News Archives - Page 25 of 31

Solar Car Drives 661 Miles On Sun Power

by Nino Marchetti of EarthTechling The world of college solar powered cars is getting busy these days. The University of Michigan, a top flight competitor in this space, just recently introduced its latest racer for the upcoming World Solar Challenge. While the Wolverines were doing this, Oregon State University (OSU) was out in Austin, Texas under a bright sun and 105 degree heat winning the 2013 Formula Sun Grand Prix – go Beavers! OSU’s entry, dubbed The Phoenix, won last week at this event by posting 193 laps, or 661 miles, around the Circuit of the Americas raceway on nothing but solar energy. Eleven teams from across North America competed in what’s said to be the “closest Formula Sun Grand Prix race in its 13-year history, a three-day race that featured 24 hours of racing time.” Runners up included Illinois State University, with 192 laps, and Iowa State University, with 191 laps. image via Oregon State University One thing which keeps this race friendl…

US Energy Efficiency is Improving

Katherine Tweed of GreenTechMedia It might seem as though energy efficiency is on a roll lately, especially after getting a shot in the arm from President Obama as part of his climate action plan. But energy efficiency covers a wide range of areas, and the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) just launched its first annual white paper on fifteen key indicators that can help the government and stakeholders understand where progress is being made and where there is more work to be done. If you are an optimist, a glance at the chart below shows that we’re doing OK, with modest progress in many areas. Only one indicator, combined heat and power (CHP) in industry, saw a small backslide from 2011 to 2010. Aggressive increases in CHP, however, is also a goal of the Obama administration, and should see a boost in coming years. “The United States is becoming more energy-efficient, but the improvements we measured are generally small, indicating that we ar…

IKEA Stores In China Embrace Solar Power

The Climate Group Nearly half of IKEA stores in China have gone solar in the last year, with yearly electric energy production now topping 1.6 Million kilowatt hours. The launch ceremony for the IKEA-Hanergy Grid-Connected Solar Power Generation Project was held today in the Beijing IKEA Store, during which IKEA and Hanergy, both members of The Climate Group, announced the preliminary results of the project. The thin-film panels installed on the rooftops of five IKEA stores in China, once put into operation, will provide 10-15% of all electricity needed to run those stores. Collaboration In June 2012, IKEA announced its strategic partnership with Hanergy to install solar photovoltaic panels on IKEA owned buildings in China as part of its goal to promote the undertaking of energy efficiency and emission reduction. Through one year’s efforts, thin-film photovoltaic solar panels have now been installed and tested via trial runs at IKEA stores in five cities across China, i…

Pot Growers Costing Canada $500 Million in Power Theft

Katherine Tweed of GreentechMedia It’s no secret that it takes a lot of energy to grow blueberry kush, purple sour diesel, voodoo or any of the dozens of other potent strains of marijuana available in North America. In the U.S. alone, indoor cannabis require about $5 billion in power annually, mostly to power the irrigation system and powerful lights that the plants grow beneath. Many indoor pot growers are not paying their electric bills in full, likely because they are outlaws in the eyes of the Canadian and U.S. federal governments. Many marijuana growers mask their operations by stealing some or all of the power needed to sustain the grow lights. But that could be changing, not only because of states like Washington and Colorado legalizing pot, but also because of advanced meters that can give utilities new insight into who might be stealing power to grow weed. “They’re starting to pull in smart meter data and correlate it,” said Zach Pollack, senior analyst …

Nike’s New App Focused on Sustainability

By Julia Neel of Women's Wear Daily LONDON — Nike has launched a new app that aims to help guide apparel designers to make informed decisions on materials based on sustainability. The tool is free to download from iTunes now and has been created to guide designers through four environmental impact areas: water, energy, chemistry and waste, as well as whether the material uses recycled or organic content. The data have been drawn from Nike’s Materials Sustainability Index (MSI) over the last seven years and is presented in a clear format that offers direct comparisons and fast insights on how different materials stack up on a sustainable level. “Waste is the new gold,” said the brand’s vice president of sustainable business and fashion Hannah Jones at the app’s London launch. “It’s a new way of thinking. Eight years ago, sustainability was considered one of the world’s great innovation challenges. It was always seen as a bit ‘granola’, a bit less. There’d be a compromi…

Apple Building Big Solar Farm In Nevada

Pete Danko at EarthTechling Already a significant solar player in North Carolina, where two 20-megawatt arrays feed a data center, Apple is taking on a big photovoltaic project in Nevada – this one 18 megawatts – to help power a new Reno-area data center. Apple said in statement reported initially by GigaOm that a “137 acre solar array will generate approximately 43.5 kilowatt hours of clean energy.” At Nevada’s average commercial electricity rate of 9 cents per kilowatt-hour, that’s $3.9 million worth of electricity every year. The Reno Gazette-Journal reported that the project would go up “in Yerington, south of the data center Apple is building outside Reno.” A C7 Tracker solar array (image via SunPower) Tech giants doing renewable energy for their data centers is beginning to be a bit of an old story, but there do appear to be a couple of interesting aspects to this one. First, the local utility company, NV Energy, said that this would be the first projec…