T. Boone Pickens says: Let's transform energy with Natural Gas

Mr. Pickens says from the outset that he believes in global warming, which I must assume he means to say human caused global warming.  He then launches into a pitch to sell us on a large-scale switch to natural gas to fuel our society.  Natural gas is a fossil fuel, and will only continue the path of global warming.   While Natural Gas is routinely believed to be cleaner, some research has shown it isn't, especially in the first stage after a frack-job when there's a lot of methane escaping into the atmosphere.

His approach is from national energy security.  The current dominance of oil to fuel our society of course undermines the U.S. national security, because oil is located in countries that aren't exactly friendly to the U.S.  Mr. Pickens calls these countries The Enemy, and one gathers that he thinks any OPEC country is part of that Enemy.  The numbers are that $3 trillion per year goes into buying fossil fuels, and of that amount $1 trillion flows to OPEC, which Mr. Pickens calls the Greatest Transfer of Wealth in History.  But, yes, of course, this is funding countries that are not friendly to the U.S.  Why, then, do the Republican politicians want to keep us on the fossil oil bandwagon?

Mr. Pickens claims there is plenty of natural gas available.  The technology enabling this is hydraulic fracturing.  In his view there's nothing wrong with that technology, he's done thousands of frack-jobs and not had a problem.  There's a lot of people who disagree with him.

His position is one of hypocrisy.  On the one hand he believes in global warming, on the other hand he's pushing a fuel that will continue the fossil fuel dependency behind human caused global warming.  The causitive factor to human caused global warming is digging up ancient fossil fuels and burning them, releasing more carbon into the ecosphere.  The way to stop this is to stop using fossil fuels.

But could natural gas be a bridge fuel to get us somewhere?  That's the core of his pitch, that it's a bridge fuel, and because he's an old guy that's about to die, he doesn't care about where that bridge leads.  It's up to us to solve the problems of adopting natural gas on a big scale.

There is already a large-scale adoption of natural gas in big trucks, as Mr. Pickens suggests.  The big trucks represent a large amount of fossil fuel/oil use, and because they're running dirty diesel engines the air pollution from those trucks is horrible and known to be carcinogenic.  His suggestion is that natural gas is cleaner than diesel, making it a better fuel.  But, what if our society adopts natural gas and then stops there?  We'll still be on the path of human caused global warming.

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New Lines, New Price Lead to 500% Jump in Sales of Pharox LED Bulbs

Pharox BLU Below $5 Price Point, Encourages New Users to Try Replacement LEDs

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 29, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Lemnis, Inc, the San Francisco-based leader in sustainable LED lighting technology, released three new lines of its popular Pharox-brand LED replacement bulbs last week and saw a 500% increase in sales over average weekly sales based on the new every-day low pricing. The lowest-priced bulb, the 200-lumen Pharox BLU, broke the $5 price point with a suggested retail price of $4.95(1) sold exclusively through pharox-led.com. The response from consumers meant the busiest week on pharox-led.com ever with web traffic up hundreds of times the average, vastly increasing sales on the Pharox XL products as well as the BLU.

"We knew there were customers out there who wanted to but hadn't yet tried LEDs," said Co-Founder Warner Philips.  "We just hadn't expected such an incredible uptake. In study after study, price is repeatedly given as the number one barrier to consumer adoption. With the new Pharox BLU and XL lines we give the average consumer a chance to experience a well-made bulb that gives off the warm, white light they want without added frills or high costs and perfect for certain home lighting applications."

Unsurprisingly, the low introductory Pharox BLU price has meant an increased interest in other Pharox models. The Pharox 300 XL has been a sales success with both consumers and hospitality businesses that want a 3-year warranty and a dimmable warm white lighting experience.

"We have found a particular strong interest in the Pharox 300 XL from customers who are looking for replacement bulbs for living rooms, dining areas, kitchens and home office/working space where Americans want dimmable products that are 'on' significantly longer than most rooms," said Philips.

The XL line is aimed at home and commercial customers who want to be sure of a longer-lasting LED and the 3-year/35,000 hour warranty to back it up. The Pharox XL 200 is priced at $8.95 and the XL 300 is $11.95. Finally, the Energy Star-qualified Pharox PRO bulbs (coming soon) are designed with the commercial and rebate-driven customer in mind and will carry a 5-year replacement guarantee.

The Pharox BLU 200-lumen model is a "no frills," non-dimmable consumer LED. It comes with a one-year warranty. The next step up in lumens is the 350-lumen Pharox BLU bulb with a suggested retail price of $6.95, also with a one-year warranty. The Pharox BLU line is only available at pharox-led.com. These low-lumen bulbs can be useful in many areas of the average home: in a bedside lamp, in reflective cans over kitchen counters or in recessed cans in a hallway.

The Pharox BLU was designed to entice consumers who wanted to try LEDs but were deterred by high prices. All three lines - Pharox BLU, Pharox XL and Pharox PRO (due out later this year) - offer customers what they need from an LED bulb without piling on added cost for features that aren't necessary for their situation. Recent Energy Star and DOE speakers hi-lighted the need for lower pricing to get consumers to start using LEDs, as well as the under-served market for lower lumen output LEDs for specific home applications.

The three lines of Pharox LED replacement bulbs offer consumers of all stripes the same reliability they expect from incandescent bulbs with vastly increased life expectancy and vastly decreased energy usage. A typical 40-watt incandescent bulb costs approximately $5.69 per year to use at $0.13 per kWh, three hours a day. The equivalent Pharox 350 lumen bulb (BLU, XL and PRO) costs just $0.85 per year in energy use. As these durable LED bulbs last between 15,000 - 35,000 hours, in most cases they pay for themselves in less than two years and keep on paying for years after.

For more information about the Pharox BLU, Pharox XL, Pharox PRO and other Lemnis Lighting products, visit www.pharox-led.com/us

About Lemnis Lighting

Lemnis Lighting is at the forefront of the rapidly developing global LED lighting industry. Lemnis has been recognised as a leader in the field of LED lighting since 2006 and the introduction of its first Pharox LED light, more than five million of which have been sold worldwide. In addition to its large scale roll-out program of consumer, street and greenhouse lighting in the Netherlands, Lemnis is also active in the areas of development, production and sales, with offices in the Netherlands, San Francisco, Hong Kong, Singapore and Johannesburg. Lemnis Lighting is an independent, privately held company and was initiated by cleantech incubator Tendris (http://www.tendris.com).

(1) Limit five (5) per customer.

SOURCE  Lemnis Lighting

Lemnis Lighting

CONTACT: CONTACT: Kevin Lewis, +1-415-518-8401, kevin@bluepractice.com

Web Site: http://www.pharox-led.com

California hits wind energy milestone: About 5 percent of power from wind

California now gets about 5 percent of its electricity from wind power, according to data released Tuesday by the California Wind Energy Association. The majority of California's electricity - 42 percent - comes from natural gas, followed by nuclear power and hydropower. According to 2010 figures from the California Energy Commission, wind made up 4.7 percent of the state's electricity mix and solar was 0.3 percent. But in 2011, wind projects that generate 921 megawatts - enough electricity for more than 400,000 homes - were installed across the state, which the wind association says should put it above the long-sought-after 5 percent threshold.


http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-02-california-energy-milestone-percent-power.html

12-16-11 2 - Breaking News Keystone XL Pipeline, with Joe Romm - Countdown with Keith Olbermann

With today's decision by the Obama Administration to deny the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project, I came across this interview by Keith Olbermann with Joe Romm back in December talking about the project.  Back in December the Republicans tied the Keystone XL project to passing the Payroll Tax Deduction and attempted to force the Administration to make a decision within 60 days.  Well, the Administration did so and said that the Republicans push to make a decision now forced the Administration to just deny the request outright, because they couldn't make a decision so quickly.

In any case Olbermann and Romm had a great discussion of the points back then.

Permanent magnet free energy generator? Possible?

Just came across this video from an Argentinian who claims to have developed a "free energy device" based on permanent magnet motor principles.  The video looks like a real working free energy device and they even show there's no extra wires running into it, while its in operation.  However such things aren't valid by normal physics due to "laws" of thermodynamic conservation and the like.  But even though physics people call those things "laws" they're really theory which are so solid because nobody has disproved them in a few hundred years and these laws of physics are used as the basis for other aspects of physics.  However they're only concrete laws insofar as the extent to which physics scientists have managed to understand how the universe works.

Another name for this sort of device is "permanent magnet generator".

To review - a free energy device is one which produces a surplus of energy.  In other words, it generates energy above the energy cost of running the device.  In other words, that the ratio of the energy output to the energy input is greater than 1 (more energy comes out than goes in).  Another phrase widely used is "over-unity".

The principle/law of conservation of energy says that shouldn't be possible.  So...

What's demonstrated is an inner axle on which it appears some magnets are mounted.  The outer part appears to have pickups to gather electricity.

There are known widely used processes where you can spin a machine like this and generate electricity.  Every gasoline powered car has one such gizmo, "the alternator".  However by conventional physics it takes some effort to spin the alternator (a.k.a. generator), and the role of an electrical generator is to convert physical force into electricity.  The physics is that spinning a wire through a magnetic field causes electricity to flow through the wire.

This video instead shows the device continuing to spin for quite awhile and continue to generate electricity.


If this video is validly showing a valid device then I wonder why the person is wasting their time making youtube videos.  They should instead just go into business building generators and solve the world energy crisis.  But because that isn't the case it calls into question the validity of the video.  That and the principles/laws of physics I just mentioned.

Liquid Biofuels Can Make EPA Compliance a Net Plus for Coal-Burning Utilities, Says Clean Energy Pathways

Clean Energy Pathways is back with a curious product announcement.  They had earlier talked about using biofuels to displace coal in electricity plants, and are now back with thermal imaging and other technological gizmos to verify these claims.

They're offering a one-day workshop for coal-burning utilities to demonstrate their claims that biofuel use in a coal fired plant offers many improvements. 

It's a product that's specifically targeted to specific government rules.  If a coal-fired utility were to buy the biofuels offered by Clean Energy Pathways, they can (while running a coal plant) earn renewable energy credits and be recognized as using renewable fuels.  It strikes me as a form of greenwashing but maybe there's some value to it.

DOTHAN, Ala., Dec. 21, 2011 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Btu-substitution with liquid biofuels can make EPA compliance a net plus for coal-burning utilities, according to Clean Energy Pathways Inc. (Pink Sheets: CPWY). The company backs that assertion with a free one-day workshop for coal-burning utilities entitled, "The Care and Feeding of Boiler Tubes." The workshop explains how Btu-substitution with liquid biofuels can be coupled with infrared thermal monitoring to optimize boiler efficiency, while aiding compliance with the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2) and Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR). Led by Wayne Ruddock, a professional infrared thermographer and instructor with 30 years' experience, the workshops are aimed at plant management, fuel procurement, environmental compliance and maintenance officers, particularly those in the 28 states affected by CSAPR.

"One purpose of the workshop is to explain how compliance with RFS2 and CSAPR can actually work to the utilities' advantage if liquid biofuels are substituted for coal," explained Ruddock. "Tests have shown these fuels reduce Sox, CO2 and fly ash in proportion to the amount substituted for coal Btu's. Liquid biofuels also reduce soot and slag buildup on boiler tubes, which improves heat transfer efficiency, maintenance and operating costs. We will also explain how thermal imaging is used to monitor boiler tubes for slag/soot buildup and temperature, enabling a plant to make appropriate adjustments to operate the boiler in its 'sweet spot' for highest efficiency."

Clean Energy Pathways markets custom-blended biofuels for use as a Btu-substitute in coal-fired utility furnaces and diesel-powered equipment. Available as B20, B100 or other custom blends, the fuels meet the EPA's RFS2 mandate for use of renewable fuel, and create carbon tax credits. The water-soluble B100 fuel is environmentally friendly and yields 50 percent higher Btu content per cubic foot than PRB coal. These fuels also qualify for the Renewable Electric Producer Tax Credit of 2.2 cents per kilowatt, or 22 cents per gallon based on 10 kilowatts per gallon. Tested as a coal substitute in a circulating fluidized bed boiler, the new fuel reduced coal consumption by 10 percent, in turn reducing the sulfur dioxide and CO2 emissions from coal by 10 percent.

For information on the workshop series, contact Jon Chynoweth at 906.370.8164 or email jonchynoweth@me.com.

About Clean Energy Pathways

Clean Energy Pathways, Inc. is a company focused on multiple solutions to aid businesses and government facilities in attaining energy independence, reduced costs, and a cleaner environment. These pathways to energy independence include biofuels, solar systems, building energy management systems and other technologies, as well as financing of, and gain-sharing in, the improvements. For more see www.cleanenergypathways.com

CONTACT: Harrison Parrish
         866-492-5325
         investor@cepathways.com