energy

BP teams with MIT on energy conversion technologies

Fuels giant BP has committed a minimum of $25 million over the next five years to fund research on low-carbon emitting fuels at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The partnership, announced on Tuesday, will focus on converting "low value" materials, such as petroleum coke and coal, into electricity, liquid fuels and chemicals. BP will also officially participate in MIT's universitywide Energy Initiative to develop greener energy technologies.

The work will focus on simulation technologies to speed up research on converting different feedstocks to fuels or electricity. Other research areas include gasification and synthetic gas technologies.

Renewable energies … Read more

'Clean coal' start-up GreatPoint Energy raises $100 million

GreatPoint Energy, a company with technology that converts coal to natural gas, has secured $100 million to finance construction of commercial plants.

The third round of funding, first reported by CNET News.com, was led by new investors Dow Chemical, Suncor Energy, AES, and Citi division Sustainable Development Investments, Daniel Goldman, the executive vice president and chief financial officer of the Cambridge, Mass.-based company, said on Friday.

GreatPoint uses a proprietary catalyst that converts coal and other carbon-based materials into methane, the primary component of natural gas. Through its process, it says that it can make its natural gas, … Read more

Pricing pollution a tricky business

SEATTLE--Carbon offsets, energy efficiency credits, renewable energy certificates. The lexicon of the new, niche business world of brokering in greenhouse gases was spoken at the Discover Brilliant conference Monday. (It felt like being in Charlie Brown's classroom.)

Carbon markets have begun to boom over the past year, offering corporations options for offsetting their emissions by trading them with cleaner companies. Many proponents of carbon trading want laws to force businesses to clean up their act.

"As long as companies can dump carbon without paying, they will," said K.C. Golden, policy director of Climate Solutions, a nonprofit … Read more

Will utilities give consumers cash for buying efficient PCs?

SAN FRANCISCO--CORRECTION: Right now, if you buy an energy-efficient dishwasher, utilities like PG&E will give you a cash rebate.

They may do the same for energy-efficient PCs.

The Climate Savers Computing Initiative, a consortium of tech companies that is trying to get the industry and consumers to adopt energy-efficient components, has started to explore the idea of direct rebates with utilities, said Erik Teetzel, a program manager at Google during a meeting at the Intel Developer Forum taking place in San Francisco. Google and Intel are the driving forces behind Climate Savers. (correction: we spelled his name wrong. … Read more

Brains alone can't create a clean energy future

SEATTLE--Clean energy innovations may be getting off the ground in labs and start-up business plans, but making them commonplace for consumers is another matter.

"We're not getting there very quickly because no one's paying the bill," said Stan Bull, director of research and development at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, which is exploring alternative fuels such as ethanol from corn stalks, waste paper and wood from forests thinned to prevent wildfires.

The government must do more to speed up the spread of greener technologies, agreed Bull and other experts at Discover Brilliant, a conference exploring sustainability … Read more

In the real world, solar often gets barely a passing grade

I'm a big fan of solar power. But as with anything, I like to know exactly what I'm getting. One of the big unspoken issues in the solar sector is the difference between the rated or estimated potential output of a solar system--and the actual production of kilowatt-hours. A range of factors from the margin of error in the modules, to temperature, dust and losses from wiring, conversion to AC power and any batteries all can contribute to as much as 30 percent lower actual power production--even in the first year.

Compounding this problem in my mind is … Read more

Energy efficiency firm EnerNoc buys MDEnergy for $7.9 million

EnerNOC, a company that sells software to businesses for lowering their energy bills, said on Monday that it has bought energy consulting firm MDEnergy for $7.9 million in cash and stock.

MDEnergy, based in Stamford, Conn., provides consulting and market information to large energy buyers looking for competitive bids in deregulated markets, according to an EnerNOC representative. The company organizes request for proposals and hosts auctions where suppliers bid on both electric and gas contracts.

The company also provides detailed industry data on usage patterns to aid in contract proposals. MDEnergy's platform will operate independently in the near … Read more

Finding the clean tech money

DAVIS, Calif.--What kind of clean tech product will thrive over the long term?

"Something that doesn't defy laws of physics, and there are plenty of those," said Rodrigo Prudencio, a partner with Nth Power LLC. The venture capital firm helped Evergreen Solar and Imperium Renewables to get off the ground.

Nobody at the AlwaysOn Going Green conference was making bold predictions about what might become the Google of green tech, but the sector is expected to continue expanding at a rapid clip.

Clean tech companies receive the third largest amount of venture capital, a staggering increase … Read more

Exxon Mobil is big, all right

DAVIS, Calif.--You read a lot about renewable energy and the coming opportunities, but there's still a lot of money to be made in gas.

Mark Henwood, managing director at Camino Energy, which analyzes alternative fuel stocks, recently ran a math problem to see just how big the clean tech market is. (We ran into him near the buffet line at the GoingGreen conference this week.)

He totaled up the market cap of all of the clean energy companies now traded on the public exchanges. The list includes solar companies, ethanol refiners and clean coal manufacturers. It does not … Read more