Readers looking for a interesting, balanced, and attractive website considering a broad range of renewable energy technologies, and the need to tackle climate change, could do a lot worse that to visit http://www.newgencoal.com.au/.
The most surprising thing is that this website is that it is run by the Australian Coal Association. Cynical readers might have expected something defensive or political from such an industry lobby group, this website is anything but.
If only some our politicians who claim to be looking out for the interests of the Australian coal industry were to read this material, they too might realise the need for action on climate change. If the coal industry claims to get it, why don’t our politicians?
Filed under: News
The inaugural on-line innovation competition held in conjunction with the Australia’s Ausinnovation festival April/May 2010 clearly showed the passion Australians in general have for preserving their environment. The competition was hosted on the popular Spigit ideas management platform, which provided participants with the ability not only to submit their ideas for public feedback but also to attract “investment” of notional currency in their idea, simulating a real world venture capital market. The winning ideas resulted from a combination of “market value” and the expertise of our judging panel. See this link for more.
Filed under: News
The Wandoan Power Consortium has announced that they have been short-listed for the next stage of the federal government’s CCS Flagship Program, using a plant which will combine Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IRC) coal based power production with carbon capture and storage.
While technically complex, IGCC has tremendous potential for Australia. CO2 can be efficiently captured from the IRC process before the gas is burnt, avoiding the complexity of post combustion CO2 capture. IRC is also thought to be a very useful solution to helping to reduce CO2 emissions from the burning of Victoria’s significant brown coal reserves. While the burning of coal and especially brown coal has its critics, the fact remains that the world may be dependant on coal for many years to come, and technologies which can reduce the impact of coal combustion may make a real difference to CO2 emissions worldwide.
Mike Lloyd
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technologies, clean coal, cleantech, coal tech 2009
Griffith Hack’s IP management consultant Mike Lloyd has just returned from the Coal Tech 2009 conference held in Brisbane, and came back a clean coal converted man:
Coal is sometimes used as the whipping boy in the clean energy debate, but the coal industry and its supporters are showing there are a number of options for dramatically improving its greenhouse gas emissions. Coal is undoubtedly important for Australia, providing about 75% of its power at an internationally competitive price, $43 billion worth of export income and 8% of its GDP. It also produces over one third of our greenhouse gases. Coal is also very important on a international scale, providing a key power source in many countries. Regardless of what its detractors may wish for, coal will be with us for many years to come.
A broad range of technologies are or have been developed to reduce emissions from coal mining and consumption, and some of these look close to being commercial ready. Coal’s relatively high greenhouse gas profile may actually help their adoption. Zero greenhouse gas emissions from clean coal technologies, while possibly being desirable in the long term, may not be necessary to achieve a significant overall reduction in Australia’s greenhouse gases emissions. Instead even a gradual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from the coal industry may be enough to have a helpful overall impact, and should be achievable in practice.
Nonetheless a big hurdle remains before these technologies are widely adopted. Some of these technologies require multi-billion dollar investments. Many of these investments may be unlikely in the current Australian political uncertainty regarding long term carbon emission pricing. Until these uncertainties are resolved, it will be difficult for the coal users to make either high emission or low emission investments in coal technologies. High emission investments will hobbled by the potential for high carbon pricing – low emission investments will be hobbled by the potential for low carbon pricing and how this will affect their business case. Maybe if the world can achieve a consensus on carbon policies during the upcoming United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Australia’s politicians can in turn agree on the long term policies required to underpin major new investments in this area.
Mike Lloyd
According to this report, around 48 percent of American consumers asked said they would be extremely or very interested in buying a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV), according to a new Pike Research survey.
According to this article, BMW is moving to develop a extremely sporty hybrid vehicle car.
Apparently, BMW has quit Formula 1 racing to allow it to develop vehicles such as the vision efficient dynamics concept.
The car has phenomenal acceleration, like an M3, and yet has similar fuel consumption to a Toyota Prius.
According to this report, wind is the worlds fastest growing source of power generation with an average annual growth of 29% over the last 10 years.
Apparently, global capacity now stands at 120 gigawatts, roughly equivalent to 121 coal fired power stations.
The article reports that by 2015 there is expected to be 425 gigawatts of global wind power installed.
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technolgies, climate change, innovation, Methane calthrate, technology
There was an article on methane calthrate – ice containing methane – in a new scientist article a couple of months ago.
Apparently there are vast reserves of this fossil fuel and it could be a significant component of the energy mix in the future.
There is concern that rising temperatures from global warming will release much of the methane locked up in the ice crystals – a so called tipping point for climate change. Given this, it is hard to know whether it is in the global interest to burn this fossil fuel – is it adding to global warming or is the methane just going to leak away and be an even more potent green house gas?
I guess it depends on the particular reserve being considered and whether it will be affected by global warming.
I wonder what technology is available to extract this resource? It is obviously a different challenge then oil / coal extraction. There may be a lot of innovation required and new machines and methods for extraction. This presents a great opportunity for innovators in this area – if an innovator invents the means to commercially extract this resource, and patent it, the innovator could gain a significant advantage in controlling the extraction of the resource and thus the commercial outcomes from extraction.
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technolgies, cleantech, Patents
Not all commentators are fans of the patent system when applied to clean technologies.
Some people, like the free software guru Richard Stallman, don't like patents
This article contains various opinions as to why the patent system should be changed (or side lined) when it comes to clean and sustainable technologies.
Is it just me or are the views of these academics disconnected from our world – were it is free enterprise that is charged with developing climate change mitigation technologies?
According to this report, four 500sqm dishes in the form of solar collectors are being built at Whyalla.
They will be able to generate temperatures in excess of 200°C. Interestingly, this experimental solar plant will have ammonia energy storage technology.
If the plant is successful, then a 600 dish plant may be built.
According to this article, the global financial crisis has affected investment in solar technology.
It appears that the countries, such as China, who are backing solar production are the ones doing the best.
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technolgies, renewable energy, solar energy, technology, wind energy
I found this article which talks about who will benefit from the Renewable Energy Bill.
The CO2CRC has commissioned carbon capture pilot plants in the last several months. Pilot plants have been constructed at Mulgrave in collaboration with HRL and at Hazelwood (Latrobe Valley).
The Latrobe Valley pilot plant will trial CO2 capture technologies on flue gas streams of brown coal fired power stations. The Mulgrave pilot plant will trial CO2 capture technology on syngas streams produced by a brown coal gasifier. The pilot plants incorporate technologies that are the subject of patent applications prepared by GH.
For further detail see issue 10, July/August edition of the Carbon Capture Journal here.
Byron Bowman
I come across this report that suggests that Australia has much less usable coal than previously thought.
It is reported that University of Newcastle researchers estimate global production will top out at 8 billion tonnes a year (it’s now about six) in 2034 and that energy production from coal will peak even sooner – best guess, at 157,000 petajoules a year in 2026.
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technologies, cleantech, patent, patent enforcement, technology, wind power
General Electric Company (GE) has successfully stopped its competitor, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd from importing wind turbines into the US by enforcing three GE patents. Here is an initial report.
The U.S. now has about 30GW of wind power installed, making it the clear global leader in wind power. Wind power capacity is also increasing faster in the US than any where else. About 2 to 3 GW of wind power is being installed every quarter, equivalent to about 3 coal fired power plants and worth several billions of dollars for every GW.
The industry appears to be very competitive, perhaps not surprisingly given the amount of money to be made in these carbon conscious-times. This competitiveness is now playing-out in the courts.
Interestingly, the amount of litigation appears to vary from one cleantech industry to another. For example, I don’t know of Toyota enforcing its hybrid patents even though it has more than any other car company. Toyota seems to prefer to enter into a commercial agreements such as licensing, and its 2008 annual report states that it has an “open licensing policy”. It has licensed hybrid technology to the likes of Nissan and Ford.
Apparently, the GE patents are related to variable-speed turbines that adjust to ensure that a consistent amount of power is supplied to the grid without damaging the machines, and that deal with periods when voltage on the grid is low, such as during an outage.
While US cleantech companies like GE are protecting their interests using the patent system and the courts, many Australian companies are still not doing this.
Filed under: News | Tags: carbon capture and storage, carbon sequestration, technology
According to this report, Australia’s first trial of CO2 underground storage, by the CO2 Co-operative Research Centre (CRC) has been a success.
Storage is an essential part of carbon capture and storage, or carbon sequestration, and the demonstration improves the prospects for the technology in Australia.
Filed under: News | Tags: cap and trade, carbon credit, CDM, clean development mechanism, climate change, greenhouse gas, India, patent, technology
I found this article that states that, worryingly, the number of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) applications in India has dropped about 30% during the recession.
The CDM gives carbon credits in the developed world (Certified Emission Reductions, CDMs) for sustainable development projects in the developing world. The credits can be traded on the open market and used, in many cases, within national cap-and-trade schemes.
CDMs are one way to encourage the transfer of cleantech, such as renewable energy technology, to the developing world. It can be very profitable. This is desperately needed because the developing world have the dirtiest and fastest growing industries and unless we address this it will be impossible to mitigate climate change no matter what the developed world does.
Transfer of technologies needs to be encouraged. There has recently been a lot of debate about the role of patents in technology transfer and nations like India claim that they block transfer of renewable energy and other clean technologies. However, to date their arguments have been rather emotive and devoid of factual support. In fact, patents are part of the solution and not the problem. A great summary of the debate is found here.
Perhaps the developed and developing nations can focus on constructive mechanisms, such as the CDM, instead of bickering pointlessly on a non issue like patents.
Filed under: News | Tags: cap and trade, carbon price, cleantech, innovation, technology
I came across this interesting article predicting that the Australian government’s proposed cap on the price of carbon, initially at $10 per tonne CO2, will stifle deployment of renewable power generators such as wind and solar.
It is rather depressing that the federal government appears more interested in protecting the interests of emitters that encouraging clean power.
But it is more than installed clean power capacity that will be stifled – investment in developing renewable energy technology in Australia will also be stifled if no one believes there is an incentive to improve renewable energy.
Perhaps the government could read the Griffith Hack clean coal and solar innovation reports that show that we are woefully behind in backing our innovators in clean technologies.
We just will not be in a position to capitalise on the booming demand for new technology unless the government gives a strong price signal, through strong carbon pricing, that there will be local strong demand for clean technology and money should be invested in it. Garnaut’s report made it clear that the best incentive for encouraging innovation in this area was a strong carbon price.
Lets hope that things change soon.
According to this article, the U.S. now has just over 29,000 megawatts of wind power installed, making it the clear global leader in wind power. Wind power capacity is also increasing faster in the US than any where else.
Filed under: News | Tags: clean and sustainable technologies, cleantech, technology, venture capital
According to this article, clean technology venture investments in North America, Europe, China and India, totaled $1.2 billion across 94 companies during 2Q09.
