STUFF

Cogentrix Energy turned on 30MW solar farm in Colo. Largest concentrating solar power facility in world. Dual-axis trackers. Fresnel lenses concentrate sunlight 500X onto multijunction cells. Xcel E buying the power.

Largest non-utility-owned solar project east of Mississippi R. dedicated: Lincoln Renewable E's 12.5MW solar farm in NJ. LRE has formed 50/50 JV with Samsung called Monument Power. LRE developing >30 solar and wind power projects in 11 states. Monument planning $500M in projects.

US Geothermal (Amex: HTM) started performance tests on new 8.6 net MW geotherm plant in Nevada. With commmercial operation by NV Energy, power rate will be $89.75/MWh with 1% annual escalation.

NREL now has lifecycle analysis of GHG emissions of energy techs from cradle to grave. "Harmonization Project". It found coal power releases ~20X as much GHG's as solar, wind or nuke. NG wasn't in final analysis. Yet. They found 45 grams of CO2 emitted per KWh for solar vs. 1K grams for coal. Nuke 12 grams. CSP 26 grams for parabolic troughs, 38 for power towers. 20 grams for amorphous silicon, 14 for CdTe, 28 for CIGS. Wind 11 grams.

Army scientists developing deployable clean E solutions.

CWET got zoning approval for their atmos differential tower generator. Arizona, I think.

Spain has asked lenders to increase provisions for bad debt by $70B. But that may be 5X short of need. Plugging the hole would require EU bailout. 5th largest Euro econ, banking system 6X Ireland's.

JP Morgan said: "a man always has 2 reasons for doing anything. A good reason and the real reason."

JP, of course, lost $2B on a $100B "bet". And we're supposed to worry about contagion? Actually, I'm one who thinks we should go back to the banking regs that Clinton et al expunged in '99. Or what's now called the Volcker Rule.

NG took off from mid-April prices. Under $2 to $2.50 now.

'10's US elgen #'s: coal 45%, NG 24%, nuke 20%, other clean (hydro, wind, solar, geo, etc.) 10%. Wonder when we see '11's #'s.

A rig in Bakken uses >3K gals of diesel/day. Estimate of up to 3M gal/d for whole field. Comps now cutting costs in half by using LNG. I wish we could more truck fleets on it. And trains. And ships.

Schneider El joined ABB, Siemens, Eaton in EV quick charge race.

Organic waste ~30% of US waste.

Greek stock market down 88% (from last top, I presume). S&P fell 85% in Great Depression.

1970-2008 US money supply (M2) grew from $624B to $8.2T. 1,314% - about the same as the Dow.

And so on we go.