Renewabale energy, particularly solar energy, is being looked at as a potential to replace conventional electrucity.

It may no longer be possible to burn millions of watts to light up glitzy billboards in the country. Advertising hoardings that use conventional lights will soon have to go the solar energy way. Solar photo voltaic power will be replacing the traditional lighting.
Renewabale energy, particularly solar energy, is being looked at as a potential to replace conventional electrucity used for advertising hoardings, street lights and water heating requirements in view of the power shortages in the country, Vilas Muttemwar, Union minister for non-conventional energy sources, said.
MNES is planning to set up advisory committees to push renewable energy across 600 districts in the country, Muttemwar said. MNES will also expand the network of 'Aditya Solar Shops' to cover all the districts of the country so that solar manufacturers can use this network to sell their products, the minister said.
The ministry has circulated a model amendment to building bye-laws which when adopted by municipalties will make installation of solar water heaters mandatory in several categories of new buildings.
The governments of Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh have already moved in this direction issuing orders to civic bodies and urban development authorities to install solar energy systems at municipal buildings, urban development authority buildings or any urban local body building. Clearance of plans for hospitals, hotels and multi-storeyed buildings are to be given only if there is provision for installing solar water heating system with open space on the roof top. Solar photo voltaic power is to replace conventional lights for hoardings in these states, financialexpress.com reported.
The Green Energy Fund created by Maharashtra raised Rs 100 crore last year. This fund is being transferred to the Maharashtra Energy Development Authority to be used for developing renewable energy in the state. This fund was created by charging 0.04 per unit green cess on the energy bills of commercial and industrial establishments. There are plans to collect on an average Rs 80 to Rs 90 crore per year for 10 years to fund renewable energy in the state. MEDA is coordinating with MERC to fix the mandatory percentage of renewable power in the state.
After the wind energy fiasco in the state where a campaign was carried out against wind power the state is trying hard to win back investors. Wind generators were blamed for the drought in the state. But with good rains this year in most part of Maharashtra the anti-wind power lobby has been silenced. Meanwhile a lot of investments in the wind sector moved to Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan. The state is now launching initiatives to win back the confidence of investors. Maharashtra has an untapped potential in the wind sector valued at Rs 24,000 crore. MEDA has identified 28 feasible sites for wind power generation with capacity to generate 3,650 mw of power.

The NCGA reported earlier this week that through funding from the Minnesota Corn Growers Association, the Minnesota Corn Research and Promotion Council and the University of Minnesota's Initiative for Renewable Energy and the Environment, engineers at the university have invented the first reactor capable of efficiently producing hydrogen from ethanol.
Ethanol fuel cells are an idea whose time has come, says Lanny Schmidt, a University of Minnesota chemical engineer who led a study on developing a cleaner-burning technology for fuel cells. Schmidt said the study proves the feasibility of using renewable hydrogen as an energy source.
According to the study, a cleaner-burning renewable fuel such as ethanol can produce hydrogen in a reactor to heat small homes and power cars more efficiently than the older fossil fuel technologies of oil and gas.
The study proves hydrogen fuel cells are clean-burning and efficient, but an infrastructure that adequately supports widespread use of the technology has not yet been developed, theindependent.com reported.
The university researchers believe their reactor will produce hydrogen exclusively from corn-based ethanol and do it less expensively. Schmidt said using corn ethanol to generate hydrogen would benefit both rural and urban economies, as well as the environment.
"This burgeoning technology not only improves the environment through cleaner emissions, but it also promotes another new use of renewable fuels," said NCGA member Duane Adams, a Minnesota grower who has actively promoted ethanol fuel cell research. "This is not just a small scale possibility, but has broad economic ramifications for agriculture producers. Lanny Schmidt's work has transformed the concept of hydrogen-powered vehicles from a dream to a reality."

Stanislav Naumov, press-secretary of the industry and energy minister, has said that the final version of the Eastern Siberian oil pipeline was handed over to the Russian government. The draft of state-owned Tatneft had been taken as the basis.
In the first stages, a pipeline will be laid from Taishet, the biggest station on the Baikal-Amur railway, to the village of Skovorodino. Then, exported oil will be transported in rail tanks to the Perevoznaya Bay terminal in the port of Nakhodka. Feasibility studies for the project should be ready by about the middle of the next year. Then they will be vetted by state inter-departmental experts.
The pipeline will pass 150 kilometers north of Lake Baikal, mainly along the well-developed zone of the operating BAM railway. From Skovorodino, which is the nearest station on the route to China, it will be possible to build in the future a feeder towards the border.
The time to construct the route to Skovorodino has been determined by the government at 3.5 years. The cost of the Taishet-Skovorodino section was earlier estimated at $6.5 billion. Structures to be built here will include a filling trestle for rail tank cars. And until the entire line is completed, oil will be delivered to the Pacific by rail. Which will require laying second and even third tracks on BAM. Russian Railways has already agreed with Transneft the main aspects of future cooperation in the transportation of export oil, rian.ru reported.
The overall length of the Eastern Siberian oil pipeline (Taishet-Kazachinskoye-Skovorodino-Khabarovsk-Nakhodka) is 4,130 kilometers. It will be provided with 44 oil pumping stations, 14 tank farms with a capacity of up to 4.4 million tons, a terminal, and berths and coast facilities in Perevoznaya Bay. It is proposed that the route should be single-stringed. The tube diameter will be 1,220 mm. The construction will involve something like 30,000 workers. They are to construct 48 crossovers on rivers, including such big ones as the Lena, Upper Angara, Ilim, Chuma and others. It will be necessary to build 115 crossings over motor and rail roads.
With construction completed, the pumping capacity of the pipeline must be 80 million tons. The total cost of the pipeline will be almost $11-12 billion. To run it, Tatneft is setting up a subsidiary which will include 4 structural departments (Taishet, Blagoveshchensk, Khabarovsk and Nakhodka).
As a resource base in the first stages the government selected the deposits in the Tomsk region, the Khanty-Mansi autonomous area in Western Siberia each with 24 million tons a year and later, following additional exploration and commissioning, the Leno-Tungusskaya, Khatanga-Vilyui oil and gas plantations in Eastern Siberia and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia).

EnCana, headquartered in Calgary, Canada, currently produces about 35,000 barrels per day of bitumen from its oil sands operations.

Premcor and EnCana have announced tentative plans to increase the daily output of Premcor's refinery.
The increase will be to 200,000 barrels per day. Its feedstock will also be switched to oil-sands-derived heavy oil produced by EnCana.
The conversion, which would add 30,000 barrels per day to the refinery's existing capacity of 170,000 barrels per day by 2008, depends on the results of feasibility and financial studies the companies will conduct over the next six months. If the project proceeds, it will operate as a joint venture. Premcor officials said that, if approved, the project also will include the installation of advanced pollution control technologies to lower emissions at the facility.
EnCana, headquartered in Calgary, Canada, currently produces about 35,000 barrels per day of bitumen from its oil sands operations, but has the potential to produce more than 200,000 barrels per day if markets for the heavy oil can be found. EnCana and Premcor think they can overcome that challenge by converting EnCana's bitumen directly to clean transportation fuels, bypassing the traditional step of converting it first to synthetic crude.
"Our participation in the proposed Lima conversion project is expected to provide a dedicated oil market, allowing us to proceed with confidence as we unlock the tremendous potential in our low-cost, in-situ oil sands resources," said Bill Oliver, President of EnCana Midstream & Marketing. "The cost of converting an existing refinery to process heavy oil is estimated to be about half the cost of building a similar-sized, standalone Alberta-based upgrader, and the final product is clean transportation fuels rather than synthetic crude requiring further processing."
Premcor previously converted its Port Arthur, Texas, refinery to handle heavy oil. That project, completed in 2001, "has achieved operating rates and economics above the levels forecast when the project was originally conceived," said Thomas D. O'Malley, Chairman and CEO of Premcor, eyeforenergy.com reported.
O'Malley said the team that accomplished that conversion is virtually intact and will become the core team leading the Lima conversion, if the two companies decide to proceed with it.
Gwyn Morgan, President and CEO of EnCana, said the Lima refinery project creates an opening for EnCana to unlock the potential of its oil sands holdings.
"For a couple of years, we have been working towards a market integration solution that opens the door to advancing development of our multi-billion barrels of in-situ oil sands potential," Morgan said. "This initiative with Premcor is an exceptional opportunity to achieve an efficient and cost-effective market integration for our growing oil sands production."
Premcor also sees an opportunity to offer Midwest customers lower-priced products, if the refinery can process a cheap, heavy oil stock rather than the high-priced light, sweet crude required by most refineries operating in the region.
"The upgraded Lima refinery would have the ability to process 200,000 barrels per day of Canadian heavy crude oil blends, resulting in increased production of higher-value finished transportation fuels" compared to its current capacity of 170,000 barrels per day, said Jefferson F. Allen, CEO-elect of Premcor. "The upgraded facility would produce more gasoline and on-road diesel to help better meet the current regional demand. This project also would help ease some of the burden on the demand for light, low-sulfur crude oil in the Midwest, which has contributed to higher prices affecting the consumer."
The two companies said the design and engineering studies should be completed in approximately six to nine months. If the study justifies the investment, Premcor and EnCana officials said they would form a 50-50 joint venture. Premcor would contribute the Lima refinery and related assets, currently valued at more than $1 billion. EnCana would contribute an equivalent amount in cash to finance the upgrades. Any additional investments would be split equally. EnCana also would sell Canadian heavy crude oil blends to the venture.
Premcor estimates the project would create 1,000 temporary construction jobs in the Lima area. The refinery currently employs approximately 400.

Residents are planning to use local energy sources such as rivers, burns and timber.

A Perthshire community is aiming to drastically reduce its dependence on fossil fuels like oil and coal.
People in the upper Tay area are bidding to be the first in Scotland to save more of the global warming gas carbon dioxide than they use.
They have come up with a range of projects as part of the effort to achieve that aim.
Residents are planning to use local energy sources such as rivers, burns and timber.
If there is one area ideally placed to go green it is surely Aberfeldy and a string of villages in the upper Tay area.

Heavy Price
There is liquid energy in the form of the river and dozens of burns. Woodland stretches up the hillsides.
Of course, it's also a long way from the central belt, which means petrol is expensive and travel comes at a heavy price.
All this got people thinking about what they could do to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels--and they have come up with some solutions, bbc.co.uk reported.
Brendan Murphy, of the Upper Tay Area Group which is driving the idea forward, said these included the introduction of an LPG fuel pump at the town's garage.
The community has also successfully pressed for the specification for the new school to include a biomass woodchip heating system.
In the center of Aberfeldy an old water mill which used to grind oats is being refurbished.
It has lain empty for the past couple of years, but many of the original features are still in working order and now an ambitious programme of works is underway to turn it into an arts centre.
Kevin Ramage, who owns book shops in England, has come to live in the town.
His project combines his ambition to create the biggest bookshop in the rural Highlands with some green energy ideas.

Reuse, Recycle
"We are converting the building into a book shop, art gallery, music and coffee shop," he said.
"Part of what we are doing is keeping as much of the old building as we can and trying to reuse and recycle.
"We will use the energy from the wheel to power the lighting of the building."
There will also be a wood burning stove.
Meanwhile, a couple of miles further up the Tay farmer Dave Murray is also involved in an ambitious project--and his is already up and running.
He got together with two other farmers to invest in a small-scale hydro scheme taking advantage of all the water running off the hills.
It should provide enough electricity every year for 3,000 people, and he sells it to ScottishPower.
But there is a lot more work to be done if the community is to be the first in Scotland to reach what it describes as a "carbon balance"--where use of fossil fuel is more than offset by use of greener alternatives.

Unseasonable Downpours
Murphy says you have to start somewhere--and believes that if enough places took up the idea it really could make a difference.
Last summer's floods in Perthshire concentrated a few minds.
If the unseasonal August downpours really were connected to global warming--and if reducing carbon dioxide is the way to halt it--then they wanted to do their bit.
And as a business proposition, they hope it will also do something for the area's clean green image.