As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

It’s axiomatic among the cleantech community that energy efficiency represents the cheapest/easiest way to address our energy and environmental challenges. Indeed, as illustrated by some analysis from McKinsey & Company, many energy-efficiency measures actually have net negative costs to implement.

So why is it so damned hard for customers to adopt energy efficiency technologies? Consider the recent article from the Wall Street Journal profiling the challenges faced in Boulder, Colo. – one of the most environmentally inclined communities in North America – in encouraging energy-efficiency measures. The WSJ article spurred some navel gazing among the green-conscious Boulder citizenry, as witnessed in this blog post.

One way of looking at this issue is that it is indeed hard to change people’s habits and behaviors, but that eventually people do change. Another way of looking at this issue is that people are economic animals: They do make changes, pretty quickly, like it or not, when something hits their wallets and pocketbooks.

In other words, it’s really pushing water uphill trying to encourage a shift to using less energy when energy is so bloody cheap for most people. Unless and until energy becomes more expensive (taxes anyone?), the only way to spur many customers to use less energy is to change codes such that inefficient devices (whether they be lightbulbs, refrigerators, air conditioners, TVs, or computers) can no longer be bought.

In the absence of price signals that strongly encourage behaviors to reduce energy consumption, restricting what customers can buy is the only brute-force method available that really works. And as can be seen in our current political environment, many Americans don’t like being strong-armed by their government.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

For as long as I can remember, Lake Erie – and by extension, all of the Great Lakes of North America – symbolized water pollution. Sure, it was much worse 40 years ago when the Cuyahoga River in downtown Cleveland caught fire, but the reputation lingers. (Remember the “Swill” skit on Saturday Night Live in the late 1970s?) Although the Great Lakes are a boater’s and fisher’s haven, for many people (myself included), the thought of bathing in the waters or drinking them untreated remains pretty unappealing.

This is truly a pity for the Midwest, because the Great Lakes represents one of the most fundamental assets a region can offer: fresh water in enormous quantities. For those who’ve never seen the Great Lakes, they are misnamed: These are inland seas, not lakes. The Great Lakes hold 20 percent of the world’s fresh water. Pause and think about that for a minute.

In recent decades, there has been an increase in attention paid to remediating the Great Lakes. A unique multi-government collaboration launched in 1955, the Great Lakes Commission was formed to oversee issues spanning the multiple U.S. states and Canadian provinces depending on the Great Lakes. Founded 40 years ago, the Alliance for the Great Lakes was an early voice advocating environmental improvement in the Great Lakes. Most substantively, the U.S. EPA leads the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, which targets “the most significant problems in the region, including invasive aquatic species, non-point source pollution, and contaminated sediment.”

Recently, the Obama Administration announced a five-year $2.2 billion blueprint for cleaning up the Great Lakes, which aims by 2014 to (1) finish work at five “toxic hot spots” that have been known as problematic for two decades, (2) reduce the rate of new invasive species by 40 percent, (3) decrease phosphorous runoff measurably, and (4) protect about 100,000 wetland acres. (See this article from the Chicago Tribune.)

As the central feature of the industrial North American Midwest, which gave birth to the industrial era of the 20th century, the Great Lakes were long taken advantage of – often without much respect – to achieve economic growth, increase standards of living, win wars, and establish the U.S. as the unparalleled leader in the world. $2.2 billion may sound like a lot of money, but it’s due time we give back to the Great Lakes for all they’ve given us.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

Of all the cleantech technology sectors, the one I can least keep track of is batteries. For those of you who want to keep the pulse of this dynamic arena, a new blog called This Week in Batteries is just what you might be looking for.

The host of this blog is Venkat Srinivasan, part of the Batteries for Advanced Transportation Technologies program at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, so he should be pretty near the center of the action in the battery world – at least as it pertains to electric vehicle applications.

Srinivasan’s most recent post is a nice riff exposing the absurdity of extrapolating Moore’s Law for semiconductors to other realms of technology advancement – as if forever-continuing exponential improvements won’t bump up against the laws of physics.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

Frank Luntz is an influential pollster in Republian circles. So it’s notable when Luntz releases findings that support movement on the climate front.

That just what happened in late January, when Luntz’s firm The Word Doctors collaborated with the Environmental Defense Fund to announce recent polling data that suggest that a majority of Republican voters continue to believe that human-induced climate change is a real phenomenon and want action to address it.

Some of the more interesting findings in the report “The Language of a Clean Energy Economy” include:

• The concept of “carbon neutral” does not resonate well with the American public. “Energy efficiency” and “healthier environment” carry more weight.
• The statement “it doesn’t matter if there is or isn’t climate change; it is still in America’s best interest to develop new sources of energy that are clean reliable, efficient, and safe” is the most compelling framing of the issue.
• National security tops every other reason to support climate action – particularly among Republican voters but also among a large segment of Democratic voters.

As Luntz summarized in his own words, “Americans want clean, safe, healthy, secure energy. That’s why Republicans and Democrats alike strongly support action to address climate change. Sure, Republicans are more concerned about the national security component and Democrats the health component, but support for action right now spans all partisan and ideological lines.”

It’s a fine and pleasant synopsis, but I’m not as sanguine as Luntz, only because energy independence is a strained rationale (not to mention probably more unattainable than major carbon emission reductions) for dealing with climate change. Why? Two reasons:

• One, if you want to maximize domestic energy production immediately and cheaply, you’ll rush right to coal – which only exacerbates the climate concerns.
• Two, until America’s vehicle fleet becomes electrified – a long way off – you can’t run America’s vehicle fleet on coal or any other lower-emitting form of domestically produced electricity. For the foreseeable future, we’ll have cars and trucks running primarily on (mostly imported) oil, and producing carbon emissions, to boot.

I’m not the only observer to be concerned about an unrealistic or even ill-advised pursuit of energy independence: see “Oil Independence: Realistic Goal or Unrealistic Slogan?” for a good summary of the literature, and a nuanced and balanced view of the notion of “energy independence.” This reinforces how unfortunate it is when the seemingly only basis for bipartisanship on climate policy is a principle that is very slippery at best and easily warped at worst.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

The distinction between “green power” – electricity without any carbon emissions, usually from renewable energy sources such as solar and wind – has been clearly drawn vs. “brown power” – electricity generated from fossil fuels.

In a recent article in The Nation, author Lisa Margonelli writes about “The Case for ‘Gray Power’“. “Gray power” is the term Ms. Margonelli uses for a concept called “energy recycling,” wherein electricity is generated from capturing waste heat from burning fossil fuels. So gray power is not as “green” as renewables, but given that the fuel is being burned anyway, generating more electricity from the same amount of fuel burn is surely a good thing.

Ms. Margonelli makes the point that there are huge untapped opportunities for capturing waste heat to generate electricity in the U.S., especially in the Midwest and South, with the plethora of coal-fired powerplants in those regions. This message has been pounded home loudly and frequently by such people as Thomas Casten of Recycled Energy Development.

So what’s preventing this opportunity from being captured?  Ms. Margonelli argues that there are two main impediments: First, various electric utility and state regulatory practices impair the economics of those who might pursue gray power opportunities. Second, the U.S. Clean Air Act is written in such a way to discourage major modifications of powerplants – even if they are modifications that improve economic and environmental performance.

Her proposed remedy is the creation of a federal Clean Power Authority, analogous to an organization like the Tennessee Valley Authority or Bonneville Power Administration, whose mission would be to recycle wasted energy from powerplants in the South and Midwest.

While I agree that the two issues she identified are in fact real impediments to recycled energy, Ms. Margonelli misses a third critical one.

In Europe, waste heat recapture is much more prevalent than in the U.S. Why? Because the waste heat often can’t be economically converted into electricity, but must remain as heat – and Europe’s infrastructure is much more optimally configured to economically use this heat.

Given that Europe is so compact and densely populated, pretty much every powerplant is within 20 to 30 miles of a sizable town, and many of these towns have central district heating systems that can make direct use of the waste heat piped in from the powerplant. In contrast, most major powerplants in the U.S. heartland are situated hundreds of miles away from any city center with a district heating system that can use waste heat. Lacking an economically proximate market for waste heat, it just goes up the stack – poof!

No question that opportunities to capture gray power in American urban centers are non-trivial, and they should be diligently pursued. But what’s needed to make gray power in the U.S. more of a widespread reality is not so much a federal Clean Power Authority, but technology that can economically convert low-grade (and low-value) waste heat into higher-value electricity. And that is exactly what firms like Akron-based ReXorce Thermionics are working to develop.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

Keith Scott, vice president of business development at Bridgelux, recently posted on GreenTech Media an interesting take on the state of LED lighting markets. Mr. Scott claims that “we are in the middle of the LED lighting revolution,” and sees big expansion ahead in for the sector.

In some ways, the picture he paints parallels the recent trends in the photovoltaics sector. The prices for LED lighting systems are high in large part because of booming demand for LEDs from other applications (e.g., high-def TVs). This is triggering expansion of LED manufacturing capacity, which should alleviate supply constraints and drive down prices.

Regulatory drivers – Energy Star, California’s Title 24, and other code tightenings – will spur demand to absorb the increased supply. Product designers are working to integrate LED into holistic systems that better satisfy customer needs on a variety of attributes – not just light quality, but also temperature.

Solar energy has consistently been one of the sexiest segments of the cleantech arena. If LED technology is following a somewhat similar trajectory, then shouldn’t it start garnering more attention?

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

A few weeks ago, the legendary Bell Labs, now the R&D engine behind Alcatel-Lucent, announced the launch of a new global initiative called Green Touch.

The goal of Green Touch is to “create the technologies needed to make communications networks 1,000 times more energy efficient than they are today.” To put that in perspective, the Green Touch rollout press release noted that a thousand-fold reduction in energy consumption would power the world’s communication networks for three years with the amount of energy now consumed in one day.

Given the likely continuance of exponential demand increases for bandwidth around the globe, the need to make communications technologies radically more energy efficient will be critical - or else.

The founding members of Green Touch are a who’s-who of high technology, including enormous telecoms like AT&T and China Mobile, academic research labs such as MIT’s Research Laboratory for Electronics and Stanford University’s Wireless Systems Labs, and industrial labs (not only Bell Labs but Samsung’s Advanced Institute of Technology).

Green Touch is seeking additional collaboration partners, so if you’re interested and can contribute materially, it should be a fascinating table at which to sit.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

Last week, E/The Environmental Magazine announced its Best Green Tech Innovations of 2009.

It’s unclear what criteria were used to select the winners, but I was impressed by the fact that I had not previously heard of any of these products or technologies. Since they were all news to me, I don’t know enough about any of them to have a favorite.

I’m also struck by the observation that the list represents innovation involving large corporations like Ford and Sony, as well as tiny start-ups and individual inventors.

I used to pride myself on being pretty well-informed about the cleantech arena, but being unable to remain abreast of developments on so many fronts is a vivid illustration of how robust the cleantech space is becoming. I’ll gladly sacrifice the comprehensiveness of my awareness and understanding for increasing velocity from an exploding number of innovators – including industrial powerhouses – in the cleantech marketplace.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

Did you know that yesterday, Jan. 10, was “National Cut Your Energy Costs Day?” Until a couple days ago, I didn’t. That is, until the folks at SunRun, a provider of residential solar energy systems, promoted the day by sending out the following blast email:

“Five quick tips on how cut costs and save energy this new year:

1. Power Strips: Plug your TV, computer, and other home electronics into power strips and flip the switch when they’re not in use. Even when appliances are turned off, they’re still running on phantom energy. If you don’t use power strips, remember to unplug your appliances when you’re done with them.

2. CFLs: Switch out your incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs. CFLs last up to 10 times longer than and use about one-fourth the energy of incandescents.

3. Solar Panels: Reduce your electricity costs by installing solar panels in your home. You use the same amount of energy but pay less for it, because you can lock in a rate with solar rather than be subject to your utility’s rate increases.

4. Sleep mode: Set your computers to sleep mode, rather than screen saver mode, when not in use. It takes about 100 watts/hour to run a screen saver on your graphics card. Cut energy costs by letting your screen go black.

5. Air sealing: Seal cracks and openings to prevent outside air from otherwise entering your house. Paired with proper insulation, air sealing can increase energy efficiency and drastically reduce your heating and cooling costs.”

Well, truth be told, #3 really isn’t an energy-saving tip, but I’ll cut SunRun some slack because at least they are honest in pointing out that anyone interested in solar energy should first implement all cost-effective energy efficiency possibilities. It’s crazy, but too often the case, for someone to install a solar energy system when the building itself is terribly inefficient. There’s no point in generating relatively expensive electricity and then wasting it – especially when the costs to avoid the waste are often so modest.

We’ll have made real progress in this country when every day is National Cut Your Energy Costs Day.

As posted to CleanTechBlog.com

One of the virtues touted for the so-called “smart grid” of the future is the ability to help customers manage their appliance usage better, and thereby reduce unnecessary energy consumption. However, since people are heavily influenced by economic considerations, fully capturing this opportunity presupposes that customers understand how much money (that is, energy) they could save by reducing consumption at any moment in time.

As profiled in the January/February 2010 issue of Technology Review, a company called Talon Communications has developed a neat little product called the “edot” to address this issue. 

The edot communicates wirelessly with a house’s “smart meter” to fetch updates on real-time power prices, thereby indicating when power prices are relatively high or low. At roughly $10 per unit, the magnetic edot can be stuck to many major appliances around the house, providing an on-the-spot indicator to the user whether or not it’s an especially good (i.e., lucrative) time to turn off or reduce power.

No, the edot will not save the world, but it is indicative of the many tiny but reinforcing elements necessary to bring the smart grid to full fruition – and to bring intelligence to energy decision-making at the household level.