Waste coffee grounds can provide a cheap, abundant, and environmentally friendly source of biodiesel fuel, according to a study by researchers at the University of Nevada-Reno. According to the USDA, world coffee production is 16.34 billion pounds per year; the scientists estimated that spent coffee grounds can potentially add 340 million gallons of biodiesel to the world’s fuel supply. A paper on the work was published online in the ACS Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.
Researchers at the Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), led by Dr. Jay Keasling at UC Berkeley, have engineered the common industrial yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae with an n-butanol biosynthetic pathway, resulting in a ten-fold improvement in n-butanol production from one of the strains to 2.5 mg/L. An open access paper on their work was published online 3 December in the journal Microbial Cell Factories.
Total domestic petroleum deliveries fell more than 4% in October compared with a year ago, contributing to a substantial year-to-date decline of more than 5% to 19.6 million barrels per day, according to the latest monthly statistical report from the American Petroleum Institute.
Ocean Power Technologies, Inc. has installed one of its PowerBuoy wave power generation units (earlier post) near Kaneohe Bay on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. This is the third PowerBuoy to be deployed by OPT over the past two months at sites in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
OPT PowerBuoy
The Oahu PowerBuoy was launched under the Company’s ongoing program with the US Navy for installation of PowerBuoys off Marine Corps Base Hawaii at Kaneohe Bay and will be connected to the Oahu power grid. Further, the US Navy has added $300,000 in funding for this program to provide for extended operation of the PowerBuoy system.
In a November special issue of the journal Ecology, a group of scientists report that if current patterns of change in the Arctic and North Atlantic Oceans continue, alterations of ocean circulation could occur on a global scale, with potentially dramatic implications for the world’s climate and biosphere.
Charles Greene of Cornell University and colleagues reconstructed the patterns of climate change in the Arctic from the Paleocene epoch to the present. Over these 65 million years, the Earth has undergone several major warming and cooling episodes, which were largely mitigated by the expansion and contraction of sea ice in the Arctic.
When the Arctic cools and ice expands, the increase ice cover increases albedo. The resulting increased reflection of the sun leads to global cooling. Likewise, when ice sheets and sea ice contract and expose the darker-colored land or ocean underneath, heat is absorbed, accelerating climate warming. Currently, the Earth is in the midst of an interglacial period, characterized by retracted ice sheets and warmer temperatures.
As large portions of the polar ice cap break off and fall into the Arctic Ocean, large quantities of fresh water abruptly reduces the salinity. Continued exposure to such freshwater forcing, however, could disrupt global ocean circulation during the next century and lead to very abrupt changes in climate, similar to those that occurred at the onset of the last ice age.
“If the Earth’s deep ocean circulation were to be shut down, many of the atmospheric, glacial and oceanic processes that have been stable in recent times would change, and the change would likely be abrupt,” says Greene.
“While the ecosystem consequences of gradual changes in the ocean are somewhat predictable, all bets are off after such abrupt changes occur.”
These abrupt disruptions on a large scale could halt the Earth’s ocean currents and lead us into the next Ice Age.
One of my passions is the idea of taking vintage vehicles and converting them to EVs. The idea of recycling 2,000 lbs of steel and rubber into a roadworthy vehicle that is more efficient than when it was new is very cool. It looks like Neil Young has the same passion. He has teamed up with Johnathan Goodwin of H-Line Conversions in Wichita, KS to start building EV/CNG hybrids from traditional internal combustion engine vehicles. Goodwin converted Young’s 1959 Lincoln and the car is on display this week at Dreamforce 2008.
A researcher at Montana State University has found a micro-organism in a plant in South America that could fuel vehicles one day. The unusual fungus contains the essence of diesel, which one could use to run a bus, for example, without processing it at all. Listen…
With the 2008 Presidential election now only a week away, speculation will soon be over on where our country will be heading under the leadership of a new president. Whoever is elected will have a costly Middle East War and a failed domestic economy to deal with. I don’t envy their position.
After reading both the Obama energy plan and the McCain energy plan, Obama has put the most effort and thought into crafting and documenting how he intends to help reduce our dependence on foreign oil and catalyze the shift to the new Clean Energy Economy.
With a drastic increase in unemployment looming, the next president should consider taking a page from the play book of FDR and institute a New Deal for America’s energy infrastructure. This “Green New Deal” would mobilize the country’s workers by funding the largest new industry created in the 21st century. By funding public works projects, the new President would create valuable new jobs, boost our economy and wean us from dependence on petroleum. These public works projects could include:
building a new high voltage DC power distribution network
retrofitting power plants with co-generation capability that uses biomass, solar, geothermal and wind where applicable
developing sustainable biofuels that don’t adversely affect food prices and supply
developing alternative fuels such as natural gas and methanol while reducing the amount of energy required to manufacture, refine and deliver them for consumption.
fostering research in CO2 reduction and sequestration techniques including reformation of CO2 and H20 into methanol for fuel and as an energy storage mechanism.
funding additional research of reforming atmospheric CO2 into methanol using selective absorption and other techniques.
incenting research in alternative methods of transportation such as electric vehicles and more advanced hybrid technologies.
upgrading our homes and buildings with energy efficiency improvements such as improved insulation, CF and LED lighting upgrades, more efficient windows and improved sealing of the building envelope.
adding government-mandated requirements on efficient new building designs
help funding energy generation retrofits to homes and businesses using solar PV, solar hot water, geothermal and wind where applicable.
David Morris’ article on AlterNet makes a case for why our nation is ready for a Green New Deal.
You can search and find many blogs or pick up most magazines and read articles on the future of ground transportation and how its use of petroleum adversely affects the environment. The cost of petroleum is near the top of the list of conversation starters as consumers around the globe deal with the doubling and tripling of fuel prices. However, you don’t often read about how to improve the efficiency of the airline industry and to transition away from petroleum-based fuels.
Bradford Plumer, in his article in The New Republic, “The End of Aviation,” writes of the coming downsizing in the commercial airline industry due to rising fuel costs. He makes a case for why the current air travel industry’s business model doesn’t work with $135/barrel oil.Read how the spiraling costs of oil, as supplies are depleted, will affect the cost and availability of air travel.
I am often a skeptic of theories until I can read enough information to support a logical conclusion that the theory is true or false. Climate change was one of those theories that I wondered if it was really true. I watched a Youtube video of a young scientist who used standard logic to determine that the best option was to assume that climate change was real and to do something about it. Here’s the video to watch and help you make up your own mind on climate change:
Now that you’ve watched the video, I wonder what your conclusion is now? If you are still on the fence about climate change and global warming, then maybe this week’s news article on the polar ice caps will help you make your decision.
It appears that the ice at the North Pole has decided to melt and should be completely melted by this September. I guess you can look on the bright side; now you can take a cruise to the North Pole and experience what many an explorer froze to death trying to accomplish!
It’s also a well-known fact that there is oil under the Arctic Ocean. I guess it will also be easier to drill for it now…
