STUFF

At the height of the bubble, Wall St. had $183T of derivatives on the books. It's now $248T. Total US debt - gov, corp, mortgage, personal - now $50T. What have we learned?

Seaweed - kelp - being studied for biofuel source. High growth rate, decay efficiently yields methane, sugars. But seasonal.

AEP Ohio "participation agreement" w/ Turning Point Solar for 50MW solar project. 250k panels will be made in OH by Isofoton. To be built on reclaimed coal mine land. Begin in '12, online in '15, 600 jobs. AEP to invest $20M.

In Spain, Torresol's 19.9MW power tower solar farm (mirrors concentrate heat on tower boiler) 1st ever to generate 24-hour solar power in last weeks of June. Molten salt heat sink generated power thru the nights. So why are we building gigawatt PV plants in the desert? Well, the gov guaranteed the loans. O, FSLR owned by Walton family. O. Political contributions? O. Oy.

Another problem with multi MW plants is that up to 20% of elgen loss with inverters and transformers with step-ups and step-downs of voltage in transmission. Small plants in close proximity to users eliminates much of that loss.

ENOC bought the largest demand response provider in Australia/NewZealand. No figures disclosed.

DOE planning $105M loan guarantee for POET's expansion of IA eth plant to make cellulosic eth. Going for ability to process 700 tons/d of corn waste (stover). DOA already has announced $405M in guarantees. $250M for Coskata to convert household waste, other waste into eth. $80M for Enerkem plant, $75M for Ineos Bio biorefinery. POET's pilot cellulosic plant is producing eth @ $2.50-$3/gal, ~50 cents higher than from corn kernels. The corn stover is steamed, treated w/ acid, then broken down by enzymes (sounds like a stomach) into ordinary sugar and a 2nd sugar w/ 1 fewer C atom. Both converted by yeast into alcohol, but persuading the yeast to eat the 2nd sugar requires DNA alteration. Cool or what?

EPA finalized rules on soot and smog-forming power plant emissions for 27 eastern states.

Forest Service: fracking discharge is toxic to plants.

Navy put out its biggest request yet for biofuels.

Quebec released cap and trade regs for '13 start.

JDSU entering CPV (concentrated PV solar) market as chip supplier, acquiring UK's Quanta Sol. Multiple quantum well tech. JDSU familiar with, used for decades in laser diodes. CPV has seen run of financing in last few weeks. And EMKR has not been consistent in supply chain.

And, finally, happy trails, pards.