Bacteria could hold the key to help recover oil from Australia’s vast offshore deposits.

Microbes feeding on highly viscous oils can produce chemical changes to allow the residual oils to be extracted.

Presenting at the Oceans and the World’s Future conference in Cairns this week, Craig Roy from CSIRO’s Wealth from Oceans Flagship, outlined some of the technologies under development in the Flagship which have potential applications for ocean-based industries.

“Microbially enhanced oil recovery will give us access to the thicker oils which at present cannot be extracted - just one example of the application of frontier technologies,” he said.

“Another example includes the extraction of offshore oil and gas by using sub-sea and down-hole technologies. This large-scale research has strong industry support and involvement. We could see the traditional platforms and surface facilities become structures of the past.”

Further oceans research is developing the Barcode of Life - a method of fish species identification based on DNA sequencing. This technology has wide ranging applications, from identifying whole fish, fins, canned products and fish eggs to historical specimens held in museums. This technology can identify accurately threatened and endangered species and possible new species.

According to Mr Roy, the Oceans and the World’s Future conference is an important occasion to plan for further discovery and potential uses of our oceans and in a responsible manner.

“Our oceans are poorly understood and their value to Australia is immense - their potential to reshape the prosperity of Australia is undeniable,” he said.

“But we are still in the discovery mode with much of our ocean knowledge, as only a relatively small amount of our oceans have been charted. We are still discovering new fauna and flora and mapping much of the ocean beds.”

CSIRO Wealth from Oceans National Research Flagship is focused on delivering ocean-based economic, social and environmental wealth to the nation through scientific, research and industry partnerships.

Original press release: Microbes join oil industry (CSIRO)

Organized by the US Department of Energy in partnership with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the Solar Decathlon competition challenges university teams to design and build an 800-square-foot, solar-powered house to compete with 17 other entries in 10 events evaluating the ingenuity, energy efficiency and architecture of the house.

The UT SolarD Team is under way in its construction of the SNAP (Super Nifty Action Package) House. A roof-raising ceremony took place Wednesday, July 6 on the construction site at 2006 Leona Street to mark the completion of the SNAP House’s structural components.

The UT SolarD Team has 45 undergraduate and graduate students from the School of Architecture and the colleges of Engineering and Liberal Arts. Although they are guided by faculty advisors Elizabeth Alford, Michael Garrison and Samantha Randall, the students are fully responsible for the design, fund raising and construction of the house.

The international competition challenges 18 universities to design and build a completely self-sufficient, solar-powered home. The teams build their houses on campus, then transport each building to the National Mall in Washington, DC, for reassembling in only four days. The houses will be judged in 10 solar contests, including the design of the living spaces, the production of hot water and the maintenance of thermal comfort. Each house will be on public display for tours Oct. 7-11 and Oct. 13-16.

To transport the SNAP House to Washington, DC, the UT SolarD Team is implementing a design of four pre-fabricated modules, or SNAPs. Each SNAP fits on a standard drop-deck semi-truck for shipping and literally SNAPs together when in place. An innovative foundation system of rails and rollers allow each SNAP to be lowered off the truck onto the rails and rolled into place. The team tested the roller system on June 25 with complete success.

After the competition in Washington, D.C., the house will be transported back to Austin, Texas and donated to a local nonprofit. The UT SolarD Team�s goal is to educate the public about the benefits of solar-powered, energy-efficient and sustainable building practices.

The UT SolarD Team made design choices for the SNAP House beyond the competition requirements of solar power and energy efficiency by embracing the full spectrum of sustainable design. Their strategy includes the use of local materials, such as mesquite flooring, the use of recyclable materials including the exterior zinc cladding, the promotion of an indoor/outdoor lifestyle through a large back deck, the use of low-volatile organic compounds-emitting paints and non-toxic materials such as the area carpets, and the reduction of the urban heat island effect through the installation of a green grass roof.

Original press release: Solar decathlon team raises roof of house for display on National Mall in Washington, D.C. (University of Texas)

Turning plants such as corn, soybeans and sunflowers into fuel uses much more energy than the resulting ethanol or biodiesel generates, according to a new Cornell University and University of California-Berkeley study.

“There is just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for liquid fuel,” says David Pimentel, professor of ecology and agriculture at Cornell. “These strategies are not sustainable.”

Pimentel and Tad W. Patzek, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Berkeley, conducted a detailed analysis of the energy input-yield ratios of producing ethanol from corn, switch grass and wood biomass as well as for producing biodiesel from soybean and sunflower plants. Their report is published in Natural Resources Research (Vol. 14:1, 65-76).

In terms of energy output compared with energy input for ethanol production, the study found that:

• corn requires 29 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced;
• switch grass requires 45 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced; and
• wood biomass requires 57 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced

In terms of energy output compared with the energy input for biodiesel production, the study found that:

• soybean plants requires 27 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced, and
• sunflower plants requires 118 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced

In assessing inputs, the researchers considered such factors as the energy used in producing the crop (including production of pesticides and fertilizer, running farm machinery and irrigating, grinding and transporting the crop) and in fermenting/distilling the ethanol from the water mix. Although additional costs are incurred, such as federal and state subsidies that are passed on to consumers and the costs associated with environmental pollution or degradation, these figures were not included in the analysis.

“The United State desperately needs a liquid fuel replacement for oil in the near future,” says Pimentel, “but producing ethanol or biodiesel from plant biomass is going down the wrong road, because you use more energy to produce these fuels than you get out from the combustion of these products.”

Although Pimentel advocates the use of burning biomass to produce thermal energy (to heat homes, for example), he deplores the use of biomass for liquid fuel. “The government spends more than $3 billion a year to subsidize ethanol production when it does not provide a net energy balance or gain, is not a renewable energy source or an economical fuel. Further, its production and use contribute to air, water and soil pollution and global warming,” Pimentel says. He points out that the vast majority of the subsidies do not go to farmers but to large ethanol-producing corporations.

“Ethanol production in the United States does not benefit the nation’s energy security, its agriculture, economy or the environment,” says Pimentel. “Ethanol production requires large fossil energy input, and therefore, it is contributing to oil and natural gas imports and U.S. deficits.” He says the country should instead focus its efforts on producing electrical energy from photovoltaic cells, wind power and burning biomass and producing fuel from hydrogen conversion.

Original press release: Cornell ecologist’s study finds that producing ethanol and biodiesel from corn and other crops is not worth the energy (Cornell University)

Cleaner-burning coal technologies are urgently needed to minimise greenhouse gas emissions from the inevitable ongoing use of fossil fuels in the coming decades, Lord Oxburgh of Liverpool, outgoing chairman of Shell, will say in a talk at the Royal Society today (Wednesday 29 June 2005).

Lord Oxburgh will point out that human civilisation has developed rapidly in a climate that has been exceptionally stable over eight thousands years, but one that we are now destabilising with emissions from the use of fossil fuels. He believes that bringing greenhouse gases under control is a massive task and that there is no quick or simple answer, both because the developed world has an enormous infrastructure geared to the availability of cheap fuel and because world population and energy demand are growing rapidly.

Lord Oxburgh will say: “We have to economise, be more efficient and move away from fossil fuels. Renewable energy sources such as wind, wave and solar have a role to play, but will not really come into their own until we have a way of storing their energy. New enzyme technology makes agricultural by-products, such as straw, a cost-effective and low carbon dioxide source of vehicle fuels, opening the way to co-production of fuel and food. Urban waste is another largely untapped energy source.

“It is, however, inevitable that fossil fuels will be widely used for many decades, particularly coal in developing countries. No energy policy is complete that does not take account of this. It is urgent that techniques for burning coal cleanly be matured.”

Lord Oxburgh will say: “Time is pressing and we have to make a start on greenhouse gas control now with the technologies we have today new approaches will undoubtedly emerge and can be fed in as they develop over the next 25 years. Research developments in energy storage, carbon capture and efficient use of energy will be particularly important.”

Original press release: Cleaner-burning coal technologies urgently needed to tackle climate change says Lord Oxburgh (Royal Society)

How sunny is it outside right now, not just locally but all across Europe and Africa? Answering this question is at the heart of many weather-related business activities: solar power and the wider energy sector, architecture and construction, tourism, even health care.

Today accurate and continent-wide scale measurements of ground radiances are provided every 15 minutes by ESA’s Meteosat Second Generation satellite.

Integrating this information with the business practices of solar energy managers is the objective of the ENVISOLAR project (Environmental Information Services for Solar Energy Industries), funded by ESA within the framework of the Earth Observation Market Development Programme (EOMD).

Solar energy has switched from a green aspiration to a solid business. The solar market in photovoltaics, the direct conversion of sunlight to electricity, has an annual turnover of 600 million euros in Germany and 1000 million euros in the rest of Europe. The latter figure is predicted to increase to 2500 million euros by this decade’s end. Furthermore, thousands of megawatt of renewable energy potential are also available in Africa, Asia and Central America as shown by the Solar & Wind Energy Resource Assessment (SWERA) project of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).

There are two kinds of solar energy establishments: solar thermal plants which concentrate heat from the Sun, and photovoltaic plants that convert sunlight into electricity.

In both cases precise, long-term irradiance data is needed for choosing plant locations and estimates of likely energy yield for prospective investors. Then once a plant is built, managers need data updated in near real-time to check the facility is working optimally, and energy output tallies with available sunshine.

“Today our audits form the basis of huge investments in the range of 50 million euros for single projects,” explains Gerd Heilscher from Meteocontrol, a company auditing photovoltaic systems and involved in ENVISOLAR. “Besides the layout, solar radiation is the most important issue. But unfortunately only a few high-quality ground-based measurements are available at this time.”

Within the wider energy market, such information is also valuable for forecasting electricity load; irradiance is the other major environmental influence on demand besides temperature.

How best to measure sunlight? Ground radiance is quite complex to quantify as it is influenced by much more than simply a site’s distance from the equator. Variations in cloud cover, humidity, aerosols and ozone in the air determine the amount of incoming solar radiation actually reaching the ground. Local topography is also important and there are large regional differences; in Europe the southern side of the Alps receives twice the annual radiance of northern slopes.

Measuring from below using in-situ data is technically demanding, expensive on an ongoing basis and limited in coverage; there are only around 200 solar-energy-measuring stations to cover all of Europe and Africa in the official networks affiliated to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).

Measuring from above using satellites provides a wide-area, objective and cost-effective solution. Research by MeteoSwiss has shown that satellites are even more accurate than ground measurements once the distance to the next ground station is greater than about 30 kilometres.

Today, ENVISOLAR partners are developing and marketing a variety of solar services based on satellite radiance data. These services benefit from the latest scientific results and state-of-the-art algorithms developed by a EU Research&Development project called Heliosat-3.

ENVISOLAR services based on these data products comprise solar plant yield estimates, plant fault detection and performance checking, energy forecasting for energy utilities, and time series services including maps and statistics of irradiance, its direct and diffuse components and spectral components such as illumination.

Customers of ENVISOLAR services include SAG Solarstrom AG, a publicly quoted German firm that builds and operates photovoltaic installations, providing entire financial investments in photovoltaics to its customers.

“We need solid information for investment decisions, especially with regard to future markets like Spain,” said Uwe Ilgeman, CEO of SAG Solarstrom AG. “The sampling and spatial resolution of ground-based data is too coarse; for example in Spain there are only 30 sites available at the moment.”

High-resolution radiance data from the Solar Energy Mining (Solemi) service operated by the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) - leader of ENVISOLAR - have contributed to the quantification of the renewable energy potential within 14 developing countries, in the framework of the SWERA project of UNEP. Results of SWERA suggest the potential is far greater than has previously been supposed.

“These countries need greatly expanded energy services to help them in the fight against poverty and to power sustainable development,” said Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of UNEP. “SWERA offers them the technical and policy assistance to capture the potential that renewable energy can offer.”

A wide range of users besides climate scientists can benefit from EO-based solar services, in particular farmers, architects interested in knowing locally appropriate window sizes, and even PVC manufacturing companies. One of these, Deceuninck, used the ENVISOLAR Solar service (SoDa) to study how the ultraviolet in sunshine degrades PVC building parts, so that their warranties could be tailored to local conditions.

Medical researchers are using sunshine maps to investigate links between sunlight and health. The International Agency of Research on Cancer (IARC), an institute of the World Health Organisation (WHO) is probing the relationship between ultraviolet radiation exposure and skin cancer.

And scientists at the UK’s University of Southampton and the Royal London Hospital have also used the data to study whether lack of vitamin D ’supplied through sunlight’ in pregnant women contributes to osteoporosis or ‘brittle bone syndrome’ in later life.

Another EOMD project called HappySun Mobile is also applying satellite-based sunlight data to public health care. With exposure to sunlight being the leading cause of melanomas and other skin cancers, this one-year project will set up a means of generating automatic warnings about safe sunbathing times based on measured ultraviolet levels, and deliver them to sunbathers via text messaging.

Original press release: Sunshine Mapping from Space Means Brighter Solar Energy Future (ESA)

77% of UK public believe wind energy is necessary;

12% of the world’s electricity can be derived from wind by 2020

The UK Government has prioritised climate change for their G8 and EU Presidencies this year and less than a week before the G8 Summit starts (7-8 July), BWEA releases its third NOP ‘Wind Tracker’ that shows that more than three quarters of the public (77%) believe that wind energy is necessary to help meet our current and future energy needs and help tackle climate change.

Today’s poll is the third poll in the series undertaken by NOP World for the British Wind Energy Association, all of which have shown a continuing high support for the development of wind energy in the UK.

The new poll is released on the same day that Greenpeace and the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) launched ‘Windforce 12′, a global industry blueprint that describes how wind power can supply 12% of the world’s electricity by 2020. The report is a crucial tool in the race to cut greenhouse gas emissions as 12% electricity from a total of 1,250 gigawatt (GW) of wind power installed will save a cumulative 10,771 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, a key contributor to climate change.

The report also highlights that thirteen key countries, including the UK, can play a leadership role to help unlock the major market deployment envisaged by this industry blueprint: Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, India, Italy, Japan, the Philippines, Poland, Turkey, the UK and the USA.

In the report, the value of the global market for wind turbines is to move from the current 8 billion to an estimated 80 billion annual business by 2020. Wind power is one of the most effective power technologies that is ready today for global deployment on the requisite scale, and can be installed far quicker than other conventional power stations. Today, wind power installed in Europe is saving over 50 million tonnes of CO2 a year and is on track by 2010 to deliver one third of the EU’s Kyoto commitment. In the UK, wind power is set to grow rapidly as the Government implements its plan to generate 10% of the nation’s electricity from renewables by 2010. The majority, some 7-8 GW of new power, will be met from on and offshore wind energy.

The UK is now one of only eight countries around the world to have installed over a gigawatt of wind energy capacity, a record which was broken earlier this month with the opening of the UK’s largest onshore wind farm to date, the 58.5 MW Cefn Croes project in Ceredigion in Wales. Breaking the gigawatt barrier comes in a record year of growth for the UK wind industry, with a total of 18 new wind projects totaling some 500 MW of capacity expected to be officially commissioned by year end, taking UK wind generation to over 1% of UK electricity supply. Meanwhile continued development in the offshore sector means that sometime in 2006, the UK is set to become the world’s number one offshore wind generator, and a significant player in the global wind energy market.

Marcus Rand, CEO of BWEA said:

“Wind energy has now firmly arrived in the UK. This year the wind industry is breaking all records as we expand to meet the bulk of the Government’s renewable targets. This new report makes clear that the UK is a critical market in the global roll out of this exciting carbon free source of power. For us to deliver our potential here in the UK it is essential that the progress that has been made over the past few years is built upon and maintained.”

Corin Millais, of the Global Wind Energy Council said:

“Wind power is one of the few energy supply technologies that is ready for a broader roll out today; wind has the maturity, clout and global muscle to deliver deep cuts in CO2, while providing a hedge against fluctuating fossil fuel prices and reduce energy import dependence. The global energy challenge of our time is not only to tackle climate change, but to meet the rising demand for energy and to safeguard security of energy supplies. As a power technology which can meet these three challenges, wind energy is a leading candidate.”

Greenpeace, joint authors of ‘Windforce 12′, commented on the report today in advance of the G8 summit. Stephen Tindale, Executive Director of Greenpeace UK said:

“The barriers to harnessing Europe’s massive wind resources are not technological, they are political. If Tony Blair had been willing to expend half as much time and effort embracing the wind revolution as he has on his fruitless attempt to shift George Bush, the UK would have a world-beating industry and our carbon emissions would be going down rather than up.”

Original press release: Support for wind remains strong as new report highlights global role of wind power (BWEA)