It took me a while to find the Web site for Better Place, Shai Agassi's electric car company, since the Business Week and several other press mentions didn't see fit to include the URL. So I ended up publishing my blog post without the link. Finally -- here it is: Project Better Place.
And once there, what did I find in the discussion area, but a proposal for how to retrofit existing cars, just as I asked: Smart Electric Retrofit.
Note that a simple Google search did not turn up a freestanding site for these anonymous inventors, but it did turn up a couple of others: EV Power Systems and a reference to a site that actually has reported a number of efforts in this direction: Green Car Congress.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Okay, the potential carbon-free energy is there...
Just in case you were wondering, the potential wind and solar energy of the U.S. is sufficient to replace total U.S. consumption -- state by state. The calculations were done by Harvard environmental studies professor Michael McElroy and his graduate students, and summarized in Harvard Magazine, March-April 2008. In fact, even the Pacific Northwest Laboratory, of the Dept. of Energy, calculates the total potential wind-generated electricity alone at twice the nation's annual consumption. McElroy includes the energy requirements of conversion of a majority of the U.S. car and truck fleet to plug-in hybrids.
McElroy has a long and distinguished cv, so I'm willing to accept that all this is true. Two little problems remain: how do you store vast quantities of wind (and solar) to balance the production with the consumption? And two, how do we get from here to there? Granted, his goal was to show simply that the energy is there -- and to take away one specific argument from the ostriches, who retreat argument by argument. See McElroy's faculty page for links to his work.
Still, what I'd like to find is someone working on how to convert existing cars and trucks to using less carbon-based fuel. Just adding one of the Prius's neat tricks, turning the power off at stops -- and letting pressure on the accelerator restart, would help!
McElroy has a long and distinguished cv, so I'm willing to accept that all this is true. Two little problems remain: how do you store vast quantities of wind (and solar) to balance the production with the consumption? And two, how do we get from here to there? Granted, his goal was to show simply that the energy is there -- and to take away one specific argument from the ostriches, who retreat argument by argument. See McElroy's faculty page for links to his work.
Still, what I'd like to find is someone working on how to convert existing cars and trucks to using less carbon-based fuel. Just adding one of the Prius's neat tricks, turning the power off at stops -- and letting pressure on the accelerator restart, would help!
Sunday, February 17, 2008
If You Bought Barron's Five Green "Cleaning Up" Stocks, Did You Clean Up?
On July 15, 2007, Barron's featured five companies that it said represented the non-frothy part of the green boom. How are they doing so far? Okay, to be fair, Barron's writer Mark Ververka said you should hold them for a decade. But life's too short not to peek at them a little ahead of maturity. Okay, a lot ahead of maturity.
Sunpower (SPWR): spinoff of Cypress Semiconductor, makes high-efficiency solar cells, and has the top spot in Spain, a big plant in Korea, and is building the U.S.'s largest plant. July price: $69.80, the 52-week high and 36 times projected 2008 earnings; Merrimack Curham's target is $75.00. Flash-forward to Friday, February 15: $79.44. Sounds good, right? Except one of those bumps Barron's warned about was a nice one: the stock topped $150 in November.
Environmental Power Corp. (EPG): "a big bet on...emissions caps and the trading of pollution credits in the U.S." July price: $8.63. Analyst Brian Tanous of MC has a target of $16, "or $23 if the value of carbon is twice what's expected." February 15: $4.72. Can they hang on until the new administration a year from now?
Fueltech (FTEK): air pollution controls that make power plants run more efficiently. $32.67 in July, heading to $41, said Tanous; $17.80 in February.
PICO Holdings (PICO): Buying up water rights. July price: $43.66. February: $30.80. Volatility is okay, says Tanous, since it's an asset play on its way to $58.
Composite Tech (CPTC.OB): An alternate windmill technology to GE's and carbon-fiber power transmission lines. $1.45 in July; $1.10 now...Barron's said it carried significant risk back in July, so you were warned!
We'll check back in a few years...if we can wait that long!
Composite Tech (
Sunpower (SPWR): spinoff of Cypress Semiconductor, makes high-efficiency solar cells, and has the top spot in Spain, a big plant in Korea, and is building the U.S.'s largest plant. July price: $69.80, the 52-week high and 36 times projected 2008 earnings; Merrimack Curham's target is $75.00. Flash-forward to Friday, February 15: $79.44. Sounds good, right? Except one of those bumps Barron's warned about was a nice one: the stock topped $150 in November.
Environmental Power Corp. (EPG): "a big bet on...emissions caps and the trading of pollution credits in the U.S." July price: $8.63. Analyst Brian Tanous of MC has a target of $16, "or $23 if the value of carbon is twice what's expected." February 15: $4.72. Can they hang on until the new administration a year from now?
Fueltech (FTEK): air pollution controls that make power plants run more efficiently. $32.67 in July, heading to $41, said Tanous; $17.80 in February.
PICO Holdings (PICO): Buying up water rights. July price: $43.66. February: $30.80. Volatility is okay, says Tanous, since it's an asset play on its way to $58.
Composite Tech (CPTC.OB): An alternate windmill technology to GE's and carbon-fiber power transmission lines. $1.45 in July; $1.10 now...Barron's said it carried significant risk back in July, so you were warned!
We'll check back in a few years...if we can wait that long!
Composite Tech (
What does Natural Capitalism mean?
Natural Capitalism is the title of a 1999 book by Amory Lovins and Hunter Lovins, founders of the Rocky Mountain Institute , and Paul Hawken, co-founder of Smith & Hawken garden and house retailer. But what does it mean?
The root is the observation that most businesses consume (transform, ruin for other uses) natural resources without having to account for them as they do financial capital or human capital. But nature, the environment, those forests cut down for paper, the oceans fished, and plains fertilized and pesticized (I think I invented that word!) for too much sugar (corn) and protein (beef), also provide other "services" such as "water storage, habitat and regulation of the atmosphere and climate." L, L & H reported calculations in the journal Nature "conservatively estimate the value of all the earth's ecosystem services to be at least $33 trillion a year. That's close to the gross world product, and it implies a capitalized book value on the order of half a quadrillion dollars. What's more, for most of these services, there is no known substitute at any price, and we can't live without them." *
In other words, if these services were on the balance sheet, companies would need to behave very differently. How should they behave?
1. "Dramatically increase the productivity of natural resources." With the incentive of measurement, companies have already found ways to reduce waste by factors of a 100.
2. "Shift to biologically inspired production models." Nature doesn't recognize the concept of waste; everything is feedstock for another process. Manufacturing can find many opportunities to do the same.
3. "Move to a solutions-based model." Instead of selling a car, which immediately begins to depreciate and deteriorate, sell personal transportation. All of a sudden, the need to lower the capital costs and production waste, and make sure the product can be recycled at the same or even higher value -- instead of lower (turning water bottles into park benches), becomes obvious to companies.
4. "Reinvest in natural capital...Restore, sustain and expand the planet's ecosystems." After all that's what businesses do with financial capital, and even human capital (training).
The article and the book continue with example after example showing how these can be applied: replacing a 95 hp pump with a 7 hp one -- a 92% reduction, for example. How? Replace thin pipes with fatter ones -- but wait, the smoother flow in larger pipes don't save enough to justify the higher capital cost. Right? Not if you also include "the lower capital cost of the smaller pumping equipment that would be needed...pumps, motors, and electrical components."
And then: straighten the path of the pipes. The engineer laid out the pipes first, then position the various tanks, boilers, etc. Bends increase friction, make installation more expensive, and cost less to insulate.
This is whole-system thinking.
*Quotes from the Harvard Business Review article "A Road Map for Natural Capitalism" from 1999, and now part of "The Best of HBR."
The root is the observation that most businesses consume (transform, ruin for other uses) natural resources without having to account for them as they do financial capital or human capital. But nature, the environment, those forests cut down for paper, the oceans fished, and plains fertilized and pesticized (I think I invented that word!) for too much sugar (corn) and protein (beef), also provide other "services" such as "water storage, habitat and regulation of the atmosphere and climate." L, L & H reported calculations in the journal Nature "conservatively estimate the value of all the earth's ecosystem services to be at least $33 trillion a year. That's close to the gross world product, and it implies a capitalized book value on the order of half a quadrillion dollars. What's more, for most of these services, there is no known substitute at any price, and we can't live without them." *
In other words, if these services were on the balance sheet, companies would need to behave very differently. How should they behave?
1. "Dramatically increase the productivity of natural resources." With the incentive of measurement, companies have already found ways to reduce waste by factors of a 100.
2. "Shift to biologically inspired production models." Nature doesn't recognize the concept of waste; everything is feedstock for another process. Manufacturing can find many opportunities to do the same.
3. "Move to a solutions-based model." Instead of selling a car, which immediately begins to depreciate and deteriorate, sell personal transportation. All of a sudden, the need to lower the capital costs and production waste, and make sure the product can be recycled at the same or even higher value -- instead of lower (turning water bottles into park benches), becomes obvious to companies.
4. "Reinvest in natural capital...Restore, sustain and expand the planet's ecosystems." After all that's what businesses do with financial capital, and even human capital (training).
The article and the book continue with example after example showing how these can be applied: replacing a 95 hp pump with a 7 hp one -- a 92% reduction, for example. How? Replace thin pipes with fatter ones -- but wait, the smoother flow in larger pipes don't save enough to justify the higher capital cost. Right? Not if you also include "the lower capital cost of the smaller pumping equipment that would be needed...pumps, motors, and electrical components."
And then: straighten the path of the pipes. The engineer laid out the pipes first, then position the various tanks, boilers, etc. Bends increase friction, make installation more expensive, and cost less to insulate.
This is whole-system thinking.
*Quotes from the Harvard Business Review article "A Road Map for Natural Capitalism" from 1999, and now part of "The Best of HBR."
From Sierra Club to Wal-Mart to Saatchi & Saatchi
Just caught up with the announcement from January 31 that Act Now Productions, the sustainability consulting firm founded by Adam Werbach, has been acquired by the world's largest (or is it second-largest) advertising agency, and renamed "Saatchi & Saatchi S" for sustainability. Check the videos at the launch site, and at the quickly rebranded ActNowProductions.com site.
Adam Werbach first became famous for being picked to head the 500,000 member Sierra Club at the age of 23, after being a Sierra Club organizer in high school and college. He was hugely successful in increasing membership and critically, in lowering the median age. Then he became notorious (on top of his fame) for deciding to accept a challenge from Wal-Mart to help them become a sustainable company. The clinching argument was simple: how could he turn down a chance to impact the largest company on earth, with one of the most extensive networks of suppliers.
His approach was to show the employees ("associates") of Wal-Mart why and how to make their own lives sustainable-- thus inspiring them to do their part to help change the company. This approach is being adopted by Saatchi & Saatchi.
The problem, of course, is parallel to the arguments against working with Wal-Mart: just as Wal-Mart's mission is to sell stuff cheap (and for recent decades, hang the consequences on suppliers and their staff, the communities in which they locate, and their own staff), S&S's mission is to help companies sell more stuff -- at whatever price. Both missions are fundamentally incompatible with a truly sustainable society.
And yet...IF, and that's not large enough --
Adam Werbach first became famous for being picked to head the 500,000 member Sierra Club at the age of 23, after being a Sierra Club organizer in high school and college. He was hugely successful in increasing membership and critically, in lowering the median age. Then he became notorious (on top of his fame) for deciding to accept a challenge from Wal-Mart to help them become a sustainable company. The clinching argument was simple: how could he turn down a chance to impact the largest company on earth, with one of the most extensive networks of suppliers.
His approach was to show the employees ("associates") of Wal-Mart why and how to make their own lives sustainable-- thus inspiring them to do their part to help change the company. This approach is being adopted by Saatchi & Saatchi.
The problem, of course, is parallel to the arguments against working with Wal-Mart: just as Wal-Mart's mission is to sell stuff cheap (and for recent decades, hang the consequences on suppliers and their staff, the communities in which they locate, and their own staff), S&S's mission is to help companies sell more stuff -- at whatever price. Both missions are fundamentally incompatible with a truly sustainable society.
And yet...IF, and that's not large enough --
IF
S&S takes on the mission of changing the mission of its clients...that would be impressive. To say the least!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
