RENEWABLE ENERGY, IT’S TIME TO TAKE THE GLOVES OFF!

Okay, so all’s fair in love and war. The latest advertising incarnation for the oil companies is a pleasant, almost jolly and good looking (Ladies, correct me if I’m wrong.) mid-50s man talking about how science does some extraordinary research that leads to finding energy underground. With a smile he professes that this great work creates jobs and runs clean vehicles and babies are born and the sky parts and we all live happily ever after (of course i'm partly kidding). Hallelujah!

In my opinion this is a bunch of $#!+. The sad part about this form of advertising is that it is effective. Just the same way we continue to elect worthless individuals during elections, this message will be drilled into the mainstream mind and perfectly sane individuals will have arguments over what’s better, clean energy or filthy disgusting polluting energy. It’s crazy to think that this stuff will work, but it will.

Until the renewable energy industry gets its act together and spends money to counter the message being served by the non-renewable energy industry we will not see considerable gains on the renewable energy side. From the beginning of time communication has been twisted to serve one cause or another.

The renewable energy industry is not without resources or organizations to represent it. I don’t mean to pick on any one group, but it comes to mind that the American Council on Renewable Energy, United States Green Building Council, and Interstate Renewable Energy Council, to name a few, have a mission to grow renewable energy. But I see no national campaigns to counter the oil companies. Yes, the oil companies have huge amounts of cash and will counter any campaign with even more ads. But, man, this is competition and you have to make your case in the minds of the people.

My message is that we should stop making apologies, take the gloves off and start using television to get the renewable energy message out. That is, if you want to stand for what you believe in. As a matter of fact, let me take the first to place an ad on behalf of renewable energy. The following demonstrates the jobs that are being created by clean renewable energy and by dirty un-renewable oil and gas (Enjoy!):



Renewable Jobs



Non-renewable jobs



Renewable jobs



Non-Renewable clean up Jobs



Renewable Jobs

 

Non-Renwable Jobs

Renewable Jobs

No caption needed

These are just a few examples of what can be used to combat the PR campaign that big oil is bringing. When the renewable energy industry organizes and fights back, the sky will be the limit.

By George Lopez

Headlines

Department of Energy Pushes for Baseline Water Testing

StateImpact Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania may be the only state that has no regulations regarding private drinking water wells. That means well location, construction, testing and treatment are all up to the individual landowner. So the Department of Energy's Shale Gas Production ...

 

Pennsylvania Groups Respond to Department of Energy Fracking Report

StateImpact Pennsylvania

By Scott Detrow As expected, the Department of Energy's fracking report is dominating today's drilling news. Here's some Pennsylvania-based reaction to the document. PennFuture's John Quigley calls it a “must-read.” Air quality, methane emissions, ...

 

Pennsylvania Wants Beacon Power's Flywheel Energy Storage

CleanTechnica

In addition to the $5-million Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program state grant, the $53-million Hazle Township plant was also awarded a $24-million Smart Grid stimulus grant from the US Department of Energy...

 

Japan parties reach agreement on renewable energy bill

Reuters

TOKYO Aug 11 (Reuters) - Japan's ruling Democratic Party reached an agreement with the main opposition parties on Thursday to pass a bill designed to promote renewable energy, an opposition lawmaker said, setting the stage for unpopular Prime Minister ...

 

Billionaire Donald Trump's anger at Scottish wind farm decision

Environmental Data Interactive

The host of the US original version of the Apprentice, who is almost as famous for his hair as he is for his business ventures, issued a statement criticising plans for 11 wind turbines. A consortium consisting of Vattenfall, Technip and the Aberdeen ...

 

Wind energy now generates 20 percent of Iowa's electricity

REVE

Terry Branstad (R-Iowa) and other state officials will join the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) in sharing wind's powerful message this week in Ames: wind farm works for Iowa, which has become a national leader since adopting the first ...

 

Ford Offers Solar Charging For its EVs and Hybrids

Hybrid Cars News

SunPower, which is based in San Jose, Calif., says the photovoltaic cells in its SunPower® E18 Series solar panels are highly efficient, and take up less space than some other systems. The Ford program calls for 11 panels totaling about 147 square feet ...

 

Inexpensive catalyst that makes hydrogen gas 10 times faster than natural enzyme

PhysOrg.com

"This nickel-based catalyst is really very fast," said coauthor Morris Bullock of the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. "It's about a hundred times faster than the previous catalyst record holder. And from nature, we knew it ...

 

Geothermal system may provide heating, cooling for 750 condos

Niagara Advance

That was the beginning of a seed that was planted that he hopes will come to fruition—the use of relatively inexpensive geothermal energy to heat and cool the entire project. Racioppo explains that in discussion with Suzanne Wiltshire, an ...

 

Metro Vancouver is in hot water - and happy about it

Vancouver Sun

The regional district installed glass tubes on the roof of the 20-storey building in Burnaby in December 2009 to collect solar heat to augment the building's hot water system and gauge the effectiveness of reducing GHGs in commercial highrises. ...

 

To make green a reality http://www.thesolarandwindexpo.com/

 

Maryland Emerging As A National Leader In Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure

ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND - Governor O'Malley's vision of a Maryland fueled by a clean energy, innovation economy is bearing fruit as the Maryland based company, SemaConnect, unveiled the state's first privately developed, publicly accessible electric vehicle (EV) charging station today in Baltimore. The station joins a wave of 65 public EV charging stations being built by the Maryland Energy Administration (MEA) and its partners by June 2011 to encourage adoption of this new technology and help Marylanders escape rising gasoline prices, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and enhance our energy security.


Maryland's success in becoming a national leader in EV readiness is made manifest by today's announcement that the first privately developed, publicly accessible electric vehicle charging stations in a residential community will open in Baltimore's Midtown community. The charging stations are part of a new, mixed-use development that is affiliated with the University of Baltimore and on-track to become the largest LEED-certified apartment community in the Baltimore area. This substantial private investment in both electric vehicles and energy efficiency is the result of years of Governor O'Malley's efforts at moving Maryland forward into the new innovation conomy by promoting clean, renewable energy and cost-saving investments in energy efficiency.

"Our goal in investing in electric vehicles has always been to ‘prime the pump'," said Malcolm Woolf, Director of the Maryland Energy Administration. "With today's announcement, it's clear that we've been successful."

Last June, MEA awarded $500,000 in grants to promote Maryland's Electric Vehicle Infrastructure, funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. These investments were designed to attract and support the emerging electric vehicle market by building 65 electric vehicle charging stations around the state, as well as to support Maryland's goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 25% by 2020. These investments complimented the newly enacted Electric Vehicle Tax Credit and Electric Vehicle HOV bills which were passed by the General Assembly during the 2010 Legislative Session under the leadership of Governor O'Malley.

The Governor has continued to build on these efforts in 2011 by introducing to the General Assembly a package of three EV bills to prepare Maryland for the array of electric vehicles coming on the market in the next few years. The bills, currently moving through the legislature, would provide consumers a $400 tax credit towards installation of electric vehicle charging stations in their homes, require the Public Service Commission to conduct pilot studies of how best to encourage off-peak charging of electric vehicles, and to establish a statewide electric vehicle planning council.

Two public EV charging stations are already operational at the Community College of Baltimore County and by June 2011 construction will have been completed on 65 publicly accessible electric vehicle charging stations funded by grants from the Maryland Energy Administration. These charging stations, which are to be located throughout the Baltimore Metropolitan Area, will equip Maryland with the second largest installed charging station capacity in the nation and cement its position as a national leader in EV readiness.

"By making smart investments in electric vehicle technologies we have attracted private investment, created jobs, and reduced our dependence on costly foreign-oil," said Mr. Woolf. "Since electric vehicles cost about 75 cents per gallon to charge, EVs are good for our household budgets as well as America's energy security. Today's announcement in Baltimore underscores the wisdom of these investments and helps to cement Maryland's reputation as a leader in electric vehicle readiness."

For more information, visit the Maryland Energy Administration.

High oil prices present an oportunity!

Here we go again. Oil prices are threatening to derail our already weak economy. What is most distressing about the whole thing is that the oil producing countries are not the only problem. Transportation companies, speculators and greedy refiners all share in the volatility of this commodity -- and I didn’t even mention our own government.

But we have a weapon don’t we? Renewable clean energy is available 24/7. And we also have the power of knowledge because these volatile times increase our awareness. It’s like free advertizing. Every time the talking heads say that the price of gas is going to be much higher this summer and fall, I can hear somebody saying, “Honey, let’s look at a Chevy Volt or a Nissan Leaf. Or how about a model from Think, Tesla or a Coda.”

These times are made for change. All over the world people want change and the freedom it brings. We need to disconnect political volatility abroad from energy pricing here. I am an optimist, so I believe that the market power of free countries in the world is critical in bringing stability to the energy markets. The result is that wealth will be distributed and not concentrated in a wealthy few.

Let’s raise our voices to push renewable, push renewable, push renewable. The fact is that politicians need your vote to stay in power, no matter what the lobbyists say. If the oil companies want to throw their weight around by using lobbyists, so be it. Contact your politicians. Tell them they will not get your vote unless they take steps to change the effect of energy volatility in this country. That, my friends, is grass roots lobbying!

The politicians seem to be lost in these difficult times. But we can guide them through our calls, emails and constant reminders that they work for us.

Make it happen!

George Lopez
Executive Director
The Solar and Wind Expo

"make green a reality" visit http://www.thesolarandwindexpo.com/

Tesla Motors goes public, will partner with Toyota on all-electric RAV-4

Tesla Motors, the maker of a super-quick, long-range, all-electric sports roadster, began offering stock for sale on June 29. Tesla, which is based in Palo Alto, Calif., is the first American automaker to go public since Ford did more than 50 years ago.


Tesla, which goes by “TSLA” on the NASDAQ exchange, raised $226.1 million in its initial public offering, according to Wired.com. Its shares sold for $20.64 apiece as of July 16.

A Tesla roadster owned by Bill Clark of Maryland was one of the biggest hits at the first Solar and Wind Expo, which took place in May – especially for those persons lucky enough to go for even a brief spin in the car. The roadster can accelerate from zero to 60 in under four seconds.

In another recent development, Tesla and Toyota announced that they plan to revive an all-electric version of Toyota’s RAV4. The small SUV will combine the RAV4 body with a Tesla electric powertrain. Toyota manufactured an all-electric version of the RAV4 in the 1990’s, and a number of these cars were sold in California. An electric RAV4 owned by Robert Neighbour, a member of the Electric Vehicle Association of D.C., that he brought to The Solar and Wind Expo also drew many visitors and much attention.