STUFF

World's only global system of carbon trading - clean development mechanism - in dire need of rescue: UN panel.

Combining photosynthetic protein in spinach with silicon, researchers created solar cell that produces considerably more current than any previous solar biohybrids. Popeye Solar.

Shell forced to stop Arctic drilling off Alaska after 1 day. Sea ice moving into area.

Wisconsin had most extreme heat of 50 states this summer. Iowa, MO, IN, MN round out top 5. '12 on track to be warmest ever for most of US.

Computer modelers say planet has enough wind to meet world E demand 7x.

New Zealand court rejected lawsuit by climate change skeptics.

Calif's geology makes fracking much less water intensive. 164K gal/well v. up to 6M gal in TX. Cal putting together shale auction plan.

Schneider El  intro'd low power range inverter/chargers with pure sine wave output. That provides off-grid solar and backup power systems with uninterrupted power that can effectively run modern eltronics. 4Kw and 2Kw. Also new line of Square D PV string combiners and disconnects for solar. 600Vdc.

$100M World Bank loan to help India move toward "enviro model of econ recovery". Energy, watershed management, industry and tourism for northern mountainous state. Plans to increase its hydro cap 10GW next 10 years.

Brazil's Federal Energy Regulatory Agency issued new rules governing rollout of smart metering. ~75M meters, $45B market.

Germany has 7K biogas plants. Total cap ~2.78Gw in '11 (~3.1% of country's E mix). Plant diagnostics and monitoring increasing yields, helping meet transparency requirements of E laws.

Ming Yang Wind Power, Guangdong Nuclear to develop offshore China wind power and "seek overseas market opportunities".

Germany's clean tech industry set to uber double in volume by '25 to maintain global market share of ~15%, and create 1M new jobs. Global clean tech market projected at 4.4T Euros by '25. (If there will be Euros by '25).

Vilsock: no waiver on support for ethanol industry. Well, hell no. Not in an election year.

Western tree mortality down for 2nd year in row. (Except for those dang pesky forest fires this year.)

Rising temps stressing vegitation in SW US.

EU aims to limit crop-based fuels on climate, food concerns.

Utilities finding repairs on nuke plants hard to justify with cheap NG.

Australia moving to block "super trawler" fishing.

EOG Resources - top producer in TX shale oil formation (Eagle Ford?) - and others citing study saying fracking rule for NG on public land may cost > 20x US govt estimates. $254K/well to meet chem disclosure and certified well isolation (leak prevention). BLM says $11.8K/well. Well, there's an election issue, A?

EC study found Euro shale NG won't cut dependence on imports (from Russia). Enviro concerns and different rules on land and resource ownership in Europe v. US. "No fracking should be allowed near aquifers." Fracking sand fills geological pores to prevent horizontal well collapse while NG migrates upward (to aquifers) along with water contaminated with fracking chems (guar bean?) and other pollutants including low-levels of naturally radioactive material. Does that sound good to you? I'm not really sure how bad it is considering everything. But it's certainly something to study.

Joule (Mass) commissioned NM demo plant to prove scalable solar fuel. Direct conversion of solar energy into liquid fuels with optimized microorganisms that act as living catalysts to make fuel rather than biomass and later extracting lipids or sugars. Comp also announced launch of Joule Fuels. "Sunflow-E" (ethanol) to be followed by Sunflow-D (diesel). Getting costs down to $50/bl without subsidies. Ultimate target 25K gal Sunflow-E/acre/yr at cost as low as $1.28/gal. That's sure a go.

LS9 completed production run of fatty alcohols at FL plant. 135K liter scale. Next is switch to diesel fuel production and ester chems. Fatty alcohols are long C-chain alcohols used widely for surfactants.

3 gas pumps on Mass turnpike now offering E85.

Brazil bioethanol lab partnering with Advance Bio Systems to increase sugarcane bioethanol yield 30-40%.

Canada created $500M fund to support small biz including next-gen biofuel producers.

Last Al-Shabaab-held port surrounded in Somalia by largely Kenyan forces. But tribes probably will carry the day.

Norway preparing program to comp industry for CO2 emissions to keep biz in country.

Turkmenistan held 1st-ever naval exercise in Caspian over undersea oil field with up to 50M tons of oil. Contesting with Azerbaijan, Russia, Iran, Kazakhstan for it. Toss a 5-sided coin? Old news.

BP sold off $5.5B of GOM assets to Plains Exploration & Production (primarily NG comp till now).

Afghans may have trillions of dollars worth of mineral reserves from gold to iron. But development curbed by corruption, violence.