German firms invest in generating energy themselves

Deutsche Welle, 17 December 2012

An increasing number of German companies are in the process of decreasing their dependency on external energy suppliers by generating energy themselves. They're wary of the government's current course.

More and more German firms are accelerating their investments in the generation of their own energy, the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) said on Monday.

"Every third company in the country is making efforts to generate conventional or renewable energy for their operations," DIHK President Hans Heinrich Driftmann told the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

He said this trend had become obvious basically across all industries, not least against the background of "growing doubts about future energy security." The DIHK's assessment was based on a poll among 2,300 German firms, many of them small and medium-sized enterprises.

Ecological production

German carmaker Volkswagen already generates more than half of its energy needs itself and announced plans to decrease dependency on external providers further in the years ahead.

"We supply our German production facilities 60 percent of self-generated electricity," VW's energy spokesman Wolfram Thomas said in a statement. "As early as next year, our highly efficient combined heat and power stations and self-generated renewables will provide three fourths of the energy needed in our German plants."

VW said it would invest some 640 million euros ($841 million) in photovoltaic installations, wind farms and a second hydroelectric plant in Brazil over the next five years. In addition, the company would in the future use gas instead of coal in its combined heat and power stations with the aim of reducing its carbon dioxide footprint.

hg/hc (dapd, AFP)

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"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version) 

“…  4 - Energy (again)

The natural resources of the planet are finite and will not support the continuation of what you've been doing. We've been saying this for a decade. Watch for increased science and increased funding for alternate ways of creating electricity (finally). Watch for the very companies who have the most to lose being the ones who fund it. It is the beginning of a full realization that a change of thinking is at hand. You can take things from Gaia that are energy, instead of physical resources. We speak yet again about geothermal, about tidal, about wind. Again, we plead with you not to over-engineer this. For one of the things that Human Beings do in a technological age is to over-engineer simple things. Look at nuclear - the most over-engineered and expensive steam engine in existence!

Your current ideas of capturing energy from tidal and wave motion don't have to be technical marvels. Think paddle wheel on a pier with waves, which will create energy in both directions [waves coming and going] tied to a generator that can power dozens of neighborhoods, not full cities. Think simple and decentralize the idea of utilities. The same goes for wind and geothermal. Think of utilities for groups of homes in a cluster. You won't have a grid failure if there is no grid. This is the way of the future, and you'll be more inclined to have it sooner than later if you do this, and it won't cost as much….”

Ivory sales must stop or Africa's elephants could soon be extinct, says Jane Goodall

The conservationist accuses China of fuelling poaching, as tusks are smuggled out in diplomatic bags

Guardian, John Vidal, The Observer, Sunday 16 December 2012

Elephants in the Masai Maara reserve in Kenya. Photograph: Anup Shah/
Anup Shah/Corbis

Jane Goodall, one of the world's greatest conservationists, has made an impassioned plea for a worldwide ban on the sale of ivory to prevent the extinction of the African elephant.

Her call follows the seizure in Malaysia last week of 24 tonnes of illegal ivory and a report by conservationists warning that the illegal ivory trade now threatens governments as rebel groups use the sale of tusks to fund their wars.

"A massive tragedy is unfolding in some parts of Africa. This is desperately serious, unprecedented," she said. "We believe that Tanzania has lost half its elephants in the last three years. Ugandan military planes have been seen over the Democratic Republic of the Congo shooting elephants from the air. Armed militia are now shooting the elephants."

She accused China of being ultimately responsible, because most of the ivory is sent there to be made into ornaments. "The main market is China and the east. The ivory appears to be smuggled out in the Chinese diplomatic pouches or in unmarked planes, or it is smuggled over the border to DR Congo. Armed gangs and rangers are joining in the smuggling or are getting killed. I fear we are losing the battle in some countries. It's shocking," she said.

China's growing presence in Africa has been blamed for an unprecedented surge in poaching. The discovery last week by Malaysian customs of 1,500 tusks hidden in secret chambers in 10 containers supposedly carrying wooden floor tiles was the largest illegal ivory haul ever, roughly equivalent to all the illegal ivory seized last year.

The containers were reportedly on their way to China via Spain from Togo, a popular destination for armed gangs to smuggle ivory. It follows the discovery in Hong Kong in October of nearly 1,000 pieces of ivory tusks from Tanzania and the discovery of more than 200 tusks in Tanzania itself.

Goodall, who became famous for her work as a primatologist working with chimpanzees in Africa, compared the deteriorating situation with elephants to the drastic decline of primate populations in the past 40 years. "We are seeing the devastation of populations of elephants in many countries. It's a similar situation to the great apes. Everyone should be concerned. We are fighting for a total worldwide ban on the sale of all ivory."

She said that she would be campaigning with David Attenborough to persuade the UN to ban ivory sales. "The world must wake up. Governments need to tighten up. No one anywhere should buy any ivory. Countries must be helped to reinforce controls on poaching," said Goodall.

A report submitted to the UN last week by WWF International warned that the illegal ivory trade threatened Africa's governments as rebel groups used the sale of tusks to fund their wars. "This is about much more than wildlife. This crisis is threatening the very stability of governments. It has become a profound threat to national security," said Jim Leape, director-general of WWF International.

Poaching in some countries is said to be out of control. In southern Sudan the elephant population, estimated at 130,000 in 1986, has crashed to 5,000, said World Conservation Society director Paul Elkan. "Within the next five years, they could completely be gone with the current rates of poaching. Even security forces are involved in trafficking," he said.

Conservationists blamed the Tanzanian authorities for not controlling ivory poaching and trafficking. "There's an enormous slaughter of elephants going on in Tanzania right now. Things are out of hand," said the veteran conservationist Iain Douglas-Hamilton. "There's no protection in numbers for elephants, any more than there was for bison in the last century when they were all wiped out in America. So people shouldn't kid themselves."

Tanzania, with 70,000-80,000 elephants in 2009, is thought to have nearly a quarter of all African elephants. But Peter Msigwa, a Tanzanian MP, said last week that poaching was "out of control" with an average of 30 elephants being slaughtered for their ivory every day.

"At the end of the year, you're talking about 10,000 elephants killed," said James Lembeli, chairman of Tanzania's natural resources committee. "Move around this country where you have populations of elephants and [you see] carcasses everywhere," he said.

Last year Tanzanian police seized more than 1,000 elephant tusks hidden in sacks of dried fish at Zanzibar port.

In June the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species described the plight of Africa's elephants as "critical" and said that elephant poaching had reached its highest level for a decade, with tens of thousands killed for their tusks each year.

Malaysian customs officers display elephant tusks that were
recently seized in Port Klang, outside Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Photograph: AP

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Office workers quit China's poisonous produce for the farm

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2012-12-15

Qi Jing, left, and Xiao Nan. (Photo courtesy of Qi Jing and Xiao Nan)

Qi Jing and Xiao Nan shuffle out of their Beijing desk jobs on Friday and head off to the countryside for the weekend, a normal routine for the farm owners who unintentionally dug up a business from their earthen interests, the party-run China Youth Daily reports.

Skepticism over the quality of the food on their plates brought the two women to reconsider their eating habits in a radical way. China has seen little improvement in its food safety standards. Almost every week the public finds out that there is mercury in their baby food, plasticizers in their drinks or that the oil they use to cook came from the gutter. Some foods, like eggs and even peas, end up being entirely, inedibly fake.

Qi and Xiao's iFengshou farm, started on a piece of rented land in the suburbs, is their solution. It opened to the public in April after more than 200,000 yuan (US$32,000) in investment.

The savvy duo make their money from the excess produce they began to sell to followers of their blog. "We didn't do it for profit in the beginning, but waste should not be tolerated," Xiao said.

One of their friends once called the duo's idea "out there and ridiculous" but later designed a postcard for the farm because of its growing popularity, the newspaper said.

Alternative "farming" is far from outlandish and is becoming mainstream far beyond the reaches of the modest Beijing venture. In Hong Kong, residents who have caught the chemical scent of China's produce have begun to stuff tiny plots into every space conceivable. Corn and cabbage sprouts on rooftops, on balconies and in communal plots all over the tightly packed city, according to the New York Times.

Organic, community-supported agriculture is cropping up all over the mainland. Even big business — from state-owned power companies to telecommunications — is cashing in on the rebellion. Company-owned plots of land are a way to unite employees through community work and guarantee healthy produce in office canteens, says US-based Health Impact News Daily.

The iFengshou farm women rent miniature plots on the land to people who also feel cornered by China's food industry, and are overrun with constant updates to their blog and customer orders. "Sometimes I feel as if I've been kidnapped by the farm," said Xiao. "But the farm has overhauled our lives."

Seventeen of the 20 lots on the farm have been rented out, and they deliver fresh produce to additional 20 families in the city.

Greenpeace welcomes Levi's pledge on chemicals ban

France24, AFP, 13 December 2012

Levi Strauss employees walk through the lobby of the company's headquarters
hemicals from its supply chain by 2020, Greenpeace said Thursday, claiming
a triumph for its global Detox campaign.

AFP - Iconic US jeans maker Levi Strauss has committed to eliminating all hazardous chemicals from its supply chain by 2020, Greenpeace said Thursday, claiming a triumph for its global Detox campaign.

"The commitment by Levi Strauss is a victory for the local residents of the production plants directly affected by this pollution and also for the countries where this label is found," the environmental group said in a statement.

Levi Strauss said this week that it was committed to "zero discharges of all hazardous chemicals from the whole supply chain and all production procedures".

To this end, the giant manufacturer said 15 of its biggest suppliers, most of them in China and Mexico, would make a public disclosure by June 2013 of hazardous chemicals used, followed by another 25 suppliers by the end of the year.

Earlier this month, Greenpeace said two Mexican factories that supply clothing for fashion brands including Levi Strauss & Co, were dumping toxic chemicals.

The company confirmed at the time that it worked with both factories but said it had developed a Restricted Substance List to ban chemicals that could harm consumers, workers or the environment.

Greenpeace launched its Detox campaign in 2011 to put pressure on big clothing brands to stop using textiles treated with chemicals that can be dangerous to health.

It urged other brands Thursday to follow Levi Strauss' example.

Protesters present a "toxic" fashion show in
front of Zara's store in Taipei. (Photo/Chen
Chen-tang)

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Israelis, Palestinians unite on energy project

Deutsche Welle, 10 December 2012

The NGO Comet ME's new center is to serve as a permanent base of operations to provide clean energy to Palestinian communites who are off-grid in the West Bank. The project was partly funded by the German government.

Elad Orain and Ala Qawasmi squint up at a still 12-meter tall wind turbine, willing the wind to gust through the Masafer Yatta region of South Mount Hebron.

Orian, an Israeli physicist, and Qawasmi, a Palestinian mechanical engineer, work for Comet ME - Community Energy Middle East - an NGO that provides clean energy such as wind turbines and solar panels to off-grid Palestinian communities in Area C of the West Bank.

They have just completed a system upgrade for the village of Hreibat El Nabi, home to seven families totalling about 60 people. Now, with the assistance of the wind and the sun, villagers can run basic appliances such as refrigerators and washing machines.

"There is always - and we've been doing it for quite some years now - but, this feeling at the end of a project when you flick the switch and there is actually electricity. It is still moving," said Orian.

Comet ME has worked in the Masafer Yatta region of South Mount Hebron since 2006. The area is home to a series of run-down Palestinian shanty-villages compiled of huts, tents and caves located on rocky terrain just a few kilometers away from the unforgiving Judean Desert.

Giant pylons cross the landscape, carrying electricity across what is technically Area C of the West Bank, under the control of Israel's Civil Administration since the Oslo Peace Accords were signed almost 20 years ago.

Yet ironically, given their proximity to power supply, most of these Palestinian villages aren't connected to the grid.

"These are small clumps of population which were illegally built over the years without an outline plan," said the Civil Administration's spokesman. "Some of the clumps are even built in archaeological and military training areas, so that their stay puts their residents in danger."

The administration wants to move the residents to approved areas and connect them to infrastructure there.

Elad Orian and Ala Qawasmi have
joined forces

Comet ME, the brainchild of Israeli physicists and activists Elad Orian and Noam Dotan, decided to find alternative ways to bring the villages electricity instead.

"I love what my partner Noam says," said Elad. "He always says, 'I want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.'"

"I've been a political activist the better part of the last 10 years and I do it on the big political level because that's my way, my little contribution toward a better future for this place."

Orian and Dotan work hands-on with the organization, designing and installing systems, conducting maintenance, and running the NGO.

From humble beginnings, Comet ME has grown into a fully functioning clean energy supplier, providing basic services to 1,300 people. This week it will open a permanent base - the Comet ME Center for Renewable Energy - in South Mount Hebron.

The premises is based on land rented from a local Palestinian farmer. That alone, Orian said, indicated the successful partnership that Comet had built with the community.

The German government donated 20,000 euros ($26,000) to enable the center's development. The premises provides storage for tools, space to construct energy systems, volunteer accommodation, and is a community drop-in.

It's also a living example of clean energy. Electricity is generated by the sun and wind; rain water is collected for drinking; the toilet is a compost toilet; heating is through good insulation and firewood.

Comet has nine people on staff - five Israelis and four Palestinians. Some Israelis donned keffiyehs, the traditional Arab headdress, and some Palestinians spoke fluent Hebrew. Orian said a focus on practical ways to help local communities was what unified the team.

Elad Orian works on an electrical
system

"I think that there's something very powerful and empowering about actually building stuff. We're very strong on the ethos of actually building stuff with our own hands. Be it systems, the centre, whatever it is, it's very concrete. At the end of the day you switch on the light and there is light, unlike many other projects where you sit in the room and you talk about this, you talk about that and it's not so clear what happened."

Comet project manager Ala Qawasmi said the team focused on shared values, not differences.

"I think what defines the team is not being Israeli or Palestinian; it's people who join many things, many views, together."

Comet ME's service is neither free nor unlimited. It charges the same as the Palestinian national supplier in order the cover the cost of battery replacement, and installs metres to ensure equal distribution of the available power supply. But what it created, said Elad, was options. 

Imad Rashid says electricity has
changed his life

Two years ago, a noisy diesel generator was the only source of electricity available in Hreibat El Nabi. Twenty-four-year-old school caretaker Imad Rashid used to drive to the nearby town of Yatta just to charge his cell phone. Electricity had changed life in the village, he said.

"Before, to make butter, we used to do it traditionally. We put the milk in a manual butter churner made from animal skins, and then we would shake it. The process takes three or four hours. Now we use the electric butter churner, which saves a lot of effort."

Now that Comet ME has a permanent base and a significant stake in the clean energy field, it's looking to turn its talents to help Palestinians villages in Area C gain increased access to clean water.

Chicago skyscrapers go green, slash energy costs

Yahoo - AFP, December 9, 2012

File picture of downtown Chicago at night. Chicago's skyline is going green,

 as property managers install energy efficient tools like motion-detectors on

 office lights, in a project officials hope will inspire changes across the United

States.

CHICAGO (AFP) - Chicago's skyline is going green, as property managers install energy efficient tools like motion-detectors on office lights, in a project officials hope will inspire changes across the United States.

At the riverside Sheraton hotel, chief engineer Ryan Egan cannot get over what his new thermostats can do -- or the $136,000 a year in savings they are producing.

First off, they're tied into the booking management system, which means he can let the room temperature drift beyond standard comfort levels until the moment a guest checks in.

An infrared sensor means the savings don't stop there. Once the guest leaves the room, the temperature starts to drift again, giving the heating or cooling system a break until it's needed again.

It's not a random drift -- the thermostat is programmed to only allow the room to warm up or cool down to the point where it can get back to the pre-set temperature within 12 minutes of the guest's return.

"The brains behind how much it can drift is really interesting," Egan said. "If you're on the shady side (in the summer) it'll drift more because it knows it can recover faster."

The Sheraton is one of 14 major commercial buildings that signed onto the Retrofit Chicago challenge to cut energy use by 20 percent over the next five years, for savings estimated at more than $5 million a year.

If they succeed, it will be like taking 8,000 cars off the road.

"The fact that this is the city that built the first skyscraper, we love that we're trying to green the skyline," Karen Weigert, chief sustainability officer for the city of Chicago, told AFP.

Some 70 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the Windy City come from the electricity and gas used to heat, cool and power homes, businesses, schools and other government buildings.

In addition to the greening in commercial buildings, the city plans to cut energy use by 20 percent in hundreds of municipal buildings, for an estimated monetary saving of $20 million a year and emissions savings equivalent to taking about 30,000 vehicles off the road.

It has also launched a program to help retrofit residential properties and expects more big commercial buildings to join the challenge.

"Fighting climate change can take all sorts of forms. This one happens to also save building owners a lot of money," said Rebecca Stanfield, a senior energy advocate for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"We're excited about the potential for big property owners who are in the Chicago initiative to use what they learn here in buildings across the country."

A similar program is being promoted by the Department of Energy, which has racked up commitments from schools, cities and businesses to reduce energy use by 20 percent in 2 billion square feet.

AT&T -- the first company to sign up for Chicago's challenge -- is testing out a host of new energy efficiency technologies at its downtown office tower.

It's just one test kitchen for the telecom giant, as it searches for best practices in its quest to cut emissions company-wide by 20 percent by 2020.

The results so far have been impressive.

They've swapped out ceiling lights with more efficient bulbs and set up motion detectors so the lights aren't burning when technicians and sales staff are away from their desks.

They've put insulated shutters on the air intake system to keep the chill out in winter and the heat out in summer.

They've installed regulators on the big fans that push heated or cooled air through the 1960's era building so they only operate when needed instead of running all day and most of the night.

They've even swapped out the belts on the fan's motors to cut down on energy-sucking slippage.

"There's no question we've identified enough opportunities to save 20 percent," said John Schinter, AT&T's executive director for energy.

All the improvements tested in Chicago will pay for themselves in three years or less, and most will be rolled out to the 1,000 corporate and 500 retail buildings that AT&T is targeting in its sustainability plan, Schinter said.

"If a project doesn't have scalability for an enterprise as large as ours, we don't spend much corporate time on it," he said in an interview.

Jim Javillet is amazed at how attitudes have changed in the 43 years he's been managing buildings like the AT&T tower.

"In the 60s and 70s they used to run (both) heating and cooling all year -- why not," he recalled.

Another big advance came when buildings installed systems to turn most overhead lights off at a set time so they didn't burn all night.

Now, even in the middle of the day, he can see who's away from their desks by the dark spots in the room. And when he walks down an empty hall, he creates a tunnel of light.

These types of innovations are common in countries like Spain and Japan, where energy is more costly and governments have been more aggressive in pushing energy efficient building codes.

But Americans are ready to accept change, said Dan Tishman, whose realty company owns the Sheraton Chicago and nine other major US hotels.

"Consumers in this country are comfortable with motion detectors on lights and other technologies that save energy, like low flush toilets or green roofs, and they appreciate it," said Tishman, who is also chairman of the National Resource Defense Council and heads a leading construction firm.

"I do think that when we implement the changes we are planning, we will be successful and other large hotel properties will follow suit."

Singapore Experiments With Sky Farms

Jakarta Globe, Kalinga Seneviratne, December 09, 2012

Workers harvesting vegetables from one of Sky Green’s vertical towers.
(IPS Photo/Kalinga Seneviratne)

    

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Singapore. With a population of five million crammed on a landmass of just 715 square kilometers, the tiny republic of Singapore has been forced to expand upwards, building high-rise residential complexes to house the country’s many inhabitants.

Now, Singapore is applying the vertical model to urban agriculture, experimenting with rooftop gardens and vertical farms in order to feed its many residents.

Currently only seven percent of Singapore’s food is grown locally. The country imports most of its fresh vegetables and fruits daily from neighboring countries such as Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines, as well as from more distant trading partners like Australia, New Zealand, Israel and Chile.

An influx of immigrants has resulted in a rapid crowding of Singapore’s skyline, as more and more towering apartment buildings shoot up. And meanwhile, what little land was available for farming is disappearing fast.

The solution to the problem came in the form of a public-private partnership, with the launch of what has been hailed as the “world’s first low carbon, water-driven rotating vertical farm” for growing tropical vegetables in an urban environment.

The result of a collaborative agreement between the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA) and a local firm, Sky Green, this venture aims to popularize urban farming techniques that are also environmentally friendly.

With a robust economy that boasts a gross domestic product of 239.7 billion dollars, Singapore has plenty of money. “But money [is] worthless without food,” according to Sky Green Director Jack Ng.

“That’s why I wanted to use my engineering skills to help Singapore farmers to produce more food,” Ng told IPS.

An engineer by training, Ng created the vertical farming system, which he nicknamed “A Go-Grow.” It consists of a series of aluminum towers, some of them up to nine meters high, each containing 38 tiers equipped with troughs for the vegetables.

In keeping with Sky Green’s focus on environmental sustainability, the water used to power the rotating towers is recycled within the system and eventually used to water the vegetables. Each tower consumes only 60 watts of power daily — about the same amount as a single light bulb.

Ng knew that if the system was too expensive or complicated, urban farmers would not be able to survive. And given that he designed the project with retirees and other housebound farmers in mind, he tried to create a situation in which “the plant comes to you, rather than you going to the plant.”

The multi-layered vegetable tower rotates very slowly, taking some eight hours to complete a full circle. As the plant travels to the top it absorbs ample sunlight and when it comes back down it is watered from a tray that is fed by the hydraulic system that drives the rotation of the tower.

This closed cycle system is easy to maintain and doesn’t release any exhaust.

Ng says that such towers, if set up on roofs of the many multi-story residential blocs that house most of Singapore’s population, could provide livelihoods for retirees and housewives, who would only need to spend a few hours up on the roof to attend to the system.

Sky Green towers currently produce three vegetables popular with locals: nai bai, xiao bai cai and Chinese cabbage, which can be harvested every 28 days.

They already supply NTUC FairPrice, Singapore’s largest grocery retailer that has a network of over 230 outlets and supermarkets. The urban-grown vegetables cost roughly 20 cents more per kilogram than the imported varieties.

The group’s purchasing manager, Tng Ah Yiam, recently told a Straits Times reporter that these ‘sky farms’ are now able to offer their customers quality, locally-grown vegetables “that are fresher because they travel a shorter distance from farm to shelf”.

Sky Green plans to supply two tons a day to NTUC by the middle of next year when they expand their farm towers.

Coordinated efforts

The Sky Green project feeds into a trend that has been underway in Singapore for several decades.

Since the urban expansion of the 1990s Singapore has attempted to respond to the scarcity of land available for traditional cultivation by promoting rooftop vegetable gardens.

A number of local institutions developed hydroponic and aeroponic cultivation systems but none ever took off. “There was always concern over whether or not the rooftops could take the weight of these structures,” Shih Yong Goh, former head of public affairs at AVA, told IPS.

Experts like Lee Sing Kong, director of the National Institute of Education and a long-time advocate of the use of ‘sky farms’, believe there is an urgent need for Singapore to become less dependent on food imports.

Given the increasing frequency of extreme weather events, including “natural disasters such as flooding, which could impact food production, it may be necessary for Singapore to look at producing some of its own vegetables from the food security point of view,” he told IPS.

Kong said that he is currently involved in the development of “vegetable factories,” whole buildings designed to grow fresh produce.

“We have [begun] developing a 6-tiered aeroponic system to grow vegetables with the help of LED lights,” he said, adding, “this is in the experimental stage. If the model proves to be successful, then the multi-tiered system can be installed within enclosed buildings for producing vegetables. This will certainly enhance the opportunities for urban agriculture.”

Since 2005, the government has shed some of its reservations about rooftop production. The National Parks Board recently converted the rooftop of a multi-story residential building in the densely populated Upper Serangoon Road into an educational farm to promote urban agriculture among school children.

Meanwhile, Sky Green has signed an MOU with Singapore’s Temasek Polytechnic technical college. Dr. Lee Chee Wee, director of the School of Applied Science, believes that partnering with Sky Green will expose his students to how technology is used in vegetable farming and make “modern farming so much more attractive as a career choice for our graduates.”

Inter-Press Service

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Middle East beginning to embrace solar energy

The Daily Star, AP, Michael Casey, December 06, 2012

UNIFIL acknowledged Environmental Day, by beginning to use a new
solar energy system. (The Daily Star/ Mohammed Zaatari)

                               

ABU DHABI: Covering nearly 300 football fields in a remote patch of desert, the Shams 1 solar project carries of plenty of symbolic significance for the United Arab Emirates.

It will be the first, large-scale solar project in the oil-rich country when it is completed at the end of the year, and the largest of its kind in the Middle East. At full capacity, the 100-megawatt, concentrated solar project will be able to power 20,000 homes. For those behind the project, it's the surest sign yet that solar is coming to the region in a big way.

"We truly believe solar will be a major contributor to meeting our own requirements," said Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber, the UAE's Special Envoy for Energy and Climate Change and the chief executive officer of government-funded Masdar, which is the majority investor in the project.

"We are not like many other countries today that are in desperate need for complimentary sources of power," Jaber said, adding Abu Dhabi plans to generate 7 percent of its electricity from renewables by 2020. "We are looking at it from strategic point of view ... we want to become a technology player, rather than an energy player."

With its vast deserts and long stretches of sunny days, the Middle East would seem to be an ideal place to harness solar energy. But until now, the region has largely shunned solar because it has cost about three times more than heavily-subsidized fossil fuels. There are also few laws in place to regulate solar power and it faces some unique technological hurdles, given the Middle East's harsh climate, which is much hotter and dustier than say Europe, where solar thrives.

But technological advances have pushed costs down dramatically, and many oil-gas rich countries are reconsidering renewables amid growing demands for power to fuel their booming economies and rapidly increasing populations. There are also fears, especially in Saudi Arabia, that their once seemingly limitless oil resources may have peaked and they could one day become net oil importers. Countries also understand they can get much more revenue for their oil - as much as $90 a barrel at current prices - if they export it rather than use it domestically.

"We are in the middle of a radical rethinking of the energy future of the region," Adnan Z. Amin, director general of the Abu Dhabi-based International Renewable Energy Agency, told The Associated Press.

"One of the real wake up calls for Saudi Arabia, which is a heavily hydrocarbon country, is that they are seeing their current energy demand growing at such a high rate that they risk becoming a net energy importer in 20 years. That would be a major economic issue to deal with."

Amid the buzz over solar, countries have begun rolling out ambitious renewable targets.

Egypt and Qatar which say they will produce 20 percent of their energy from renewables by 2020 and 2024 respectively. Algeria has plans to produce 22,000 megawatts of power from renewables between now and 2030. Saudi Arabia announced targets of 10 percent by 2020 and Kuwait 15 percent by 2030.

Tarek El Sayed, a principal with the consulting firm Booz & Company, projected that countries in the Middle East and North African could become significant renewable energy players in the coming decades.

Although he said in a report that the sector is currently "underfunded or not funded at all," several projects across the region are on the drawing board and El Sayed expects Egypt, Libya and Saudi Arabia to be big players along with the smaller Gulf countries like the UAE that are investing heavily in the sector.

"If you had talked renewable energy five or six years ago to anyone in the region, they would have said, 'come on we can't do that. It's like shooting ourselves in the foot. We are our oil producers.' Today, nobody would tell you that," El Sayed said.

Vahid Fotuhi couldn't agree more. A longtime proponent of solar in the region, he first worked for an oil giant struggling to sell solar in the region before it gave up on the project a few years back. He has since joined an American solar systems provider, Alion, which set up shop the region six months ago. Fotuhi, who also heads the Emirates Solar Industry Association, admits he is desperate to get a "piece of the pie."

"The real prize is Saudi Arabia," Fotuhi said, noting that it has promised to build 41,000 megawatts of capacity by 2032. "Anyone who is looking at the Middle East will have their eyes sharply focused on the Saudi market. It's the 800-pound gorilla of the Middle East solar market."

But not everyone is so bullish.

Imen Jeridi Bachellerie, a researcher associated with the Gulf Research Center in Geneva, questioned some of the renewable targets as overly ambitious adding that countries would be better off focusing improving energy efficiency of buildings and upgrading existing infrastructure before investing heavily in renewables. She said they will need years to change attitudes about energy, offer significant subsidies that would make solar competitive with fossil fuels and develop the regulatory framework required to help the industry thrive.

"I don't think there should be a rush to renewables," said Bachellerie, warning that a hasty push into the field without first sorting out technological glitches could pose problems.

To some degree, governments in the region understand this.

On the sidelines of U.N. climate talks, Qatar Science & Technology Park, GreenGulf Inc. and Chevron Qatar inaugurated a solar testing facility. The 35,000-square-meter facility will be used to determine what types of solar are best for the region, looking at how dust, heat and humidity impacts various technologies. Qatar, a tiny desert nation which has promised to host a carbon neutral 2022 World Cup, also is looking at ways to make solar more efficient.

"We are one of the biggest believers in solar," Abdullah Bin Hamad al-Attiyah, a former Qatari oil minister who is the president of the climate conference, told reporters. "We have technical problems with solar but I'm a big believer that technology will solve it."

German's solar ovens make sunbaked tortillas in Mexico

Yahoo – AFP, Pierre-Marc Rene, 5 December 2012

German Gregor Schappers shows a bread oven heated with solar energy at

 his home in El Sauz, Hidalgo state, Mexico, in November 2012. Schapers 

designed and installed giant circular solar panels in the small town of El Sauz

to show that the sun's rays can cook up a storm.

Under a blazing sun in Mexico's central mountain range, a clutch of large dish-shaped solar panels suck up the light and beam the heat into a kitchen, cooking tortillas.

Forget coal, gas or electric ovens. German entrepreneur Gregor Schapers designed and installed giant circular solar panels in the small town of El Sauz to show that the sun's rays can cook up a storm too.

Schapers, who has lived in this town 180 kilometers (110 miles) north of Mexico City since 2003, hopes that this environmentally-friendly solar cooker can ultimately slash energy bills in Mexico's poor rural communities.

"You can cook for a group of up to 60 people per reflector," Schapers told AFP, wearing a checkered shirt, sunglasses and a wide straw hat under a clear sky in the Sierra Madre Oriental mountain range.

He adapted solar energy-harnessing technology created by the Austrian Wolfgang Scheffler.

But the parts for his oversize solar cooker were all built in Mexico, by the company he founded, Trinysol.

"It's good for social and economic development in rural communities," he said of his cooker and the business of building it.

The glass and aluminum panels are either 10-square-meters or (107-square-foot) or 16-square-meters (170-square-foot) in size. Some are placed at a 45-degree angle while others rest almost horizontal, facing the sky.

The reflectors can generate temperatures hotter than 1,020 degrees Celsius (1,868 degrees Fahrenheit).

Once the powerful heat reaches the cooker, it is shared between a cauldron, a griddle to make tortillas, and an oven. The solar panels can be used in restaurants or bakeries.

The solar cooker system is costly to build, between $4,000 and $5,000 depending on size. But once it's set up, it produces free energy, Schapers said. Each reflector saves the equivalent of 60 liters (16 gallons) of gas each month.

And the oven is environmentally-friendly, using renewable energy and creating zero greenhouse gas emissions.

Schapers said his design makes some significant improvements over other existing models.

"The beauty of our system is that one can cook directly in the house," he explained. Other solar ovens require a cook to brave the outside elements.

Like sunflowers, his solar panels automatically turn toward the sun with the help of a light sensor.

In addition to heat, the solar reflectors can produce steam and Schapers is testing three other uses for his giant panels: a greenhouse project; honey production; and a system for steam baths.

"At first people here in the region were very skeptical about the usefulness of my project," Schapers said.

But he said the finished product has won them over.

"Once they saw the facilities and what we can do with these reflectors, they realized that they work."

Plans unveiled for biggest solar PV plant in Africa

BBC News, Matt McGrath, Environment correspondent, 4 December 2012

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A UK firm has announced plans to build what they claim is the biggest photovoltaic (PV) solar power plant in Africa.

The Nzema project, based in Ghana, will be able to provide electricity to more than 100,000 homes.

Construction work on the $400m (£248m) plant is due to start within 12 months.

The developers say that they are optimistic that finance for the project will be confirmed within six months.

Fully cooked

The initiative is being developed by Blue Energy, a UK-based renewable energy investment company.

Dozens of solar projects have been announced across Africa in recent years but few have been on this ambitious scale says industry analyst Ash Sharma at IMS Research. He says the 155 megawatt plant will increase Ghana's generating capacity by 6%.

"It is the biggest single project that's going ahead at the moment," he told BBC News. "It is not the biggest in the world, but if it goes ahead it will be the biggest in Africa."

He says that a key element in helping the project go ahead has been Ghana's renewable energy law under which the plant has been awarded a feed-in tariff for 20 years. These are premium prices, guaranteed for the working life of the site.

Project director Douglas Coleman, from Mere Power Nzema Ltd. who will build the plant, told BBC News that it was "fully cooked" in planning terms.

This map shows the amount of ultraviolet radiation reaching the ground

"The project has land, it has planning consent, it has a generating licence, and it has received a feed-in tariff," he said, "it is the right plant in the right place at the right time."

He was confident that the finance needed to build the plant could be raised in the next six months.

The company behind the scheme is majority owned and funded by members of the Stadium Group, a large European private asset and development company with £2.5bn under management.

Ash Sharma believes that the backing of this firm plus the feed-in tariff makes the idea viable.

"One of the biggest stumbling blocks has been overcome and the financing looks like it could be in a good position to succeed I would say."

Not concentrating

Unlike many other solar projects in Africa that use concentrated solar power, the Nzema plant will use photovoltaic (PV) technology to convert sunlight directly into electricity. Douglas Coleman says the characteristics of the Sun in Ghana favour PV.

"We can predict with great certainty on an annual basis, the output from the plant. That predictability means we can harmonise with the needs of the transmission network, to balance load with generation."

While concerns have been raised in recent weeks about the future of North Africa's Desertec project that aims to export solar power to Europe, researchers are far more hopeful about the prospects for local African markets.

Demand for renewable energy has been held back in emerging economies like Ghana by high costs, but a recent glut of solar panels on world markets has seen prices tumble - much to the advantage of African countries.

"The reason the technology hasn't taken off so far is that it has been too expensive," says Ash Sharma, "but the costs of solar have decreased dramatically in the last two years, they've fallen by 40% plus, and this has really enabled it to be used in emerging regions in Africa and Asia."

Installation of more than 630,000 solar PV modules will begin by the end of next year with electricity being generated early in 2014. It is due to reach full capacity at the end of 2015.

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