STUFF

China produced ~3.2B metric tons coal in '10, up 10% from '09. And how many lives? ~15B bls oil equivalent or 1/2 world oil production. Beijing saying that growth rate to end this or next year. And a 300M ton coal gap will have to be filled. Wyoming? Australia (presently under water)?

CNPV of Luxembourg handed over their 1st utility-scale 7MW solar project in China for $25M.

GE E Financial, Bankers Commercial Corp bought 150MW Alta wind farm at Tehachapi in a leaseback. 3GW planned. First 1.5GW contracted to SCalEd.

Vestas to supply 38MW wind project in Germany. '11 delivery.

Xinjiang Goldwind got contract for 51MW of turbines for Ethiopia.

Milwaukee considering lakefront wind turbines after Toronto, Cleveland lead.

GE contract for 45MW windfarm in France. 580MW already installed in Champagne-Ardennes region.

DOE to fund $50M+ in test/demo initiatives for solar. Focus on concentrating solar thermal v. concentrating PV. DOE w/ DOI proposing solar E zones.

ESLR(D) shutting down Mass plant. $350M writedown next 2 Q's. 800 employees. The plant in China reportedly up and running. ESLR's shipments ~47MW in Q4, avg. sell price (ASP) 1.90/W. They're continuing the hitemp filament plant in Mich. In discussions to expand the wafer plant in China. O yea, got $58M from State of Mass. in '08 for that plant they are shutting down.

PetroChina and UK's INEOS announced plans for trading/refining joint venture in Europe (2 sites). Petro to provide capital (well, they do have a lot of our money now) for 50% share. Fuel demand in China growing ~8%/yr. Last year their oil/NG acquisitions totaled $24B, up from '09's $17B.

DC-powered datacenters 10% more efficient than state-of-art AC units. Purchase/install costs 30-35% less. Further redux by putting center's air conditioning on DC. Need 25-40% less floor space because UPS, other components, heavy wire not needed.

The US does not have the infrastructure to meet the fed mandates for renewable fuels with eth. But could with significant increases in cellulosic, next-gen biofuels: Purdue study. Not enough flex-fuel vehicles - 7.3M vehicles of 240M fleet (3M owners not even aware they can use E85 or don't want to because of lower mileage or possible engine damage) - or E85 pumps (2k installed over 20 years). Even going to 15% blend hits the "blending wall" again in 4 years. Sounds political, huh? Poowee on ethanol.

US spends $300B/yr on foreign oil. 60% of trade deficit.

DOE announced $30M over next 3-4 years for up to 5 projects for next-gen biofuels R&D. Boy, that's serious money, huh?