Scene on the Energy Road

...on Interstate 76 in Pennsylvania on the way to Toledo, we saw many billboards above ... and a few brave windmills tilting away...

                                                                                                                 

Got Life Support?

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (aka PNAS) has a new section: Sustainability Science which they define as:an emerging field of research dealing with the interactions between natural and social systems, and with how those interactions affect the challenge of sustainability: meeting the needs of present and future generations while substantially reducing poverty and conserving the planet’s life support systems.

Visit http://www.pnas.org/site/misc/sustainability.shtml

Prize for hydrogen storage method

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
Initial H-Prize Competition for
Breakthrough Advances in Materials
for Hydrogen Storage
AGENCY: Office of Energy Efficiency and
Renewable Energy, Department of
Energy (DOE).
ACTION: Notice of Initial H-Prize
Competition for Breakthrough Advances
in Materials for Hydrogen Storage (‘‘HPrize
Competition’’).
SUMMARY: As authorized in Section 654
of the Energy Independence and
Security Act of 2007, DOE is
announcing the Initial H-Prize
Competition which will be a single
award for $1 million in the subject area
of advanced materials for hydrogen
storage—a critical challenge to enable
widespread commercialization of
hydrogen and fuel cell technologies.
Evaluation of entries will begin
approximately 15 months after the date
this announcement appears in the
Federal Register (FR). A single prize of
$1 million will be awarded, unless no
entries are significant enough to merit
an award.

Full text here:
http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2009/pdf/E9-20552.pdf

Solar PV cell oversupply

http://www.edn.com/blog/1690000169/post/220047622.html?nid=3351&rid=1584049

Smoky Mountain Solar

You never know where you will find a little sustainable energy gold. My wife and I found a little nugget in the Smoky Mountains at the Sugarlands Visitor Center in the way of a nice solar installation. They are using our same Siemens panels and they look to be in about the same shape as ours. It is a little crazy as they are just preheating water with the electricity but it is a nice installation and we can learn a bit from how they put things together. I have more pictures that I can share.