Mike, Here are many more interesting article synopses from the National Society of Professional Engineers Daily Designs. I think there are more than a dozen here, so don’t feel like they all need to be sent. Nate Barber
I found every one of these articles most interesting, so I'm forwarding them all. Peruse and read want you want. It is a nice temporary respite from our compulsive/obsessive "nuclear energy conversation." mike
EDF, Enel Venture Predicts Low Cost For Nuclear Power.
The Wall Street Journal (8/4, Johnson) Environmental Capital blog reported, "The most eye-opening part of Italy's formal embrace yesterday of a nuclear-powered future is how cheap the companies involved think it will be." The joint venture between EDF and Enel "said it has plans to build four 1,600-megawatt nuclear power plants at a cost of 4 billion euros each," which works out to roughly "$3.25 million per megawatt," which is "much cheaper than any recent nuclear-plant proposals in the U.S." EDF is working with Areva, and "figures costs will come down even more once the new group gets the hang of things." However, "the reactors Italy is looking at are the same design that Areva has been trying to build in Finland for years-and which has been plagued with constant delays and cost overruns."
China To Issue Clean Energy Plan By End Of Year. Bloomberg News (8/9, Wang) reported, "China, the world's second-biggest fuel consumer, will issue a plan by the end of this year to push the development of clean energy sources such as nuclear, wind, solar and hydroelectric power." The country's New-Energy Development Plan "aims to increase the nation's energy efficiency and reduce reliance on oil and coal," according to Sun Qin, deputy head of the National Energy Administration. China "plans to reduce major pollutants such as sulfur dioxide by 10 percent in the five years through 2010. The government will invest more than 100 billion yuan ($14.6 billion) to more than double from last year its wind-power capacity by 2010 ." The country's "wind-power capacity is likely to almost triple from the 2008 level to 30,000 megawatts by the end of next year, Sun said." Other officials noted that "the nation's nuclear capacity may reach 80,000 megawatts by 2020."
Dow Jones Newswires (8/10) reports, "Duke Energy Corp. said Monday it has signed a memorandum of understanding on clean coal technology and renewable energy projects with China Huaneng Group, China's biggest power producer by capacity." According to Duke CEO Jim Rogers, "the two companies will cooperate on the development of Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle systems for coal plants, and technology that can capture and store greenhouse gases." The signing "comes as the U.S. government presses China to do more to slow the growth of its greenhouse gas emissions and establish peak emitting years so Washington can consider signing on to an international climate accord."
The Washington Post (8/9, A4, Layton) reported, "In a reversal, chemical industry leaders said last week they are joining environmentalists, public health groups and consumer advocates in seeking more robust federal regulation of chemicals." For the first time, chemical manufacturers said "they are willing to furnish the Environmental Protection Agency with health and exposure data they have gathered that are related to their chemicals, and to allow the agency to determine whether the chemicals are safe to use." The industry has "long insisted that the 1976 federal law governing chemicals, the Toxic Substances Control Act, has been working well." But a number of critics say "the law is weak and does not enable the government to ensure the safety of thousands of chemicals that have been introduced into consumer goods and the environment." Top executives from several companies said the industry "wants Congress to give the EPA new authority and resources to ensure the safety of chemicals used in such things as furniture, cellphones and grocery bags."
The Houston Chronicle (8/8, Clanton) reported that when Paul Woods, CEO of Algenol Biofuels, "looks at the Texas Gulf Coast...he thinks two words: algae farms." Woods envisions farms that "span hundreds of acres each, heading south from Freeport. On them would be long, clear plastic tubes filled with salt water and algae. And when pumped with carbon dioxide from nearby oil refineries and chemical plants, they would yield a valuable crop: ethanol." Earlier this summer, "Algenol and Dow Chemical Co...announced plans to build a $50 million pilot plant at Dow's massive complex in Freeport that will test Algenol's technology on a large scale," and "could have several important implications." Among them are the potential for "a more sustainable path for making ethanol," as well as "a glimpse of a future in which polluting carbon emissions from industrial plants could be captured and put to good use."
The Washington Post (8/9, Wheeler) reports, "On one of the fields where students learn about agriculture, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore will soon be planting a new kind of crop with a constantly renewable yield: 20 acres' worth of photovoltaic panels, the largest solar farm in the state." The 2.1-megawatt solar farm will "be built by...SunEdison" and "will generate electricity for the 4,100-student campus in Princess Anne, Md., when it's finished." Officials said that the solar farm will not only "help stabilize electricity costs for the university," it will also "displace more than 100 million pounds of climate-warming carbon dioxide over the next 20 years that a coal-burning power plant would otherwise emit to keep the campus's lights on." The school was able to afford the system through negotiations with SunEdison, as well as '"federal tax credits worth up to 30 percent of the construction cost."
Wind For Schools Program Brings Turbines, STEM Education To Classrooms. The Coloradoan (8/9, Woods) reported that Wellington Middle School "is one of six Colorado rural schools to receive a wind turbine under the Department of Energy's Wind for Schools program. With $5,000 from the Governor's Energy Office and $2,500 from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL, in Golden, each school will install a working turbine this fall." One education officials said, "We want to do whatever we can to make science, technology, engineering and math education exciting." He added, "We want to make sure we are lighting the fire and showing them what really fun things can be done in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education." The Wind for Schools program "operates in six states with two turbines already in Colorado," and "started when a survey conveyed the need for a skilled workforce in renewable energy, said Ian Baring-Gould, senior mechanical engineer for the National Wind Technology Center at NREL."
Kate Galbraith writes for the Green Inc. blog at the New York Times (8/6), "As the clean energy manufacturing base in this country grows, it often builds upon the facilities and expertise of struggling traditional industries." Galbraith notes steel firms converting to wind turbine plants and a few paper mills "reorienting to process biofuels." In Oregon, "SolarWorld, a German company, opened a manufacturing plant...that makes use of an abandoned semiconductor factory (and recruits many workers from the semiconductor industry). And Stirling Energy Systems, which makes solar electric machines called SunCatchers that will eventually be deployed in California, plans to use automotive suppliers in the United States to make several components (though Stirling will not yet specify its automotive partners)."
Venture Capitalists Building Investments In Alternative Energy. The AP (8/6, Shore) reports, "Venture capitalists increased investments in alternative energy by 73 percent over the past three months, according to a report issued Wednesday," by Ernst & Young LLP as investors are "growing more confident because the government is making good on promises to try to shift the national energy policy more toward wind, solar and other renewable technologies." Also, "businesses with products in the shipping stage received 65 percent of the overall investment compared with 54 percent in the first quarter."
Munich Re Convinced Copenhagen Summit Will Adopt Climate Change Efforts.
Bloomberg News (8/6, Suess) reports, "Munich Re, the world's largest reinsurer, is more convinced than ever that the Copenhagen climate-change summit in December will successfully set the course for capping the most harmful effects of global warming. ... Envoys at the Copenhagen talks are aiming to reach an agreement to slow greenhouse-gas emissions and shift the world's energy diet to lower-carbon and less-polluting sources." Yet "China and the U.S., the largest polluters, have yet to commit to targets for cutting greenhouse gases before the Dec. 7-18 meeting in Copenhagen."
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The Salt Lake Tribune (8/6, Tribune) reports, "Profits dropped at EnergySolutions Inc. for the second quarter to $7.3 million, or 8 cents per share" down 42 percent from a year ago. And "revenues for the Salt Lake City-based nuclear-waste company also declined, with second-quarter 2009 revenues of $373.6 million, compared with $460.3 million a year ago, a 19 percent decline." Chairman and CEO Steve Creamer said, "Some of our commercial customers continue to delay sizable investments in waste remediation, removal and disposal."
ABC News (8/6, Dye) reports on research being done in Derek Lovley's lab at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, chronicled in the August issue of the journal Biosensors and Bioelectronics, regarding Geobacter, which "produces electricity to help digest iron oxide." Lovley "has tried all sorts of sophisticated tampering, including genetic engineering, in an effort to get the bug to increase its output. The best he could get was a doubling of the current, better, but not good enough." Then "by introducing a tiny 'pushback' current to the microbe's environment, the bugs adapted to the new challenge," and produced "a new strain of geobacter that produces eight times the electricity of its predecessor." The discovery "moved microbial fuel cells a significant step closer to mainline electronics."
Ángel González writes for the Environmental Capital blog at the Wall Street Journal (8/6), "Algae, say scientists and industrial titans alike, could jumpstart a viable biofuels industry because it reproduces quickly and can be turned into fuel without taking food from the world's plate." But it "needs some genetic tweaking before it can be produced en masse," because as "Targeted Growth's Chief Executive Tom Todaro," has said, "The things we're asking the algae to do are not things that nature has evolved it to do." Todaro also said that the problem of "fast-growing, fuel-churning algae escap[ing] to take over every pond in the world...can be avoided: Algae, for example, can be tweaked to die off quickly if not given a specific nutrient."
The Australia Broadcasting Corporation (8/6) reports, "A world renowned oceanographer says BHP Billiton is attempting to violate environmental legislation with it is proposal for a desalination plant in South Australia's Upper Spencer Gulf." Jochen Kaempf, associate professor at Flinders University, "says the discharge of brine into the Upper Spencer Gulf would create more pollution than any other Australian development." BHP Billiton has said that "its scientific research showed the design of the plant would minimise any impact of brine outflows on the gulf."
The Los Angeles Times (8/4, Roosevelt) Greenspace blog reported, "The federal Environmental Protection Agency, under a court-ordered deadline, has proposed a major new regulation to control nitrogen dioxide (NO2), a key factor in respiratory illness. The new EPA rule, which will be the subject of a public hearing in Los Angeles on Thursday, is the first to address the dangerous gas in 35 years." The new rule "would require stronger monitoring near roadways, a key provision for many of the mainly poor and minority communities that hug the freeways in Los Angeles and other big cities." Although it "would retain current annual limits of 53 parts per billion, it would also "establish a one-hour federal standard of between 80 and 100 ppb" designed to "prevent NO2 levels from spiking during shorter periods such as rush hour."
The Richmond County (NC) Daily Journal (8/5) reports, "The world's first thermoplastic composite bridge has been erected at Camp Mackall across Big Muddy Creek." With the exception of the bolts holding it together and several metal plates atop thermoplastic piling, the entire structure is made up of recycled plastic," yet "it can withstand extreme weight such as a 70-ton tank." The bridge "is made of some 85,000 pounds of recycled plastics and is the first known structure of its kind to support military equipment loads exceeding 70 tons," according to the Army, and "was constructed under the leadership of Engineer Research and Development Center's Construction Engineering Research Laboratory." The project sought "to provide a low-maintenance, affordable structure using recycled materials and avoiding the use of any wood components that require chemical treatments to fight rot and insect attack as well as costly routine maintenance to repair or replace deteriorated members."
Methods For Determining Fuels' Carbon Footprint Questioned.
The Wall Street Journal (8/4, Campoy) Environmental Capital blog reported, "The Environmental Protection Agency dealt a big blow to the ethanol industry earlier this year when it decreed that the corn-based fuel doesn't have a much better carbon footprint than gasoline made with crude oil." Now, "ethanol producers have since regrouped and are striking back by taking a page from the EPA's playbook." The industry contends that gasoline also leads to "indirect land-use changes," and "argues that the corn-based fuel's environmental credentials should be measured against gasoline made with" oil like that produced by Canada's oil sands, "not with the lighter and more easily refined crude grades, which are becoming scarcer." Although this particular issue "is far from settled," the debate raises "questions about how to extricate the real carbon footprint of a fuel from a complex web of interconnections across continents."