryer can wait to run at offpeak times to get the lowest rate. Plus this opens up the idea of ’whole home”  back up battery technology that would allow us to store up power during off peak hours to reduce the need to buy power off the grid during peak times. But the smart grid goes beyond that, it allows the electrical companies to sell more electricity with fewer plants by optimizing supply and demand.  Fewer power plants being built saves the industry billions of dollars. that’s money that can be spent on newer, greener power generating technology. 

So let’s teach our grid some new tricks, it’s conservation, optimization via automation.

One of the Obama administrations top priorities is energy.  Beyond the priority of energy is the administration’s focus on conservation and green energy.  When you are able to conserve energy in a less costly and polluting way than doing nothing, simple logic and thriftyness would cry out to do so.  Fortunately the US governement offers tax credits and as part of the recent recovery act, federal grants to retrofit schools, goverment building and homes of the poorest to do just that. 

In Allegheny county PA, home to Pittsburgh, the county expects to spend an $8.1 million federal grant on energy effienciency and getting that information out to the citizenry.  A recent project at the Allegheny county jail spent $950,000 to replace 805 lights with new LED fixtures.  LEDs, which can last over 20 years use as little as of 1/10 the power of incandescent bulbs.  The county expects to save about $180,000 on electric fees each year, paying the project back in 6 years, roughly a 12% return on investment.

How many county jails, hospitals, offices, etc. can make these switches, eventually every single one.  Until pricing comes down, by about 75%, homeowners and landlords won’t be able to afford to make the move.

As we head toward Earth Hour here in the Americas, i’m asking why?  Why bother with an earth hour, why set it up for saturday night, local time, when most people are out socializing and enjoying their weekend.  The idea, is to “vote” for a fight against global warming by shutting off your lights for the hour .  While i’m all for consciousness raising and spreading the word, but these cute little events also tend to make people feel that they’ve done something hard, when they’re really done very little.

While i’m good with helping people take the first step, i think having a billion people sign petition/oath to strengthen the fight against global warming would be an incredible feat and would send a much louder message.  This earth hour gets “support” by abandoned buildings around the world not using power, while the lights that aren’t extinguished, most likely because they are controlled by timers or the available light will be judged as protests.   So whether you’re city is too bright or nice and dark, it’s won’t be easy to measure “the vote”.  30+ years ago, April 22nd was established as Earth Day as a way to raise conciousness and advocate for the environment.  Instead of finding more ways to make statements, how about something that focuses on making real, long term changes in the way we live.

Some of the best arguments against the US capping CO2 can be summed in a single word.  These words are: India, China, Brazil and Indonesia.  The long winded version of these arguments go something like this:

Even if the US and Europe cut emissions by 100% there are still 3+ billion people, half the world living in the in those countries and they are increasing their CO2 at a stagering pace.  The cost of “green energy” is so much higher than carbon based energy that these and other developing countries will chose the cheaper carbon choice.

So, what can be done about this?  Should we subsidize these developing countries so they go with green power? Should we give up?  The short answer is that we (North America, Europe, Japan, Korea) need to push for deployment and development of wind, sun and hydropower solutions at home, now.  We need to help reduce the cost of these technologies, by supporting this young industry. 

Yes, the old rules of the marketplace work here, the more solar and wind generation is deployed, the faster the cost of these power sources decline.  The early affect of Germany’s efforts to encourage solar and wind power has helped to both reduce the cost of solar panels and wind turbines with increased the demand for these technologies. Much in the way that VCRs, PCs, microchips and Flat Panels have dropped in pricing as a result of increased demand and sales, economies of scale and competition, solar and wind technologies have followed that model.  When the cost of these new technologies create power for less than the cost of fossil fuels, we’ll see developing countries choose green.

So if you want to keep the developing world from building 1000s of fossil fuel power plants, tens of millions of gas powered vehicles and 100s of millions of carbon burning homes, it’s best to encourage the developed world to increase the speed of green energy deployments here.  Let’s hope the US either leads the way, or follows germany’s lead.  Fortunately with the exit of the Bush administration, the US has gotten out of the way.

Yes that’s the claim of a study by BC Hydro in Canada reported to their utility commission that in some cases compact fluorescents (CFLs) can actually increase greenhouse gas emissions.  The report explains that because of the great inefficiency of incandescent light bulbs, they generate a great deal of heat in the average home.  In a cold climate the extra heat is appreciated, but when these old, inefficient bulbs are replaced with CFL, the more efficient bulbs don’t give off as much heat.  It turns out that this is enough of a heat loss that people turn up their heat and if it’s gas heat, it’s increasing the emission of CO2.

Unfortunately this headline and the way i’ve seen and heard in the media makes it sound as if the fluorescents will increase global warming, but in fact the study assumes that all BC electricity will be “green” said this:

By 2017, Hydro said, it anticipates efficient lighting could annually save 480 gigawatt hours of electricity.

However, Hydro also states that lighting regulations “will increase GHG emissions in Hydro’s service territory by 45,000 tonnes due to cross effects” of a switch to cool-burning bulbs.

well 480 gigawatts of coal fired power emits about 480,000 tons of CO2, from natural gas about 325,000 tons. The idea that this somehow is an overall negative is ridiculous, until all power is generated without CO2 emissions.  Even if BC was 100% green energy, do all the materials to build the dams, wind farms, nuclear reactors not count? Is having to build an extra nuclear plant really more greenhouse friendly than reducing inefficient lighting?

While it’s interesing to know that there is some emissions that will result from the loss of heat in cold weather, it’s just another factor in calculating overall greenhouse emissions.  Don’t stop changing those bulbs!