Energy Exchange

EDF Energy Innovation Series Feature #20: Renewable Energy Financing From Mosaic

By Jim Marston / Published: June 3, 2013

EDF’s Energy Innovation Series highlights innovations across a broad range of energy categories, including smart grid and renewable energy technologies, energy efficiency financing and progressive utilities, to name a few. This Series helps illustrate that cost-effective, clean energy solutions are available now and imperative to lowering our dependence on fossil fuels.

Find more information on this featured innovation here.

Mosaic’s “crowd-investing” concept gives people the opportunity to invest in a clean, low-carbon energy economy

Over the last decade, web-based crowd funding has grown from a clever way for fans to fund their favorite artist to a multimillion dollar funding option for just about anyone with a new widget. For as little as a few bucks, anyone can help a friend or stranger get a good idea to market, and you might even get one of the first CDs or gadgets that come off the line.

But crowdfunding isn’t really an investment.

Source: Mosaic

Oakland-based Mosaic wants to do for renewable energy investing what crowdfunding sites have done for entrepreneurs. But rather than just offering a chance to help, Mosaic offers a piece of the profit. Think of it as a renewable energy Kickstarter with a kickback.

“We connect individuals and institutions with high quality solar project investments,” said Billy Parish, president and founder of Mosaic. “The fastest way to grow the clean energy economy is to allow more people to benefit from it.” Read More »

Posted in Energy Innovation, Renewable Energy / Comments are closed

The Oil And Gas Industry’s Assault On Renewable Energy

By Jim Marston / Published: April 29, 2013

This commentary was originally posted on our EDF Voices blog.

Source: ali_pk/flickr

Renewable energy enjoyed a record year in 2012 – the U.S. wind industry surpassed 50,000 megawatts of electrical power generation capacity and solar proved once again to be the fastest growing energy source in the United States. That’s a milestone worth celebrating, since greater use of clean, homegrown energy resources creates jobs, cuts foreign oil imports, stabilizes prices, makes our system more resilient and reduces harmful pollution. The list of benefits is vast. So who could possibly be upset?

Well, some utilities that own old and often dirty fossil fuel power plants are upset that renewables are making it harder for their older, polluting units to stay in business. Then there are oil and gas industry association leaders like American Petroleum Institute (API) president Jack Gerard, who often talk about wanting a “level playing field” – implying that policies promoting renewable energy are unfair to fossil fuels.

Don’t be fooled. Renewable investments pale in comparison to the amount of money poured into fossil fuel companies since 1918 to fatten their bottom lines and crowd out competition. Fossil fuels have received around 75 times more subsidies than clean energy. Up to 2011 (adjusted for inflation), the oil and gas industry received $446.96 billion in cumulative energy subsidies from 1994 to 2009, whereas renewable energy sources received just $5.93 billion. An industry that has been enjoying federal tax subsidies for over a century has no standing to argue for a level playing field.

Heavily subsidized fossil fuels may have made sense 100 years ago, when we were racing to build the energy infrastructure of the last century. But today we’re racing to build the clean energy infrastructure of the new century — and we need to support a new set of industries. And we’re making real progress.

So it is no surprise that we are seeing a well-funded, industry-backed effort to roll back the policies that have been so successful in developing and deploying renewables. Take, for example, the latest assault on a series of state laws around the country that have increased the amount of clean, renewable energy these states produce.

Front Groups do the Dirty Work for Oil and Gas Industry

So far, 29 states have implemented Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) programs that require increased production of energy from renewable sources such as solar, wind, geothermal and biomass. They’ve been adopted in red states and blue – from California to Texas to Maine – through democratic processes and with popular support. RPS programs have helped jumpstart an industry that is spurring economic development, creating American jobs, boosting energy independence and cutting our carbon footprint.

A Bloomberg article released last week details how the oil and gas industry, through some self-described free market organizations that they fund, are trying to engineer a legislative massacre of these policies in more than a dozen states.

The groups may sound familiar: American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which is currently pushing legislation around the country that would mandate the teaching of climate change denial in public school systems, and The Heartland Institute, which ran a billboard campaign last year comparing global warming “admitters” to Osama bin Laden and Charles Manson. Both have long opposed sensible energy policies. And their funders will sound familiar, too: the oil, gas and coal industries and their owners like the Koch Brothers.

Posted in Climate, Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy / Tagged ALEC, Heartland Institute, Koch Brothers, Renewable Portfolio Standard, RPS | Comments are closed

EDF Energy Innovation Series Feature #19: Energy Analytics From FirstFuel Software

By Jim Marston / Published: April 9, 2013

Find more information on this featured innovation here.

Driving improvements in the built environment is extremely impactful because buildings emit more than a third of our country’s greenhouse gases. Furthermore, according to IBM, roughly 30 percent of building energy usage is wasted. From location to location, however, these changes are sometimes hard to prove beforehand or demonstrate quantitatively after changes or investments are made. As the need to comprehensively tackle energy inefficiency has increased, so has technology’s ability to identify and measure the impact that building upgrades (retrofits), operational shifts or basic behavior changes can make.

Companies like Lexington, Mass.-based FirstFuel Software (FirstFuel) are doing for energy information what Google has done for online search: using complex algorithms to help make simple, usable sense of the massive amounts of energy data being collected by smart meters and other energy management devices. Needing only one-year of hourly meter data and an address, FirstFuel’s Remote Building Analytics platform screens entire building portfolios for high-potential opportunities, conducts deep building audits and tracks energy savings – without ever going onsite or installing connected devices.

Using hundreds of proprietary algorithms and external weather and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping technology, FirstFuel can provide detailed insight into each facility’s energy use and lay out specific, actionable recommendations for improved efficiency. “We call it a ‘zero-touch’ approach,” said FirstFuel Software CEO Swapnil Shah. “It’s a very simple and compelling value proposition for the customer. No hardware and no on-site visits mean you can begin to achieve true scale.” Read More »

Posted in Energy Innovation, General / Comments are closed

Should America Get Behind The Fuels Of The Future Or The Past?

By Jim Marston / Published: March 22, 2013

One of Yogi Berra’s famed quotes is about to apply to America’s energy policy: “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

The truth is, America’s been staring at a fork in the road for a few decades. Every president since Nixon has talked about freeing the country from its dependence on foreign oil. And each recent administration has understood that our energy policy affects more than the price of a gallon of gas or a kilowatt of electricity. It affects job growth, technological innovation and environmental progress (or decline).

The last few months of the budget and debt debate gives us a good picture of the paths America could take.

One path, embraced for years by both parties, entails government investments in new, clean, efficient and affordable energy. It harnesses the creative talents of our top scientists, engineers, businesspeople and research centers.

The other, most recently articulated in Representative Paul Ryan’s budget, is driven only by a doctrinaire obsession with cutting government – no matter what we sacrifice in doing so. According to that view, the government need not invest, because the private sector has it all figured out. That’s a stunning philosophy given that some of the most important breakthroughs – the Internet, our space program, wind and solar energy development – have happened because government and industry worked hand-in-hand.

The President recently called for a $2 billion Clean Energy Trust that would fund energy research and development. That’s exactly the kind of thing we need in order to continue the clean energy technology revolution that will make it possible to reduce imports of foreign oil and weaken the threat of rising greenhouse gas emissions. The budget is tight, so how do we find the money for it? By using money collected from oil companies when they drill for oil and gas on federal lands. Put another way, we can use some of the proceeds from the fossil fuel industry to help accelerate the transition to a clean, low-carbon energy economy. Read More »

Posted in Renewable Energy, Washington, DC / Comments are closed

EDF And Others Honored For New York City’s Carbon Emissions Video

By Jim Marston / Published: March 8, 2013

Source: Carbon Visuals

Last week, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and Carbon Visuals, a UK-based firm (brought to EDF’s attention by Power Angels) dedicated to “communicating carbon data more effectively,” were honored by American Clean Air Skies Foundation at their awards gala to commemorate videographers and web-based innovators for works that bring climate change and energy resources to mainstream media. Carbon Visuals produced a video, funded by EDF, which encapsulates, literally, New York City’s (NYC) carbon emissions in a year’s time. The video shows blue bubbles as they multiply and expand to cover NYC’s skyline over the course of an hour, day and year. It was designed to engage everyday people who use energy (which is everyone!), helping them to visualize the magnitude of carbon emissions emitted in order to better understand why we must act NOW to accelerate the transition to the clean, low-carbon energy economy we need to avoid climate catastrophe.

This visually impactful video was made possible with the support of NYC and its exemplary effort to track and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The City of New York provided a report from September 2011, Inventory of New York City Greenhouse Gas Emissions, documenting the 54 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) – the principal contributor to man-made climate change – NYC added to the atmosphere that year. The building sector alone contributed approximately 75 percent of the emissions, with the bulk of the remainder attributed to the transportation sector. While these figures may seem irreversible, NYC and Mayor Bloomberg have made considerable strides to reduce emissions in one of the most energy-intensive cities in the world. For instance, emissions in 2010 were 12 percent less than 2005 emissions, and NYC continues to stay on track to reduce emissions by 30 percent by 2017 – a commendable target.

Posted in Climate, Energy Efficiency, Investor Confidence Project, New York, On-bill repayment / Comments are closed

EDF Energy Innovation Series Feature #18: Gas Leak Detection From Picarro

By Jim Marston / Published: January 17, 2013

For more information on this featured innovation, please view this video on Picarro’s innovation.

With the surge in shale gas discovery and development, natural gas, which is approximately 90% methane, is a growing part of our nation’s energy mix. There are now more than 40,000 shale gas wells in operation in the U.S. today – three times as many as in 2005.

Despite its great promise though, current production practices all too often impose unacceptable impacts on air, water and landscapes. Methane leakage is a key area of concern, as leaks during the production, distribution and use of natural gas have the potential to undermine and possibly even reverse the greenhouse gas advantage that natural gas has over coal or oil. This is because methane is a remarkably powerful greenhouse gas and its effect on the climate is 72-times more potent than that of carbon dioxide over a 20-year time frame. Estimates of fugitive emissions range from 1.5 to 9.0%; the truth of the matter is that no one knows for sure.

Enter Picarro Surveyor^TM from the Silicon Valley start-up Picarro, which makes devices and software that detect, measure and analyze a range of gasses from acetylene and CO2 to ammonia and formaldehyde. This high-tech solution, which integrates a mobile methane gas analyzer with cloud-based, geo-informatics software, is currently in use by companies like PG&E (not to mention EDF’s own scientists).

“When it comes to safety and environmental impact, we know that fugitive natural gas leaks are an important factor, which gas companies must manage carefully,” said Michael Woelk, CEO of Picarro. “Our technology is making that process easier by modernizing the way these companies detect leaks along their pipelines. The result is better public safety and a healthier environment.”

Source: Picarro

About the size of a suitcase, Picarro Surveyor can be installed in the trunk of a car. Additional sensors installed on the car’s roof capture wind speed and direction to determine the source of even the most trace amounts of gas. The technology also distinguishes natural gas leaks from other sources of methane, such as landfills, sewers or livestock. The results are matched with GPS data via Picarro’s cloud-based data processing platform, P-Cubed®, and reporting is available online to anyone with a web-enabled device and secure connection. This allows personnel to investigate gas sources and coordinate necessary responses to repair the leaks. This real-time, networked detection system replaces the incumbent process of monitoring natural gas pipeline leaks by workers on foot patrolling areas with hand-held detectors and manually logging their results.

PG&E is currently deploying multiple Picarro Surveyors and is optimistic about its results. “This gas detection technology is revolutionary,” PG&E’s EVP of Gas Operations Nick Stavropoulos noted in a PG&E video. “It is going to change the way all gas companies across the world try to find and detect leaks. It is so much more precise, so much more real-time, in terms of the information it provides us.”

Picarro also layers current wind and weather data on Google Maps and satellite images, providing visual simulations that help pinpoint potential sources and predict possible affected areas.

Natural gas can have significant climate benefits over coal and oil. But only if leaks are adequately detected and quickly reduced. New emissions detection technology, like Picarro Surveyor, make it possible for industry to implement more effective methane leak detection and repair programs today, and enables regulators to establish emission limits and detection practices that mitigate methane pollution.

Posted in Energy Innovation, Methane, Natural Gas / Tagged Fugitive Emissions | Comments are closed