Michael's Comments

In the interest of full disclosure Mr. Khosla should have told the interviewer that he has shut down the cellulosic ethanol plant he was building in Georgia; with millions of taxpayer dollars I might add. The details have not been released, but it seems his secret technology just did not live up to its billing. It is a lot harder to economically produce cellulosic ethanol than we have been led to believe.

plant and animal fats. This does not seem to be that unique. But it does remove these materials from the waste stream

This is fascinating. I wonder how anyone ever thought it was a good idea to ship oil and coal over thousands of miles of ocean to fuel cars and a lifestyle on an island in the middle of the Pacific. It certainly speaks to the obsession all people have with the personal freedom afforded by the auto and the convenience of electric appliances. My neighbor once serviced the smoke stack scrubbers for the Honolulu municipal dump's incinerator. He said it was huge. Is it used to generate power in any way?

geo thermal just seems so natural. No plowing, fertilizer, mechanized harvesters as needed for bio power. No bird killing turbines. No mile after mile of solar panels cluttering the landscape....The gasses and stuff are already flying out of volcanos on every island. Maybe geo-thermal would help relieve the pressure. Are there any new geo-thermal projects being attempted?

Would someone please tell me why they are not producing power from their volcanos? I think it is called "geo-thermal".

Interesting..... Georgia Power, a Southern Company division, does nothing out of the goodness of its heart. Which may be positive in that this project may be sustainable, profitable and a break for consumers. Georgia has a surplus of farmed pine and this is hurting the traditional small tree farmers. It has been driving some of them to more intensives forms of development. A new market will help keep trees and not suburbs on the land.

Alternators; they reduce milage by 2 or 3 mpg. Exhaust generated electricity would, could, might replace alternators and be a tool for improving auto efficiency. You just never know where something like this will lead. This is the kind of article that keeps me reading "Renewable Energy" thank you.

As the supply of solar silicon goes from shortages to oversupply in the next five years I wonder if the efficiencies of the Evergreen String technology will be sufficient to allow the company to prosper. REC and Q seem to view the system with some trepidation. Neither company has dropped their old "slice and dice" technology in favor of "the string".
We live in interesting times; especially if you are investing in solar energy.
comments?

why arn't Evergreen's partners, REC and Qsomething in Germany using the string technology? The only place it is used is in the home plant in Mass and at the Joint facility, EverQ in Germany.

 

real quick; why are price increases in beef, pork and chicken blamed on growing production of ethanol? My understanding is that spent mash or dried millers grains from the distillation process are a cheap or free source of good quality livestock feed.  Meat prices should decrease with ethanol production,not increase.  What is going on here?

What is the status of algae r/d?  How close are the players to commercial production, months, years or decades?What is the status of the plant featured in this months National Geographic-Greenfuel inc and their Redhawk plant in Arizona. When the article was written the plant shut down because of rising costs and the ever popular "technical problems".

What is the status of algae r/d?  How close are the players to commercial production, months, years or decades?What is the status of the plant featured in this months National Geographic-Greenfuel inc and their Redhawk plant in Arizona. When the article was written the plant shut down because of rising costs and the ever popular "technical problems".

I enjoy this site and its information and comments.  Unfortunately, like anything that is printed or communicated to the general public; the train has already left the station!  A little research showed that companies going long on silicon today are going to get burned.  Out of fear, they are preparing for tomorrow by planning for yesterday.  The market will again be swamped with silicon two years out, maybe eighteen months to three years, depending.  The beneficieries will be new PV manufacturers with no long term silicon contracts that will take advantage of the plummeting silicon prices.  I know that they know and they therefore must have incredible faith in continued explosive growth in this industry.  I am not so sure.  Costs are still a long way from grid equivalent and I  am leary of continued government subsidies at those higher volumes. 

Didn't Shell Oil sell its silicon pv investments in order to focus on "thin film"? Does anyone recall which company they bought in order to get into the thin film game? I think they bought it out of bankruptcy.
It may be just pocket change for Shell, but it says a lot about the direction of the industry

Which is cheaper at this time, CSP or PV power? Which has the greater potential for further development?
CSP seems to have such potential for desalinization, are there any projects underway in that arena that would be interesting? [power and fresh water}