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1. California Leads on Warming (NYTimes ed.)
2. Go Speed Racer !
3. GCEP Conference: Fundamental Research Towards Reducing GH Gas Emissions, Sept 18-20
4. UBC Planning "Most Innovative and High Performance Building in North America"
5. A 150 mpg car? The Loremo
6. Plug-In Hybrid Bus and Dump Truck?
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1. California Leads on Warming
August 5, 2006
EDITORIAL, NYTimes
Tony Blair, the British prime minister, who worries about global warming more than any other world leader, has finally found an important American ally: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California. This week, the two agreed to collaborate on cleaner-burning technologies and to explore an emissions-reduction program that would combine mandatory controls on greenhouse gases with market incentives to reduce the costs of compliance.
Mr. Blair said he was not end-running his good friend President Bush. The governor was less diplomatic, saying that the administration and Congress had shown no leadership on the issue. In any case, the White House was a conspicuous no-show. No surprise there: the meeting of politicians and corporate executives, convened to discuss climate change, served only to dramatize how badly Washington lags both Britain and California with its program of voluntary reductions and Hail Mary technologies.
And California is about to get a lot tougher. Later this month, the Legislature will vote on two ground-breaking bills. One would set binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions with a goal of reducing them to 1990 levels by 2020 - an ambitious undertaking by any measure.
The other is a strikingly original bill that would bar long-term contracts with any out-of-state utility that failed to meet strict standards for pollution. A coal-fired plant in Wyoming, for instance, could sell power into California only if it found ways to dispose of most of its carbon dioxide, instead of merely venting it into the atmosphere. A bill like this would not only help California meet its targets but could also help jump-start clean-coal technologies that will be essential to reducing carbon dioxide emissions in countries like China and India.
For good measure, the Legislature will entertain two more warming-related bills, and Californians will be asked to vote in November on a ballot initiative that would raise $4 billion to promote alternative fuels.
All of this is may be too ambitious even for environmentally conscious Californians. But a recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found that two-thirds of the state's voters supported an aggressive attack on global warming. And while Mr. Schwarzenegger's re-election chances will clearly benefit from appealing to these voters, this is a genuinely bipartisan effort of the sort that has completely eluded Congress.
Moreover, California has long enjoyed taking the lead on environmental issues and bringing other states with it. Four years ago, Mr. Schwarzenegger signed the so-called Pavley bill aimed at reducing carbon dioxide emissions from cars. Though the law has been challenged by the automobile companies and the Bush administration, 10 other states have adopted similar legislation.
Meanwhile, the alarms about the consequences of warming have grown louder. Californians are particularly worried about the snowpack that provides their drinking water, about coastal erosion and about the dangerous ground-level air pollution that comes with heat waves. But a strategy useful for California will become even more valuable if it serves as a template for the nation.
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2. Go Speed Racer!
EDITORIAL NYTimes July 23
Virtue alone will not break the grip that petroleum holds on the automobile market. That's why the introduction of a sleek, high-performance roadster that happens to be electric rather than gasoline-fueled is worth noting.
Tesla Motors, a Silicon Valley start-up, has developed a two-seater that goes from zero to 60 miles an hour in four seconds, leaving the days of electric cars as glorified golf carts in the dust. The company seems to understands what it means to love cars as well as the environment. (On its Web site, Tesla revels in the power of the car's acceleration pinning passengers to their seats.)
With a range of about 250 miles, the Tesla Roadster can go much farther on a single charge than earlier electric cars. And 150 of those miles cost about the same as one gallon of gas. But the car itself will not be cheap, running from $85,000 to $100,000. Rather than a stumbling block in this case, it's actually a selling point.
Martin Eberhard, the company's chief executive, recognizes that new technologies usually start out as high-end products. He and his team are making their car the newest hot gadget, a status symbol. If rappers and football stars buy them, maybe the company can make a dent in the market.
Tesla already has plans for a mainstream vehicle down the road if it can expand its business. Perhaps this is one area where trickle-down theories could really work.
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3. GCEP Conference: Fundamental Research Towards Reducing GH Gas Emissions, Sept 18-20
Developments in Fundamental Research Towards Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Energy Systems
September 18–20, 2006
Frances C. Arrillaga Alumni Center
Stanford University
The Global Climate and Energy Project (GCEP) will hold its second energy research symposium featuring well-known speakers and leading researchers from Stanford and around the world. The three-day event is intended to provide a forum for the discussion of scientific results and developments that may lead to energy technologies with significantly reduced greenhouse gas emissions. Both GCEP-funded and outside investigators will give presentations highlighting the results of their innovative research. Several poster sessions will also be held to allow all GCEP investigators and their graduate students to provide details of their work.
The keynote speaker will be Dr. Steve Chu, Director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and 1997 winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics. His keynote address will open a session that will include presentations from Stanford and outside experts intended to set the stage for the meeting by providing an overall perspective of the background to the technical talks given during the conference.
The agenda will cover the following topic areas:
Monday, September 18
Morning – Global Energy Context
Afternoon – Solar Energy
Tuesday, September 19
Morning – Bioenergy Storage and Conversion
Afternoon – Advanced Materials and Catalysts
Wednesday, September 20
Morning – Carbon Mitigation, Capture, and Separation
Afternoon – Carbon Storage
The symposium is free and open to the Stanford community and other researchers and energy professionals. All attendees must register for the meeting by Friday, September 8, 2006. To register, please visit the symposium website at http://gcep.stanford.edu/symposium.
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4. UBC Planning "Most Innovative and High Performance Building in North America"
University of British Columbia is planning to build a $36 million Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability. Planners are aiming to make the building "the most innovative and high performance building in North America." To achieve this goal, the building is being designed to require almost no off-site energy, water or wastewater systems to function. The UBC-owned building will be built on the Great Northern Way Campus, a collaboration of UBC, the B.C. Institute of Technology, Simon Fraser University and the Emily Carr Institute of Art+Design. The building is expected to be complete in mid-2008.
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5. A 150 mpg car? The Loremo
German Loremo AG (Munich) introduced their ultra efficient car at the 76th annual Motor Show 2006 in Geneva the Loremo.
Founded in 2000, this new company developed a light-weight passenger car with outstanding aerodynamics. The one, two combination of light weight and tunnel tested aerodynamics allow this car to travel 157 miles per gallon of gasoline or 1.5 l per 100km!
Even with this added gas mileage Loremo didn't sacrifice speed. The base model Loremo LS is powered by a 2 cylinder 20 hp turbo diesel engine that will reach a speed of 100 mph and the GT model will reach up to 135 mph with a 0 to 60 mph acceleration of 9 seconds.
With safety in mind, Loremo patented the "linear cell structure" and used it in their construction process so despite the cars light weight, their cars withstand impact and meet static/dynamic requirements for crash safety.
Loremo AG plans to sell the Loremo LS for less than 11,000 Euros (~$13,000) and the GT for 15,000 Euros. Standard features include airbags, particle filter, dashboard computer, and air conditioning.
As Loremo put it, "Loremo is different from all other known cars. The more your will open up to the concept, the greater your excitement about it will become." The Loremo
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6. Plug-In Hybrid Bus and Dump Truck?
From: "John Davi" <jdavi@calcars.org>
Two different stories on three different PHEV projects in Long Island,
which has gone plug-in crazy for heavy-duty vehicles. A plug-in bus
from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is ready to roll into
service in the next couple of months, and the town of Oyster Bay was
recently awarded $270,000 to convert three dump trucks to plug-ins.
Not many specifics on the truck conversions as they've just been
funded. They'll be used -- of course -- for curbside recycling.
They'll run in full-electric mode for residential pickups and only
turn on their diesel engines for travel to and from the recycling
facility. These (also postal service vehicles) represent practically
the ideal commercial implementation of PHEVs: in addition to the
standard major benefits of a plug (cleaner/cheaper/domestic) there's
significant impact from the side benefit of "stealth mode."
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