I Have The Power!

This alternative energy and sustainable power blog covers alternative energy and fuel technologies buzzing through the media.

USDA Forest Service Tests Voltree Power’s Bio-Energy Harvester

Posted by Matthew Traum on October 31, 2009

In February 2009, I posted “Voltree Power Harvests Electricity from Trees without Combustion,” describing how Canton, MA based Voltree Power was commercializing a patented technology from MIT to extract energy from trees. Using the pH difference between trees and the soil, a miniscule amount of electricity is produced, which Voltree captures to power wireless mesh networks within for ...... Read More

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The US Energy Revolution Will Be Regional

Posted by Matthew Traum on October 18, 2009

Solar, wind, geothermal, or nuclear: which alternative technology will be the foundation of an America free from fossil energy? A typical energy engineering calculation I ask of my students is to estimate the solar panel area needed to meet the energy needs of the country. I leave it to them to discover that the answer depends on where the arrays are placed and how they are distributed. Arizona is ...... Read More

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FIU Preserves a Piece of Energy Engineering History

Posted by Matthew Traum on September 30, 2009

At the College of Engineering at Florida International University (FIU), near Miami, an eco-friendly central park is under construction. The centerpiece of this park is not a waterfall or a fish pond. Instead it is an important piece of energy engineering history that I am very pleased to see FIU preserving so well: the university’s 2005 entry in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar De ...... Read More

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The Green Economy Goes Homeboy

Posted by Matthew Traum on August 31, 2009

Former Los Angeles gangsters seeking to reenter the workforce are trading in their gang colors for a new hue: Green. By training to become photovoltaic (PV) panel installers, these ex-gang members are joining the Green Economy and capitalizing on the influx of government funds for renewable energy projects intended to stimulate business and strengthen the green technology sector of the US economy ...... Read More

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Superconducting Generators May Enable Wind Turbines to Surpass 6 MW Limit

Posted by Matthew Traum on July 31, 2009

In a few blustery places, wind turbines are nearly cost competitive with conventional fossil energy, and tax credits designed to stimulate renewable energy growth are enabling profitable deployment of wind power in many parts of the country. West Texas, for example, is awash in wind turbines, like this majestic wind farm visible from I-20 near Loraine, TX. Emerging Energy Research, an industry re ...... Read More

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World’s Toughest Wind Turbines Power Antarctic Research Station

Posted by Matthew Traum on July 20, 2009

On the Utsteinen nunatak in the Dronning Maud Land of Eastern Antarctica, the planet’s last terrestrial frontier is being tamed by wind power. At the Princess Elisabeth Station, a Belgian-funded outpost manned by 20 scientists, research on global climate change has been ongoing since February 15. Primarily powered by eight 6 kW wind turbines, the facility itself aims to reduce the ecologic ...... Read More

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NASA Offering $1.65 Million for Research on Training Through Virtual Worlds

Posted by Matthew Traum on June 28, 2009

Since late 2007, I have touted the revolutionary training, product design, and test capabilities of virtual worlds like Second Life (SL). In January 2009, I implored the engineering community to stop thinking of SL as a game and embrace it as a product design tool. For my trouble, a reader with the handle JWM commented, “It’s a game, get back to work.” (See “Second Lif ...... Read More

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ARPA-E Awarding High Risk/High Reward Grants for Energy Research

Posted by Matthew Traum on June 12, 2009

The Apollo-Program-scale federal investment in renewable energy technologies called for by so many in the energy profession has finally arrived. In late April, President Obama gave a speech to the National Academy of Sciences in which he announced massive new investments in energy. To manage these investments, a new division of the Department of Energy (DOE), called the Advanced Research Projects ...... Read More

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"Big Green Lies" Exploits Green Backlash with Questionable Science

Posted by Matthew Traum on May 30, 2009

The Green backlash is here, and it WILL be televised. The public is being bombarded by messages, many of them in conflict, about how to be environmentally conscious, and we are simply zoning it all out; or worse, regressing to unsustainable habits. As Alex Williams of the New York Times reports in “That Buzz in Your Ear May Be Green Noise“, we are overwhelmed with too much Green adv ...... Read More

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MacKay’s “Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air” Quantifies Technology Constraints

Posted by Matthew Traum on May 19, 2009

I have used “Green Obsession” to describe the ridiculous fascination the American public has with renewable energy and activities that are supposedly environmentally friendly. From its inception, this blog has maintained the opinion that no new energy technology, no matter how green, will ever be adopted on a meaningful scale unless it proves less expensive than competing convention ...... Read More

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Tweet-a-Watt Successfully Combines Personal Fabrication, Social Messaging, and Green Electronics

Posted by Matthew Traum on April 29, 2009

Foresight and inventiveness are required to take disparate emerging trends and combine them into useful applications. Yet, when synthesized correctly, innovations arising from combing new trends represent compelling forward-looking milestones. Limor Fried, MIT graduate and founder of Adafruit Industries, has successfully combined three such emerging trends: personal fabrication, social messaging, ...... Read More

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GE Requests EPA Approve Isobutane for Monogram® Refrigerators with Double Benefits

Posted by Matthew Traum on April 12, 2009

In a recent press release, “GE Opening a Door to a Future of Cleaner Home Refrigeration,” GE Appliances announced a petition to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) requesting approval to use the hydrocarbon isobutane (R-600a) as the refrigerant in GE’s new Monogram® brand refrigerator, which is slated for introduction in the U.S. in early 2010. According to the pre ...... Read More

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