Green-tech news harvest: Tesla drivetrain, Google on plug-in hybrids

• Cellulosic ethanol plant opens--Technology Review
  An important milestone: Verenium will open an ethanol plant in Jennings, La., that will use agricultural waste from sugar cane farming.
• Engineering update on Powertrain 1.5--Tesla Motors blog
  Tesla's CTO offers the nitty-gritty on a one-speed, more durable drivetrain that's expected to make it into cars later this year.

Tesla Roadster's upcoming one-speed drivetrain. More durable, still fast.
(Credit: Tesla Motors)
• RechargeIT goes to Washington, calls for plug-in videos--Official Google.org Blog
  Google.org and the Brookings Institute will host an event in Washington, D.C., to see how plug-in hybrids can lessen dependence on oil. Via Earth2Tech
• Signet Solar, or how the chip industry will colonize the solar business--Greentech Media
  Michael Kanellos parses the opening of a new thin-film solar cell production line to make the point of how the brutally efficient chip industry is bring down solar costs.
• 'Last best chance' for renewable energy tax credits?--Renewable Energy World
  The latest attempt to pass an investment tax credit, which is set to expire at the end of this year. The uncertainty is already causing a slowdown in the wind and solar businesses, companies say.
• SunEthanol receives third DOE grant for cellulosic research--Ethanol Producer Magazine
  SunEthanol, which launched last year, is using a naturally occurring bug to break down plants to make ethanol.

[AppleSuxLeo]

They will probably find that the RF these electric cars are putting out are cooking your internal organs. Most electricity is made from coal in this country.
I would rather have a Methanol or Ethanol based car. Think "alcohol dragster" alcohols can be made from many different things that are grown and renewable. We need to look at what Brazil has done...just amazing !

[AppleSuxLeo]

They will probably find that the RF these electric cars are putting out are cooking your internal organs. Most electricity is made from coal in this country.
I would rather have a Methanol or Ethanol based car. Think "alcohol dragster" alcohols can be made from many different things that are grown and renewable. We need to look at what Brazil has done...just amazing !

[lastchoice]

like cutting down the rainforest for sugarcane?

cellulosic ethanol...

[razor.rodriguez]

First of all, you are probably getting more RF from your cell phone than you'll ever get from the EVs. Second, we need to look at the fact that internal combustion is extremely inefficient, somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 to 30%. I'm not saying that cellulosic ethanol doesn't have a place in all this. I just think that all of this new fuel technology can provide ethanol to be burnt at electric power plants where, through the use of high efficiency turbines, heat sequestering and other systems, they can reach up to 80-85% efficiency. The point is, if we put the burden on power generation, it's a lot easier to pool resources to improve power generation from fuel and renewables and stop dumping money into an inefficient system.