Upcoming Webinar – Commercial Lighting

by current events, energy • Tags: , , , , , ,

DOE Commercial Lighting Solutions: Overview

Carol Jones, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Tuesday, January 25, 2011
11:00–12:00 pm Pacific (2:00–3:00 pm Eastern)

Commercial Lighting Solutions arms lighting practitioners, contractors and owners with time-saving and credible strategies to reduce energy use and qualify for incentives. Learn about the tool’s development and capabilities, and discover how the tool applies to a wide range of audiences and lighting projects.

More information and a link to register here.

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U.C.S.B. Students Take on Zero Net Energy Goals

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by energy, waste, water • Tags: , , , ,

University of California Santa Barbara students passed a unique “Student Services Renewable Energy Initiative”, voting in a $6 per term fee, even as tuitions in the U.C. system continue to sharply increase. The resulting measure will generate $3.4 million towards campus-wide zero net energy goals.

The future electorate is at work…

Read more about the UCSB initiative here.

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Assorted Links

by current events, links • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Here’s a quick round-up of some of some of the latest stories on the controversy surrounding the installation of SmartMeters in California, especially by PG&E.

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According to an independent report by the California Council on Science and Technology, the intensity of the SmartMeters’ radiation falls well within federal limits for wireless devices.

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Pacific Gas & Electric Co. does not plan to comply with Marin County’s moratorium on the installation of its controversial wireless utility meters (aka SmartMeters).

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Marin County sherriffs announce that they will not enforce the SmartMeter ban.

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Two women were arrested in Rohnert Park, California today for blocking a truck carrying smart meters. The arrests follow two earlier, similar ones in the area.

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Upcoming Bay Area Events, January 2011

by current events, energy, transportation, Uncategorized, water • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Happy New Year Zero Resource Readers!

Below is a collection of interesting events for the month of January.

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Electric Vehicles + Smart Grid

Dian Grueneich, Former Commissioner, California Public Utilities Commission, Mark Duvall, Director of Electric Transportation and Energy Storage, Electric Power Research Institute and Ted Howes, Partner, IDEO, discuss new technologies and their implications for the future of power generation, while Anthony Eggert, Commissioner, California Energy Commission, Transportation Lead, Diane Wittenberg, Executive Director, California EV Strategic Plan, Diarmuid O’Connell, Vice President of Business Development, Tesla Motors, and Marc Geller, Co-founder, Plug-In America, discuss the future of the electric car in California. At the San Francisco Commonwealth Club, with a networking break between topics.

Thursday, January 13,  9 – 11:30 a.m.

595 Market St., 2nd Floor, San Francisco, CA

$45 member, $65 standard, and $15 student tickets

event link

 

A Look Ahead at California’s Clean Energy Future

Panama Bartholomy from the CEC and Emma Wendt from PG&E discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the new report “California’s Clean Energy Future”, jointly issued by the California Air Resources Board, California Energy Commission and the California Environmental Protection Agency, among others.

SPUR Evening Forum, Tuesday January 25, 6p.m.

654 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA

free to SPUR and Association of Environmental Professionals members, $10 general admission

event link

 

Film, ‘ A Sea Change: Imagine A World Without Fish’

The San Francisco Public library will be hosting two free screenings of  ‘A Sea Change’.  “The documentary film A Sea Change, broadens the discussion about the dramatic changes we are seeing in the chemistry of the oceans, and conveys the urgent threat those changes pose to our survival, while surveying the steps we can take to reduce the severity of climate change.”

Wednesday, January 26, 6 p.m. and Saturday, January 29 at 2 p.m.

Koret Auditorium, Main Library, 100 Larkin St., San Francisco, CA.

free

event link

 

“Transforum” with Peter Calthorpe: ‘Urbanism in the Age of Climate Change’

Highly influential urban planner Peter Calthorpe discusses his new book, ‘Urbanism in the Age of Climate Change’.

Thursday, January 27, 6:30 p.m.

Hosted by Transform, and held at the SPUR Urban Center, 654 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA.

$15, rsvp recommended.

event link

 

“Save Our Caltrain!” Summit

Attend this summit to learn about and discuss the severe fiscal crisis facing Caltrain, an important Bay Area transit agency that lacks its own dedicated funding, and connect with others working to find solutions. Organized by the Friends of Caltrain.

Saturday, January 29, 8:30 a.m. – 2:30 p.m.

Samtrans Auditorium 1250 San Carlos Avenue, San Carlos, CA

free

event link

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New Year, New Light Bulb Standards in CA

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by current events, energy • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

(Image credit: Wikimedia Commons)

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A new federal law, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA), creates new energy efficiency standards for light bulbs sold in California. According to a press release from the California Energy Commission:

While the country will adopt this standard on January 1, 2012, California was given authority to implement the national standards one year earlier to avoid the sale of 10.5 million inefficient 100-watt bulbs in 2011 which would cost consumers $35.6 million in higher electricity bills…

The standard in California states that a 100-watt bulb manufactured on or after January 1, 2011 must use 28 percent less energy (i.e. a 100-watt bulb may not use more than 72 watts). The new 72-watt replacement bulb will provide the same amount of light (i.e. lumens), use less power, and cost less to operate.

For more information, go to:

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Cancun Climate Summit, part 2

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by current events, energy, transportation, water • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Global Temperature Anomaly Map 2000-2009, NASA

(see my previous post for background info on the Cancun Climate Summit)

The Cancun Climate Summit, 16th Conference of the Parties (COP16) wrapped up on Saturday morning. With modest expectations widely held after the last years’ highly anticipated COP15 in Copenhagen failed to come to an accord, in the end the Cancun summit has succeeded in achieving a broad-based consensus and vision, if not a road map on how to get there.

Delegates from 194 countries remained deadlocked over the week of meetings in Cancun until a compromise was dramatically reached on the closing day. The conference did not produce another legally binding framework like 1997’s Kyoto Protocol- the terms of which expire next year- but it puts into place the building blocks for such an agreement to be forged.

Key goals include:

– Industrialized countries are charged with developing low carbon development plans and strategies and assessments to meet them.

– A Green Climate Fund will be established and administered by the United Nations in order to provide financial support to the climate change mitigation goals of developing nations. A total of $30 billion in “fast start” finance from developed nations will be secured up to 2012, with a goal of $100 billion in longterm funds to 2020.

– For the first time, a U.N. document sets the imperative that global temperatures must not rise more than 2 degrees C, based on pre-industrial levels.

– A new “Cancun Adaptation Framework” will become established to help undeveloped nations with the necessary planning and technical support to implement their climate mitigation goals.

The next U.N. Climate Change Summit will take place next winter in Durban, South Africa.

 

More on the outcome of the COP16 Summit:

U.N. Climate Talks End, The Wall Street Journal

Progress on Climate Fund, but Questions Remain, Mother Jones

The United Nations Framework on Climate Change website

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GreenTRIP Certification

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by energy, transportation • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

GreenTRIP is a certification program developed by TRANSFORM, an organization that “works to create world-class public transportation and walkable communities in the Bay Area.” According to the TRANSFORM website:

GreenTRIP is a powerful new certification program that rewards residential in-fill projects that apply comprehensive strategies to reduce traffic and greenhouse gas emissions. GreenTRIP certification standards supports projects providing appropriate amounts of parking and offer effective incentives for new residents to drive less and own fewer vehicles. Since these types of developments create less driving and use less land for parking, there’s more space for shops, services, and affordable homes – plus less traffic and pollution.

For more information on the certification and the pilot projects, visit the TRANSFORM website.

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How Crucial is Desalination to California?

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by water • Tags: , , , , ,

Image: View into a reverse osmosis desalination plant. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Last week I observed a panel discussion on the benefits and trade-offs of using desalination to augment the state’s water supply that was put on by the Berkeley Energy & Resources Collaborative (BERC) at U.C. Berkeley. The discussion, titled “Innovation in Desalination- An Answer to Our Water Woes”, featured commentary by water regulators, water experts, engineers, and others, all grappling with the question of when and if desalination makes sense as a water resource strategy. The takeaway message seemed to be that in California’s complex system of water rights, population, climate and location considerations, desalination emerges as one in a suite of strategies that can be used to meet an area’s water supply needs, but that it should remain at this time, something of a last resort.

Desalination is the process of removing the salt from a sea-water or brackish-water supply in order to make it potable, clean water. In a seasonally dry, coastal state like California that has a major conveyance system in order to get precious water resources from the north to the densely populated and more arid south, desalination might sound like a great idea. However, the technology comes at steep price, both financially and environmentally.

What are those costs? First, there is the financial cost; the USGS estimates that desalinated water can cost up to $1,000 per acre-foot as compared to roughly $200 per acre-foot from typical supplies. It is heavily consumptive in terms of energy use; and sea-water systems can disrupt local ecosystems at intake, as well as pollute them with the concentrated discharge at the end of the process.

Despite all of these hurdles and drawbacks, desalination has already been employed in California at a small scale for many years. Desalination will likely also become a more prominent feature of the state’s water profile as the price of the technology continues to come down. At present however, it makes sense for desalination to take a back seat to conservation, water recycling and consumer education.

Read the Pacific Institute’s report, Desalination: With a Grain of Salt

Desalination in the news:

Monterey desalination plant OKd by state PUC, SF Gate

Californians need water but desalination plants are bogged down, LA Times

KQED’s Forum featured a segment on The Cost and Benefits of Desalination, on October 25, 2010.

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Assorted Links

by links • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has proposed changes to Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims (Green Guides) that would make greenwashing more difficult.

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Starbucks has set a goal of making 100% of its cups reusable or recyclable by 2015.

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The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) has upgraded its green building standards, requiring LEED Gold certification for all new federal construction and major renovations.

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The editorial page of The Sacramento Bee ran a head-to-head editorial last week discussing whether the proposed high-speed rail project in California is a valuable addition to infrastructure or a boondoggle.

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Recycling Center In Golden Gate Park To Close

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by current events, waste • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The HANC recycling center is located just to the southwest of Kezar Stadium in Golden Gate Park. (Image credit: Wikimedia Commons)

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According to the San Francisco Chronicle:

The Recreation and Park Commission unanimously approved plans for a community garden at the site long home to a recycling center run by the Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council…

HANC, as the group is known, has run the recycling center at the location for 36 years, and also operates a native plant nursery there.

Recreation and Park Department officials said that the advent of curbside recycling and the need to dedicate more space for increasingly popular community gardens bolstered their resolve to act.

”HANC’s time has run out and it’s time for us to have a community garden,” said Commissioner Tom Harrison, a retired park gardener.

City officials, during several mayoral administrations, have threatened to shut down the program. They say it is incompatible with the park, creates noise and serves as a magnet for the homeless and crime.

Mayor Gavin Newsom, in the waning days of his administration, is now prepared to issue a 90-day eviction notice aimed at closing down the recycling operation, although the nursery may be allowed to stay.

You can read the entire story here.

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