By Tony Juniper
Science & Technology
Friday, 9 March 2012 at 12:43 pm
While efforts to tackle climate change bring a host of major challenges, there are opportunities too. This fact is not least demonstrated by the entrepreneurial individuals who are coming up with so many innovative emissions-busting solutions.
As we approach Climate Week (12-18 March), and as we continue with the debate about how best to rejuvenate the economy, it is perhaps timely to have a quick look at the work of the ‘ecopreneurs’ who are bringing new energy and imagination to the job of cutting emissions.
In addition to coming up with great business ideas another thing that strikes me about these new pioneers is how they are so effectively challenging the received wisdom as to the apparent choice between meeting environmental goals and economic ones.
Take solar outfit Eight19, for example. This company was set up by scientists at the University of Cambridge to provide affordable solar-powered lighting to homes in developing countries. They did this to assist the 20 per cent of people in the world who don’t have electricity and instead use dirty fuels such as kerosene.
Eight19 developed a concept based on the fact that 600 million people who do not have electricity are mobile phone subscribers. Its IndiGo service allows off-grid communities to use mobile phones for ‘pay as you go’ solar power.
Individuals pay $10 to install the solar lighting system and a keypad (IndiGo box). They can then buy power for any period of time they wish – purchasers receive a passcode via text message.
Power from the solar cell charges the battery in the IndiGo box, making electricity available for lighting or charging other devices, such as mobile phones.
First introduced in Kenya and then trialed in Zambia, Malawi and Southern Sudan, Eight19 this January signed a deal with charity Solar Aid to distribute an initial 4,000 Indigo systems in East Africa.
Other micro-scale innovations are supported by a programme called SEED – a global partnership for action on sustainable development and the green economy run by the United Nations. The scheme awards funding to small, local entrepreneurs across the world whose businesses provide social and environmental benefits.
One of these, based in The Gambia, sells briquettes made from groundnut shells alongside fuel efficient stoves. This uses a waste product to make affordable fuel for local people with stoves produced by local welders. It is piloted by partners including restaurants and school kitchens and is promoted through women’s networks.
It seems to me that alongside large scale initiatives relying on multi-billion dollar investments that it is a myriad of small innovations like these that will help to make a difference. Of course, all changes need to come alongside legislation and targets agreed to by governments. But even in well governed western countries legislation is rarely enough by itself – innovation and behaviour change are also key factors in determining how we use natural resources and protect climatic stability. And there are plenty of examples here in the UK of how that is happening.
One individual, a young engineer called Laurence Kemball-Cook, has designed paving slabs which generate electricity from footsteps. The Pavegen system works by harnessing the kinetic energy generated when footsteps depress the slab. The energy can either be stored in a battery or connected directly to a piece of equipment such as a light or sign.
The latest version of Pavegen is made from 70 per cent recycled materials to minimise its environmental impact. The young engineer has toured Pavegen around schools, music festivals and town centres to help build awareness of the possibilities of renewable energy. He believes that it could be possible for all kinds of devices, such as ticket barriers at underground stations, to be powered by his micro-generators.
Designs like Pavegen are so exciting because they have been conceived to meet needs, as well as reduce environmental impact. In making this kind of step are a growing band of mainly young ‘ecopreneurs’. It seems to me that they are at the forefront of a new age of environmentalism – ensuring it is workable as well as good for the planet. But these people need more than brilliant ideas, drive, commitment and imagination. As well as help from policy-makers they could do with a bit more recognition and encouragement, and that is what the Climate Week awards are all about.
Designed to recognise and celebrate those who are devising ingenious ways of combating climate change, a total of 56 initiatives have been shortlisted covering a huge array of categories, including individuals, business, education and events.
As one of the judges who sifted through a wide range of inspired and inspiring entries, I have to say that I was left feeling how there is every good reason to be optimistic about our ability to solve even this gravest of global challenges. While most politicians and large companies give every impression that they wish the problem would just go away, there is a mass of activity going on, driving us toward a better future, and in many cases being pushed forward by tomorrow’s leaders.
Monday, 12 March 2012
Green investment bank HQ to be in Edinburgh
Vince Cable also says GIB fundraising office will open in London, in move that strengthens case against Scottish independence
Severin Carrell Scotland correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 8 March 2012 13.13 GMT
A green investment bank intended to attract billions of pounds in funding for new renewables projects will be run from Edinburgh, in a move designed partly to bolster the case against Scottish independence.
Vince Cable, the business secretary, announced that the new bank, expected to employ between 50 and 70 people, would have its headquarters in Edinburgh, but will also operate a large fundraising office in London to exploit the City's financial clout and global reach.
Cable told the Guardian the two cities had come top of a financial and technical assessment, with Manchester lying third.
But he said the side-effect of splitting it between Edinburgh and London supported the "wider narrative" of binding Scotland into the UK in the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum.
He admitted he expected criticism of the decision to split its operations up, and confirmed that London had by far the strongest case of all the 19 cities studied. But, he added, the UK government was also committed to putting major institutions in other parts of the UK to "rebalance the economy".
"Edinburgh has a lot going for it, both in terms of it asset management and finance sectors, [and] also its proximity to green energy activity," he said. "I think Manchester came third [during the assessment process] and had Manchester come second, I would've felt obliged to look at Manchester but it didn't. Edinburgh had more to offer."
Choosing the Scottish capital to strengthen the UK was "a good argument anyway" since it supported "the wider narrative that the UK has a lot going for it".
Suspicions that the decision was partly politically motivated were reinforced after Michael Moore, the Scottish secretary, said that sharing its operations between Edinburgh and London underlined the significance and interdependence of the whole UK energy market.
As Alex Salmond builds his case for Scottish independence by highlighting Scotland's significant green energy potential, UK ministers have been arguing that independence would harm new investment by undermining the pan-UK energy framework and removing the UK government's crucial public subsidies.
Moore said: "The size and scale of the UK's single energy market ensures the level of investment that will unlock Scotland's renewables future, providing sustainable and affordable green energy across the UK. It makes perfect sense to have a GIB presence there.
"By basing the GIB's corporate HQ, asset management and administrative functions in Edinburgh and its transaction team in London, we can harness expertise across the country to deliver a strong and successful GIB for the UK."
The first minister has previously insisted that an independent Scotland's energy industry would still be closely integrated with the rest of the UK's, but made no reference to independence or the 2014 referendum in his reaction to the GIB announcement.
Salmond, who has played a prominent role in building up overseas investments in green energy, pointed out instead that £103m of the GIB's start up capital of £3bn came from the money owed to Scotland by the Treasury, which has been sitting on Scotland's share of the fossil fuel levy for some years.
He stressed that Scotland had a major role to play for the UK, with the potential to meet 30% of the UK's overall renewables target, if it achieved the Scottish government's target of generating 100% of its electricity from green sources by 2020.
"The decision recognises Scotland's position at the vanguard of the renewables revolution and follows an excellent and professional bid campaign. It is great news for Edinburgh's economy and for Scotland's thriving low carbon sector," he said.
Green campaigners said the decision on the GIB's location ignored the problems with its powers: it would not have borrowing powers until at least 2015, raising significant issues about its ability to start raising the £200bn estimated to be needed to hit the UK's CO2 reduction targets.
The bank will initially get £775m towards that £3bn total funding due to come from the Treasury; its key role is to raise up to £15bn in private sector funding, from pension funds, foreign sovereign wealth funds, energy companies and banks, by underwriting the initial losses and risks from new and untested green technologies.
Sue Charman, the "one planet finance leader" at WWF-UK, said the GIB had an essential role to play in shifting the UK to a low carbon economy, but giving it no immediate borrowing powers was a critical mistake. "Stepping up investment in renewable energy infrastructure and energy efficiency will be critical to cutting the UK's climate emissions," she said.
"The current proposals that the bank won't be able to borrow until 2015 risks hindering urgent and much needed investment in green jobs and technologies and the UK government should reconsider this.
"In addition, linking borrowing power with net debt falling as a percentage of GDP will hamstring the bank's power and calls into question if the Bank really sits at the heart of UK financial and economic policy."
David Powell, Friends of the Earth's economics campaigner, urged the chancellor, George Osborne, to use this month's budget to allow the bank to borrow immediately. "Choosing the HQ for the green investment bank has been like arguing about where to put the cherry on a half-baked cake," he said. "This is great news for Edinburgh, but George Osborne's inadequate support means it will start life as a lame duck."
Cable said the green groups were wrong. He said that the bank's first priority was to find investors for the most difficult, initial start-up costs of new technologies, rather than borrow billions of pounds for projects not yet in planning. "The question about borrowing powers assumes that there are a vast number of projects out there waiting for funding, and that just isn't the case," he said. "I don't think the green groups appreciate the difficulties in getting new projects off the ground, making them work and being credible."
Mike Crockart, the Lib Dem MP for Edinburgh West, who played a leading role in the city's campaign to bring the GIB to Scotland against bids from 19 other cities, said that the political element in the decision was exaggerated.
He said the campaign for Edinburgh, which was backed by the first minister, all the main parties and other Scottish cities, was based on its technical and academic expertise in green energy technologies, and its large financial and investment sector, which is the second largest in the UK.
It had decided to ignore the argument that siting it in Edinburgh would help "bind Scotland into the union" in late 2010, Crockart said.
The city's campaign "was quite unashamedly why Edinburgh had the strongest business case, the location of financial services, green technology and research investment going into Scottish universities; that is the case we have been making for 16 months."
Martin McAdam, chief executive of Aquamarine Power, one of a number of Edinburgh-based marine energy firms, said that choosing the city was "tremendous news" for his industry, which has been boosted by a series of green energy investment decisions by major global firms including Mitsubishi, Gamesa and Samsung Heavy Industries.
"The GIB will build on this lead and enable businesses such as Aquamarine Power to leverage the significant private sector capital which will allow the UK's green energy sector to flourish," he said.
Severin Carrell Scotland correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 8 March 2012 13.13 GMT
A green investment bank intended to attract billions of pounds in funding for new renewables projects will be run from Edinburgh, in a move designed partly to bolster the case against Scottish independence.
Vince Cable, the business secretary, announced that the new bank, expected to employ between 50 and 70 people, would have its headquarters in Edinburgh, but will also operate a large fundraising office in London to exploit the City's financial clout and global reach.
Cable told the Guardian the two cities had come top of a financial and technical assessment, with Manchester lying third.
But he said the side-effect of splitting it between Edinburgh and London supported the "wider narrative" of binding Scotland into the UK in the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum.
He admitted he expected criticism of the decision to split its operations up, and confirmed that London had by far the strongest case of all the 19 cities studied. But, he added, the UK government was also committed to putting major institutions in other parts of the UK to "rebalance the economy".
"Edinburgh has a lot going for it, both in terms of it asset management and finance sectors, [and] also its proximity to green energy activity," he said. "I think Manchester came third [during the assessment process] and had Manchester come second, I would've felt obliged to look at Manchester but it didn't. Edinburgh had more to offer."
Choosing the Scottish capital to strengthen the UK was "a good argument anyway" since it supported "the wider narrative that the UK has a lot going for it".
Suspicions that the decision was partly politically motivated were reinforced after Michael Moore, the Scottish secretary, said that sharing its operations between Edinburgh and London underlined the significance and interdependence of the whole UK energy market.
As Alex Salmond builds his case for Scottish independence by highlighting Scotland's significant green energy potential, UK ministers have been arguing that independence would harm new investment by undermining the pan-UK energy framework and removing the UK government's crucial public subsidies.
Moore said: "The size and scale of the UK's single energy market ensures the level of investment that will unlock Scotland's renewables future, providing sustainable and affordable green energy across the UK. It makes perfect sense to have a GIB presence there.
"By basing the GIB's corporate HQ, asset management and administrative functions in Edinburgh and its transaction team in London, we can harness expertise across the country to deliver a strong and successful GIB for the UK."
The first minister has previously insisted that an independent Scotland's energy industry would still be closely integrated with the rest of the UK's, but made no reference to independence or the 2014 referendum in his reaction to the GIB announcement.
Salmond, who has played a prominent role in building up overseas investments in green energy, pointed out instead that £103m of the GIB's start up capital of £3bn came from the money owed to Scotland by the Treasury, which has been sitting on Scotland's share of the fossil fuel levy for some years.
He stressed that Scotland had a major role to play for the UK, with the potential to meet 30% of the UK's overall renewables target, if it achieved the Scottish government's target of generating 100% of its electricity from green sources by 2020.
"The decision recognises Scotland's position at the vanguard of the renewables revolution and follows an excellent and professional bid campaign. It is great news for Edinburgh's economy and for Scotland's thriving low carbon sector," he said.
Green campaigners said the decision on the GIB's location ignored the problems with its powers: it would not have borrowing powers until at least 2015, raising significant issues about its ability to start raising the £200bn estimated to be needed to hit the UK's CO2 reduction targets.
The bank will initially get £775m towards that £3bn total funding due to come from the Treasury; its key role is to raise up to £15bn in private sector funding, from pension funds, foreign sovereign wealth funds, energy companies and banks, by underwriting the initial losses and risks from new and untested green technologies.
Sue Charman, the "one planet finance leader" at WWF-UK, said the GIB had an essential role to play in shifting the UK to a low carbon economy, but giving it no immediate borrowing powers was a critical mistake. "Stepping up investment in renewable energy infrastructure and energy efficiency will be critical to cutting the UK's climate emissions," she said.
"The current proposals that the bank won't be able to borrow until 2015 risks hindering urgent and much needed investment in green jobs and technologies and the UK government should reconsider this.
"In addition, linking borrowing power with net debt falling as a percentage of GDP will hamstring the bank's power and calls into question if the Bank really sits at the heart of UK financial and economic policy."
David Powell, Friends of the Earth's economics campaigner, urged the chancellor, George Osborne, to use this month's budget to allow the bank to borrow immediately. "Choosing the HQ for the green investment bank has been like arguing about where to put the cherry on a half-baked cake," he said. "This is great news for Edinburgh, but George Osborne's inadequate support means it will start life as a lame duck."
Cable said the green groups were wrong. He said that the bank's first priority was to find investors for the most difficult, initial start-up costs of new technologies, rather than borrow billions of pounds for projects not yet in planning. "The question about borrowing powers assumes that there are a vast number of projects out there waiting for funding, and that just isn't the case," he said. "I don't think the green groups appreciate the difficulties in getting new projects off the ground, making them work and being credible."
Mike Crockart, the Lib Dem MP for Edinburgh West, who played a leading role in the city's campaign to bring the GIB to Scotland against bids from 19 other cities, said that the political element in the decision was exaggerated.
He said the campaign for Edinburgh, which was backed by the first minister, all the main parties and other Scottish cities, was based on its technical and academic expertise in green energy technologies, and its large financial and investment sector, which is the second largest in the UK.
It had decided to ignore the argument that siting it in Edinburgh would help "bind Scotland into the union" in late 2010, Crockart said.
The city's campaign "was quite unashamedly why Edinburgh had the strongest business case, the location of financial services, green technology and research investment going into Scottish universities; that is the case we have been making for 16 months."
Martin McAdam, chief executive of Aquamarine Power, one of a number of Edinburgh-based marine energy firms, said that choosing the city was "tremendous news" for his industry, which has been boosted by a series of green energy investment decisions by major global firms including Mitsubishi, Gamesa and Samsung Heavy Industries.
"The GIB will build on this lead and enable businesses such as Aquamarine Power to leverage the significant private sector capital which will allow the UK's green energy sector to flourish," he said.
Post-Fukushima world must embrace thorium, not ditch nuclear
The man whose inventions led to nuclear power proliferation knew thorium was preferable to uranium – it's time we caught up
• What is thorium and how does it generate power?
Bryony Worthington
guardian.co.uk, Friday 9 March 2012 11.24 GMT
A year ago this Sunday, a dreadful and terrifying natural disaster was sweeping a trail of death and destruction along the north-eastern coast of Japan. The Tohoku earthquake and ensuing tsunami claimed an estimated 20,000 lives, washing away entire towns and wreaking havoc with the nation's infrastructure. An oil refinery was set ablaze leading to the death of six workers and a reservoir also failed, killing a further four people. The nuclear reactors at Fukushima experienced a partial meltdown causing the release of radiation, but killing no one.
The media's treatment of the entire disaster, however, was completely out of kilter with these facts. The unfolding events at the stricken power station quickly dominated the coverage, ousting the actual earthquake and its dreadful aftermath from the headlines and, it seems, our collective memories. A year later we talk of the anniversary of the Fukushima disaster, not the far, far greater tragedy of the Tohoku earthquake.
In no way do I wish to make light of the suffering of the thousands evacuated from the exclusion zone around the power station, nor to undervalue the immense bravery of the workers who, under extreme pressure, worked tirelessly to minimise the impact of the accident. But we need to keep things in perspective. This was a terrible event, caused by a much more terrible event, which again brought to the surface the many troubling aspects of how the nuclear industry operates.
For instance, the siting of reactors on the eastern seaboard of a country highly vulnerable to earthquakes ought to have necessitated far more preventative measures or, better yet, the decision not to build there at all. The reactor itself was over 40 years old and operating company Tepco had been criticised ahead of the accident for lax safety standards.
The events in Fukushima do not justify a wholesale rejection of nuclear power. We have been able to harness the fissioning of the nucleus of an atom for good and evil, for life-saving medical treatments and to create the atom bomb. Somewhere on this scale of achievements lies our use of nuclear energy. And even within this, not all nuclear power is equal.
The inventor of the technology upon which most of today's operating nuclear power stations are based, Alvin Weinberg, was all too aware of this. He worried about some of the safety issues involved in using solid uranium fuel in his water-cooled reactors. He believed this configuration, though useful for creating materials for nuclear weapons, posed too many safety risks and created too much hazardous waste for widespread civilian use. As a result, he also directed a research team that invented a radically differently designed reactor, based on using chemically stable liquid salts as the coolant, and thorium as the fuel. Sadly, though he advocated safer, cleaner nuclear designs for the rest of his life, the world took no heed and the reactors we live with today are still fundamentally the same as those that he considered unnecessarily complex and vulnerable to accident.
Fortunately, one of the legacies of Fukushima is that while investment in today's current reactor designs may have slowed, there is a renewed interest in Alvin's alternative designs and in other fundamentally different approaches. In China, a major R&D programme into thorium molten salt reactors is underway, with the first test reactors to be completed in 2015 and a larger-scale demo ready by the end of the decade. In the US, safer, molten salt cooled pebble bed reactors are being developed. In Europe, there are various research programmes into new designs. Even here in the UK, where nuclear R&D has been starved of investment, important but fragmented research is underway and, with the help of the Weinberg Foundation, I have helped to set up an all-party parliamentary group dedicated to exploring the potential of thorium-based energy.
Fukushima must mark a turning point in the history of nuclear power. The proponents of the existing technologies should be chastened by the reminder it provided of how things can go wrong. Even if they are not, the providers of investment, both public and private, have had a wake-up call and will proceed with far greater caution.
But the twin concerns of climate change and energy security mean we cannot afford to turn our back on nuclear altogether, as there is no greater potential source of energy on the planet. It is still an amazing achievement to have harnessed the vast energy forged into the heart of an atom during the dying moments of a star, and a safer, cleaner form of nuclear power is possible. As we move forward we need to admit to the failings of the current technologies and commit to developing new ones now.
To try to use Fukushima to justify a complete disavowal of the use of nuclear power would be a gross distortion of the extent of the threat it posed. It would also consign the world to greater use of fossil fuels and higher concentrations of greenhouse gases, unleashing many more natural disasters with huge loss of life. This is the real risk we need to be vigilant against.
• What is thorium and how does it generate power?
Bryony Worthington
guardian.co.uk, Friday 9 March 2012 11.24 GMT
A year ago this Sunday, a dreadful and terrifying natural disaster was sweeping a trail of death and destruction along the north-eastern coast of Japan. The Tohoku earthquake and ensuing tsunami claimed an estimated 20,000 lives, washing away entire towns and wreaking havoc with the nation's infrastructure. An oil refinery was set ablaze leading to the death of six workers and a reservoir also failed, killing a further four people. The nuclear reactors at Fukushima experienced a partial meltdown causing the release of radiation, but killing no one.
The media's treatment of the entire disaster, however, was completely out of kilter with these facts. The unfolding events at the stricken power station quickly dominated the coverage, ousting the actual earthquake and its dreadful aftermath from the headlines and, it seems, our collective memories. A year later we talk of the anniversary of the Fukushima disaster, not the far, far greater tragedy of the Tohoku earthquake.
In no way do I wish to make light of the suffering of the thousands evacuated from the exclusion zone around the power station, nor to undervalue the immense bravery of the workers who, under extreme pressure, worked tirelessly to minimise the impact of the accident. But we need to keep things in perspective. This was a terrible event, caused by a much more terrible event, which again brought to the surface the many troubling aspects of how the nuclear industry operates.
For instance, the siting of reactors on the eastern seaboard of a country highly vulnerable to earthquakes ought to have necessitated far more preventative measures or, better yet, the decision not to build there at all. The reactor itself was over 40 years old and operating company Tepco had been criticised ahead of the accident for lax safety standards.
The events in Fukushima do not justify a wholesale rejection of nuclear power. We have been able to harness the fissioning of the nucleus of an atom for good and evil, for life-saving medical treatments and to create the atom bomb. Somewhere on this scale of achievements lies our use of nuclear energy. And even within this, not all nuclear power is equal.
The inventor of the technology upon which most of today's operating nuclear power stations are based, Alvin Weinberg, was all too aware of this. He worried about some of the safety issues involved in using solid uranium fuel in his water-cooled reactors. He believed this configuration, though useful for creating materials for nuclear weapons, posed too many safety risks and created too much hazardous waste for widespread civilian use. As a result, he also directed a research team that invented a radically differently designed reactor, based on using chemically stable liquid salts as the coolant, and thorium as the fuel. Sadly, though he advocated safer, cleaner nuclear designs for the rest of his life, the world took no heed and the reactors we live with today are still fundamentally the same as those that he considered unnecessarily complex and vulnerable to accident.
Fortunately, one of the legacies of Fukushima is that while investment in today's current reactor designs may have slowed, there is a renewed interest in Alvin's alternative designs and in other fundamentally different approaches. In China, a major R&D programme into thorium molten salt reactors is underway, with the first test reactors to be completed in 2015 and a larger-scale demo ready by the end of the decade. In the US, safer, molten salt cooled pebble bed reactors are being developed. In Europe, there are various research programmes into new designs. Even here in the UK, where nuclear R&D has been starved of investment, important but fragmented research is underway and, with the help of the Weinberg Foundation, I have helped to set up an all-party parliamentary group dedicated to exploring the potential of thorium-based energy.
Fukushima must mark a turning point in the history of nuclear power. The proponents of the existing technologies should be chastened by the reminder it provided of how things can go wrong. Even if they are not, the providers of investment, both public and private, have had a wake-up call and will proceed with far greater caution.
But the twin concerns of climate change and energy security mean we cannot afford to turn our back on nuclear altogether, as there is no greater potential source of energy on the planet. It is still an amazing achievement to have harnessed the vast energy forged into the heart of an atom during the dying moments of a star, and a safer, cleaner form of nuclear power is possible. As we move forward we need to admit to the failings of the current technologies and commit to developing new ones now.
To try to use Fukushima to justify a complete disavowal of the use of nuclear power would be a gross distortion of the extent of the threat it posed. It would also consign the world to greater use of fossil fuels and higher concentrations of greenhouse gases, unleashing many more natural disasters with huge loss of life. This is the real risk we need to be vigilant against.
Solar power firms in Mojave desert feel glare of tribes and environmentalists
Presence of horned toads and desert tortoises are holding up production at multimillion-dollar sites in California
Edward Helmore in Blythe, California
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 11 March 2012 16.00 GMT
Of the many projects commissioned by the Obama administration to showcase its commitment to renewable energy, few are as grandly futuristic as the multibillion-dollar solar power projects under construction across broad swaths of desert on the California-Arizona border.
But at least two developments, including the $1bn, 250-megawatt Genesis Solar near Blythe in the lower Colorado river valley and the Solar Millennium project, are beset with lengthy construction delays, while others are facing legal challenges lodged by environmental groups and Native American groups who fear damage to the desert ecology as well as to ancient rock art and other sacred heritage sites.
Out on the stony desert floor, Native Americans say, are sites of special spiritual significance, specifically involving the flat-tailed horned toad and the desert tortoise.
"This is where the horny toad lives," explains Alfredo Figueroa, a small, energetic man and a solo figure of opposition who could have sprung from the pages of a Carlos Castaneda novel, pointing to several small burrows. Figueroa is standing several hundred metres into the site of Solar Millennium, a project backed by the Cologne-based Solar Millennium AG. The firm, which has solar projects stretching from Israel to the US, was last month placed in the hands of German administrators and its assets listed for disposal.
Figueroa is delighted with the news. "Of all the creatures, the horny toad is the most sacred to us because he's at the centre of the Aztec sun calendar," he says. "And the tortoise also, who represents Mother Earth. They can't survive here if the developers level the land, because they need hills to burrow into."
Figueroa, 78, a Chemehuevi Indian and historian with La Cuna de Aztlán Sacred Sites Protection Circle, has become one of the most vocal critics of the solar programme and expresses some unusually bold claims as to the significance of this valley: he claims it is the birthplace of the Aztec and Mayan systems of belief. He points out the depictions of a toad and a tortoise on a facsimile of the Codex Borgia, one of a handful of divinatory manuscripts written before the Spanish conquest.
On a survey of the 2,400-hectare site Figueroa points out a giant geoglyph, an earth carving he says represents Kokopelli, a fertility deity often depicted as a humpbacked flute player with antenna-like protrusions on his head. Kokopelli, he says, will surely be disturbed if the development here resumes.
The area is known for giant geoglyphs, believed by some to date back 10,000 years. Gesturing towards the mountains, he also describes Cihuacoatl – a pregnant serpent woman – he sees shaped in the rock formations. All of this, he says, amounts to why government-fast-tracked solar programmes in the valley, where temperatures can reach 54C, should be abandoned. It is a matter of their very survival.
"We are traditional people – the people of the cosmic tradition," Figueroa explains. "The Europeans came and did a big number on us. They tried to destroy us. But they were not able to destroy our traditions, and it's because of our traditions and our mythology that we've been able to survive. If we'd blended in with the Wasps – the white Anglo-Saxon Protestants – we'd have been lost long ago."
At the Genesis Solar site, 20 miles west, Florida-based NextEra has begun to develop an 810-hectare site. The brackets that will hold the reflecting mirrors stand like sentinels. Backed by a $825m department of energy loan, Genesis Solar is planned as a centrepiece of the administration's renewable energy programme, with enough generating capacity to power 187,500 homes.
But local Native American groups collectively known as the Colorado River Indian Tribes are demanding that 80 hectares of the development be abandoned after prehistoric grinding stones were found on a layer of ashes they say is evidence of a cremation site "too sacred to disturb".
NextEra rejects the claim, arguing that while Native American artefacts have been found, "no determination" has been made that they come from a village or prehistoric site. "At the request of the Native American tribes we have not tested the ashes, so to suggest this is a cremation site is incorrect," says the NextEra spokesman, Steve Stengel.
The company says that attempts to sue it by lawyers representing the La Cuna group – which is not federally recognised as a Native American tribe – have already been dismissed. But it warns that losing a 10th of the site over any of these claims could make it uneconomic to proceed.
Critics of the solar programme say problems stem from hasty planning and lack of local consultation – claims denied by bureau of land management (BLM) officials. John Kalish, spokesman for the department in Palm Springs, says: "All the projects were thoroughly analysed and assessed for their impact on cultural and biological resources. As part of that process we developed agreements with the tribes to deal with any potential conflicts."
But tribal leaders say damage to their sacred sites is inevitable. They have filed suits against six sites, including Ivanpah, a $2.2bn Google-backed project in the Mojave desert which will be the largest solar plant when it comes online in 2014.
BrightSource, operator of Ivanpah, says that claims that hundreds of square miles of desert will be scraped flat, destroying sensitive habitat, are exaggerated. The company calculates that if all 11 plants approved by the California energy commission are built, they would cover only 66 square miles, 0.26% of the Mojave desert's 25,000 square miles.
The company says it has spent $22m to help the desert tortoises with breeding and nursery programmes, fencing and, at certain times, 100 biologists employed to patrol the site. In addition, BrightSource plans to spend up to $34m to meet federal and state mitigation obligations. The tortoises are not short of attention: one early survey found just 17 across the entire site.
The rush to establish new solar projects has led to reports of a gold rush mentality with some desert areas said to be experiencing a 10- to 20-fold gain in land values.
In others, there are suspicions that the solar business is a rigged game in which projects affiliated to power companies are given the green light more readily. "Land deals are being done but unless you can get connected there is no deal," says Vinson Johnson, a real estate agent in Twentynine Palms, a city in nearby San Bernardino county, California.
None of this impresses tribal leaders, who argue that the land around Blythe was theirs until their numbers shrank and it came under federal control. "It was reservation land until it was reduced," says Figueroa. "They didn't even contact us. So we filed a lawsuit."
One alternative to using BLM land, he says, would be to use areas that have already been disturbed, such as farmland, abandoned military airfields or the huge testing ranges that dot the south-western deserts.
Figueroa is sceptical of the suggestion that accepting solar would be a greater good. "How much is Mother Earth worth?" he says, sharply.
"Yes, it is good to make use of the sun but not when it comes to disturbing sacred sites, pristine desert, the turtles or the horny toad. We were placed here to be guardians of harmonious equilibrium and we have a mission to ensure the sites are preserved for future generations. We cannot allow them to destroy us."
Edward Helmore in Blythe, California
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 11 March 2012 16.00 GMT
Of the many projects commissioned by the Obama administration to showcase its commitment to renewable energy, few are as grandly futuristic as the multibillion-dollar solar power projects under construction across broad swaths of desert on the California-Arizona border.
But at least two developments, including the $1bn, 250-megawatt Genesis Solar near Blythe in the lower Colorado river valley and the Solar Millennium project, are beset with lengthy construction delays, while others are facing legal challenges lodged by environmental groups and Native American groups who fear damage to the desert ecology as well as to ancient rock art and other sacred heritage sites.
Out on the stony desert floor, Native Americans say, are sites of special spiritual significance, specifically involving the flat-tailed horned toad and the desert tortoise.
"This is where the horny toad lives," explains Alfredo Figueroa, a small, energetic man and a solo figure of opposition who could have sprung from the pages of a Carlos Castaneda novel, pointing to several small burrows. Figueroa is standing several hundred metres into the site of Solar Millennium, a project backed by the Cologne-based Solar Millennium AG. The firm, which has solar projects stretching from Israel to the US, was last month placed in the hands of German administrators and its assets listed for disposal.
Figueroa is delighted with the news. "Of all the creatures, the horny toad is the most sacred to us because he's at the centre of the Aztec sun calendar," he says. "And the tortoise also, who represents Mother Earth. They can't survive here if the developers level the land, because they need hills to burrow into."
Figueroa, 78, a Chemehuevi Indian and historian with La Cuna de Aztlán Sacred Sites Protection Circle, has become one of the most vocal critics of the solar programme and expresses some unusually bold claims as to the significance of this valley: he claims it is the birthplace of the Aztec and Mayan systems of belief. He points out the depictions of a toad and a tortoise on a facsimile of the Codex Borgia, one of a handful of divinatory manuscripts written before the Spanish conquest.
On a survey of the 2,400-hectare site Figueroa points out a giant geoglyph, an earth carving he says represents Kokopelli, a fertility deity often depicted as a humpbacked flute player with antenna-like protrusions on his head. Kokopelli, he says, will surely be disturbed if the development here resumes.
The area is known for giant geoglyphs, believed by some to date back 10,000 years. Gesturing towards the mountains, he also describes Cihuacoatl – a pregnant serpent woman – he sees shaped in the rock formations. All of this, he says, amounts to why government-fast-tracked solar programmes in the valley, where temperatures can reach 54C, should be abandoned. It is a matter of their very survival.
"We are traditional people – the people of the cosmic tradition," Figueroa explains. "The Europeans came and did a big number on us. They tried to destroy us. But they were not able to destroy our traditions, and it's because of our traditions and our mythology that we've been able to survive. If we'd blended in with the Wasps – the white Anglo-Saxon Protestants – we'd have been lost long ago."
At the Genesis Solar site, 20 miles west, Florida-based NextEra has begun to develop an 810-hectare site. The brackets that will hold the reflecting mirrors stand like sentinels. Backed by a $825m department of energy loan, Genesis Solar is planned as a centrepiece of the administration's renewable energy programme, with enough generating capacity to power 187,500 homes.
But local Native American groups collectively known as the Colorado River Indian Tribes are demanding that 80 hectares of the development be abandoned after prehistoric grinding stones were found on a layer of ashes they say is evidence of a cremation site "too sacred to disturb".
NextEra rejects the claim, arguing that while Native American artefacts have been found, "no determination" has been made that they come from a village or prehistoric site. "At the request of the Native American tribes we have not tested the ashes, so to suggest this is a cremation site is incorrect," says the NextEra spokesman, Steve Stengel.
The company says that attempts to sue it by lawyers representing the La Cuna group – which is not federally recognised as a Native American tribe – have already been dismissed. But it warns that losing a 10th of the site over any of these claims could make it uneconomic to proceed.
Critics of the solar programme say problems stem from hasty planning and lack of local consultation – claims denied by bureau of land management (BLM) officials. John Kalish, spokesman for the department in Palm Springs, says: "All the projects were thoroughly analysed and assessed for their impact on cultural and biological resources. As part of that process we developed agreements with the tribes to deal with any potential conflicts."
But tribal leaders say damage to their sacred sites is inevitable. They have filed suits against six sites, including Ivanpah, a $2.2bn Google-backed project in the Mojave desert which will be the largest solar plant when it comes online in 2014.
BrightSource, operator of Ivanpah, says that claims that hundreds of square miles of desert will be scraped flat, destroying sensitive habitat, are exaggerated. The company calculates that if all 11 plants approved by the California energy commission are built, they would cover only 66 square miles, 0.26% of the Mojave desert's 25,000 square miles.
The company says it has spent $22m to help the desert tortoises with breeding and nursery programmes, fencing and, at certain times, 100 biologists employed to patrol the site. In addition, BrightSource plans to spend up to $34m to meet federal and state mitigation obligations. The tortoises are not short of attention: one early survey found just 17 across the entire site.
The rush to establish new solar projects has led to reports of a gold rush mentality with some desert areas said to be experiencing a 10- to 20-fold gain in land values.
In others, there are suspicions that the solar business is a rigged game in which projects affiliated to power companies are given the green light more readily. "Land deals are being done but unless you can get connected there is no deal," says Vinson Johnson, a real estate agent in Twentynine Palms, a city in nearby San Bernardino county, California.
None of this impresses tribal leaders, who argue that the land around Blythe was theirs until their numbers shrank and it came under federal control. "It was reservation land until it was reduced," says Figueroa. "They didn't even contact us. So we filed a lawsuit."
One alternative to using BLM land, he says, would be to use areas that have already been disturbed, such as farmland, abandoned military airfields or the huge testing ranges that dot the south-western deserts.
Figueroa is sceptical of the suggestion that accepting solar would be a greater good. "How much is Mother Earth worth?" he says, sharply.
"Yes, it is good to make use of the sun but not when it comes to disturbing sacred sites, pristine desert, the turtles or the horny toad. We were placed here to be guardians of harmonious equilibrium and we have a mission to ensure the sites are preserved for future generations. We cannot allow them to destroy us."
Monday, 5 March 2012
Bill Clinton Points Fingers in Clean-Energy Speech
By Yuliya Chernova
Bill Clinton, speaking at a Department of Energy conference this week, said that despite new ways of recovering oil and gas in the U.S.–and despite the efforts of climate change naysayers and other opponents–the country should still pursue cleaner energy sources and energy efficiency.
Associated Press Shown here in a Thursday speech, Clinton spoke earlier in the week at a clean-technology conference.
This sector, said the former U.S. president and head of the Clinton Climate Initiative, will bring jobs, reduce climate change and allow the country to stop being affected as much by volatile oil and gas prices.
“Our economic future isn’t threatened by what you are doing, but is dependent on the success of what you are doing,” said Clinton, addressing hundreds of listeners in National Harbor, Md., many of them representatives of start-ups working on advanced-energy technologies and recipients of grants from the Department of Energy’s ARPA-e program, which is tasked with backing high-risk, high-potential energy technologies.
But Clinton said that despite an imperative for continued support for clean energy technologies, several entities are trying to derail the efforts.
While not all Republicans are against clean energy–Senator Lamar Alexander was one of the keynote speakers at the ARPA-e conference–Clinton said that the party has made it “ideologically imperative to delay realities of climate change.”
It’s not true, he said, that reducing carbon emissions has to correlate with slower economic growth, pointing to the examples of Sweden and Denmark.
“I think the government should invest even more money in ARPA-e,” said Clinton, referring to the Energy Department’s grant program that was funded initially through the Recovery Act of 2009. President Obama’s new budget proposal is asking to put $350 million more into the program. It previously received about $445 million.
The Obama administration has received strong push-back from many in the Republican party who do not see continued clean-energy government investments as wise policy, especially after the notorious bankruptcy of solar panel maker Solyndra.
Clinton said that it’s not just those efforts that are making things unnecessarily difficult. He slammed government-sponsored Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, two of the nation’s largest mortgage holders, for refusing to allow homeowners to pay for energy-efficiency retrofits via mortgages. Clinton said that people are ready and interested in making their homes use less energy but “the biggest obstacle is from Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
“It’s not true that it undermines the value of the house,” he said, of homes that are retrofitted. “The house is worth more, not less.”
Clinton laid out the most important ways he sees that the country should undertake to pursue the development of clean energy. He cited the Department of Defense as one that will deploy many technologies. “We need more reliance on the military and their capacity to organize and implement” technologies.
The U.S. DoD is on track to spend $10 billion each year on clean energy by 2030, according to the Pew Project on National Security, Energy and Climate.
He said the country should stop emitting as much methane and other rapidly dispersing greenhouse gases that are more of a contributor to climate change than carbon. “I don’t think there should be any open landfills anywhere in the U.S.,” he said. Methane can be captured and turned into fuel, he said.
Before the U.S. asks developing countries to do something about climate change, “We should go after methane, prove there are financeable, affordable models that can work,” he said.
Clinton also touted decoupling, or removing the direct link between a utility’s sales of energy and its profits, which is aimed at giving utilities incentive to invest in clean energy projects. In 20 states, said Clinton, utilities are paid not simply on how much electricity they sell, but rather they receive a certain rate of return based on expenses that can include investments in energy-efficiency and distributed-energy programs.
Even as he called for more investments in non-fossil-fuel energy, Clinton said that the audience should “remove ambivalence on natural gas. We will take it out of the ground.” There are many benefits to that, he said, like jobs created in his state of Arkansas, and the U.S. recently becoming a net exporter of fuel for the first time in a long while.
In an earlier speech at the same conference, Frederick W. Smith, chairman, president and chief executive of one of America’s largest corporations, FedEx, drove home some of the same themes as as Clinton.
“The U.S. cannot operate as a growing industrial society without access to low-cost energy,” he said. “Our dependence on imported oil constitutes our country’s largest security risk and largest economic risk.”
FedEx, a $28.8 billion company by market capitalization, is involved in several initiatives to increase the use of electric cars and natural-gas-driven vehicles.
Reach Yuliya Chernova via email at yuliya.chernova@dowjones.com and follow her on Twitter at @ychernova.
Bill Clinton, speaking at a Department of Energy conference this week, said that despite new ways of recovering oil and gas in the U.S.–and despite the efforts of climate change naysayers and other opponents–the country should still pursue cleaner energy sources and energy efficiency.
Associated Press Shown here in a Thursday speech, Clinton spoke earlier in the week at a clean-technology conference.
This sector, said the former U.S. president and head of the Clinton Climate Initiative, will bring jobs, reduce climate change and allow the country to stop being affected as much by volatile oil and gas prices.
“Our economic future isn’t threatened by what you are doing, but is dependent on the success of what you are doing,” said Clinton, addressing hundreds of listeners in National Harbor, Md., many of them representatives of start-ups working on advanced-energy technologies and recipients of grants from the Department of Energy’s ARPA-e program, which is tasked with backing high-risk, high-potential energy technologies.
But Clinton said that despite an imperative for continued support for clean energy technologies, several entities are trying to derail the efforts.
While not all Republicans are against clean energy–Senator Lamar Alexander was one of the keynote speakers at the ARPA-e conference–Clinton said that the party has made it “ideologically imperative to delay realities of climate change.”
It’s not true, he said, that reducing carbon emissions has to correlate with slower economic growth, pointing to the examples of Sweden and Denmark.
“I think the government should invest even more money in ARPA-e,” said Clinton, referring to the Energy Department’s grant program that was funded initially through the Recovery Act of 2009. President Obama’s new budget proposal is asking to put $350 million more into the program. It previously received about $445 million.
The Obama administration has received strong push-back from many in the Republican party who do not see continued clean-energy government investments as wise policy, especially after the notorious bankruptcy of solar panel maker Solyndra.
Clinton said that it’s not just those efforts that are making things unnecessarily difficult. He slammed government-sponsored Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, two of the nation’s largest mortgage holders, for refusing to allow homeowners to pay for energy-efficiency retrofits via mortgages. Clinton said that people are ready and interested in making their homes use less energy but “the biggest obstacle is from Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
“It’s not true that it undermines the value of the house,” he said, of homes that are retrofitted. “The house is worth more, not less.”
Clinton laid out the most important ways he sees that the country should undertake to pursue the development of clean energy. He cited the Department of Defense as one that will deploy many technologies. “We need more reliance on the military and their capacity to organize and implement” technologies.
The U.S. DoD is on track to spend $10 billion each year on clean energy by 2030, according to the Pew Project on National Security, Energy and Climate.
He said the country should stop emitting as much methane and other rapidly dispersing greenhouse gases that are more of a contributor to climate change than carbon. “I don’t think there should be any open landfills anywhere in the U.S.,” he said. Methane can be captured and turned into fuel, he said.
Before the U.S. asks developing countries to do something about climate change, “We should go after methane, prove there are financeable, affordable models that can work,” he said.
Clinton also touted decoupling, or removing the direct link between a utility’s sales of energy and its profits, which is aimed at giving utilities incentive to invest in clean energy projects. In 20 states, said Clinton, utilities are paid not simply on how much electricity they sell, but rather they receive a certain rate of return based on expenses that can include investments in energy-efficiency and distributed-energy programs.
Even as he called for more investments in non-fossil-fuel energy, Clinton said that the audience should “remove ambivalence on natural gas. We will take it out of the ground.” There are many benefits to that, he said, like jobs created in his state of Arkansas, and the U.S. recently becoming a net exporter of fuel for the first time in a long while.
In an earlier speech at the same conference, Frederick W. Smith, chairman, president and chief executive of one of America’s largest corporations, FedEx, drove home some of the same themes as as Clinton.
“The U.S. cannot operate as a growing industrial society without access to low-cost energy,” he said. “Our dependence on imported oil constitutes our country’s largest security risk and largest economic risk.”
FedEx, a $28.8 billion company by market capitalization, is involved in several initiatives to increase the use of electric cars and natural-gas-driven vehicles.
Reach Yuliya Chernova via email at yuliya.chernova@dowjones.com and follow her on Twitter at @ychernova.
New device heralds potential to turn sewage plants into power stations
Breakthrough that combines fuel cell with other technologies could provide power for entire water grids, scientists say
Damian Carrington
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 19.00 GMT
Sewage can be used to generate electricity using a new device revealed by scientists on Thursday. It combines a fuel cell with other technologies to convert waste water treatment stations into power plants, which the researchers believe could provide the power for entire water grids.
"We certainly could take care of the whole water system: the treating and pumping of water, which currently requires substantial amounts of power," said Prof Bruce Logan at Pennsylvania State University in the US. "We also treated the organic matter much faster."
His team's work is published in the journal Science and is "the proof of concept", Logan said. "Our hope now is to optimise the electricity generation as much as possible."
Switching sewage plants from users to generators of electricity would be especially useful in developing countries, said Logan, an environmental engineer specialising in water systems. "There are 2 billion people in the world who need sanitation, including 1 billion who need access to clean water," he said. "If you go into a country and give them a waste treatment system - the World Bank and others have done this - they do not keep it going, as it needs power and maintenance. It is a drain on the community. But if you can also provide electricity for lighting, or charging mobile phones, that's a game-changer."
The new device combines two types of energy-producing technology: a microbial fuel cell, in which bacteria consume organic matter to produce a current, and a reverse electrodialysis system, in which positive and negative ions are separated by a series of membranes, also creating a current. Microbial fuel cells are relatively inefficient while reverse electrodialysis requires many specialised membranes, making it expensive.
"By combining the two technologies, we overcame the limitations of the fuel cell and synergistically generated energy for the reverse electrodialysis system," said Logan. A crucial factor was using ammonium bicarbonate as the fuel for reverse electrodialysis, which performs better than the seawater typically used. Lastly, said Logan, the combination of technologies meant it was possible to use just five membrane pairs rather than the 20 pairs typically needed to generate electricity.
The device produced 0.9 kilowatt-hours of electricity per kilogram of organic waste. In contrast, sewage treatment usually consumes 1.2kWh per kilogram.
"There were a lot of people looking at fuel cells and a completely different group looking at reverse electrodialysis," said Logan. "We brought the technologies together."
The scientists said broths of other organic material, such as crop waste or other sources of cellulose, could be used to generate power in their device. They also said it could be used to produce electricity from the 7-17% of energy used in the US that is lost as waste heat.
In 2011, British water company Thames Water said it would produce 16% of its electricity by burning sewage flakes. Another company, Wessex Water, has launched a trial running a car on methane gas derived from the sewage treatment process at its Bristol works.
Damian Carrington
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 19.00 GMT
Sewage can be used to generate electricity using a new device revealed by scientists on Thursday. It combines a fuel cell with other technologies to convert waste water treatment stations into power plants, which the researchers believe could provide the power for entire water grids.
"We certainly could take care of the whole water system: the treating and pumping of water, which currently requires substantial amounts of power," said Prof Bruce Logan at Pennsylvania State University in the US. "We also treated the organic matter much faster."
His team's work is published in the journal Science and is "the proof of concept", Logan said. "Our hope now is to optimise the electricity generation as much as possible."
Switching sewage plants from users to generators of electricity would be especially useful in developing countries, said Logan, an environmental engineer specialising in water systems. "There are 2 billion people in the world who need sanitation, including 1 billion who need access to clean water," he said. "If you go into a country and give them a waste treatment system - the World Bank and others have done this - they do not keep it going, as it needs power and maintenance. It is a drain on the community. But if you can also provide electricity for lighting, or charging mobile phones, that's a game-changer."
The new device combines two types of energy-producing technology: a microbial fuel cell, in which bacteria consume organic matter to produce a current, and a reverse electrodialysis system, in which positive and negative ions are separated by a series of membranes, also creating a current. Microbial fuel cells are relatively inefficient while reverse electrodialysis requires many specialised membranes, making it expensive.
"By combining the two technologies, we overcame the limitations of the fuel cell and synergistically generated energy for the reverse electrodialysis system," said Logan. A crucial factor was using ammonium bicarbonate as the fuel for reverse electrodialysis, which performs better than the seawater typically used. Lastly, said Logan, the combination of technologies meant it was possible to use just five membrane pairs rather than the 20 pairs typically needed to generate electricity.
The device produced 0.9 kilowatt-hours of electricity per kilogram of organic waste. In contrast, sewage treatment usually consumes 1.2kWh per kilogram.
"There were a lot of people looking at fuel cells and a completely different group looking at reverse electrodialysis," said Logan. "We brought the technologies together."
The scientists said broths of other organic material, such as crop waste or other sources of cellulose, could be used to generate power in their device. They also said it could be used to produce electricity from the 7-17% of energy used in the US that is lost as waste heat.
In 2011, British water company Thames Water said it would produce 16% of its electricity by burning sewage flakes. Another company, Wessex Water, has launched a trial running a car on methane gas derived from the sewage treatment process at its Bristol works.
Support for wind energy remains strong
Any suggestion that investment in UK wind energy is 'grinding to a halt' does not chime with reality
Maria McCaffery
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 19.32 GMT
In a series of articles this week, you reported on some of the challenges faced by the wind energy industry (The wind war, 27 February-March 1). This did an excellent job of highlighting what the UK stands to lose – in terms of investment, jobs and energy security – if we don't overcome these challenges and grasp the reins of this new industrial revolution. However, in places it also injected some uncertainty over the future of this crucial industry which does not chime with reality.
In particular, your front page subheading on 27 February wrongly stated: "Investment in wind energy grinds to a halt as companies doubt political will." This year the UK has already benefited from hundreds of millions of pounds of investment pledged by multinational companies planning to create jobs across the country. Since January, Samsung has announced a £100m project in Scotland to develop its new offshore turbine at Fife Energy Park, which will employ up to 500 people. The wind turbine manufacturer Vestas has submitted a planning application to build a factory at Sheerness, Kent, which could create 2,000 jobs. Siemens wants to build a wind turbine factory in Hull, creating 700 jobs directly, and many more in the supply chain, when it opens. Samsung has also agreed a multimillion-pound deal to design and manufacture gearboxes for the new turbine. No "grinding to a halt" there.
You also stated that there are "concerns over the government's commitment to wind energy". The opposite is true. Although the industry is not complacent about recent backbench opposition, last month a No 10 spokesman said: "We need a low carbon infrastructure and onshore wind is a cost effective and valuable part of the diverse energy mix." And this was backed up by deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg.
In another article, you stated that "Turbines bring millions for rich landowners" and reported how the Prince of Wales would benefit from leases for offshore wind farms. Well, there are community-owned windfarms such as the Fintry Renewable Energy Enterprise near Stirling, where villagers earn tens of thousands of pounds for community projects.
Local people who host wind farms also reap financial benefits. The wind industry stipulates that communities must receive at least £1,000 per megawatt per year of wind energy installed. These benefit funds are handed over to local people so that they can decide how to spend that money. This is how residents in Burton Latimer, Northamptonshire, were able to afford solar panels for a sheltered housing scheme, children's books for the local library, and energy-efficient glazing for a health centre. That's why, as you reported with a new opinion poll, "a large majority of the public (60%) remains firmly in favour of wind energy".
Maria McCaffery
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 19.32 GMT
In a series of articles this week, you reported on some of the challenges faced by the wind energy industry (The wind war, 27 February-March 1). This did an excellent job of highlighting what the UK stands to lose – in terms of investment, jobs and energy security – if we don't overcome these challenges and grasp the reins of this new industrial revolution. However, in places it also injected some uncertainty over the future of this crucial industry which does not chime with reality.
In particular, your front page subheading on 27 February wrongly stated: "Investment in wind energy grinds to a halt as companies doubt political will." This year the UK has already benefited from hundreds of millions of pounds of investment pledged by multinational companies planning to create jobs across the country. Since January, Samsung has announced a £100m project in Scotland to develop its new offshore turbine at Fife Energy Park, which will employ up to 500 people. The wind turbine manufacturer Vestas has submitted a planning application to build a factory at Sheerness, Kent, which could create 2,000 jobs. Siemens wants to build a wind turbine factory in Hull, creating 700 jobs directly, and many more in the supply chain, when it opens. Samsung has also agreed a multimillion-pound deal to design and manufacture gearboxes for the new turbine. No "grinding to a halt" there.
You also stated that there are "concerns over the government's commitment to wind energy". The opposite is true. Although the industry is not complacent about recent backbench opposition, last month a No 10 spokesman said: "We need a low carbon infrastructure and onshore wind is a cost effective and valuable part of the diverse energy mix." And this was backed up by deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg.
In another article, you stated that "Turbines bring millions for rich landowners" and reported how the Prince of Wales would benefit from leases for offshore wind farms. Well, there are community-owned windfarms such as the Fintry Renewable Energy Enterprise near Stirling, where villagers earn tens of thousands of pounds for community projects.
Local people who host wind farms also reap financial benefits. The wind industry stipulates that communities must receive at least £1,000 per megawatt per year of wind energy installed. These benefit funds are handed over to local people so that they can decide how to spend that money. This is how residents in Burton Latimer, Northamptonshire, were able to afford solar panels for a sheltered housing scheme, children's books for the local library, and energy-efficient glazing for a health centre. That's why, as you reported with a new opinion poll, "a large majority of the public (60%) remains firmly in favour of wind energy".
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