The particular environmental requirements necessary to produce substantial outputs of energy are difficult to come by outside of tourist-popular coastal areas. While wind turbines are cleaner and make much better neighbors than coal and nuclear power plants, that does not mean that sight-seeing tourist attractions want 350 ft wind turbines popping up along misty mountain ridges where locals make their income from beautiful sunsets and the sights of colorful fall leaves and bursting spring buds. That’s why locations like Pasquotank County and Perquimans County in North Carolina are becoming prime real estate for wind energy investors like Atlantic Wind LLC. These rural locations are close enough to the coastal winds to produce 2 megawatts of electricity per tower, yet still rural and undeveloped enough to ask crops and grazing cattle to be neighborly to the huge towers instead of beach-going tourists or commuters in major cities.

Atlantic Wind LLC will pay farmers and other landowners $6,000 each year per turbine erected on their property, and they can still farm around the concrete bases of the turbines. There isn’t a crop that can match that return per acre, and in this case, they can still produce their crops in addition to their wind-generated income. The huge project planned for these rural/coastal areas could potentially produce 300 megawatts of clean, renewable electricity, increase landowner income, and power 50,000-60,000 homes.

According to the American Wind Energy Association, the United States produces about 2 percent of our total energy with 850 utility-scale wind farms much like the one proposed for NC. The turbines in the utility-scale wind farms produce enough electricity to power 10 million American homes, and Atlantic Wind LLC intends to contribute to that number in the near future.

Virginia has approved a 19 windmill farm for the beautiful mountains of Highland County, but construction has not yet begun. To entice the wind farmers to their areas, counties and states offer tax breaks, subsidies, and other financial “carrots” to bring attention to the wind potential of their areas. Atlantic Wind LLC will recoup one third of its $600 million dollar investment through the federal government. The company has already had its local tax bill reduced on a permanent basis from $25,000 per windmill down to $5,000 per turbine. The incentives turn out to be good for everyone though, and even with a 75% local tax reduction, Atlantic Wind will still be the county’s largest taxpayer by 300%. That’s 3x more tax revenue for the county, a boost in income for the landowners, and a reliable source of clean energy for the state.

With dollar signs in their eyes and clean energy in their hearts other states are lining up to invite the wind developers to check out their locations.

There is enormous potential in renewable energy that can meet our current and future needs. Here are a few facts worth knowing about wind power’s renewable energy:

• A single wind turbine can power over 300 homes if it is well designed. To start a turbine, the winds only need to reach fourteen miles per hour, so places with light wind such as the UK are able to use it with ease.
• Wind power was used as far back as 5000 BCE for ships, wind mills, and power pumps.
• Contrary to popular thought, wind power is not harmful to birds. A study by NASA has shown that windmills have no significant impact on birds.
• In 2008, enough wind power was generated in the U.S. to power the entire state of Colorado

While these facts are impressive, even more information is being discovered about wind power all the time. It seems only fitting that Google, a company that is based on information and technology, can start funding a project that will lead to more wind power findings. In the Atlantic Ocean, Google is investing $5 billion on a 350 mile stretch of land from New Jersey to Virginia to create a large scale wind farm. The strong winds that blow over the sea are ideal for a wind farm because of all the energy they can produce. It will be a pioneer effort to become the first U.S. offshore wind farm in full operation. Google is hoping to attract other companies to the project by investing a substantial 37.5 percent of the initial funds.

Google representatives are as excited about the project as the “green geeks.” The Director of Green Business Operations and Strategy at Google, Rick Needham, describes the project as a “superhighway” of energy. He stated that not being afraid to take risks has gotten the company to where it is today and that they hope that this will be a good example to other companies on what can be possible. The project is called the Atlantic Wind Connection. Once completed, the project will bring wind energy to an estimated 2 million homes.

Last year, Google invested in 20 years of wind energy and created a branch in the company called Google Energy. This doesn’t necessarily mean that Google is taking over everyone’s power bills. Rather, it means that the company is actively seeking alternative, greener, sources of energy to power its infrastructure in the future. Any excess energy the company might generate it plans to sell to back to the grid, so that everything from our home computers to our garage doors can be powered by clean energy.

The technology giant not only wants to be at the front line of efforts to go green, but also believes that this will be a good business practice for others to imitate. The company is liaised with Good Energies, a European and American investment company, as well as Marubeni, out of Japan.

We can hope that more efforts such as these can help bring the nation to energy independence and spark new hope for the people to know that they will have a safe place to work and live in the future.

The KWP officials said that the main purpose of their visit was to learn from China’s experience in the geothermal sector. CPC officials said that “China would like to enhance its exchanges with the DPRK in the field in order to jointly improve their capability to develop and utilize renewable energy.”

Share of combustible renewables and waste steadily increased between 1989 and 1996 after which its share has become stagnant. The country is also rich in hydro power resources which, according to available data constitutes about 50% of the total generation capacity.

Renewable energy would prove extremely helpful for North Korea’s economic growth as the country is heavily dependent on imported fuels. North Korea depends on oil imports from Russia, China and Iran.

On average, electric bills have increased over 7% each year during the last 20 years. Solar Panels have also come a long way during those twenty years as people search for alternative energy sources.

There are several factors that now play a part in determining the value a solar system has for a home or business. First, you must consider the size solar system that you would need. Just like you need a bigger garage door in your home to handle more cars, the larger your electric bill, the larger the solar system you will need. But, it doesn’t stop there. While that determines the size in kilowatt hours that would you need, it’s not the only factor that determines what the cost will be.

Solar prices have dropped recently for several reasons. First, the prices for the components have come down, and that’s a good thing. Second, there are tax credits and local incentives available that will help you pay for the cost of a system. There is currently a 30% federal tax credit good through the year 2016 that you can claim when you purchase a system. Of course, you need to have a tax liability in that amount or greater to claim it, but most people don’t have a problem meeting that. Other incentives are usually found with the local utility companies. Last year, in Nevada, NV Energy offered unusually large rebates for non-profit organizations and when combined with the federal tax credit – it didn’t cost the organization a penny – it was FREE. For homeowners the utility rebate for solar was quite a bit less. The rebate would cover about 25% of the cost for a solar installation. But, again, when combined with the federal tax credit, about 55% the cost of a system was paid for.

Now, as much as I would love to say that all these rebates are still available, most aren’t. Throughout California and Nevada the rebates were exhausted, quite literally, within hours of opening the application process online. But, don’t worry, there’s good news. Most utilities are gearing up for another round of rebates. When you factor that 55% the cost of solar can be paid for through these incentives, and you factor in the $1500-$2000 a year in electric savings you have, you can see very clearly how solar quickly pays for itself.

Kelly Rigg, from the global climate change alliance (GCCA), writes on the Huffington Post:

“Colleagues and I have been directly corresponding with Yoshinori Ueda leader of the International Committee of the Japan Wind Power Association & Japan Wind Energy Association, and according to Ueda there has been no wind facility damage reported by any association members, from either the earthquake or the tsunami.”

She reports that the Kamisu wind farm, which is located 300km from the epicenter of the earthquake, managed to survive without any damages. Mostly thanks to its “anti-earthquake battle proof design”. According to Yoshinori Ueda most of the wind farms in Japan are now operational. The remaining ones are offline due to grid failures caused by the earthquake and tsunami.

So while the awful nuclear crisis continues, with experts warning that the Fukushima disaster could become worse than Chernobyl and that the deconstruction of the plant could take decades, this story really should give a boost of confidence to the renewable energy sector. And it seems that the stock markets agree on this. The stock price of Japan Wind Development Co. Ltd. has risen from 31,500 yen on 11 March to 74,700 yen today. And the Guardian reports that the Japanese nuclear crisis has made shares in renewable energy sources rocket as public and investors recoil from the nuclear energy industry.

Fukushima really does makes the case for renewable energy, as Antony Froggatt writes on BBC.

Another article worth reading is this one by Leuren Moret on “Japan’s deadly game of nuclear roulette“. It was published seven years ago and warned about the potential consequences of investing heavily in nuclear energy near such a dangerous earthquake zone as Japan:

“Of all the places in all the world where no one in their right mind would build scores of nuclear power plants, Japan would be pretty near the top of the list.”

It’s like Naomi Klein says. Our societies have become addicted to extreme and reckless risk-taking.

The clip bellow shows the best parts of the documentary Here comes the sun and is well worth taking a look at:

Greenecon.net reports:

According to the Energy Information Administration, in 1956 solar PV panels were $300 per watt, and in 1980, the average cost per solar modules was $27/watt and has fallen precipitously to approximately $2/watt in October 2009.

New breakthroughs point towards much cheaper solar panels in the near future (examples of this can be read about here, here or here), and with the emergence of nanotechnology, which already is underway, it’s reasonable to expect many new breakthroughs. But exactly when will solar energy become cheaper than conventional energy?

Solar cells are getting more and more efficient. The graph shows the best research-cell efficiencies for different types of solar cells measured in how much of the sunlight they can convert into electricity.

Ray Kurzweil, a famous inventor and futurists, predicts that this will happen within 2013. Dispatches from the Frozen North, a blog by the Peter Leppik, makes a calculation that leads him to think that in Minneapolis solar panels will be cheaper than power from the electric company in 2015, give or take a few years. Solarcentury, the UK’s largest solar company, predicts that in Britain solar energy will become cheaper or as cheap as conventional nonrenewable electricity by 2013. These are all uncertain predictions, and when it will become cheaper for you depends on where you live. But as far as I know most experts think that solar power will become cheaper than conventional energy in the near future – probably before 2020. And after that it will continue to become cheaper and cheaper. It’s a question of time before solar energy will be half the price of fossil fuels, one fifth the price, one tenth the price, etc.

Needless to say cheap solar energy will not just be good for the environment, but will also give other enormous benefits to society. And in many ways it will be more convenient than power from the grid. We will have to transport the energy less, and mobile phones, laptops, electric cars, etc. will be able to reload their batteries when they are outside in daylight. Another great thing about solar power is that it can provide cheap electricity to poor countries (in sub-Saharan Africa, etc.) where the power supply is unreliable and many villages aren’t connected to an electric grid.

Earths city lights at night. Cheap solar power can help light up poor parts of the world, where many villages aren't connected to a grid.

Making solar power cheaper and more convenient isn’t just about getting better at converting sunlight into electricity. Storing the energy is also a part of the challenge. Breakthroughs are underway in this area (examples of this can be found here and here), and batteries are generally getting better, so there is reason to be fairly optimistic. That being said, the future of solar energy would be very, very bright even if energy-storing technology didn’t get better at all.

Despite of being fantastic in a lot of ways, cheap solar energy isn’t enough by itself to completely solve the energy-problem. We also have to make sure that fueling your car on solar power is cheaper and easier than using gasoline. Although maybe not within the run of this decade, I also think that electric cars will dominate the roads sooner then we think. But this post is long enough already, so I will save that for a later update.

Also published on howisearth.wordpress.com.

The £50 billion government investment would, according to Patt, convince private companies that the supergrid idea is both “feasible” and “attractive”, the Guardian reports.

“In the long term, such a plan, combined with strings of windfarms along the north Africa coast, could “supply Europe with all the energy it needs”.

He said technological advances combined with falling costs have made it realistic to consider north Africa as Europe’s main source of imported energy.

“The sun is very strong there and it’s very reliable. There is starting to be a growing number of cost estimates of both wind and concentrated solar power for North Africa….that start to compare favourably with alternative technologies. The cost of moving [electricity] long distances has really come down.”

According to Patt only a small fraction of the Saharan desert would be needed to produce enough energy for the whole of Europe.

Arnulf Jaeger-Walden of the European commission’s Institute for Energy have said that the solar energy from the Saharan desert would be cheap and “below what the average consumer is paying:”

“The biggest PV system at the moment is installed in Leipzig and the price of the installation is €3.25 per watt. If we could realise that in the Mediterranean, for example in southern Italy, this would correspond to electricity prices in the range of 15 cents per kWh, something below what the average consumer is paying.”

So what are we waiting for!?

Photo credit: jesse.millan

Sweden might be the host for Europe’s largest wind farm if the Swedish government approves the proposed plans. The wind farm will be located in Markbygden near Piteå in northern Sweden and will have a total of 1,101 wind turbines.

“This would be Europe’s, if not the world’s, biggest wind farm,” Caj Noren, a spokesman for the board, told AFP. Construction could begin in two-and-a-half years and would be completed after about a decade, Noren said.

Once constructed the wind farm will produce between 8 to 12 terawatt hours per year and would alone meet Sweden’s national wind power target to reach 10 terawatt hours by 2015. The wind farm is expected to cost about 55 billion Swedish Kronor (around $6.9 billion or €4.5 billion) to construct.

The Swedish right-wing government recently announced that they will reverse a nearly 30-year-old ban on building nuclear power plants. Its madness when we can get cheap, clean renewable energy and at the same time create thousands of new jobs from wind farms like this one.

Photo credit: Blyzz

New research from the Helsinki University of Technology’s Advanced Energy Systems in Espoo, Finland, shows that with the help from global cooperation and investment renewable energy will “exceed all previous estimates.”

According to the new findings renewable energy technologies like wind and photovoltaics could supply 40% of the world’s electricity by 2050. But this could only become a reality if the renewable technology is backed up by adequate financial and political support. If not, the renewable share is likely to hover somewhere below 15 percent.

“Our findings demonstrate that with global political support and financial investment, previous notions that the potential for renewables was in some way limited to a negligible fraction of world demand were wrong,” Peter Lund from the Helsinki University of Technology’s Advanced Energy Systems said. “If we prioritize and recognize the value of renewable energy technologies, their potential to supply us with the energy we need is tremendous.”

Previous projections have put the renewable share at only 12% by 2030.

Also read: 10% of U.S. Energy Now Comes From Renewable Energy Sources

Photo credit: phault

Sölvesborg, a small village near the coast located in southern Sweden, was first in the world with sea-based wind power. And now it might become the place for Sweden’s and northern Europe’s largest offshore wind farm.

The renewable energy companies Vingkraft AB and Eolus Vind AB wants to construct 500 wind turbines in the sea outside of Sölvesborg by 2014-2019. Once completed the wind farm will supply 5-7 TWh of electricity every year. That is equal to the amount of electricity the now decommissioned Swedish nuclear plant Barsebäck generated every year.

Although the proposed wind farm have a long way to go and many different instances to pass, such as the military, before getting approved the local politicians and people in the region are excited. The politicians believe the wind farm will create thousands of new jobs in the region and even act as a way to attract more tourists.

The wind farm is expected to cost 50 billion Swedish kronor, equal to around €4.5 billion.