Saving the planet may not seem like the quickest path to riches. Yet plenty of investors are betting that sustainable energy will make them lots of money. Already the sector is fast becoming a multibillion-dollar industry, giving companies the chance to boost their profit margins and help fight climate change at the same time. Taking advantage of this investment revolution, a wave of European firms has pioneered alternative energy technology to help make Europe the world leader in reducing carbon emissions.
The fight against climate change has definitely become big business. According to London-based research firm New Carbon Finance, public and private investment in the global renewable-energy sector will top $90 billion in 2007, a 27 percent increase over the year before. The UN Environment Program (UNEP) says Europe remains the top spot for investment, receiving $27.1 billion in 2006, while the US came in second, with $22.5 billion. An estimated $27.9 billion was set aside last year for financing renewable energy projects around the world, and $18 billion in 180 investment funds is now focused on sustainable energy, Businessweek.com reported.
With so much money floating around, several public and privately held European firms have been quick to pounce on these new opportunities, and the firms now dominate industries such as wind-turbine manufacturing and solar-panel design. With annual sales totaling $737 million, German company Q-Cells has recently finished building the world’s largest solar farm in southern Spain, and Danish wind-turbine maker Vestas, with $279 million profits in 2006, has outmaneuvered the likes of General Electric (GE) to become the leading global wind-turbine provider. “The industry is growing both geographically and technologically,“ says Q-Cells spokesperson Stefan Dietrich. “You have to expand internationally because there are so many new players coming into the market.“
At present, wind and solar power remain the most commercially viable technologies, but other firms are looking to cash in on the growing interest in the sector by developing new ways to produce renewable electricity. One such company is Marine Current Turbines (MCT), based in southern England. It has created a machine that harnesses tidal power to produce environmentally friendly energy, and the company expects its first “tidal farm“ to come on line by early 2008. According to MCT’s technical director Peter Fraenkel, it’s now a lot easier to find funding for new technologies. “When we started it was very difficult, but now governments and investors are throwing money at many different projects,“ he says.
Behind much of the growing interest in alternative energy is European Commission policy. The EC outlined plans early this year to produce 20 percent of the EU’s energy from renewable sources by 2020. Such regulatory certainty has helped to reassure investors, who still face significant risks developing new types of energy technology. According to New Carbon Finance’s Chief Editor Angus McCrone, subsidies from European governments have made the EU the No. 1 investment destination in the sector, although other countries, particularly the US, are quickly catching up.
As sustainable energy becomes more mainstream, Europe’s tight hold on the sector could be threatened. Simon Shaw, managing director of London-based EEA Fund Management, which has more than $1.5 billion invested in renewable projects, believes North America will soon attract more investment than Europe. “Regulatory regimes around the world have shifted towards alternative energy,“ Shaw says. “Over the next 10 years, the majority of governments will support this technology.“
Despite the growing threat from competitors, European companies remain out front for now and hope to stay ahead by focusing new growth in international markets. Ocean Power Delivery, a Scottish company that has designed a turbine powered by wave energy, has targeted North America as a key battleground. Growth in the US, according to the company’s Business Development Director Max Carcas, could propel the wave-power sector to a $10 billion-per-year industry by 2012. Similarly, Germany’s Q-Cells, which has gone from employing 19 people in 2000 to a projected 5,000 in 2010, is trying to diversify into Asian markets, which are expected to be worth $36.1 billion by 2010. For many companies, the rising awareness--and growing competition--for alternative energy is good for business as emerging markets offer new commercial opportunities. Investment in sustainable energy in India, for example, has jumped 160 percent over the last three years, while cash for such projects in China has increased by a staggering 2033 percent, to $6.1 billion, in the same period.
Along with overseas markets, European companies have a steady supply of projects in their home countries to help shore up their bottom lines. Currently more than 25,000 wind farms are operating throughout Europe, and capacity is expected to double by 2015. According to the European Wind Energy Assn., the industry will be worth $109 billion by 2020. Similarly, solar panel capacity in Germany, the world’s largest market with annual sales over $5 billion, is expected to reach 4,500 megawatts by 2010--the equivalent of almost six coal-fired power stations. Government subsidies and beneficial electricity tariffs are also making energy from marine and biomass technologies increasingly cost-effective.
The rapid increase in investment over recent years has made such advances possible. For as the public’s imagination has been caught by the fight against climate change, so too have European companies been won over by the high rates of return offered by the renewable energy sector. No one would say firms are making investment decisions simply to save the planet, but if that’s a by-product of the growing investment in alternative energy, so much the better.

Biofuels can reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels and increase energy security.

Africa must exploit its biofuel resources fully and effectively to defeat poverty and achieve the Millennium Development Goals, a team of experts underscored at a regional forum.
“Promotion of biofuels industry in developing countries has the capacity to propel such countries to achieve the MDGs through poverty reduction (especially job creation and economic enhancement), health impact and climate change,“ the team said in a report presented at a regional forum of experts in the field of biofuel that kicked off at the AU Conference Hall.
The forum is deliberating on the effective and enhanced utilization of biofuel to tackle poverty, Daily Monitor reported.
The experts drawn from various African universities indicated that Africa presents significantly higher biofuel potentials than Europe and even North America and can aid farmers in the continent to earn better income for their produce due to the expanded market of biofuel.
According to the report, the majority of African countries that are oil importers can avoid their expenses on oil by utilizing their biofuel resources.
Biofuels can reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels and increase energy security.
There is a growing realization in the Africa that high dependency on imported fossil fuels is having a negative impact on the continent’s economic development, the report said.
According to available information, out of 47 of the world’s poorest countries, 38 are net oil importers and the majority of them are from Africa.
A total of 42 countries in Africa are net oil importers vulnerable to the adverse macro-economic (particularly balance of payments) of high oil prices.
This is particularly true as economies of countries in sub-Saharan Africa are oil-dependent, according to the report.
Estimates show that recent changes in the price of oil caused, in some cases, losses as high as 3 percent of GDP.
According to the same report, biofuels use in Africa is expected to remain as very limited as it is now, reaching to 3.4 Mtoe by 2030.
The report further recommended future policies of Africa to be designed to meet not only the domestic needs but also the growing international biofuels market.
“The AU should be the coordinating body in implementing a common policy for biofuels in Africa,“ the report added.

Each stretch of an artificial muscle attached to a buoy can generate 20 watts of power.

Artificial muscles are being used to turn the ocean’s waves into electrical power in a novel pilot project off the coast of Florida, US.
The “muscles“ produce electricity as they bob up and down attached to buoys. Although they only generate enough power to light a small light bulb currently, the scientists involved see it as a first step to implementing a new, cheap technology for harvesting renewable energy from the ocean, NewScientist.com reported.
The artificial muscles are made from electroactive polymers, a material that can be physically activated with a jolt of electricity.
Electroactive polymer artificial muscles (EPAMs) are heralded as a key technology for powering future robots and other machinery. The design is remarkably simple Ð essentially several sheets of specialized rubber sandwiched between two elastic, oppositely-charged electrodes. When an electric charge is applied the electrodes squeeze the rubber. When the charge is dropped, the rubber relaxes.
Roy Kornbluh of Stanford Research Institute International in California, US, and colleagues simply reversed the process. They rolled a sheet of EPAM into a cylindrical shape, and attached a weight to one end. They then fixed it to a weather and navigation buoy inside a watertight capsule.
As the buoy floats on the ocean surface, the force generated by the wave action stretches and relaxes the rubber, oscillating the distance between electrodes and generating electricity (see image, right, and a video animation showing the system in action).
With an average 0.8-meter wave, each stretch of the muscle can generate as much as 20 watts of power. Since waves tend to come about every 4 seconds, though, the sustained energy output is closer to 5 watts.
“Right now we’re just powering lighting systems on a buoy,“ Kornbluh admits, “but we want to scale up by orders of magnitude, and you can imagine hundreds or thousands of these thing scattered in the ocean.“
In the last year, nearly 40 applications were filed with the US Federal Energy Regulation Commission for installing the ocean energy systems along the US coastline. It is a crowded field, but Kornbluh believes the simplicity and low cost of his design could give it advantages over competitors.
“Most wave systems are more complicated, they use flowing hydraulic fluid to turn a transmission, which then spins a turbine,“ Kornbluh says. “We’re just stretching our generator. It’s hard to imagine anything more simple.“
The US energy market could welcome ocean energy technology with open arms. A recent report issued by the Electric Power Research Institute suggested that ocean energy could expand to meet 10 percent of the total electricity demands of the US without any measurable adverse effects on the environment.
“Either way it’s encouraging that someone is working with artificial muscles and moving in a direction that is really our problem now--energy,“ says Yoseph Bar-Cohen of Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,

Residents of Arusha have expressed their concern over the construction of gasoline stations in residential areas.
They said during interviews with the Arusha Times that the presence of petrol stations in their neighborhoods can turn out to be deadly in case of fire outbreaks.
They blamed the municipal council for continuing to issue permits for the construction of gas stations in residential areas, saying by doing so the authorities are putting their lives in danger, AllAfrica.com reported.
“If the municipal authorities do not stop this, we will forward our grievances to President Kikwete. We are fed up by this and worried about the safety of our families,“ they complained.
Residents interviewed explained that their long time grievances on the matter to government officials have fallen on deaf ears and that was why they are considering to appeal to the president.
“We are also appealing to media institutions to assist us by highlighting the dangers of having gas stations in the residential areas“ said one of them on condition that his name should not be mentioned.
He added; “The municipal officials have simply ignored our pleas. Now we want to seek the intervention of President Kikwete. Our lives will be in danger in case of fire outbreaks“.
Some of the gas stations, whose construction was opposed by the inhabitants of “the Geneva of Africa“ , are located in the up market Njiro suburb and others along the Moshi-Namanga road.
The gas stations are owned by local businessmen whose names were not immediately made available to the Arusha Times.
Reports circulating in Arusha say that the wananchi have opposed the construction of the two oil filling stations but the owners went ahead with the project apparently after getting permits from the municipal officials.
There are suspicions that the permits were obtained through corrupt means, an allegation which the municipal officials declined to comment on.
When approached to comment on the matter, the acting mayor Anelson OIe Joel said the municipal council has “never ever“ given a permit to construct a gas station in a residential area in Arusha.
The wananchi interviewed said construction of oil filling stations in residential neighborhoods contravened a government directive which prohibited such structures near people’s homes. The directive, given some years ago, aimed to avoid the possible calamities in the event of a fire outbreak.
There are cases in various parts of the country, including Arusha, where people have been burnt to death through explosions at oil stations and gas tankers.
When pressed further, the acting mayor admitted he was not aware of any session of the councilors’ meetings, which he normally chairs, that has given permits to construct gas stations in prohibited areas.
Arusha district commissioner Evans Balama, on his part, confirmed to have received many complaints on the matter and that he had instructed the municipal director to act on them.
“At one time I sought legal advice from the municipal council on the matter and also wanted to see the government directive on construction of gas stations. So far I have not received any response,“ he noted.
It could not be immediately established how many gas stations are in Arusha, a city of 400,000 people. However, in recent months there had been a marked increase of new oil filling stations.

BC Transit has inked a $46.4-million contract to produce the world’s first fleet of buses powered by hydrogen fuel cells.
Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon announced that New Flyer Industries of Winnipeg will make 20 buses, due to hit the road by the end of 2009.
The innovation comes with a hefty price tag, averaging more than $2 million per vehicle.
Portions of the project will also be handled by ISE Corporation of San Diego, which will make the hybrid drive system; Burnaby’s Ballard Power Systems, responsible for making the fuel-cell modules; and Dynetek Industries of Calgary, which will design a hydrogen storage system, Canada.com reported.
The buses are said to have a range of 500 kilometers, a top speed of 90 kilometers an hour and a life expectancy of 20 years.
Falcon touted the project as part of the province’s commitment to reduce B.C.’s greenhouse gas emissions by one-third by 2020.
“These buses produce no smog-creating emissions and no greenhouse gas emissions, and they can be twice as efficient as internal combustion engines,“ said Falcon in a statement.
The buses are expected to be showcased at the 2010 Winter Olympics and will initially be based in Whistler.
They are part of the Liberal government’s commitment to the development of a so-called “hydrogen highway“ to help reduce carbon emissions that contribute to global warming.

A group of chemists from the University of Leicester have developed a way of purifying biodiesel made from vegetable oils, which is cheap, simple and low in toxicity.
The team, led by Professor Andrew Abbott is able to remove glycerol, the main by-product of vegetable oil-based biodiesel, using ionic liquids made in part by vitamin B4 (choline chloride).
If left in biodiesel, glycerol would damage engines but this technique simply washes it out of the fuel. The ionic liquid developed by Professor Abbott uses a complex of choline chloride with glycerol to extract more glycerol out of the biodiesel, Science Daily said.
The Leicester process is greener than traditional processes and effectively provides a sustainable methodology for the purification of biodiesel without the production of significant waste.
Professor Abbott commented: “We hope that further research will optimize the ionic liquid recycling and recovery of the glycerol. We are hoping to collaborate with a biodiesel producer to test this technology further.“