Iceland digs deep for geothermal energy  

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Vox has an article on Icelandic efforts to develop deep geothermal energy reserves - Iceland is digging a seriously deep hole to tap a new source of clean energy.

Most geothermal projects harvest energy from hot rocks relatively near the surface, at temperatures of around 200 degrees Celsius. But the Iceland Deep Drilling Project (IDDP) is going much deeper, in search of hot magma reservoirs that generate temperatures between 400 degrees Celsius and 1,000 degrees Celsius. If that energy could be tapped, a single well could generate 10 times as much electricity as a conventional geothermal well.

There’s some precedent for this idea. In 2009, the IDDP was drilling a conventional geothermal well and accidentally struck upon a magma reservoir 1.2 miles below the surface. When they poured water into it, they were able to draw out superheated steam at temperatures higher than 400 degrees Celsius — an extremely potent source of energy. So now they’re trying to see if they can replicate the concept.

What OPEC’s Oil U-Turn Missed: Peak Demand Keeps Getting Closer  

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Bloomberg has an article on "peak oil demand", as OPEC members try to pump as fast as possible - What OPEC’s Oil U-Turn Missed: Peak Demand Keeps Getting Closer.

OPEC’s decision last month to reverse its policy of unfettered production and cut oil output to boost prices may be at odds with the industry’s most important long-term trend: demand for what they produce could start falling within 15 years.

If rapid improvements continue in renewable energy, electric vehicles and other disruptive technologies, petroleum consumption will peak in 2030 and decline thereafter, according to a report from the World Energy Council. As the globe’s largest producers gather in London this week for the Oil and Money conference, they might want to check their assumption that the market will grow for decades to come.

The plunging cost of renewable energy -- with solar-module costs falling 50 percent since 2009 -- is already upending the business model of utilities. Disruption could spread to the oil industry as electric vehicles become more economic than gasoline or diesel cars, potentially displacing millions of barrels of daily fuel use by the late 2020s. Projections for decades of demand growth that underpin investments in oil projects could be misplaced.

The Myth Of Renewables Threatening Grid Stability  

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RNE has a look at the increasing penetration of renewables for power generation, demonstrating they pose no issue for grid stability - The Myth Of Renewables Threatening Grid Stability.

Germany’s power grid outage averaged 12.7 minutes last year, 41% less than in 2006, even though renewables have grown to account for as much as a third of power generation in the country, according to data released by the federal regulator last week.

This put to rest concerns about intermittent sources of power threatening grid stability. The country is weaning itself away from nuclear power and embracing renewables generation, providing a working model of transformation of the energy sector for many other countries. ...

Meanwhile, there are countries that are still stretching their clean energy targets. Morocco wants to increase the proportion of energy consumption from renewables to 42% by 2020 and up to 52% by 2030, by when it aims to have 10.1GW of renewables – 4.6GW of solar, 4.2GW of wind and 1.3GW of hydro power.

Drilling Down: Batteries upend Peak Oil debate  

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The AFR has a look at the dim future for oil producers in a world of electric vehicles and "peak oil demand" - Drilling Down: Batteries upend Peak Oil debate.

If "peak oil" conjures up thoughts of when oil output will reach its maximum then you're way behind the times. Now it's all about demand.

And rather than a debate about the geology, it's about technology, and when batteries will force consumption of oil – or at least oil used for transport fuels – into terminal decline.

In an assessment last week by Fitch Ratings of credit risks to various sectors from a breakthrough in battery technology, oil came at the top of the list, meriting a "serious threat" diagnosis. While the utilities and automotive sectors can scratch out some new opportunities from the rise of batteries, it's all downside for oil producers.

Tesla Unveils its New Line of Camouflaged Solar Panels  

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Wired has an article on Tesla's new solar roof and energy storage (Powerwall including solar inverter) product announcements - Tesla Unveils its New Line of Camouflaged Solar Panels.

Tesla is also noting that their commercial / utility energy storage product, the "Powerpack" is "gaining momentum".

EVER THE SHOWMAN, Tesla CEO Elon Musk took to the stage at Universal Studios in LA this evening promising to make solar sexy. To that end, he unveiled a range of textured glass tiles with integrated solar cells that are nearly indistinguishable from conventional tiling, along with a sleek update to the company’s energy-storing Powerwall.

A couple hundred invited guests, mostly Tesla owners, ooh-ed and ahh-ed as Musk revealed that a row of suburban American houses on Wisteria Lane—the old set of Desperate Housewives—were all, in fact, topped with solar roofs. Each house’s old roofing material had been stripped away, and replaced with one of four new styles of solar tile. From the street, it was virtually impossible to tell; the roofs retained a variety of traditional looks, from textured slate shingle to terra cotta tile. ...

The solar roofs are designed to be used with the Tesla Powerwall. Version 2.0, which Musk also unveiled today, is a bright white rectangle, and flatter than the first version, which Tesla released in April 2015. It will cost $5,500 for 14kWh of storage and 7kW peak power draw. That’s enough to power a four bedroom house for a day.

'Great Pacific garbage patch' far bigger than imagined, aerial survey shows  

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The Guardian has an update on the "great pacific garbage patch" - 'Great Pacific garbage patch' far bigger than imagined, aerial survey shows.

The vast patch of garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean is far worse than previously thought, with an aerial survey finding a much larger mass of fishing nets, plastic containers and other discarded items than imagined.

A reconnaissance flight taken in a modified C-130 Hercules aircraft found a vast clump of mainly plastic waste at the northern edge of what is known as the “great Pacific garbage patch”, located between Hawaii and California. The density of rubbish was several times higher than the Ocean Cleanup, a foundation part-funded by the Dutch government to rid the oceans of plastics, expected to find even at the heart of the patch, where most of the waste is concentrated.

Australia In Danger Of Missing Out On Solar Thermal  

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The latest IEA renewable market report conspicuously failed to mention Australia in it's list of desert-rich countries in developing solar thermal power - Australia In Danger Of Missing Out On Solar Thermal And Storage.

The latest mid-term renewable energy outlook document from the International Energy Agency says China, Chile, Morocco and South Africa are likely to take a lead in solar thermal developments in the next five years. There is no mention of Australia.

The IEA says there are currently about 4.6GW of large-scale solar thermal projects in the world, around half of them in Spain, which led early development. Over the next five years, it sees an additional 6.4GW of solar thermal – nearly all of it with storage – although this figure could nearly double in its “accelerated” deployment scenario.

IEA: Renewables largest source of installed power capacity in the world  

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The IEA has released their Medium-Term Renewable Market Report - IEA raises its five-year renewable growth forecast as 2015 marks record year.

The International Energy Agency said today that it was significantly increasing its five-year growth forecast for renewables thanks to strong policy support in key countries and sharp cost reductions. Renewables have surpassed coal last year to become the largest source of installed power capacity in the world.

The latest edition of the IEA’s Medium-Term Renewable Market Report now sees renewables growing 13% more between 2015 and 2021 than it did in last year’s forecast, due mostly to stronger policy backing in the United States, China, India and Mexico. Over the forecast period, costs are expected to drop by a quarter in solar PV and 15 percent for onshore wind.

Last year marked a turning point for renewables. Led by wind and solar, renewables represented more than half the new power capacity around the world, reaching a record 153 Gigawatt (GW), 15% more than the previous year. Most of these gains were driven by record-level wind additions of 66 GW and solar PV additions of 49 GW.

Watch Tesla’s new fully self-driving car navigate around Palo Alto, driving through intersections & finding its own parking spot  

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Elektrek has an article on Tesla's latest self-driving vehicle technology - Watch Tesla’s new fully self-driving car navigate around Palo Alto, driving through intersections & finding its own parking spot.

The summoning mode reminds me of the car "Kit" in the old TV series Knight Rider. Apparently Tesla are looking to train the machine intelligence that operates the vehicle using real-world driver behaviour data captured over the coming months before rolling out the software to customer vehicles.

BNEF has a study on the "future of urban mobility" (AN INTEGRATED PERSPECTIVE ON THE FUTURE OF MOBILITY) which follows on the footsteps of their report earlier in the year looking at the growth of electric vehicle sales (ELECTRIC VEHICLES TO BE 35% OF GLOBAL NEW CAR SALES BY 2040).

Tesla released a video demonstration of a Model X equipped with its latest self-driving sensor suite, which is going into Tesla’s vehicles right now, and using the most advanced version of the software, which will be pushed to owners gradually throughout the coming year. The demo shows the Model X self-driving around Palo Alto, near Tesla’s headquarters. ...

Tesla CEO Elon Musk says that “when searching for parking, the car reads the signs to see if it is allowed to park there, which is why it skipped the disabled spot.”

When you have to get back to your car, of course, Tesla will not make you try to find it. You can tap ‘Summon’, like the current feature in ‘Tesla Autopilot 1’, but with the new hardware suite Musk says that “it will eventually find you even if you are on the other side of the country” instead of the 39 feet the first generation Autopilot can travel.

The Biggest Building Boom in History  

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Alex Steffen has a post at Medium on the need for a infrastructure boom (particularly constructing green buildings) - The Biggest Building Boom in History.

The Guardian reported last week on a new study saying that over the next 15 years, to meet our climate goals, we’ll need to shift $90 trillion worth of new infrastructure spending to low- or zero-carbon models. As the study’s authors say:

“Investing in sustainable infrastructure is key to tackling the three central challenges facing the global community: reigniting growth, delivering on the Sustainable Development Goals, and reducing climate risk in line with the Paris Agreement. Transformative change is needed now in how we build our cities, produce and use energy, transport people and goods, and manage our landscapes. And the challenge is urgent.”

Wind Energy Could Supply 20% Of Global Electricity By 2030  

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Cleantechnica has a post on this year's Global Wind Energy Outlook report - Wind Energy Could Supply 20% Of Global Electricity By 2030. The main obstacle to this is probably the rise of solar power - with solar PV generation doubling every 2 years there might not be enough room left for additional wind power in 2030.

Specifically, the report outlined ways in which wind power could reach 2,110 GW by 2030, supplying up to 20% of global electricity while simultaneously creating 2.4 million new jobs, reducing carbon emissions by more than 3.3 billion tonnes per year, and attracting annual investments of €200 billion. ...

“Wind power is the most competitive option for adding new capacity to the grid in a growing number of markets,” Sawyer continued, “but if the Paris agreement targets are to be reached, that means closing fossil fuel fired power plants and replacing them with wind, solar, hydro, geothermal and biomass. That will be the hard part, and governments will have to get serious about it if they are to live up to the commitments to which they have now bound themselves.”

EIA Annual Energy Outlook: Renewable Energy Growth Blows EIA Forecasts Out of the Water, Again  

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DeSmogBlog has a (slightly old now) post on the US Energy Information Agency's long standing habit of underestimating growth in renewable energy - Renewable Energy Growth Blows EIA Forecasts Out of the Water, Again.

Another year, another U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) assessment report that makes the agency's own forecasters look foolish.

In the latest Electric Power Monthly report, which covers all twelve months of 2015, the EIA revealed that renewable energy sources accounted for nearly 13.5-percent of the nation’s utility-scale electrical output. This is up by more than 2-percent over 2014. But get this: less than three months earlier, in the “Short-Term Energy Outlook,” the agency predicted “total renewables used in the electric power sector to decrease by 1.8% in 2015.”

The EIA’s record for long-term forecasts is no better. In fact, it’s consistently worse. ...

“Just a few years ago EIA had forecast that renewables might provide 15% of the nation's electricity by 2035,” said Bossong. “It now appears that goal could be reached within the next two years and quite possibly sooner!”

This isn’t the rare instance of the EIA getting something wrong. Rather, it’s something of an annual tradition. Consider these examples, taken at random (and culled from links I’ve bookmarked over the past few years under the tag, “EIA wrong”):

“In 2009, the federal government’s Energy Information Administration made a forecast for the next two decades: U.S. wind power would grow modestly, reaching 44 gigawatts of generating capacity in 2030, while solar power would remain scarce, inching up to 12 GW. Just six years later, U.S. wind capacity is already up to 66 GW, and solar has shot up to 21 GW. There's now enough installed wind and solar to power 25 million American homes— more than three times what the EIA expected before President Obama took office.” Michael Grunwald in Politico

“In 2005, EIA forecast that U.S. solar power capacity would hit about 1.2 GW in 2013. Where are we right now [in 2013]? According to Greentech Media, the U.S. is closing in (if it already hasn’t passed) the 10 GW mark in solar PV capacity right about now, and that’s not even counting solar thermal power generating capacity (according to this article, you can add another 1 GW or so of U.S. solar thermal power capacity). In sum, EIA forecast 1.2 GW of U.S. solar power capacity in 2013; the actual figure is around 11 GW – nearly 10 times higher than EIA forecast!” Former EIA employee Lowell Feld, in 2013.

“The report this year [2015] predicts that by 2040, the U. S. will have added only 48 gigawatts of solar generating capacity. The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) expects that the industry will add half of that by the end of 2016. “ Samantha Page in ThinkProgress

In an update on June 2015, the EIA projected that the cheapest solar deployed in 2020 would cost $89 / mwh, after subsidies. That’s 8.9 cents / kwh to most of us. (This assumes that the solar Investment Tax Credit is not extended.)…How has that forecast worked out? Well, in Austin, Greentech Media reports that there are 1.2GW of bids for solar plants at less than $40/mwh, or 4c/kwh. And there are bids on the table for buildouts after the ITC goes away at similar prices. Ramez Naam

Scottish Tidal Power Technology Escapes To China  

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The Guardian has an article on no-defunct Scottish tidal power company Pelamis - Mysterious factory break-in raises suspicions about Chinese visit.

It was an unusual burglary, in which four or five laptops were stolen from a Scottish renewable energy manufacturer in the dead of a March night in 2011. So innovative was the company that it had been been visited by a 60-strong delegation led by China’s then vice-premier only two months before.

Nothing else was taken from the company and the crime, while irritating, went unsolved and forgotten – until a few years later pictures began emerging that showed a remarkably similar project manufactured in the world’s most populous country.

Australian Oil and gas tax may raise no extra revenue for decades  

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The Age has an article comparing the income generated from natural gas exports by new global production leader Australia over the previous incumbent, Qatar - Turnbull government called on to explain where Australia's offshore gas wealth is going.

By 2021 Australia will eclipse the Persian Gulf state of Qatar to become the world's biggest exporter of liquefied natural gas. In that year, when both countries are forecast to pump and ship roughly 100 billion cubic metres of LNG each, Qatar's government will receive $26.6 billion in royalties from the multinational companies exploiting its offshore gasfields. According to Treasury estimates, Australia will receive just $800 million for the same volume of gas leaving its shores.

RIP Bill Mollison  

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The Guardian reports that permaculture pioneer Bill Mollison has passed away - Bill Mollison obituary.

Bill Mollison, who has died aged 88, was one of the co-creators of permaculture, an agricultural system that works with, rather than against, nature, on the basis that the natural world holds the key to stable and productive systems. Having developed the concept, he then travelled from his native Tasmania for 30 years to embed his approach worldwide. His ideas have spread widely – permaculture is practised in more than 140 countries and by more than 3 million people – even though in the 1970s the idea was considered, in Mollison’s words, “the highest form of sedition”.

Much of what he espoused was based on his great respect for the wisdom of subsistence farmers around the world, who have long used sustainable methods to grow their crops. In agricultural terms, this means planting diverse sets of crops, using perennial species to form productive stable systems, and ensuring the conditions for soils to be regenerated.

Other characteristics that he observed in the Tasmanian wilderness informed permaculture, for instance that the interfaces between different habitats are the most productive and that elements such as plants and animals need to be placed together so they are mutually beneficial – as once when he pointed out: “You don’t have a slug problem, you have a duck deficiency!”

Mollison pointed to further beneficial ecological consequences: “The only safe energy systems are those derived from biological systems. A New Guinea gardener can walk through the gates of his garden taking one unit of energy and hand out 70. A modern farmer who drives a tractor through the gate takes 1,000 units of energy in and gives one back. Who is the most sophisticated agriculturalist?”

New record low cost for solar power  

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Inhabitat has a post on falling solar power prices - The cost of solar power has fallen 25% in just five months

In just five months, the cost of solar plummeted an incredible 25 percent as demonstrated by two recent construction bids for solar projects in China and Abu Dhabi. On August 11 a bid of $0.46/W was put forward to build 500 megawatts of solar power in China and on September 19 a record low bid of $0.023/kWh was submitted for 1.2 gigawatts of solar power in Abu Dhabi.

Tesla Expands California Manufacturing Facility  

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The San Jose Mercury news has an article on expansion plans for Tesla's car making factory - Tesla eyes big Fremont expansion, 3,100 jobs could be created.

Tesla Motors has proposed construction of 4.6 million square feet of new space next to its electric vehicle factory in Fremont, a move that could create 3,100 new jobs and would nearly double the size of its existing auto plant.

China's growing oil stockpile  

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The Washington Post has an article on China's strategic oil reserve - China may be stockpiling more oil than anyone realized.

One of the mysteries of the oil market is the question of how much crude oil China has squirreled away in commercial and strategic stockpiles.

Now a satellite-imaging firm called Orbital Insight claims to have an answer. It says Chinese inventories in May stood at 600 million barrels, substantially more than commonly thought and nearly as much as the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Chinese storage capacity, which includes working inventory, is four times widely used estimates, Orbital Insight says, adding that the firm has not only counted storage tanks but has also used imaging techniques to figure out how much oil is in the tanks.

The issue could influence expectations in oil markets. If China has built larger reserves than previously estimated, that means much of what looked like oil demand over the past couple of years was not a result of higher consumption but of strategic planning.

Aliens helping to bring free energy to earth ?  

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One interesting snippet that emerged from the "Podesta emails" on Wikileaks was this weird email from one time Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell in which he mentions aliens "helping us" bring "zero point energy" to earth.

While it's entirely possibly he could just be a nut spamming someone of political influence it does make you wonder...

Remember, our nonviolent ETI from the contiguous universe are helping us bring zero point energy to Earth.

While I'm a big fan of both Julian Assange and Edward Snowden, I think that leaks of information are (unfortunately) going to become increasingly politicised in future, with the validity of the information coming into question.

Bruce Schneier recently had a post on "Organizational Doxing and Disinformation" he he talked about the problem of the leaker (or supplier of information to the leaker) throwing in a few choice items that aren't real.

Forging thousands -- or more -- documents is difficult to pull off, but slipping a single forgery in an actual cache is much easier. The attack could be something subtle. Maybe a country that anonymously publishes another country's diplomatic cables wants to influence yet a third country, so adds some particularly egregious conversations about that third country. Or the next hacker who steals and publishes email from climate change researchers invents a bunch of over-the-top messages to make his political point even stronger. Or it could be personal: someone dumping email from thousands of users making changes in those by a friend, relative, or lover.

Imagine trying to explain to the press, eager to publish the worst of the details in the documents, that everything is accurate except this particular email. Or that particular memo. That the salary document is correct except that one entry. Or that the secret customer list posted up on WikiLeaks is correct except that there's one inaccurate addition. It would be impossible. Who would believe you? No one. And you couldn't prove it.

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