Thin Film Solar Panels Are Here
Christopher DeMorro on our sister site, Gas2.org, just wrote a story on a new high-speed train China is planning that is expected to go 1,000 KMH! Say what? Yes, that is fast.
As DeMorro writes, “The latest plan from the People’s Republic calls for a high speed train that will combine the maglev system used in Japan and France with vacuum tubes. In theory, this train will be able to go 1,000 kph, or about 620 mph. That is twice as fast as most high speed trains travel today.”
On its way to reduce its carbon emissions per unit of economic output 40 percent by 2020, China’s current plan requires it to use 20 percent less energy per unit of economic output than in 2005.
To reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Chinese government has tried the usual carrot and stick approach of governments in Europe and the US, but to no avail. Now it is literally closing the door on the dirtiest, most unprofessional and least efficient factories, the New York Times is reporting, leaving only the ones that have put energy efficiency measures in place to keep producing.
To reduce energy waste, 2,087 highly inefficient factories have been placed on a list by The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to be closed by the end of September.
I always wondered about the economic efficiency of creating long, safe, underground tunnels for subway systems. Now, a Chinese company has decided that this traditional underground transit system isn’t as good as an innovative, overground system it has just designed.
The company, Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment Co., has come out with a concept “3D Fast Bus” (also called a “straddling” bus) that straddles the road, going directly over cars, trucks, and probably even monsterbikes. (I think you can get the idea from the pictures above and below.)
China attracted more asset financing in clean-energy technology in the second quarter than Europe and the U.S. combined, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. A clever piece of legislation created the renewable energy bonanza.
Six months ago, China made it the law that all utilities have to buy any renewable power put on the grid or they get fined. Since then private investment in renewable sources in the country has surged past US and EU levels. Investors are betting on China.
In the second quarter, outside financing of wind turbines, solar panels and low-carbon technology in China soared 72% to $11.5 billion.
China’s renewable sector accounted for one third of renewable investment for the period for the entire world, which totaled $33.9 billion, including all share sales, venture capital, private equity and asset finance.
Of this amount, private investment in clean energy in the US rose to $4.9 billion for the quarter while in Europe it fell to $4.5 billion for the same time period.
The same day that the US Senate gave up on cap and trade climate legislation that would make polluters pay for the switch to clean energy, because not even one Republican will vote for it, news comes that China has just beaten us to implementing their own cap and trade system to reduce greenhouse gases.
The decision came on Wednesday, at a meeting attended - not by industry lobbyists as here in this unfortunate plutocracy – but as China Daily reports, by climate policy think tanks, government officials, and environmental organizations.
China’s enormous stimulus spending on green energy has already resulted in more green tech investment coming to the nation than in the US and Europe combined, but now the communist nation has also beaten us at our own game: capitalism.
China Development Bank recently agreed to loan the Argentinian government $10 billion for new railway and metro construction.
China has become a major source of funds for countries around the world, acting essentially as an alternative or competitor to the World Bank. It has been increasing its spending in Africa (much more than other countries). And it is looking to fund much of an intercontinental high-speed rail network it and others are planning, “the largest infrastructure project in history.”
The world’s largest stand-alone integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) project began transmitting power to the electric grid in Shanghai on Sunday.
This 6.68-megawatt ($23.6 million) solar system, which can produce 6.3 million kilowatt-hours (kwh) of electricity per year (enough power for 12,000 Shanghai households), will cut coal consumption by 2,254 tons and will reduce carbon emissions by 6,600 tons.
And, as a solar and high-speed rail enthusiast, a really cool aspect of this project for me is that it was built on top of the newly completed Hongqiao Station (on the Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway line).
According to IMS Research, a total of 14.6 GW of solar PV capacity would be added this year which would mark a 95 percent increase from the previous year’s figure. However, the research also notes that sales in the European Union could stagnate and new markets would drive growth in the coming few years.
The research has predicted a massive addition of 14.6 GW on the basis of data collected from 40 countries. More than 50 percent of these installations would come up in Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic totally to about 9.8 GW of capacity addition. However, the growth could likely be shifted to developing markets such as Asia and North America in the near future.
According to the Marketbuzz 2010 report, a total of 7.5 GW of solar PV capacity was added in 2009 with Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic contributing about 77 percent to this growth. The United States and Japan were neck-to-neck in terms of capacity addition. This trend, however, could soon change.
In yet another example of how easily US automakers are able to meet much more stringent emissions standards in other countries, General Motors and its joint ventures in China set new sales records in China for the first half of 2010 with a 49% increase for the same period last year, selling 1,209,138 units, according to a recent GM Press release.
GM sold more cars in China than it did in America in the first half of this year. In itself, that is not surprising, considering that there are easily three times as many consumers in China. In addition, those Chinese consumers were largely shielded from the Big Recession because China’s government quickly implemented a green-economy stimulus by investing $9 billion a month in building a new clean energy infrastructure.
GM’s Opel was up 143% from June 2009. The Chevrolet division’s sales, including the joint venture New Sail line, with the lowest emissions in its class, jumped 43.3 percent to 38,304 units, mostly due to the strong demand for the Cruze lower-medium sedan and record monthly demand for the New Sail small car of more than 9,000 units.
A recent NRDC analysis of a Pew study found that the ten nations leading the world in government investment in renewable power have now passed the US by. The US had the 8th fastest growth over the last 5 years, trailing South Korea, China, Australia, France, India, the UK, and Turkey.
As a percentage of GDP, the most realistic comparison, our government investment lags the top ten. China’s clean energy investment is 0.39% of its GDP – which puts China in 3rd place, while the US invests only 0.13% of GDP in renewable energy development – in 11th place behind China, Spain, Brazil, the UK, and five other smaller nations.
At No. 11, the US comes in right after… Mexico.