wrdforwrd

Solar firms Suntech Power Holdings and Petra Solar have joined forces with a plan to develop and market utility-grade pole mounted solar AC systems and AC module products.

Financial terms and the scope of the deal were not disclosed. In a joint statement they said their alliance will “target unique pole mounted allocations for utilities in the U.S. and the rest of the world.”

It’s a powerful match between two major players in the solar industry. Suntech, with regional headquarters in China, Switzerland and San Francisco, is the world’s leading manufacturer of crystalline silicon photovoltaic (PV) modules, and the South Plainfield, NJ-based Petra designs and manufactures intelligent utility-grade solar energy and smart grid systems.

In a statement, Dr. Zhengrong Shi, Suntech’s founder, chairman and CEO said: “We recognize that Petra Solar is the leader in the development of innovative utility grade, pole-mounted distributed PV systems. Their vision to create a market for intelligent solar energy systems attached to utility poles and streetlights, which combines distributed solar generation and smart grid technology, has great potential for Suntech.”

Dr. Shihab Kuran, founder, president and CEO of Petra Solar, returned the compliment: “Suntech’s global reach and well deserved reputation for market leading products provide compelling value to the utility market in the United States and around the globe. Suntech has the world’s largest crystalline silicon module manufacturing capacity and we look forward to expanding our market coverage to address all segments of the global utility market as a result of this alliance.”

Kuran says the collaboration will create a host of green jobs.

Petra’s SunWave utility grade solar AC systems are designed to mount quickly and safely to utility distribution and streetlight poles and deliver power directly to the grid. The systems consist of a high efficiency PV module and integral line voltage inverter with comprehensive communications and smart grid capabilities.

The company’s  AC Module has received CSA Certification according to UL standards. In addition, Petra received CSA Qualification for Witness Testing for its manufacturing facility in South Plainfield, NJ, where AC modules and systems will be manufactured.

Suntech says its Suntech’s patent-pending Pluto technology for crystalline silicon solar cells improves power output by up to 12 percent compared to conventional production methods.

A China State Council policy paper released early this month aims to stimulate the country’s bioindustry by building a number of large enterprises operated by multinational companies.

The policy outline also encompasses “innovation-oriented small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and industrialization bases,” according to the June 2 People’s Daily Online report. Other reports on this appears in China Daily and Xinhua.

The measures, Policies to Accelerate Biological Industry Growth, comprise 33 items in 10 parts, involving policy targets, key fields in the biological industry, technology innovation, attracting talent and providing fund support.

China sees this bioindustry policy boost as potentially producing revenue of 500 billion yuan ($73.1 billion), although the timeframe for this is unclear.

“Efforts should be made to attract more technologies, talents and capital to the bio-industry and build an innovation system with companies playing the leading role. Important technologies, products and standards with Chinese independent intellectual property rights have to be developed,” the PD report says.

The policy document identifies priorities in the bio-pharmaceutical, bio-agriculture, bio-energy, bio-manufacturing and bio-environmental protection sectors.

”Governments at all levels are required to invest more on R&D and industrialization of bio-tech, especially on demonstration projects of priority technologies,” the PD continues. “The national government will give support to biodegradable materials and bio-energy products, including non-grain made fuel ethanol, bio-diesel, biomass thermal power, etc.”

Also, enterprises, research institutions, higher education institutions and individuals “are encouraged” to file for IP protection for new botanic varieties, patents and trademarks.

Favorable tax treatment will be granted to R&D costs for new technologies, new techniques and new products under the new policy.

The document also stresses the importance of greater efforts to protect biogenetic resources, bio-safety management and ethical review of bio-research.

Fungible fungi?

There are two guys, Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre, who want to line the walls of your home with mushrooms. Instead of getting the mold out they want to put put it to more unique and productive use.

This is not something out of Alice in Wonderland, or maybe it is. Anyway they have developed a strong, low-cost biomaterial called Greensulate that could replace the expensive and eco-harmful Styrofoam and plastics used in wall insulation, packaging and other products. This could even be used for wind turbine blades and auto-body panels, the two say.  They even won a Popular Science Invention Award for their efforts.

“We like to call it low-tech biotech,” Bayer says. In the lab, they grow mycelia, the vegetative roots of mushrooms that resemble bundles of white fiber. But instead of soil, the roots grow in a bed of agricultural by-products like buckwheat husks, and those intertwining fibers give the material structural support. The mixture is placed inside a panel (or whatever shape is required) and, after 10 to 14 days, the mycelia develop a dense network — just one cubic inch of the white-and-brown-specked Greensulate insulation contains eight miles of interconnected mycelia strands. The panels are dried in an oven at between 100° and 150°F to stop mycelia growth, and at the end of two weeks, they’re ready to do their thing on the wall.

In 2007, the inventors incorporated under the name Ecovative Design and won $16,000 in funding through the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance. A year later, joined by now-COO Ed Browka and other team members, they took the $700,000 prize at the PICNIC Green Challenge in Amsterdam.

Ecovative, based in Troy, New York, has begun a trial run of Greensulate panels as replacements for insulation in a Vermont school gym. The partners expect to complete all industrial certification and testing by the end of the year.

They enlisted Jeff Brooks of the Timberline Panel Company to advise them on meeting American Society for Testing and Materials standards for building insulation. “If they get to the point where I think they’ll get,” he says, “there’s a chance there would be no reason to use conventional foam products.”

 
Solar dollars?

On another note entirely and away from dampish shadows and into the sunlight: Cleantech Group’s Neal Dikeman on Friday said his group is “actively looking to buy solar projects and development teams and pipelines. Primarily in the US, but will look elsewhere as well for the right opportunity.”

Contact him at dikeman@janecapital.com “if you are in that sector and looking for capital.”

I posted this on Triple Pundit earlier this week and wanted to place it on my bit of cyberspace.

Schott Corporation’s focus is on glass and the powerful ideas that can shine through glass.

The $3 billion company, with corporate offices Germany and North America, employs about 17,000 people. It has virtually cornered the market on a multitude of glass uses from pharmaceutical packaging to fiber optics to microlithography to glass tubing. But the 125-year-old company’s big push for decades and especially lately is in concentrated solar energy for power plants and photovoltaic technology applications.

The group’s Schott Solar unit has more than 50 years of experience in solar technology. And it sees a major opportunity for solar in Africa. Lars Waldmann, the company’s public relations manager notes that given Africa’s abundant solar resources and it underdeveloped electric power sector, solar technologies are a big part of the continent’s energy answer.

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The collapse of the forest products industry, especially in Canada, has idled many paper and pulp mills but out of that continuing disaster comes an opportunity for biofuels and bioenergy.

There’s some evidence of that this week from the Government of Saskatchewan, even if it is a vaguely worded. The Canadian province reached an agreement with Iogen Energy and Domtar, a major Canadian paper and wood products company, which “sets the stage for the potential redevelopment of the Prince Albert mill site as a cellulosic-based ethanol plant and bioenergy facility.”

Under the agreement Iogen, a biotechnology firm based in Ottawa, would convert the Domtar pulp mill – idle since 2006 – into a facility that would convert cereal straw to cellulosic ethanol. If a final investment decision is positive, the province says, the multi-million dollar project, in partnership with Royal Dutch Shell, would also include a power plant generating electricity from forest and ethanol plant residues. Shell and Iogen are linked through a commercial alliance.

The money/investment part is also vague at this point because Iogen/Shell won’t make a final investment decision on the project until design and feasibility work is completed. If the project then proceeds Iogen will buy the mill assets from Domtar.

The Saskatchewan government would then assume ownership of the remaining mill property not involved in the Iogen bioenergy initiative, and take responsibility for the existing environmental cleanup obligations associated with the decommissioning of the pulp mill site. In exchange, Domtar would pay an environmental settlement fee to the province as compensation for its share of the environmental site obligations.

The quote, from Bill Boyd, Saskatchewan’s energy and resources minister: “Redevelopment of this mill site has been a priority for us, for our forest industry and for people of the area. A final decision still needs to be made by the company, but this agreement is an important first step in our commitment to find new uses for the mill facilities, new markets for our forest and agricultural resources and new forestry jobs for Saskatchewan people.” He called the deal a “win-win” situation for the forest industry and area farmers while showcasing new technology and new approaches from Iogen. So it’s a win-win-win, eh?

Iogen is planning public meetings later this month with communities and the First Nations tribe in the region as it evaluates the pulp mill site. The company also will move ahead with detailed engineering studies and the required environmental approvals.

The agreement is the “essential next step” for the Saskatchewan project, says Iogen Chief Operating Officer Pat Foody. “It allows us to proceed with the development and assessment work that will provide the needed input into the eventual decision whether to proceed.”

If it does proceed, the province said it would purchase green power produced from the plant and also “provide new growth tax incentives related to technology commercialization and transportation.”

Slow change is better than no change: BP America and the Port of Long Beach Wednesday opened the world’s first oil tanker terminal equipped with shore power plugs.

A major source of air pollution in port areas comes from the giant vessels that tie up at their docks to load and unload cargo. That’s because the powerful diesel engines have to run continuously to keep the ships’ equipment and support systems operating. That also means continuous spewing of ghg and diesel particulate emissions into the local air.

A solution to this massive emissions problem has long existed but is not widely implemented because of the expensive modifications required for on-ship and offshore facilities. It’s called shore power, which allows ships to shut down their diesel engines at berth and literally plug into the landside electricity grid, thus vastly improving air quality.

The BP terminal on Pier T is actually Long Beach’s second dock equipped with shore power, but it’s the first such facility in the world for “liquid bulk” ships — vessels that transport large amounts of petroleum and related fuels.

Reducing air pollution is a major component of the port’s Green Port Policy, adopted in 2005. Also this week Long Beach issued a call for ideas to implement a zero-emission container movement system.

The ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, along with the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority are seeking new technology to move cargo containers between docks and the Intermodal Container Transfer Facility near West Long Beach, potentially eliminating thousands of short-haul diesel truck trips each day and reducing air pollution.

Proposed technologies might include electric guideways, zero-emission trucks, or electrified rail, all of which use electricity to power the movement of cargo, rather than diesel-fueled trucks.

Shore power, also known as “cold-ironing,” allows a specially equipped vessel to plug in at berth. The vessel can then draw power for its pumps, communications, ventilation, lighting and other needs from Southern California Edison, instead of its own diesel engines.

Providing shore power to an off-loading oil tanker is the pollution-reducing equivalent of removing 187,000 cars from the road for a day. In a year, shore power will eliminate more than 30 tons of pollution.

BP’s shore power installation delivers enough electricity to power about 5,500 homes — up to 8 megawatts at 6,660 volts. The Alaska Tanker Company has equipped two vessels that regularly visit the port to be able to plug into the BP Terminal on Pier T, which supplies local refineries with crude oil. The joint project was completed at a cost of $23.7 million: $17.5 million from the port and $6.2 million from BP.

First- and second-gen biofuels get White House boost

It looks like the Governors’ Biofuel Coalition got what it was looking for from President Obama – an endorsement of biofuels development, support for the continued viability of the existing ethanol industry and an invite to partner with members of the administration on energy independence.

In a letter late last month to the coalition leadership, Obama asked the Coalition to join him in implementing his Presidential Biofuels Directive, which was issued earlier in May.

The directive outlined the President’s vision for biofuels development and his expectations for key cabinet and administration officials to lead the Administration’s biofuels initiatives. The President noted that the Coalition’s February 2009 recommendations helped form key points of the directive, and led to the President’s request for the Coalition to work with “members of my cabinet to implement the directive.”

Biofuels are the “primary near term option for insulating consumers against future oil prove shocks and for lowering the transportation sector’s carbon footprint,” the president writes.

In the letter Obama says he is committed to the rapid development of “an array of emerging cellulosic technologies so that tomorrow’s biofuels will be produced from sustainable biomass feedstocks and waste materials rather than corn.”

He continues: “This transition will be successful only if the first-generation biofuels industry remains viable in the near-term, and if we remove long-standing artificial barriers to market expansion necessary for large volumes of of advanced renewable fuels to find a place in America’s transportation fuels system.”

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