Cleantech and Environmental News – Latest Headlines

A collection of carbon footprint data for building products

The information has been collected in the European ECO2 research project. The main objectives of the project were to define principles for carbon footprint assessment, and to assess greenhouse gas impacts of wooden building products and buildings.

October 23, 2013 Read more

People don't put a high value on climate protection

Without further incentives selfish behaviour will continue to dominate.

October 23, 2013 Read more

Shifting winds in turbine arrays

Researchers modeling how changes in air flow patterns affect wind turbines' output power have found that the wind can supply energy from an unexpected direction: below. According to the researchers, many wind turbine array studies overlook the fact that important airflow changes occur inside the array.

October 22, 2013 Read more

Amping up solar in the snowy north

Solar farms are a no-brainer in warm and sunny places, but what about in northern climes where snow can cover and even shut down the panels?

October 22, 2013 Read more

Weatherizing homes to uniform standard can achieve $33 billion in annual energy savings

With winter around the corner some homeowners may be thinking about plugging all the leaks in their home to make them less drafty. Imagine if every homeowner in the country did that -- how much energy could be saved? Using physics-based modeling of the US housing stock, researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found in a new study that upgrading airtightness to a uniform level could achieve as much as $33 billion in annual energy savings.

October 21, 2013 Read more

Private sector-led initiative to increase climate finance launched at Global Green Growth Forum in Copenhagen

A new platform, called Finance for Resilience is being launched to accelerate the flow of investment into climate, clean energy, green growth and sustainability-related opportunities.

October 21, 2013 Read more

The potential of straw for the energy mix has been underestimated

Straw from agriculture could play an important role in the future energy mix for Germany. Up until now it has been underutilized as a biomass residue and waste material. These were the conclusions of a study conducted by the Thueringian Regional Institute for Agriculture, the German Biomass Research Center, and the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research.

October 21, 2013 Read more

Scientists make breakthrough solar technology

Unique material is far cheaper to produce and generates almost as much power as today's thin film solar cells.

October 21, 2013 Read more

Explainer: what is carbon capture and utilisation?

The predominant view is that CO2 is a waste product, and a polluting one at that, even though small amounts are used to carbonate fizzy drinks, or to make urea or useful industrial solvents. But because of our fossil fuel energy use, we have large amounts of CO2 available that could be put to better use as a resource. This could be done without disrupting the natural carbon cycle, while reusing the carbon to create new products would also decrease fossil fuel use.

October 18, 2013 Read more

Three projects aim to improve fuel efficiency, reduce emissions on the highway

Much more is expected of cars and trucks than in the past. Pollution has been cut dramatically and fuel efficiency has risen. That's a difficult feat for manufacturers to pull off, since equipment to reduce pollution typically adds weight, potentially reducing fuel economy.

October 18, 2013 Read more

California passes grid energy storage mandate

The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) today established an energy storage target of 1,325 megawatts for Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas and Electric by 2020, with installations required no later than the end of 2024.

October 17, 2013 Read more

Innovative system uses bamboo to treat wastewater

The EU-funded project BRITER-WATER ('Market replication of bamboo remediation of food industry effluent grey water for re-use') looked at developing and demonstrating an innovative wastewater treatment system using bamboo.

October 17, 2013 Read more

Without plants, Earth would cook under billions of tons of additional carbon

Researchers based at Princeton University found that Earth's terrestrial ecosystems have absorbed 186 billion to 192 billion tons of carbon since the mid-20th century, which has significantly contained the global temperature and levels of carbon in the atmosphere.

October 17, 2013 Read more

Urgent investment required for battery storage of green electricity

In the coming years, the Netherlands will have to work hard on Smart Grids, intelligent local networks with new storage capacity for green electricity. It will thus be possible to counter the impending instability caused by the increasing power surges of electricity from wind turbines and solar cells. Large numbers of locally installed batteries should accommodate the increasing fluctuations in the electricity grid that are inherent to sun and wind energy.

October 17, 2013 Read more

Sun and photocatalysts will clean polluted water - cheaply and quickly

A little amount of appropriately prepared powder is poured in water polluted with phenol and cellulose. A bit of the sun and after fifteen minutes harmful compounds disappear, and the powder can be filtered off and reused. Sounds like a fairy tale? Perhaps, but it is not magic, only a masterly use of chemistry and physics by researchers from the Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw.

October 17, 2013 Read more

50 Ideas for sustainable cities

Creating sustainable cities requires technical, organizational and financial innovations, in order both to organize urban systems and to establish key business models. These are created when stakeholders collaborate across disciplines to bring creative approaches to new technologies. Fraunhofer's 'Morgenstadt - city of the future' initiative provides the space required to facilitate this kind of innovation and active work.

October 17, 2013 Read more

Solar panels can be used to provide heating and air conditioning

The use of solar panels to produce toilets hot water is standard practice, but researchers at the Madrid Universities Carlos III and Politécnica suggest that they may also be used to provide large offices with heating in the winter and air conditioning in the summer.

October 16, 2013 Read more

Latin America and Caribbean attract increasing share of global clean energy investment

Funding diversifies across the region as emerging LAC countries promote deployment and strengthen policy support.

October 16, 2013 Read more