Solar and wind energies are going slowly but irresistibly mainstream as more and more large deals are being signed worldwide. Even if they still represent a tiny fraction of the world electricity generation, this will change this decade. The 2.5 GW deal signed in Ontario (Canada) by Samsung for $6.6 billion – 4.7 billion euros – […]
A huge solar and wind energy deal for Ontario Read More »
20 percent of America’s – and perhaps the world’s – electricity could soon come from wind and solar. Our societies thus need reliable, cheap and sustainable energy storage solutions. Concentrated solar could benefit from molten salts, yet wind energy doesn’t have yet its own solution. German and Swiss utilities are working on Compressed Air Energy Storage
The critical issue of back up power Read More »
Solar energy is to me the panacea for Africa, a continent where 550 million people still lack electricity. With molten salts, concentrating solar could bring light to these populations during important parts of the night. Solar cookers could also help fighting deforestation by removing the need for fuelwood. Now an experiment run in Benin (West Africa) shows
Solar energy, a panacea for Africa Read More »
The World Bank via its Clean Technology Fund is investing $750 million (522 million euros) in eleven concentrating solar plants in the Middle East and North Africa region. This is due to spur additional investments worth $4.85 billion. These projects are due to add nearly a gigawatt of capacity to local grids within three to
World Bank funds solar projects in North Africa Read More »
Here is my latest post for CleanTechies : According to a new report [Fr] from the ADEME ( the French Environment and Energy Management Agency ) 90,000 jobs have been created in the French green growth sectors between 2006 and 2008. These jobs have been created mostly in energy conservation and the development of renewable
Green economy: 90,000 new green jobs in France Read More »
Earlier this year I was wondering if cleantech is the new arms race. I noted at the time that America, Europe and China are beginning to compete in such an important economic sector. A US study released last month shows that not only there is an arms race between the United States and Asian nations,
The Cleantech arms race continues Read More »
Scientific American published in this month’s issue an article on how the world could completely stop relying on fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear) by 2030 and use only solar, wind and water energies. To make a long story short and after reading the various critics this is completely impossible. We can go
Can we stop relying on fossil fuels by 2030 ? Read More »
One of the main hindrances of solar energy is that when there is no more sun, there is no more electricity as well. This problem is being solved with the molten salt technology which stores energy for seven hours. A Californian company is willing to build a 150 Megawatt plant – The Rice Solar Energy
Storing solar electricity with molten salt Read More »
Concentrating Solar Thermal is a fantastic energy source and some experts estimate that it could answer a quarter of the global electricity needs by 2050 if large plants were installed in sunny deserts. However the New York Times notes that this energy source use significant amounts of water. Since this resource is already scarce in
Concentrating solar needs huge amounts of water Read More »
The European Union will give over the next decade up to 50 billion Euros to research on low carbon energy. Solar energies will receive 16 billion euros, wind power 6 billion, nuclear 7 and energy from waste and biomass 9 billion. This is due to enable the 27 members to compete on cleantech with the
EU to give 50 billion euros to energy research Read More »
