The Crown Estate of England knows which way the wind blows and has decided to acquire the prototype of the world’s biggest wind turbine, Clipper’s 7.5 megawatt MBE turbine, also known as the Britannia. While the other windmills have been land-based, this giant will be located in deep waters near the UK. This will assist the marine interests of The Crown Estate which includes almost the entire UK territorial seabed out to 12 nautical miles , about 55% of the UK’s coastal foreshore, and rights to lease seabed for the generation of renewable energy on the continental shelf within the Renewable Energy Zone which extends out to approximately 200 nautical miles.
This will drive forward the development of turbine technology designed for the challenges of the offshore environment hence providing a great opportunity to help establish a new industrial base of activity to advance the UK’s leadership in renewable energy.

The 10-megawatt monster machine built by Clipper Windpower of Carpinteria, California will have a wingspan larger than two soccer fields and will stand 574 feet tall when completed. The windmill is expected to displace two million barrels of oil as well as 724,000 tons of CO2 over its lifetime. It will also serve as the flagship for Clipper’s Britannia Project, an effort to produce massive new turbines on deep-sea floating platforms. If all goes as planned, the Queen’s windmill will light up thousands of British homes starting in 2012.
This thus, will not only prove benevolent but when yield as a good financial investment for the Crown as well.


Via fashionfunky

Imagine a university being granted 10million$ by the Army for its spectacular job in the field of technology. The University Of Michigan College Of Engineering, known for new inventions for advances in the energy industry, has recently been awarded a $10 million, five-year grant from the U.S. Army to develop a six inch robotic spy plane that bears a striking resemblance to a bat. The grant helped establish the University’s COM-BAT (Center for Objective Microelectronics and Biomimetic Advanced Technology), thus re-establishing the U.S. Army as a world leader.

The COM-BAT is designed to provide short-term but real-time surveillance and feedback to soldiers in urban combat zones using a collection of sight, sound and smell sensors while running on 1 W of power. The Army is hoping that the spy plane could scavenge power from vibrations, wind and of course the sun, which the University of Michigan has a particular expertise in. The robot they believe is “to be 1,000 times smaller and more energy efficient than systems being used now.” The COM-BAT project will also be used to vastly improve other existing technologies like solar cells and navigation and communication systems, which the team already feels can be dramatically reduced in size.

The University of Michigan will work in a collaborative effort with the University of California at Berkeley and the University of New Mexico for developing a different system on the spy plane.
Though facing certain hurdles in finding a way to give the COM-BAT a usable amount of battery life between charges, the potential applications of this condensed technology are virtually limitless.
Via ecogeek

Clean diesel car buyers in Japan will now be rewarded incentives by the next fiscal year. The government is looking to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions and is willing to go the extra mile for those who help them achieve their goal. And it’s certainly not the first time Japan will be doing so. If you remember way back in 1998, the Japanese government offered consumer incentives on hybrid cars for nine years to promote gasoline-electric vehicles when they were first launched.
The cars in discussion will be those which meet the tighter regulations on nitrogen oxide (NOx) and particulate matter (PM) emissions. These cars will be introduced in Japan by October 2009. News is that Nissan Motor Co will probably be the first to launch a diesel car that meets the criteria mentioned above. Honda, Mitsubishi and Fuji too will follow suit. Another thing to note is that the only brand selling diesel passenger car, Mercedes-Benz, will not clear the next emission standards.
Diesel cars emit less carbon dioxide and are 20-30 per cent more fuel efficient than gasoline cars.
Via enn

Anti-whaling activists are facing a hard time in Japan. Apparently, the authorities are miffed with the brouhaha they have created and have released arrest warrants for three of them (two Americans and a Briton from the Sea Shepherd group), who are believed to be a part of the heated clash with Tokyo’s whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean last year.
Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said, “Physical protests will not be tolerated by the authorities, no matter what you feel about whaling.” The three activists will soon be placed on the international wanted list once the arrest warranst are obtained. They are suspected of jamming a ship’s propeller with a rope to prevent whaling.
Environmentalists the world offer are troubled over the issue of whaling as it violates the 1886 global moratorium on commercial whaling. However, the Japanese say in defence that whaling is part of their tradition and they only perform it for scientific research.
Yep, the reasons are vague!
Via enn

Ganesh Chaturthi is a festival which many Indians look forward to as in today’s workaholic life, it sums up ten days of spirituality, fun, faith and socializing around. But what many people fail to admit (although, they know it very well) that the after festival picture is filthy with vast amounts of pollution on the beach and inside water where the Elephant God rests post Visarjan. Such people happily befool themselves giving excuses like, “God will take care of the fishes and the beaches.” But now, thanks to Goa government, this year at least in Goa the marine life will not have to ask God’s help for its survival for the much needed human awakening is already set into motion.

Goa’s power and environment minister Alexieo Sequeira recently announced a ban on the manufacturing of Ganesha idols from plaster of Paris in Panaji, in a media conference. These gigantic idols no doubt look wonderful but their molding and modeling involves the use of highly polluting agents like plaster of Paris and coloring pigments that contain toxic chemicals like lead and titanium. These pollutants leach in the waters where these idols are immersed and then, through wave currents the pollutants reach far off areas to disturb the marine ecology. These chemicals are known to alter the life cycle of fishes and other marine fauna. Not only this, the water post Visarjan becomes highly polluted .And this happens year after year. By this time the water has become filthy and polluted enough to give skin diseases and allergies to anyone taking a dip near the beach.

The serious environmental concerns regarding Ganesh and Goddess Durga’s Visarjan
During festivals have aroused enough hues and cries but nothing concrete has happened so far because the state governments have been busy protecting the religious sentiments of people (or may I say, the state authorities have been busy sleeping over the issue!) But now, a streak of positivity has emerged with Goa’s government taking a firm stand against the manufacturing and selling of such polluting idols. The ban if followed religiously can lead to a Green Ganesh Chaturthi this year-one which will not damage the coastal ecology (any further). Also, it will curb the cases of food poisoning in the state population as reported when people consume polluted fishes.

I whole heartedly appreciate this initiative taken by Goa and plead other states to join in for Indian coast lines and marine flora and fauna are quite unique and we must come forward to protect them for posterity.

Via: mapsofindia

Today every positive move towards curbing pollution counts and whenever I hear about any such development I like to share it with you all. After a ban on plastic bags in China, Israel, Australia (Melbourne) and San Francisco, it’s now Los Angeles’ turn.� The city dwellers want to green-up their homes, offices and play grounds by completely shunning plastic bags by 2010. The positive move is now going to materialize with the coming in effect of Assembly bill (AB 2058) next month. The latter will addresses recycling issues and a fee for plastic bags. This means the new legislative measure will take care of the 2.3 billion bags consumed by LA’s population. Until now, there was a voluntary program residing in the city which involved encouraging customers to opt for reusable bags (which sums up to 5% of entire lot).

But as it turns out the move is not enough to tackle the problem of growing numbers of plastic waste. Besides plastic, a ban on Styrofoam will also be implemented by 2009 at all city-owned facilities (including LAX). The enormous Styrofoam and plastic waste piled up in LA contributes to direct pollution of Pacific Ocean owning to the city’s prime location. After hearing all this good news from Melbourne,� San Francisco and now Los Angeles too, I whole heartedly feel others should also embrace such bans, especially India where plastic nuisance has choked her major rivers like Yamuna and is daily adding on to its pollution scale.

Via: inhabitat

The Sun is rising in political spheres! Valuing the sun as renewable source of clean solar power, the EU supergrid gets a crucial political backing from UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy. It is jointly decided now that the vast desert of Sahara would be the land where dozens of solar farms will be constructed as a part of the $71 Billion EU supergrid infrastructure. The latter is an initiative taken by the European Commission to meet the continent’s electricity demands in future. The clean power generated by this supergrid will be shared by all the EU countries.
It is projected that each farm of the supergrid will generate upto 200 Megawatts of power. This would then be transferred to EU states via high voltage DC transmission, which is a better option over AC lines. The energy loss incurred over long distances is much lesser when DC lines are used. The decision to build solar panels in Sahara originates from the simple fact that the desert receives intense sunlight throughout year which can be effectively harnessed.

� According to an estimate PhotoVoltaic panels installed in Sahara will be 3 times more energy efficient (in terms of electricity generation) than those fitted in the European countries.
The project’s success will effectively reconfirm that solar power will be the most potent among renewable energy sources which also include wind and geothermal powers.

Via: treehugger

The state of California sure knows what it means to “Go Green”! This time the initiative comes from the California Building Standards Commission. The latter has announced a statewide adoption of “green” building code on Friday 18th of this month.The announcement comes as a happy surprise among Californians, who are the pioneers to adopt such a code for their state in the entire United States of America!

Here’s what the Californian governor said,”By adopting this first-in-the-nation statewide green building code, California is again leading the way to fight climate change and protect the environment.”The Commission found out that in terms of higher carbon footprint the state’s buildings rank next to its transportation.

Thus, this announcement reflects a positive concern to improve the situation by reducing the carbon emissions. The new standards yet to be employed promise :

•� 20% improvement in water use efficiency for both residential and commercial plumbing fixtures
•� a 50% increase in conservation for water used in landscaping
•� reduction in energy consumption by 15%
•� overall reduction of greenhouse gas emissions 30% by 2020

The new policies are envisioned to be in sync with the goals mandated in Assembly Bill 32 (passed as law 2 years ago).

Friday also saw the introduction of Green Building Initiative by governor Schwarzenegger (Executive Order S-20_04). This initiative calls for a 20% cut back in energy consumption by all state-owned buildings by 2015. As of now, a total of 13 state-buildings are LEED certified. According to the Green Building Initiative, the renovation of rest of the state-buildings will be planned in a manner to acquire a LEED Silver certification.

The initiative taken by Californian government is very inspiring. Let us hope that other states and countries of the world follow this trail in order to achieve a sustainable, greener and healthier tomorrow.
Source: enn

It’s the same tug-of-war for people of Kenya, which every nation wanting to progress, faces today. The issue being is it development or devastation in the name of development? The recent decision of Kenyan government to approve a biofuel project in the Tana River delta area has created an uproar among people. The biofuel project requires the setting up of a sugar cane plantation in the 80 sq mile river delta. Much of the crop produced at the plantation would be converted into ethanol. This would be done in a nearby purpose-built factory. The factory will provide employment opportunities to the locals. This is the government’s side of story. The other side is provided by the local farmers and fishermen. These people along with the environmentalists detest the approval to the project. The Tana River delta is an area of biodiversity in terms of animal and plant species found there. The land is home to hippos, lions, rare shark species, primates and 345 bird species. It also sustains the local community of thousands of fishermen and farmers. Their protests against this project, it seems have fallen on deaf ears! According to Paul Matiku, executive director of Nature Kenya (a Nairobi- based conservation group), the whole project is an ecological disaster. “It will seriously damage our priceless national assets and will put the livelihoods of the people living in the delta in jeopardy,” Paul said.

For the government, the biofuel project holds a promise to gain valuable euros and dollars. Biofuels are prepared from ethanol which in turn, is in huge demand in the European Union and the U.S. For the locals this project spells devastation than development. The gulf between the two sides deepens as the locals say their protests are being ignored by the powers-that-be. In order to achieve a sustainable development it is important that the government realizes the deep-set ecological concerns rather than blindly approving rampant� projects.

Via Guardian

We take inspiration from the post of Polisblog on the first 100 days of the Berlusconi government to express our environmental proposals. We have read the interesting comments after the disappearance of the Greens by Parliament. We of Ecoblog’m glad that everyone has been able to express their opinions in a civil and exchange views despite the heat of the moment after elections.

We then continue with the political discourse, in this case by looking forward and leaving behind what has been. The problems we know all: between the stagnant economy and the need to work and safety, fit environmental issues. Who takes the environment is often accused of not having serious proposals if not those of “no”. We try then to dispel this commonplace.

If you had the possibility of sending a series of proposals for the new government, what do concrete, feasible immediately, rather immediatissimo? For example, as risolvereste emergency in Campania waste? How ridurreste pollution of the city? How favorireste public transport? To you the floor.

Photos | Flickr