Category — Coaching

In the months since the inauguration of the Obama administration many people, myself included, have been waiting to see how all the campaign talk about green jobs, green economies, alternative energy, etc. will actually be turned into laws.

In this photo taken Wednesday, July 1, 2009, a woman rides a bicycle near the electric bicycles and mopeds parking in Shanghai, China. Industry estimates put the number of electric bikes and scooters on the roads at more than 65 million. It

Per capita, the United States is by far the largest polluter of the global climate. Naturally we don’t want to keep this title and rather establish a leadership role that changes the world economy from a recession shaken state into a growth state with new energy alternatives and the ET (Energy Technologies) that Thomas Friedman demands in his latest book “hot, flat, and crowded”

It is interesting to pause and take a look at where we stand right now:
The 2009 G8 Summit has been held on July 10th in L’Aquila, Italy, as a mark of solidarity with the people of Abruzzo after the recent terrible earthquake. The leaders of the G8 agreed that the increase in global average temperatures should not exceed 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels by 2020. The media has turned its attention to the Copenhagen Climate Conference which will be in session from 7th to 18th December 2009 of this year in Copenhagen, Denmark, but what is this conference and what issues will it cover?

In 1990, the United Nations General Assembly decided to start work on a climate change convention. This lead to 154 countries signing the United Nations Framework Climate Change Convention (UNFCCC) at the UN Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Since then, 192 countries including the USA and UK have ratified (To approve and make valid) the convention.

Now every year since the convention was established, a conference takes place called Conference of the Parties or COP for short, where the countries which have ratified the convention meet to discuss how they can meet the objective of the convention, which is to prevent global warming. Most people are referring to this years conference as the Copenhagen summit/conference. Officially it is called COP-15, COP being Conference of the Parties and the 15 meaning the fifteenth annual conference since its establishment with the first being held in Berlin, 1995.

“The overall goal for the 2009 (COP15) United Nations Climate Change Conference hosted by Denmark is to establish an ambitious global climate agreement for the period from 2012.” (From COP-15 official site, provided by Governing Dynamo)

In this photo taken Tuesday, June 30, 2009 photo, commuters ride bicycle, mopeds and electric bicycles in the rain in Shanghai, China. Industry estimates put the number of electric bikes and scooters on the roads at more than 65 million. It

In 2012 the Kyoto Protocol to prevent climate changes and global warming runs out. To keep the process on the line there is an urgent need for a new climate protocol. At the conference in Copenhagen 2009 the parties of the UNFCCC meet for the last time on government level before the climate agreement needs to be renewed.

Presiedent Bush did not sign the Kyoto protocol and claimed that there would be better methods for the United States to take on a leading role. As we know now, about 8 years later, that leading role has not been established, the economy is in recession and credit is so tight that very little innovation is happening. The Obama administrant has indicated that it is interested to re-join the world community and coordinate efforts on behalf of climate change. It even wants to take a leading role.

Any time regulations are negotiated, all countries try to preserve their claims, make sure that they are not impacted un-proportionally harsh, and preserve their ability to grow and advance. While the positioning is occurring, those with funds and the political will to change are fast working on new alternatives. IN the process position of dominance comparable to the Microsoft Windows dominance in computer operating systems is the vision for many of the players.

In the world of transportation, it is not always the glorious and expensive super car that drives the developments forward. Elaine Kurtenbach shows in her recent article tilted: “The bicycle kingdom is going electric” how a green transportation industry is emerging, based on the very old, traditionally human powered bicycle:

It’s a simple pleasure, but Xu Beilu savors it daily: gliding past snarled traffic on her motorized bicycle, relaxed and sweat-free alongside the pedal-pushing masses.
China, the world’s bicycle kingdom _ one for every three inhabitants _ is going electric.

In this photo taken on Friday, July 3, 2009, workers assemble electric scooters at the Hanma Electric Bicycle Co. Ltd in Tianjin, China. Industry estimates put the number of electric bikes and scooters on the roads at more than 65 million. It

Workers weary of crammed public transport or pedaling long distances to jobs are upgrading to battery-powered bikes and scooters. Even some who can afford cars are ditching them for electric two-wheelers to avoid traffic jams and expensive gasoline.

The bicycle was a vivid symbol of China in more doctrinaire communist times, when virtually no one owned a car. Even now, nearly two decades after the country began its great leap into capitalism, it still has 430 million bicycles by government count, outnumbering electric bikes and scooters 7-1.

But production of electric two-wheelers has soared from fewer than 200,000 eight years ago to 22 million last year, mostly for the domestic market. The industry estimates about 65 million are on Chinese roads.

Car sales are also booming but there are still only 24 million for civilian use, because few of the 1.3 billion population can afford them. And unlike in many other developing countries, Chinese cities still have plenty of bicycle lanes, even if some have made way for cars and buses.

“E-bike” riders are on the move in the morning or late at night, in good weather or bad. When it’s wet, they are a rainbow army in plastic capes. On fine days, women don gloves, long-sleeved white aprons and face-covering sun guards.

One of them is Xu, on her Yamaha e-bike, making the half-hour commute from her apartment to her job as a marketing manager. She had thought of buying a car but dropped the idea. “It’s obvious that driving would be more comfortable, but it’s expensive,” she says.

“I like riding my e-bike during rush hour, and sometimes enjoy a laugh at the people stuck in taxis. It’s so convenient and helpful in Shanghai, since the traffic is worse than ever.”

In this Tuesday, June 30, 2009 photo, a man parks his electric bicycles at a parking slot in Shanghai, China. Industry estimates put the number of electric bikes and scooters on the roads at more than 65 million. It

The trend is catching on in the U.S. and elsewhere.

In Japan, plug-in bicycles are favored by cost-conscious companies and older commuters. “Many company workers are beginning to use them to visit clients instead of driving, to save fuel costs,” says Miyuki Kimizuka of the Japan Bicycle Promotion Institute, a private industry group.

Australians use electric bicycles in rural towns without bus and train service. Tony Morgan, managing director of The Electric Bicycle Co. Pty. Ltd., the continent’s largest manufacturer and retailer of e-bikes, says he has sold about 20,000 in the past decade, priced at 1,000-2,000 Australian dollars (about $800-$1,600).

In the Netherlands, an especially bicycle-friendly country, the industry says sales passed 138,800 last year.

In India, Vietnam and other developing countries, competition from motorcycles, as well as a lack of bike lanes and other infrastructure, are obstacles.

Indian sales have risen about 15 percent a year to 130,000 units, thanks in part to a 7,500 rupee ($150) government rebate that brings the cost down to about the cost of a conventional bicycle. But they are far outnumbered by the millions of new motorcycles taking to India’s roadways.

In China, electric bikes sell for 1,700 yuan to 3,000 yuan ($250 to $450). They require no helmet, plates or driver’s license, and they aren’t affected by restrictions many cities impose on fuel-burning two-wheelers.

Worker assembling E-Bike in Chinese factory

It costs a mere 1 yuan (15 U.S. cents) _ about the same as the cheapest bus fare _ to charge a bike for a day’s use, says Guo Jianrong, head of the Shanghai Bicycle Association, an industry group.

They look like regular bicycles, only a bit heavier with the battery strapped on. Some can be pedaled; others run solely on battery. In China, their maximum weight is about 40 kilograms (90 pounds), and maximum legal speed is about 20 kph (12 mph).

“For us, these are tools for transportation,” Guo said. “We’re not like Americans and Europeans, who tend to bicycle for fun or exercise.”

The e-bike doesn’t emit greenhouse gases, though it uses electricity from power plants that do. The larger concern is the health hazards from production, recycling and disposal of lead-acid batteries.

Although China is beginning to turn out more electric bikes equipped with nickel-meter-hydride and lithium-ion batteries, 98 percent run on lead-acid types, says Guo.

In this photo taken on Friday, July 3, 2009, electric scooters are seen before being shipped to the United States, at the Hanma Electric Bicycle Co. Ltd in Tianjin, China. Industry estimates put the number of electric bikes and scooters on the roads at more than 65 million. It

A bike can use up to five of the batteries in its lifetime, according to Christopher Cherry, a professor at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville who researches the industry. A Chinese-made battery containing 10 kilograms (22 pounds) of lead can generate nearly 7 kilograms (about 15 pounds) of lead pollution, he says.

“Electric bikes result in far more emissions of lead than automobiles. They always use more batteries per mile (1.6 kilometers) than almost any other vehicle,” Cherry said in a phone interview.

In China, owners are paid about 200 yuan ($30) to recycle old batteries but the work is often done in small, under-regulated workshops.

With price competition brutal among China’s 2,300 electric bike and scooter makers, manufacturers have shied away from embracing costlier, cleaner technology. But bigger foreign sales and demand for better batteries may speed improvements.

“We are trying to upgrade to lithium battery technology to be able to sell internationally,” said Hu Gang, a spokesman for Xinri E-Vehicle Group Co., the country’s biggest e- bike manufacturer, with sales of more than 2 million units last year.

The goal is to boost production to more than 5 million units by 2013, he said.

“It’s not that we’re that ambitious,” Hu said. “It’s just that the industry is growing so quickly.”

Article about e-bikes by ELAINE KURTENBACH, Associated Press, 2009-July-26

Here we are, another week later with the next part of our PopSci series about green energy alternatives. In June 2009 David Roberts provided an article about Solar development for PopSci.

Solar Panel farm

Here are some of the findings based on what the experts have to say: 

Solar paneling: Nick Kaloterakis and Kevin Hand
The Big Picture: “Solar power” no longer refers just to chunky photovoltaic panels. A variety of tools for turning sunlight into usable energy — thin-film solar, solar thermal, solar heating, and more — are undergoing a burst of technological acceleration. Whether it’s powering an entire housing development or simply heating your house, taken together, their potential is huge

A shortage of low-carbon power sources seems absurd when you consider that a nearby star bathes the planet in 85,000 terawatts of energy every year. We just have to capture it.

The Google-funded start-up eSolar has devised a relatively cheap and efficient form of solar power by refining concentrating solar thermal (CST), in which large mirror arrays focus light to create heat and ultimately electricity. Proponents say CST can make solar cost-competitive with coal within a decade. It is “probably the only thing that can be done at a big enough scale to produce terawatts,” says Bill Gross, eSolar’s CEO.

At the first eSolar power plant, a five-megawatt facility called Sierra situated northeast of Los Angeles, 24,000 mirrors gather the sunlight falling on 20 acres of land and train it on water-filled boiler units perched on top of towers. This creates temperatures of approximately 850°F, producing steam that turns an onsite turbine to generate electricity.

CST has been around since 1980, but in the 1990s a lack of public interest sent it into hibernation. Now public interest is back in a big way, and CST has awoken with a vengeance. One new megawatt of CST hardware was installed worldwide in 2006; in 2007 there were 100. The Earth Policy Institute projects that the installation of CST worldwide will double every 16 months, from 457 megawatts in 2007 to 6,400 megawatts by 2012. At least 13 plants are in advanced planning stages in the U.S.

ESolar’s approach is comparatively cheap because, unlike most of its competitors, which use large, custom-built parabolic mirrors to capture sunlight from all angles, eSolar uses small, flat mirrors, each about the size of a big-screen television. Computerized tracking keeps each mirror focused at the optimal angle throughout the day. The mirrors are easy to manufacture, and it takes just two workers to attach them to relatively light scaffolding on-site. ESolar’s standard 46-megawatt array, which makes enough juice to power about 30,000 homes, occupies only a quarter of a square mile, which will allow the company to avoid the land-use fights that have ensnared other solar companies.

Sierra is a demonstration project, but in February eSolar signed a deal to build 11 46-megawatt plants in the Southwest United States, and it is set to build a full gigawatt’s worth of plants in India. “Efficiency wins in every industry,” Gross says, “and it’s going to win in solar as well.”

Below is an example that solar is not just an opotion for ares with lots of sun. The new BMW museum in Munich, Germany, has a complete solar roof providing surplus energy to the facility as well as the adjacent factory.

BMW Museum Solar Roof

One of my most favorite authors, Thomas Freidman, from the New York Times recently wrote an opinion piece about the situation in Iran and how oil plays a large role in any revolution since the beginning of the 20th century.

While we are trying to figure out how to overcome the current economic and fiscal crisis in the United States, another crisis is growing in the 5th largest oil exporting country in the world, Iran. It would be foolish for me to try to write what Friedman expresses so brilliantly. Here is what he wrote on June 23rd, 2009

There has been a lot of worthless chatter about what President Barack Obama should say about Iran’s incipient “Green Revolution.” Sorry, but Iranian reformers don’t need our praise. They need the one thing we could do, without firing a shot, that would truly weaken the Iranian theocrats and force them to unshackle their people. What’s that? End our addiction to the oil that funds Iran’s Islamic dictatorship. Launching a real Green Revolution in America would be the best way to support the “Green Revolution” in Iran.

Oil is the magic potion that enables Iran’s turbaned shahs — “Shah Khamenei” and “Shah Ahmadinejad” — to snub their noses at the world and at many of their own people as well. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad behaves like someone who was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple. By coincidence, he’s been president of Iran during a period of record high oil prices.

So, although he presides over an economy that makes nothing the world wants, he can lecture us about how the West is in decline and the Holocaust was a “myth.” Trust me, at $25 a barrel, he won’t be declaring that the Holocaust was a myth anymore.

The Obama team wants to pursue talks with Iran over its nuclear program, no matter who wins there. Fine. But the issue is not talk or no talk. The issue is leverage or no leverage. I love talking to people — especially in the Middle East — on one condition: that we have the leverage. As long as oil prices are high, Iran will have too much leverage and will be able to resist concessions on its nuclear program. With oil at $70 a barrel, our economic sanctions on Iran are an annoyance; at $25, they really hurt.

“People do not change when you tell them they should; they change when they tell themselves they must,” observed Michael Mandelbaum, the Johns Hopkins University foreign policy specialist. And nothing would tell Iran’s leaders that they must change more than collapsing oil prices.

Mr. Obama has already started some excellent energy-saving initiatives. But we need more. Imposing an immediate “Freedom Tax” of $1 a gallon on gasoline — with rebates to the poor and elderly — would be a triple positive: It would stimulate more investment in renewable energy now; it would stimulate more consumer demand for the energy-efficient vehicles that the reborn General Motors and Chrysler are supposed to make; and, it would reduce our oil imports in a way that would surely affect the global price and weaken every petro-dictator.

That is how — as Bill Maher likes to say — we make the bad guys “fight all of us.”
Sure, it would take time to influence the regime, but, unlike words alone, it will have an impact. I believe in
“The First Law of Petro-Politics,” which stipulates that the price of oil and the pace of freedom in petrolist states — states totally dependent on oil exports to run their economies — operate in an inverse correlation. As the price of oil goes down, the pace of freedom goes up because leaders have to educate and unleash their people to innovate and trade. As the price of oil goes up, the pace of freedom goes down because leaders just have to stick a pipe in the ground to stay in power.

Exhibit A: the Soviet Union. High oil prices in the 1970s suckered the Kremlin into propping up inefficient industries, overextending subsidies, postponing real economic reforms and invading Afghanistan. When oil prices collapsed to $15 a barrel in the late 1980s, the overextended, petrified Soviet Empire went bust.
In a 2006 speech entitled “The Collapse of an Empire: Lessons for Modern Russia,” Yegor Gaidar, a deputy prime minister of Russia in the early 1990s, noted that “the timeline of the collapse of the Soviet Union can be traced to Sept. 13, 1985. On this date, Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani, the minister of oil of Saudi Arabia, declared that the monarchy had decided to alter its oil policy radically. The Saudis stopped protecting oil prices, and Saudi Arabia quickly regained its share in the world market.

“During the next six months,” added Gaidar, “oil production in Saudi Arabia increased fourfold, while oil prices collapsed by approximately the same amount in real terms. As a result, the Soviet Union lost approximately $20 billion per year, money without which the country simply could not survive.”

If we could bring down the price of oil, the Islamic Republic — which has been buying off its people with subsidies and jobs for years — would face the same pressures. The ayatollahs would either have to start taking subsidies away from Iranians, which would only make the turbaned shahs more unpopular, or empower Iran’s human talent — men and women — and give them free access to the learning, science, trade and collaboration with the rest of the world that would enable this once great Persian civilization to thrive without oil.

Let’s get serious: An American Green Revolution to end our oil addiction — to parallel Iran’s Green Revolution to end its theocracy — helps us, helps them and raises the odds that whoever wins the contest for power, there will have to be a reformer. What are we waiting for?

As often before, I totally agree. The eco-conscious pioneers I am working with and new ones we hope to attract will do their part to move the green revolution forward. Please join us - together we can make a difference!

This post has been provided by my good friend Debbie Zachry

20 June 2009 

Plan Designed by Leading Architect to Revive Staggering Economy-
As the market recession rolls on, the housing industry is one of the many trades at a standstill. Founded by distinguished architect Edward Mazria, Architecture 2030 is a “One Year 4.5 Million Jobs Investment Plan” to help America invest in green homes building and revamp present homes to make them more energy efficient.

A place to start

Mazria claims that the private building division is the biggest solution toward enlivening the United States economy and creating green jobs, as the industry accounts for about 10 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product. Construction produces demand in every division of the economy such as wholesale, retail, distribution, manufacturing, constructing, banking, development and professional services; utilizing expensive products such as rubber, steel, glass, insulation, lumber, electrical appliances, heating/cooling appliances, fabrics, paint, windows, tile and metal.
Apart from tax credit incentives applied to first time home purchasers, the $787 billion stimulus funds didn’t do much to support the housing market; causing many American residential home builders to feel the impact of layoffs. The Architecture 2030 Plan entails energy efficiency incentive grant offerings to “buy down the interest rate” on home mortgages used to buy new energy efficient homes or to remodel exisiting homes, proposing a 1 percent full interest rate buydown for a new home that uses 50 percent less energy than present energy standards, or a home energy modification that would lower energy consumption of an already existing residence to 30 percent below current requirements.

For example, if your mortgage interest rate quote is 4.75 percent, the plan would offer an interest buydown which would lower the interest rate a full percentage point, to 3.75 percent. The Architecture 2030 Plan is one of intelligence and fervor which may possibly guide the way out of America’s lingering recession; we can only wait to see how the Obama Administration and Congress respond to this powerful proposal.

My German heritage and close ties to friends and family in Germany allow me to stay in touch on topics regarding the issues of sustainability, business, and economics, besides other subjects. Every once in a while I receive some amazing documents (in German) that are worth translating and bring to the attention of my readers and followers.

Solar Roof of BMW-Welt

As we have heard over and over again in the media, the world is suffering from recession and a global economic crisis. The impact of this crisis is different from country to country, and region to region, mainly because the systems of commerce are different. When Americans can pile up credit card debt across multiple cards from Visa, Master Card, and American Express, purchases made with credit cards by German customers are paid in full directly from their bank accounts at the end of each month. There is no such thing like credit card debt.

Similarly, there was no real housing bubble in Europe, except for Britain, which uses a similar system like the United States. Still, economies across the globe are suffering and one of the biggest impacts has come to the auto-industry.

Double-Cone Munich

We have all read and heard the stories about GM and Chrysler. All the money that was provided by the US government ultimately didn’t avoid bankruptcy for both of these former giants. Now the question is: What shall we do and what should we safe? Where does it make sense to spend more tax payer money?

A highly respected German magazine (Focus Money) recently compiled a special edition looking into the impact of alternative energy industries, specifically solar energy. Compared to the sunshine state, or places like Arizona, Nevada, Utah, California, and New Mexico, among others, Germany is not particularly blessed with sunshine. Still it is dominating the world market in solar technology.

World Sunshine Distribution Map

Here are some perplexing facts from the special edition of Focus Money:

• While more than $11 Billion have been spend to support Opel (a GM subsidiary) and pay for new car incentive programs directly by German tax payers, government funds are provided to energy companies (similar to PG&E or Edison) to subsidize the generation of green power only when system actually produce.
• There are now more jobs in Green Technology in Germany (1.2 Million) than in all engineering firms (approximately 1 Million) and the automobile industry (about 760.000).
• The cost for an average household to pay for the government subsidies to green energy generation is 1 cent per KW/h on the utility bill.
• The prices for solar system installed on privates homes fall 8% - 9% per year while the companies providing the systems still keep a profit margin of 20% plus.
• The solar and green technology industry is growing, even in the current crisis, while all other industries are either contracting or stagnating
• Investments in technology and research pay huge dividends. While wages in Germany are high compared to competitors in China and India, the German systems have top market share because they focus on quality and efficiency versus lower prices.
• A recent test solar system at the cutting edge of research produced a world record efficiency of 41% while typical systems in use reach 15- 17% efficiency.

In comparison to what has been happening in solar energy research and system installations in Europe, the US market is still very small. Wind energy installations have caught up by annual installation standards, although they have been hampered by the fact that US banks don’t lend money but use government handouts to prop up their balance sheets, something that doesn’t just apply for alternative energy companies, but all businesses and even private home owners who want to get financing.

Today Market Watch reported that it has never been harder to receive a small business loan in the US than it is in the current environment.

We will need a modern and successful auto industry in the future. That makes it sensible to provide some funding for it, provided the money will be used to find new approaches, new technologies, and new systems to protect the environment. At the same time it is important to realize that we should pay way more attention to modern technologies like solar, wind, and others.

The regions and countries we have traditionally competed with, like Germany, Britain, Italy, etc. have a huge lead in these technologies, and they are joined faster and faster by countries like China, India, and Japan.

There is nothing wrong with having more people employed inventing new solar and wind systems, installing them, and providing all the services related to them, than will ever again work in the US auto industry. Yes, the workers in these companies will use cars and trucks to get to work and back home. If we want to be successful and competitive in the future, our focus should shift and our funds should be spend where the potential is high, like solar, wind, wave energy, etc.

Preserving the old industries is like hoping to regain economic leadership with steam engines and horse buggies. That wouldn’t have worked in the 20th century, and hoping to use the broken auto industry to restart the economy will not work now.

We will know that we are on the right track when the cars we drive generate part of the green, clean energy, that power our houses, together with solar panels and other suitable systems.