Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Hydrogen, Green Daily

While the California Air Resources Board has certainly played a huge role in putting cleaner vehicles on the road over the years, some plug-in vehicle advocates have a bone to pick with Chairman Mary Nichols (pictured here during the 2007 Alt Car Expo). During the recent UC Berkeley Energy Symposium, Nichols said she had a problem with plug-in proponents as well. Well, not just with them, but with advocates who push one type of technology and have no room in their green motoring vision for another. Specifically, Nichols said that:

Read more of Nichols’ statement, and why she is certain that we need both technologies, over at Green Car Congress

[Source: Green Car Congress]

CARB chair calls all this hydrogen/battery fighting “madness” originally appeared on AutoblogGreen on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 20:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Dr. Ken Cassman of Univesity of Nebraska-Lincoln, is now scheduled to make a special presentation at the Nebraska Ethanol Board meeting on March 6. Dr. Cassman is the co-author of a study that found that corn ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 51 percent compared to gasoline.

The study, published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology, found that the emissions created during the production and use of ethanol—lifecycle emissions—are lower than the lifecycle emissions of gasoline. Cassman said that this was partly because ethanol production has recently become more efficient than ever before, while previous studies had relied on outdated data.

“Increased efficiency in ethanol production combined with better agricultural practices mean that ethanol production yields a higher net energy gain and lower emissions than we previously thought,” Cassman said.

Cassman will summarize his research and the process of developing an emissions modeling system during his presentation at the Nebraska Ethanol Board meeting on Friday, March 6 at 8:30 am. The meeting will be held at Hampton Inn South, 5922 Vandervoort Drive, in Lincoln.

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It’s official!
Cleantech, the sixth industrial revolution, has arrived on
time and in the midst of extraordinary crisis. Like every good revolution, blood
is flowing in the streets; the guillotine is en route to Wall Street and the mob
is so busy plotting retribution for the excesses of the past that most have no
time to consider the future. But as yesterday’s dynasties decay, crumble and
fall, a new generation of visionaries is already building on the wreckage of the
past. These are indeed troubled times that bear an eerie resemblance to the
opening sentence from A Tale of Two Cities.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of
wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the
epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness,
it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything
before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were
all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the
present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being
received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”
Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870)

However like all times of trouble, this too shall pass.

In mid-February, President Obama signed an economic stimulus package that
included $38 billion in alternative energy spending. A week later, in a
memorable address to a joint session of Congress, the President outlined a
vision for America’s future that rests on four pillars: energy independence,
improved education, reduced healthcare costs and jobs. Last Thursday, he
unveiled a 10-year plan that envisions $150 billion in alternative energy
subsidies that will be paid for by a carbon cap and trade scheme. After decades
as a backwater agency with a modest mandate and budget, the Department of Energy
is finally surging to the forefront as the powerful agency it should be. With a
little luck we may even see a comprehensive national energy policy and that
would be a wonderful thing.

If you believe the press and listen to the politicians, a brave new world of
clean renewable energy is just around the corner, but there are a couple of
particularly nasty flies in the ointment. Alternative energy is inherently less
stable than its conventional counterparts and cost-efficient transmission,
distribution and storage systems do not yet exist. While the litany of potential
solutions grows longer with each passing day, these solutions are largely
unproven and will take years if not decades to implement nationwide. In the
interim, our only option is to wake up in the morning, go to work with the
toolbox we own, solve our problems to the best of our ability and be ready to
embrace newer and better technologies when they are perfected. If we’re lucky
and sensible,
cheap will triumph over cool.

I’m a dilettante when it comes to power generation, transmission and
distribution, so I’ll leave those issues to better-informed writers and focus my
attention on a narrow sector that I know well, manufactured energy storage
devices.

Historically, batteries have been a critical but largely invisible part
of daily life. They start our cars and power our cell phones but the only times
they merit more than a passing thought are when they need to be recharged or
replaced. With the dawn of cleantech, however, rechargeable batteries are no
longer mere conveniences. For the first time in history, rechargeable batteries
are fundamental enabling technologies that can help smooth the peaks and valleys
in renewable power and foster the development of electric vehicles.
Unfortunately, the battery industry is not ready for the current challenges,
much less the sweeping changes that the cleantech revolution will require.

To understand the current state of battery technology, one must first
understand the historical necessities that were the mother of invention.
Around
250 BC, a clever Babylonian discovered that a genie could be released from a
clay pot containing the right combination of lead and acid. During the 1800s,
people began to find ways to make the genie do useful work beyond
electro-plating and parlor tricks. Until the 1970s, there were only two primary
classes of batteries: rechargeable lead-acid batteries and disposable dry cells.
Lead-acid batteries handled the heavy work like starting cars and providing
emergency lighting while dry cells were used for flashlights, toys and consumer
goods, including the first portable radios and tape players.

In the mid-70s, maintenance free valve regulated lead-acid (VRLA) batteries
were introduced and rapidly became the dominant automotive technology. They
worked so well in fact that most battery manufacturers cut their R&D budgets to
the bone because VRLA batteries performed well and a complacent auto industry
saw no reason to pay premium prices to fund further research. While there was
some progress on deep-cycle batteries for golf carts, forklifts and industrial
systems, R&D in the lead-acid sector essentially took a 25-year siesta as
electrochemistry became passé and college students gravitated toward more
exciting, glamorous and rewarding careers in electronics, communications and
information technology. Over the last few years, rapidly evolving bulk
energy storage needs have sparked a new wave of lead-acid research that
uses modern materials and manufacturing methods to improve and revitalize an
old-line chemistry. The results have been almost magical and an entirely new
generation of advanced lead acid and lead carbon batteries is in the final
stages of pre-commercial development. These products are not widely available
yet, but the new generation of batteries promise extraordinary performance at a
lead-acid price, which once again proves the ancient wisdom that with time,
everything old is new again.

The late 70s were a time of sweeping change as electronics manufacturers
shifted their focus from toys, radios and tape players to productivity tools.
The introduction of business tools like electronic calculators and the pagers,
computers and telephones that quickly followed, drove the development of compact
and light-weight rechargeable battery chemistries including nickel cadmium (Ni-Cd)
nickel metal hydride (Ni-MH) and lithium ion (Li-ion). Since buyers of portable
electronics invariably viewed run time between charges as a critical performance
metric, R&D spending on these technologies soared and continues to this day.

Until recently, rechargeable batteries were not something the average
consumer would think of as a discrete product class. Instead, they were relatively
inexpensive components in high-end consumer durables like cars and electronics.
In automobiles, batteries typically represent less than 1% of total product cost
and in electronics it is rare for batteries to represent more than 5% of product
cost. This historically low ratio of battery cost to total product cost resulted
in a market dynamic where the auto industry could afford to be complacent, while electronics
manufacturers were willing to pay huge premiums for modest improvements in
battery performance. Both approaches were sensible in an earlier epoch, but neither has
any utility in the emerging world of cleantech.

Where batteries were once viewed as low-cost components in expensive
products, the pendulum is swinging in the other direction with a vengeance as
the ratio of battery cost to total product cost escalates to the point where the
batteries represent up to 20% of the cost of an HEV, up to 50% of the cost of an
EV and over 90% of the cost of a grid-based system. Unfortunately, most
batteries are simply too expensive for the jobs people want them to do. As
thought-leaders, policymakers, manufacturers and consumers come to grips with
the cruel and inflexible economic realities, cost accountants and industrial
engineers will end up making the hard buying decisions and the opinions of
futurists, scientists, techno-geeks and bloggers like me will become
increasingly irrelevant. In the end, the only thing that will matter is a
rigorous and comprehensive cost benefit analysis for each new energy storage
application.

A couple days before Christmas, I published “Alternative Energy Storage Needs
to Take Baby Steps Before It Can Run,” an article that was selected
as an Editor’s Pick at Seeking Alpha and included cost data from a July 2008 Sandia National
Laboratories report on its
Solar Energy Grid Integration Systems – Energy
Storage program. While the Sandia report focused on the current and projected
capital costs of energy storage for solar power installations, the basic cost
structure applies to the entire spectrum of energy storage applications. Several
Li-FePO4 advocates promptly pointed me to Chinese Internet sites to support
their arguments that Sandia’s cost estimates are wrong, but I’ve found the
Sandia estimates consistent with available industry cost data and believe they
provide a reasonable basis for investment decisions. The Sandia capital cost estimates are
set forth in the following table:

With the basic cost structure firmly established from reliable sources, it’s
probably worthwhile to revisit some cherished mythologies and incontrovertible
realities that I assembled from eight months of reader comments and discussed at
length in an article on the importance of
rebuilding America’s domestic battery
infrastructure.

Cherished Mythology Lead-acid batteries are environmental hazards.

Incontrovertible Reality With recycling rates approaching 99%, lead-acid
batteries are the most highly recycled product on the planet and substantially
all of the materials recovered through recycling can be used to make new
batteries. Neither NiMH nor Li-ion chemistries can even come close to matching
the natural resource efficiency and environmental safety of lead-acid batteries.

Cherished Mythology Li-ion batteries are one-quarter of the weight of their
lead-acid counterparts.

Incontrovertible Reality The relentless but frequently unsuccessful quest for
product safety has doubled the weight of Li-ion batteries. So while the
explosive Li-ion chemistries have four times the energy density of lead-acid
batteries, the safe Li-ion chemistries only cut the weight in half. In either
event it’s silly to fret about battery weight in the context of a 3,000-pound
car or a stationary power storage installation.

Cherished Mythology NiMH and Li-ion batteries have more power than lead-acid
batteries.

Incontrovertible Reality The recent development of asymmetric lead-carbon
hybrids has improved the power profile of advanced lead-acid batteries to
competitive levels at a fraction of the cost.

Cherished Mythology NiMH and Li-ion batteries have far longer cycle-lives than
lead-acid batteries.

Incontrovertible Reality The recent development of asymmetric lead-carbon
hybrids has improved the cycle-life of advanced lead-acid batteries to
competitive levels at a fraction of the cost.

Cherished Mythology NiMH and Li-ion batteries will improve as the technology
matures.

Incontrovertible Reality NiMH and Li-ion batteries are already fully mature
technologies. Substantially all of the recent advances in Li-ion technology are
like changing a carrot cake recipe; call it what you will, but it’s still a carrot cake
when it comes out of the oven. There have been big safety gains from new
flavors of Li-ion chemistry, but those gains have always come at the cost of
reduced energy density.

Cherished Mythology Li-ion batteries are an ideal solution for most energy
storage problems.

Incontrovertible Reality Li-ion batteries are the best solution for small format
energy storage needs including cellular phones, power tools and portable
computers. They also have significant potential for use in electric bicycles and
hybrid scooters. Their cost effectiveness plummets when the battery pack is
bigger than a breadbox. Even if Li-ion batteries could be cost effective in
power-hungry applications like EVs and stationary applications, sound economics
and rational industrial policies will always favor the manufacture and sale of
5,000,000 cell phones or 500,000 laptops over exporting the same batteries to
power 1,000 EVs.

Cherished Mythology Plug-in electric vehicles provide a cost-effective path to a
clean energy future.

Incontrovertible Reality Plug-in electric vehicles provide dramatic PR sound
bites for politicians, car companies and environmentalists, but even the auto
executives are quick to acknowledge that pure electric vehicles cannot be paying
propositions for the average consumer until gas prices are far higher than they
have ever been.

Cherished Mythology NiMH and Li-ion batteries will get cheaper as demand
increases.

Incontrovertible Reality Roughly 75% of the cost of any battery is raw materials
and NiMH and Li-ion batteries have been mainline industrial products for almost
20 years. The bulk of the potential manufacturing cost savings have already been
achieved and the only way battery prices can fall dramatically is if massive new
supplies of raw materials become available at bargain basement prices.

At the dawn of the cleantech revolution, the financial sector is in shambles and
the Obama administration has thrown down the gauntlet on healthcare spending.
While I
have every confidence that the banks and insurance companies will heal with
time, I also believe that margins in healthcare will be pressured for the
foreseeable future. So the only investable long-term trend that I see in the
current economic and political environment is alternative energy. In the
alternative energy sector, the fundamental enabling technologies are
transmission, distribution and storage. Each of these sub-sectors is essential,
each is a target rich environment for investors and each will be a major
recipient of long-term government support. Since accepted market wisdom holds
that you should never fight the Fed, I think the policy clues for investors are
crystal clear.

I can identify a dozen pure play public companies that have the potential to
make a real difference in America’s energy storage future. Since I’ve made my
personal opinions clear in earlier articles, I won’t bother re-plowing
that ground today. However I encourage readers to study each of the principal
market participants, consider where their existing and proposed products will
mesh with the needs of the coming cleantech revolution, and consider who the
likely buyers of their existing and proposed products will be. The short list of
pure play public companies includes:

As a student I strove for the extreme right hand tail of the bell shaped curve.
As a businessman, I’m delighted to sacrifice the extremes on both ends of the
curve because the bulk of the revenue will go to the company that best serves
the needs of the

guys in the middle.

Disclosure: Author holds a large long position in
Axion Power International (AXPW.OB)
and small long positions in
Active Power (ACPW),
Exide (XIDE),
Enersys (ENS) and
ZBB Energy (ZBB).

John L. Petersen, Esq. is a U.S. lawyer based in Switzerland who works as a partner in the law firm of Fefer Petersen & Cie and represents North American, European and Asian clients, principally in the energy and alternative energy sectors. His international practice is limited to corporate securities and small company finance, where he focuses on guiding small growth-oriented companies through the corporate finance process, beginning with seed stage private placements, continuing through growth stage private financing and concluding with a reverse merger or public offering. Mr. Petersen is a 1979 graduate of the Notre Dame Law School and a 1976 graduate of Arizona State University. He was admitted to the Texas Bar Association in 1980 and licensed to practice as a CPA in 1981. From January 2004 through January 2008, he was securities counsel for and a director of Axion Power International, Inc. a small public company involved in advanced lead-acid battery research and development.

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By Jesse Jenkins, reporting for the Energy Collective and WattHead – Energy News and Commentary

I grabbed a few minutes amidst the buzz and activity of Power Shift 2009 with Jerome Ringo, the President of the Apollo Alliance. As 12,000 young people come together for the largest gathering of citizens on climate and clean energy solutions in U.S. history, Mr. Ringo discusses progress made, challenges ahead, and the unique and critical role young people play in securing a clean energy future.

Jesse Jenkins: Jerome, as President of the Apollo Alliance, you are a leading advocate of a new, clean energy economy, the Apollo Alliance has spent years incubating the vision of clean energy sources that can provide good jobs for America. You must be pretty happy to hear President Obama move that effort to the center of his agenda with his Joint Address to Congress last week.

Jerome Ringo: The Apollo Alliance has been working for years to frame the issue of green jobs and how they can help both the economy and our environment. Luckily, we now have a president who gets it.

The green jobs programs and initiatives promoted by the Apollo Alliance are an answer to the nation’s economic issues. But it goes beyond that … to address the greatest environmental issue we’ve faced in a generation, global warming, as well as the national security issues we face, as we watch body bags coming back from where we’re fighting to defend oil interests on foreign soil.

Investment in green is a win-win-win-win for America and for our communities, and we are fortunate to have a president that gets that.

You are one of the keynote speakers later this evening at Power Shift 2009, where close to 12,000 young people will gather to hear you and other leaders speak. What do you see as the significance of an event like Power Shift 2009?

The Apollo Alliance is about building a coalition around clean energy. The most important part of any coalition that wants to change the status quo is how you prepare the next generation to deal with those issues.

Unfortunately, because of the practices of my generation, we are leaving these young people with one heck of a mess … global warming, the economy is floundering, and we’re being held over an oil barrel by foreign governments. We’ve got to prepare a generation to not only receive the problems my generation created, but to fix them.

With President Obama now pushing for many of the same things Apollo’s coalition has been calling for, new opportunities for significant progress are on the horizon. Of course, the real work is just beginning. What is the role of young people in advancing clean energy solutions, overcoming obstacles and seizing those opportunities in the coming year?

Unfortunately there’s a state of urgency due to the state of the economy and it’s seen that there may be a lack of resources to address these issues. That’s a challenge. So it’s going to take an effort to reactivate activism in this country.

What we can do as green leaders in the movement today, is to invest in the young leaders of this movement to prepare for the challenges ahead.

The election of Barack Obama sent a powerful signal about the power of the voice of young people in this country. Young people have successfully reactivated activism in this country and restored the power of young voices in this country. Whether they are speaking through organized events or through email, the power of young people in moving the presidency forward and bringing a new face to America can be replicated in moving the green movement forward and responding to the many economic and national security challenges we face today.

Thank you Jerome for speaking to me. I’m looking forward to hearing more from you at tonight’s Power Shift 2009 keynote address, and from the voices of the 12,000 young people who are gathered here to repower and reclaim their future.

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If good things come in small packages, then a $70,000 small-business grant from the U.S. EPA could rock the fast food world.  The pea sized grant will go to develop a low cost pollution control retrofit for commercial underfired charbroilers like the one at your local burger joint.  Innova Tech, the company that won the grant, is developing an energy efficient system that combines a filter, vapor condenser, and continuous grease removal system.  If the technology proves successful, it could provide a key to reducing the impact of commercial cookeries on rapid glacier melt.

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As an alternative energy innovation junkie I used to get my climate cooling news from scouring the web, but recently made a green job transfer into California’s very innovation-driven alternative energy industry and have been on such a very steep learning curve (for me) that I got out of that reading loop a bit.

But I am learning how to estimate and design solar systems, so now I get emailed inside news as it breaks from within the solar industry, and…

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Saturn Aura is going to be the first hybrid GM is launching on the US market, as a direct competitor for Toyota Prius. Only in 2006, Toyota sold 107,000 Prius units, creating a big popularity of the hybrid.

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220 Volt Heavy Duty Receptacle. Image credit:Angiogram

This is one of those comparison posts that that could draw many angry comments: like Could Hype Sell An Inferior Hybrid? – Ford Fusion versus Toyota Camry did. Please carefully read the caveats.

Investigators from Carnegie Mellon University, in Pittsburg PA, have made a Volt-type v.s. Prius-type design comparison which flags a big differentiator when emissions and efficiency are normallized: battery price, or, more proper…

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If you happen to have an electric motorcycle, ATV or quad and always wanted to have your name in the record books, your chance for glory might be arriving this upcoming 4th of April. Zero Motorcycles is hosting the world’s very first 24 hour off-road endurance event for battery-powered vehicles and you’re invited to give it a shot. All the action happens “in the heart of San Jose” at the 408MX Motocross Track and registration (PDF), which must be sent in by March 20th, is free. While everyone that enters will get some type of prize (plus free drinks and snacks!), only the top three finishers will bring home trophies so plan on bringing your “A” game.

If you’re an enthusiast and don’t yet have an electric bike, Zero says they want to give you a chance to be involved and will make a “special effort” to make that happen. We’re not sure exactly what they mean by that but we do know that anyone who buys a Zero X now will get about $745 back at tax time next year due to the federal tax credits now in effect. While we’re on the topic of Zero Motorcycles, we should mention that the video we featured last month by Blake Mitchell won that month’s prize and the rider now has an extra battery to swap out. Nice.

[Source: Zero Motorcycles]

Filed under: EV/Plug-in, On Two Wheels, USA, Racing

Zero Motorcycles to host 24 Hours Of Electricross originally appeared on AutoblogGreen on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 17:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Late in 2008, Ford revealed that it would be re-tooling several North American plants to build smaller vehicles that will be brought over from Europe over the next several years. One of those is a Louisville, Kentucky truck plant that was expected to make vehicles based off the European Focus. A Louisville TV station is reporting that sources have told them that one of the vehicles coming from the plant will be the Ford Kuga crossover. The Kuga was launched in Europe last year to very positive reviews. If the Kuga is offered in the U.S., its not clear if it will replace the Escape or supplement it. Either way it will make a stylish, smaller addition to Ford’s domestic lineup.

Related:

• Geneva 2008: 2009 Ford Kuga arrives in Europe under diesel power

[Source: WAVE3.com]

Filed under: Ford

Kentucky Ford plant could build Kuga crossover originally appeared on AutoblogGreen on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 15:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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