May 2011

Linking Innovative Technologies with Global Energy Markets Dear Reader, Welcome to our NET Newsletter, tracking the latest news related to new energy technologies. NET update focuses on how new technologies are changing the global renewable and non-renewable energy markets. In doing so, the NET newsletter provides a well-rounded view on the most up-to-date energy news coming from a broad range of sources including policymakers, scientists, energy financiers, and so forth. This month we have news on New Online Mechanism for Electric Vehicle Charging, Asia technology comes clean to provide green solutions, Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant begins operation, Scotland toasts new whisky-powered bioenergy plant, Solar industry pins hopes on U-turn as feed-in tariff consultation ends, The Co-operative enters gas and electricity market, EU finalises 'stress' tests for nuclear reactors, New Green Technology for Hydrogen Production, UK Approves Binding 50% Greenhouse Gas Cut by 2025 along with the commentaries By Peter Jones of Waste2Tricity and Ecolateral with a view point on Waste Energy and John Baldwin from CNG Services with a view point on electric vehicles and much more If you would like to receive further information on any of the issues raised in this newsletter, please contact me at info@meconsult.co.uk. Please let me know if you have any particular news items that you would like to have included in the next newsletter or if you know of any individual or organisation that would like to receive the newsletter in the future. Kind Regards, Granville House 132-135 Sloane Street London SW1X 9AX Tel: 020 7591 4816 Fax: 020 7591 4801 e-mail: info@meconsult.co.uk CONTENTS Business and

Technology News Policy News Events and

Commentaries

Contacts us: MEC International Ltd.

Nitin Verma

Technology and Business News

Hydrogen Fuel Tech Gets Boost from Low-Cost, Efficient Catalyst

3 May 2011 ScienceDaily
The alternative way scientists utilized to make hydrogen fuel from water and sunlight is with the help of light absorbing electrode which is a cheap and abundant alternative to expensive platinum catalyst. This fact which became known is an important development effort to mimic the way plants make fuel from sunlight and the one step ahead of creating green energy economy. Read More

Oil and gas industry confidence 'suffering' over tax

4 May 2011 Source: BBC News The oil and gas industry has suffered a "dramatic drop in confidence" due to tax concerns, it has been claimed. Oil and Gas UK said its quarterly index report provided a measure of industry confidence on a 100 point scale, with a higher rating - above 50 - indicating a positive outlook and a lower rating, below 50, giving a more negative view. Read More

Green energy plant could create hundreds of Kent jobs

4 May 2011 Source: BBC News Hundreds of jobs could be created if plans to turn a former power station into a green energy park are approved. As well as construction jobs, the proposed development at Richborough, near Sandwich, could create 60 full-time posts once built. Read More

New Online Mechanism for Electric Vehicle Charging

8 May 2011 ScienceDaily A new pricing mechanism has been designed by the researchers at the University of Southampton where they developed a different way to charge the electric vehicles that makes possible to charge electric vehicles without loading the electricity network much. As according to Dr.Alex Rogers, who is a computer scientist said in one of the papers that plugging in electric vehicles will overload the local electricity distribution network due to many vehicles charging simultaneously, therefore the scheduling of charging points needs to be done. Read More

Shale gas drilling 'contaminates drinking water'

9 May 2011 By Mark Kinver Shale gas drilling operations increase the risk of nearby drinking water becoming contaminated with methane, a study has suggested. Researchers found, on average, methane concentrations 17 times above normal in samples taken near drilling sites. Read More

Professor Jackson said he had witnessed contaminated water being set alight

Revived Lancashire gas store consultation starts

10 May 2011 Source:BBC News A consultation process begins later on a controversial scheme to store thousands of tons of gas underground in Lancashire. Halite Energy Group, which hopes to store gas underground at Preesall, said it would seek the views of local residents before submitting its plans. A previous application was rejected in January 2010 by Canatxx UK. Halite could revive Canatxx's plans which had three proposals widely opposed by people living in Over Wyre.Read More

Scotland toasts new whisky-powered bioenergy plant

4 May 2011

Kirsty Scott
Up to 9,000 homes to be powered with energy produced by burning waste matter from the whisky-making process. Scottish distilleries will power 9,000 homes with electricity and heat from bio energy plants using waste matter from the industry. It is the spirit that powers the Scottish economy, and now whisky is to be used to create electricity for homes in a new bioenergy venture involving some of Scotland's best-known distilleries. Contracts have recently been awarded for the construction of a biomass combined heat and power plant at Rothes in Speyside that by 2013 will use the by-products of the whisky-making process for energy production. Read More

UK marine energy sector 'could be worth 76bn and support 68,000 jobs'
2 May 2011

Terry Macalister
A government thinktank has predicted that the British marine energy sector could be worth 76bn to the economy and support 68,000 jobs by 2050. The analysis, released this week by the Carbon Trust, comes only weeks after coalition ministers ended the industry's subsidy programme. Britain could capture almost a quarter of the global wave and tidal power market if it builds on its existing lead, the trust forecast. The majority of the jobs would be a result of the growing export markets in countries such as Chile, Korea and the US as well as Atlantic-facing European states which benefit from powerful waves or tidal currents. The study, the most in-depth of its kind, found that total marine energy capacity could be 27.5 gigawatts in the UK by 2050, enough to supply more than a fifth of current electricity demand. Read More

Solar industry pins hopes on U-turn as feed-in tariff consultation ends

6 May 2011 James Murray La Narbonnaise photovoltaic solar power plant in France - in the UK, such large scale solar farms could see feed-in tariff payments cut. The consultation on the government's proposed cuts to feed-in tariff incentives for solar projects with 50kW capacity draws to a close today, with industry figures warning that the sector faces "disaster" if the coalition adopts its current proposals. The consultation documents, which were launched in March, propose deep cuts to feed-in tariff incentives of between 40 and 70 per cent for all solar photovoltaic (PV) installations with over 50kW capacity. Read More

The Co-operative enters gas and electricity market

10 May 2011 Jill Insley

The Co-operative will offer a single variable tariff for gas and electricity users. The Co-operative has entered the energy market with a simple, single tariff designed to be consistently fair and competitive. The Pioneer tariff, named after the Rochdale pioneers who founded the first co-operative in 1844, has a variable rate and no penalties for switching to a different provider. Co-operative Energy also promises that new customers will not receive preferential treatment over existing customers with cheaper price offers. The company describes the multi-tariff offerings of other energy providers as "baffling and bewildering", and says it will challenge the big profits made by the other companies by including a twice-yearly profit-sharing deal for all its customers, who will own the business. Read More

Teaching Algae to Make Fuel: New Process Could Lead to Production of Hydrogen Using Bioengineered Microorganisms
24 May 2011 ScienceDaily Many kinds of algae and cyanobacteria, common water-dwelling microorganisms, are capable of using energy from sunlight to split water molecules and release hydrogen, which holds promise as a clean and carbon-free fuel for the future. One reason this approach hasn't yet been harnessed for fuel production is that under ordinary circumstances, hydrogen production takes a back seat to the production of compounds that the organisms use to support their own growth. Read More

Chile approves $7bn hydroelectric dam in Patagonian wilderness

10 May 2011 Source:Guardian A project to dam two of the world's wildest rivers for electricity has won approval despite strong public opposition A hydroelectric dam in Chile. The government has approved a project to build five dams on two of Patagonia's rivers. A $7bn (4.2bn) project to dam two of the world's wildest rivers for electricity won environmental approval on Monday from a Chilean government commission, despite a groundswell of opposition. Read More

New Green Technology for Hydrogen Production

23 May 2011 ScienceDaily Researcher Mohamed Halabi of Eindhoven University of Technology demonstrates a proof-of-concept for a new and clean technology to produce high purity hydrogen from natural gas. This allows hydrogen to be produced in an elegant technique at much lower temperatures, and without releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Read More

Policy news Renewables Could Be 80 Percent of Energy by 2050

9 May 2011 By Stanley Carvalho According to Writing by Alister Doyle in Oslo and editing by Jane Baird from Reuters in their article says that the renewable sources such as solar, wind and hydro could serve 80% of the worlds demand for energy by 2050 following the policies of United Nation. The IPCC report says the 80% of renewable energy would cut greenhouse Gas emissions and will lead to more cleaner energies where geothermal or ocean energy would also pay the vital role. Rajendra Pachauri who chairs the IPCC says the cost of installing renewable energy projects is decreasing due to which wind and solar PV projects are increasing significantly. Read More

'Nuclear energy will help reach carbon reduction target'

9 May 2011 Source: BBC News The Committee on Climate Change says that increasing our nuclear energy capacity is the best way for Britain to meet its carbon reduction targets. In a report released today, it says nuclear power could provide as much as 40% of our energy needs by 2030.Click here for more

Asia technology comes clean to provide green solutions

10 May 2011

By Richard Anderson

Many Asian companies are focusing on how best to recycle waste products Climate change sceptics might not like to admit it, but Asia is embracing environmentallyfriendly technologies. China is spending tens of billions of dollars every year on renewable energy projects almost twice the next biggest spender in this field, the US - while South Korea's clean energy capacity more than tripled in 2009. Asia is not, then, the environmental laggard some in the West would have us believe. In fact, growth in what the industry calls the clean tech, or environmental technology, sector looks set to take off. Read More

How Angela Merkel became Germany's unlikely green energy champion

9 May 2011 Christian Schwgerl German Chancellor Angela Merkel is anything but a left-wing greenie. The party she leads, the Christian Democratic Union, is the political equivalent of the Republicans in the US. Her coalition government is decidedly pro-business. Often described as Europe's most powerful politician, Merkel's top priority is job creation and economic growth. Yet if the chancellor succeeds with her new energy policy, she will become the first leader to transform an industrialized nation from nuclear and fossil fuel energy to renewable power. Read More

EU finalises 'stress' tests for nuclear reactors

25 May 2011

Source: Guardian
European nuclear watchdogs agree details of new safety checks on resilience of reactors to terrorist attacks and natural disasters Slovakia's oldest nuclear power plant, Jaslovske Bohunic. The safety tests will also address resilience to more common threats such as forest fires, transport accidents and the loss of electrical power supplies European nuclear watchdogs have agreed details of new safety checks on the region's 143 reactors and said a group would be set up to deal with the risks of a nuclear crisis arising from a terrorist attack. Read More

Wind forecast upgrade should mean big drop in fossil fuel use
UK's electricity infrastructure controller now knows where the wind will blow next 87% of the time potentially saving 1.5GW 25 May 2011 Fiona Harvey Wind power should provide a fifth of generating capacity within a decade if EU targets on renewables are met. Better forecasting of where the wind is blowing could

allow British fossil fuel power stations to be switched off and counter critics' claims that wind power is too intermittent. National Grid, which runs the UK's electricity grid infrastructure and spends billions each year on balancing energy supply with electricity demand, has made a significant upgrade to enable it to predict much more reliably where, when and how strongly the wind will blow. Read More

UK Approves Binding 50% Greenhouse Gas Cut by 2025

17, May 2011 LONDON (Reuters) The British government on Tuesday approved a binding 50 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 versus 1990 levels. The British government on Tuesday approved a binding 50 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 versus 1990 levels. "By making this commitment, we will position the UK a leading player in the global low-carbon economy, creating significant new industries and jobs," Prime Minister David Cameron said. Read More

Tidal energy the UK's best kept secret

Chris Goodall 18 May 2011 Tidal energy could provide a quarter of the UK's electricity, but renewable experts are lukewarm because they are overestimating the cost Underwater 10 megawatt tidal stream project in the Sound of Islay between the Hebridean islands of Islay and Jura. The latest report on Renewables from the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) offers lukewarm support for electricity generation from tidal streams. The UK has some of the fiercest tidal currents in the world, but the CCC says the tidal turbines will deliver energy at a higher cost than PV in 2040. The assumptions behind this pessimism are questioned in this article. Read More

EVENTS

Attend Wind Power Italia to meet face-to-face with industry leaders including top utilities, developers, national and regional policy makers, financial institutions, law firms, OEMs and key technology providers. Hear them discuss the future developments of Italys wind resources and how you can adapt your business model to a changing environment guaranteeing maximum return from your wind power projects.
For further information email Katie.dunn@greenpowerconferences.com

More information: www.greenpowerconferences.com/winditalia

Contact: admin@meconsult.co.uk for more information

http://www.meconsult.co.uk/Newsletters/Morocco%20Investors%27%20Summit%20MIS%20Agadir%20Atlan tic%20Palace%20Resort%204-5%20July%202011.pdf

Commentaries

Is waste a waste of Energy?

By Peter Jones of Waste2Tricity and Ecolateral. May 2011 The current Electricity Market Reform evidence session to the Environmental Audit Committee is published on Monday May 16th and it is scathing on the complexity of current approaches to stimulating the market. A week earlier the Climate Change Committee published its recommendations for carbon dioxide abatement targets and as I write it is in anticipation that the Prime Minister will sideline those ideas on the basis that politicians make long term promises then run scared as once far off deadline dates crystallise. The waste sector was never going to be a substantial proportionate share of the renewable energy equation but in terms of critical intervention at the margin in zones of supply criticality ( in terms of pipe/ wire / network capacity) that contribution is often ignored, over-ridden or under estimated. One of the last contributions from the West Midlands RDA was a Strategic Spatial Planning strategy tool which won 1st Prize from the RITP in that category suggesting a co location strategy for advanced mechanical, thermal and biological conversion systems re utilising carbon based waste. At around 50 million tonnes this amounts to the total consumer purchased tonnage of food and non food retail products each year and with the demise of landfill (due to accelerating tax regimes on gate fees) this creates a sizeable forward demand for new sortation and energy conversion sheds amounting to around 12 billion of investment .Hardly surprising then that major commercial property and industrial estate owners like BNP Paribas are looking at their portfolios to see where CHP and other systems might provide renewable energy as gas, heat, electricity, transport fuels or fuel preparation to operators of docks, universities, industrial estates, food preparation and freezer stores ,transport hubs ,universities and docks. The site drives the low carbon load that defines the technology, that drives the feedstock profile and that drives sortation and collection logistics. Clients are the blue chip majors shortly running scared of CRC, electricity price hikes, CSR and renewable obligation targets. And what might the technology be? Whilst this is demand profile driven emergent companies offer anaerobic digesters ( methane and CO2 for gas to grid injection), gasifiers ( for CHP Turbines) or plasma gasification for Hydrogen and high quality syngas based around approaches not dissimilar to coal gasification. In total such waste streams nationally could deliver around 4 GwE and around the same extra as heat depending on the technology selected. Initial funding exercises are underway and the economic viability is firming rapidly as security of supply, traded pollution permits, international obligations and non replacement of UK landfill

void space emerge to create a firming business case superior to a lot of other pipedreams being touted. www.ecolateral.com

The Inconvenient Truth about Electric Vehicles

By John Baldwin (MD) CNG Services Ltd May 2011 Politicians and press are extolling the virtues of the electric vehicles (EVs) that are coming to market in 2011 and the Government provides a subsidy of 5,000 per car. It is said that EVs solve both the air quality and global warming issues. Well there is no doubt they are very good for local air quality, but what about reducing CO2 emissions? First, lets consider what an EV is actually replacing. Whilst EVs are often claimed by their supporters to replace average cars (such as a Ford Mondeo, with CO2 of 140 g/km), in reality the 6 EVs on the grant register are cars in the same class as the following: Golf diesel 99 g/km Toyota Prius - 89g/km CO2 Ford Focus diesel 99 g/km Astra diesel 104 g/km So, for the Nissan Leaf class, lets assume an average CO2 of 100 g/km on a tailpipe basis. This needs to be increased by 15% to give an overall Well to Wheel emissions of 115 g/km Now lets look at the Nissan Leaf EV. According to the US EPA (UK figures are not available on the official UK website www.vcacarfueldata.org.uk), it has electricity consumption of 34 kWh per 100 miles or 0.21 kWh per km. The minimum electricity demand in a year is during summer night-time, at approximately 23 GW. Nuclear and wind generation can currently produce a maximum output of 14 GW at any one time. This means that the net extra electricity used to charge an EV from the grid will be generated by burning coal or gas at least until 2020. A.D. Hawkes* produced a detailed analysis of the Marginal Emissions Factors for CO2 emitted from electricity. His 2016 central estimate is 600 g/kWh, however, if the emissions in respect of the production and transportation of the gas and coal are taken into account this increases to around 660 g/kWh. In addition, around 6% of electricity is lost in transmission and distribution so that the figure becomes 700 g/kWh at the EV charging point. So, on that basis the Leaf emissions in the UK are 0.21 X 700 = 147 g of CO2 per km. But it gets worse. When it is cold, the EV uses a significant proportion of energy for the heater, whereas a diesel has free heating from the engine cooling system. This is not taken into account in the official CO2/km figures but means that the Leaf EV is now causing a 50% increase in emissions of CO2 compared to its low emission peers.

One of the reasons the EV is so poor is the weight. At 1,521 kg the Leaf weighs 207 kg more than the Golf diesel, equivalent to having two 16 stone rugby players in the back. It takes a lot of energy to drive rugby players around. Furthermore, the range of an EV is limited to short journeys, making the use of a second vehicle necessary to travel greater distances. In contrast, the Golf, Astra and Focus can be used for all journey types. Given that the EV owners second car is unlikely to be as efficient as the Golf, this puts the EV even further behind. It is manifestly clear from the above calculations that the new generation of EVs are not the best option in terms of CO2 emissions in the UK if they use grid electricity. Whether they become less bad, is dependent on nuclear, offshore wind and coal/gas with CCS. The likelihood of these projects going ahead depends on an increase in the world carbon price to enable the UK to finance these projects. It also depends on natural gas prices, which are significantly linked to the cost of shale gas production. This is discussed in the CNG Services submission to the Energy and Climate Change Committee inquiry into Shale gas which makes the case that dual fuel 75% compressed natural gas 25% diesel trucks should be encouraged: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmselect/cmenergy/writev/shale/ sg17.htm It may be that the abundance of shale gas means that EVs should go the route of the Nimrod and be broken up for scrap before they are used. Maybe in 20 years we can look at them again if we have low CO2 electricity, though the target set by the internal combustion engine will also be much lower due to the advances we are seeing now that manufacturers are focussing on efficiency. This new scrap page scheme would avoid all the extra CO2 emissions by the EVs in the next decade or so. My final point is that if I bought an EV and received a 5,000 subsidy from the UK Government I would be both ashamed and embarrassed. Ashamed because I would be taking money from taxpayers that should be invested in something that actually reduces, not increases, CO2 emissions, such as insulating a house with solid walls. For the latest updates please access our website: http://www.meconsult.co.uk
If you would like to learn more about this newsletter or our forthcoming events, or would like to suggest an event or article for inclusion in the next edition, please do not hesitate to contact me at info@meconsult.co.uk.

Nitin Verma MEC International Ltd. Granville House 132-135 Sloane Street London SW1X 9AX Tel: 020 7591 4816 Fax: 020 7591 4801 E-mail: info@meconsult.com