There is a need for new carbon-free power generation to be developed alongside a rapidly expanding energy efficiency program.

Following an announcement from the global wind industry reporting a market expansion of 20 percent last year and that Europe once again dominated with over 70 percent of new installations in 2004, the British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) is welcoming the publication of a report by the German Energy Agency, DENA, clarifying the cost of integrating wind power into the German electricity grid.
"Contrary to press stories that claim this report calls into question Germany's policy to dramatically expand wind generation, it actually sets out that the country's power network can be adapted quite easily for such an expansion, and at reasonable cost," BWEA said in a statement, solaraccess.com reported.
While BWEA is awaiting the full translation of this lengthy and detailed report, initial analysis of the executive summary, together with the official English press statement from DENA and a translation of the press statement made by German Environment Minister Jurgen Trittin, the organization said they are baffled "that the report's findings could be so misconstrued."
The headline finding of the report is that expansion of Germany's wind power capacity to 37,000 megawatts (MW), up from a world-leading 17,000 MW now, can be accommodated by extending and upgrading 5 percent of the country's grid, and increasing power prices by only 0.36-0.45 Euro cents/kWh (0.25-0.31 p/kWh). As a result, the average household electricity bill will increase by only Euro 12.6-15.8/year. Put in context, for an additional cost to the UK consumer of about GBP 10 per year, equivalent to two cinema tickets, Germany will achieve 20 percent of its power from renewables, reaping the benefits of lower carbon emissions, economic development and security of energy supply.
The recent report by the National Audit Office indicated that sourcing 10 percent of the UK's electricity from renewables would also increase power bills marginally, by about 5 percent by 2010, in the same order of magnitude as the numbers in the DENA study.
"Given that gas prices are volatile and high, which has resulted in steep rises in power bills, this small rise in costs appears to be excellent value for money," BWEA said.
Wind will provide the vast bulk of the new renewable power required to meet this target. For this small additional cost, the UK wind industry will deliver savings of between 10 and 17 million tons of carbon dioxide, a significant part of our country's carbon dioxide reduction plans, thousands of new jobs and of course improve our nation's energy security.
"This report, like that produced recently in the UK by the National Audit Office, makes clear that a significant expansion of wind power can be delivered at only a small additional cost to both German and UK consumers," Marcus Rand, chief executive of BWEA said.
It is true that carbon emissions can be reduced from present levels through energy efficiency at a lower cost than using wind power. However, savings available from efficiency gains are a one-time benefit and do not eliminate the requirement for environmentally sustainable power supplies. There is a need, given the scale of emission reductions required, for new carbon-free power generation to be developed alongside a rapidly expanding energy efficiency program. Any coherent climate policy will include both energy conservation and renewables--and both the UK's and Germany's policies do just that.

Geothermal energy units can be installed with straight pipes in a vertical or horizontal layout.

Energy workers and environmentalists say geothermal heating and cooling systems are the best available. The systems are energy efficient, environmentally friendly and well, new.
And the Burlington Public Library plans to have one.
Saturday the library brought GeoÐ1, Alliant Energy's educational van, and two geothermal buffs to share information with those interested in the geothermal heating and cooling process.
With the new building project under way, the library will begin installing parts of the geothermal unit next month. Once complete, the library will have 167 vertical wells that run 267 feet deep, said Diane Hanson, Alliant Energy trade account manager.
"Those are the magical numbers," she added, saying people can't just go out and buy piping and install it. Instead, each home requires a different set of piping, a different piping depth, and possibly a different layout for the system.
Geothermal energy units can be installed with straight pipes in a vertical or horizontal layout, with horizontal spiral tubing or with spiral tubing attached to straight pipes and set in a pond, thehawkeye.com reported.
Contractors can measure homes or businesses and calculate the size of heating unit needed, also determining which layout is appropriate.
The new library will use the vertical system, which will be installed below its parking lot, near the retaining wall now being built, Hanson said.
In 2001, Great River Medical Center installed a horizontal, spiral piping system in its lake. The system is said to save the hospital $400,000 in energy bills and maintenance each year, according to Alliant's Web site.
At this time, no one is sure how much money the library will save on energy bills.
"They say (the system) will pay for itself in five to seven years," said Kay Weiss, library director. "(The librarians) don't know how to operate (a geothermal heating and cooling unit), but we hope it will be easy and will mean money savings for us."
Weiss said at the last construction meeting, crews estimated drilling the 167 wells would take 90 days or more. After the wells are drilled, the pipes will need to be installed, tested for pressure and leaks and then covered with dirt. The pipes are filled with water and environmentally friendly antiÐfreeze.
Hanson said the risk of pipes breaking is minimal, and if they do, contractors can find the leak and repair the damaged section. Most pipes are made of polyÐethylene plastic and are under warranty for 50 years.
Once covered, the water mixture inside the pipes will pull heat energy from the earth. Below the frost line, four feet below the surface, the earth is a constant 50 degrees in Iowa. The water will continuously draw energy from the earth and will flow through the pipes, drawing energy or BTUs to the main source of the system, the heat pump.
The heat pump has a refrigerant or compressor inside; when the energy is compressed, it creates heat, which will be blown into the library. During the summer, the system will work in the opposite fashion, pulling the warm air from inside the building and "pushing" it back into the earth.
In either case, once the building has used the energy it needs, some unused energy can be used to preheat water, serving as the water heater.
Though the system costs twice as much as standard units, it saves twice as much on bills. It also supplies a unified or constant source of comfort, Hanson said. With gas and electric costs rising, she added that many people are looking into geothermal heating and cooling.
Listening to a movie on geothermal heating systems, she said it sums up why geothermal units are the best source of energy.
"(The system provides) 70 percent of energy in the home absolutely free," the video states. "Basically it's just stored solar energy ... it's savings from the ground up."

Our country is addicted to oil, and we are paying a fearful price. Our profligate use of petroleum contributes to air pollution, urban smog and global warming. Our addiction leaves us dependant on relatively unstable foreign sources of supply. And, it increases the pressure for oil and gas exploration in sensitive areas like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the front range of the Rockies.
We must end this addiction. There are several possible substitutes for oil as a transportation fuel, each of which has its advantages and disadvantages. But for the last fifteen years, we have made far too little effort to develop these less damaging alternatives. Less than 2% of the fuels used in transportation come from non-petroleum sources--most of it from ethanol produced from corn.
By far the most attractive alternative is using hydrogen to power vehicles because hydrogen is nonpolluting when burned. But implementing a hydrogen based transportation system will take 25 to 50 years. Several of the proposed technologies for mass production of hydrogen involve environmentally risky use of nuclear power or coal--so-called "black hydrogen." The "greener" hydrogen technologies, based on wind power, solar and other renewables, are not yet cost effective. Moreover, it will take years and billions of dollars to install hydrogen fueling stations across the country. In short, we need to look elsewhere while further work is done on a possible "green" hydrogen future, enn.com reported.
We could power our cars with electricity using electric cars or gas electric hybrids that plug into the electricity grid. But as with hydrogen, running our cars on electricity only makes sense if the electricity is produced from an alternative source such as wind or solar power. Otherwise, we will simply be fueling our cars on the fossil fuels being burned at power plants, losing as much as two thirds of the energy during the production and transmission of the electricity.
At the nationÕs fuel pumps today, ethanol produced from corn is the most widely used non-petroleum fuel. Corn based ethanol reduces our dependence on foreign fuel sources but it requires significant energy, fertilizer and water to produce and is only 20% better than gasoline in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Producing large amounts of ethanol from corn perpetuates the system of agricultural monoculture that is polluting streams and rivers. And, according to recent estimates, it also costs significantly more to produce than gasoline.
Corn-based ethanol is only one of several plant-based alternatives to oil. Using agricultural waste and used cooking oil from restaurants, we can generate biodiesel fuel. (People report that cars burning biodiesel sometimes smell like French fries.) There is a growing interest in biodiesel in the agricultural states. Minnesota recently mandated that all diesel fuel sold in that state must contain at least two percent biodiesel. According to a recent report from the National Commission on Energy Policy, biodiesel will have a niche in the non-petroleum future, but is unlikely to become economic on a large scale.
Current research suggests that the best plant-based, short-term alternative to oil is ethanol produced from cellulose. We can break our addiction to oil but it will take both significant changes in policy and substantial investments.
We can start by using less fuel for transportation. At current rates of petroleum consumption, it is difficult to imagine utilizing enough cropland, or increasing the productivity of cellulosic sources enough to end our addiction to oil. The nation needs to mandate more efficient vehicles. Existing technology can easily double the fuel efficiency of cars.
Second, we should establish a target of replacing half of all gasoline and diesel with renewable, environmentally sound alternatives by the year 2030.
Third, we should move agricultural subsidies from food crops to biofuels. This shift would provide a powerful incentive for developing alternative fuels, and would have the added advantage of reforming the current agricultural subsidy system that encourages artificially low food prices in the US and undermines farmers in developing countries.
Finally, we should be making major investments in alternative fuels. ItÕs true that the most recent Bush budget projects huge increases in the federal deficit, and would appear to preclude substantial new investments in anything. But failing to develop alternative fuels as quickly as possible will cost us far more in the long run.

Fuels produced from the oil of soybeans, corns, cottons and other vegetables would likely become a petroleum displacement.

The opportunities and the payoffs seem endless, but it's the timing that had a group of Mississippi and Louisiana farmers worried at Wednesday's agriculture meeting on biodiesel fuels.
The meeting, sponsored by Ferriday's Agricultural Commodities Economic Development, Inc., featured Mark Zappi, the director of the Universities' Consortium for Bio-energy Research. Zappi walked the group of about 20 interested in agriculture through the creation of biodiesel fuels, the sales potential and the possible problems.
"We've become almost exclusively dependent on petroleum," Zappi said of the country. "We are going to run out eventually and we are going to have to eventually gravitate away from petroleum."
Zappi said fuels produced from the oil of soybeans, corns, cottons and other vegetables would likely become a petroleum displacement.
Zappi used slides to show when the biodiesel fuel market would be best, but could not put dates on when farmers should buy into the fuels production, natchdemocrat.com reported.
He said Mississippi and especially Louisiana have the greatest potential for bio-energy fuels based on the crops grown in the states.
Biodiesels are made from plant oils, animal fats, a base and ethyl or methyl alcohol and provide a more environmental friendly fuel that Zappi said major oil companies are interested in.
ACED began studying alternatives for the soybean, and other crops, last year when the received a $17,350 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to study the feasibility of locating an extraction plant in the area to remove the oils.
Clint Vegas, who recently attended the national biodiesel conference, also spoke to the group.
"I wasn't lucky enough to be in the gold rush in California, but I think I may have a sense of the feel of it," Vegas said. "Right now there's a total productivity out there of 150 million gallons. Twenty million are being bought."
Vegas stressed that at this point the biodiesel market was a confusing one with a lot unknowns and few regulations.
"It's an industry that is so young that the world is wide open," Vegas said. "I see this opportunity, but I also see lots of people losing money."