Posted by Sohail Azad
On 02:30
Today's blog is a follow-up of our last post on the "message of fear" that continues in the media over biomass energy (e.g., the Huffington Post article -- Green Nightmare: Burning Biomass is Not Renewable Energy). To refresh everyone's memory -- the author of this article states that the development of biomass energy will lead to the destruction of forests world-wide.The dishonesty of these types of arguments is that no approach to energy production...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 19:28
Two stories on biomass energy caught our attention this week where "misinformation of fear" continues to be presented in the media:Huffington Post: Green Nightmare: Burning Biomass is Not Renewable EnergyNew York Times Op/Ed: Clear-Cutting the Truth About Trees.The purpose of these articles is to advance a "message of fear" -- that adopting policies of biomass energy will lead to the mass destruction of forests throughout the world as clear cutting...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 03:35
The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) has an excellent technical paper explaining why CO2 emissions associated with coal-fired generation are significantly higher than the use of natural gas.EPRI's comparison basis is called the "carbon intensity" ratio and reflects:The higher carbon content of coal versus natural gas and oil, and The lower energy efficiency of existing coal power plants versus generation technologies that use natural gas...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 11:20
My Grandfather used to tell me -- "Don't strain at gnats when elephants are running through your garden". The simple message is to focus on the big things first in dealing with a problem.We spend a lot of time talking about coal use in the U.S. to generate electricity, and we don't do this with any intent to bash the coal industry or electric utilities. We present coal data to explain to Policymakers and Environmentalists where the problem is (the...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 07:03
In trying to answer the question "What does the Common Purpose Institute do?", sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words.We are advancing sustainable biomass energy development, with a key focus not just on biomass technology (bio-gasification, ethanol production, etc.) and agricultural best practices (e.g., high crop yields) but land use integration as well -- with a critical emphasis on carbon management (sequestration, soil building, environmental...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 04:49
The N.Y. Times has an article today on "Green Energy" efforts of Electric Utilities -- specifically the very low participation rates on voluntary programs offered by electric utilities.The article cites that an extremely high percentage of proceeds coming from electricity customers is going to administrative and marketing/advertising expenses rather than capital investments of new renewable energy resources.An example was cited of the Florida Power & Light program where ~75% of customer payments...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 15:26
Let's face it -- Most Environmental Groups only begrudgingly accept biomass energy as truly green. In their view, energy options such as wind or solar are much "Greener". After all, although bio-energy can claim the "Carbon Neutral Argument", it still emits air pollutants such as greenhouse gas emissions, where solar and wind do not.The fatal flaw in these Environmental Group's perspective is their failure to understand basic Energy 101 involving electricity generation -- and how an integrated...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 05:02
Renewable Energy World has a current article on the value of the "heat" component CHP (combined heat and power) from biomass energy.The article has the following graph, illustrating the greenhouse gas benefits of the "heat" CHP component, like with using biogas for industrial product drying. Note the highest level of greenhouse gas benefits is the 3rd bar -- the scenario with the highest "heat use" component.But, lets look at how Congress views...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 17:51
The New York Times has an interesting story on CO2 capture at coal power plants.To view the story Click HereA couple of points of the N.Y. Times story:For now, no one is sure what it will cost to capture and sequester carbon dioxide from coal plants because the first such project in the nation, at American Electric Power�s coal-fired plant in New Haven, W.Va., got under way only last month. At the moment, the process consumes 30 percent of the coal plant�s energy, but engineers are working to cut...
Posted by Sohail Azad
On 05:22
The below graphic is extremely informative on the sources of greenhouse gases and the critical importance of developing renewable energy projects within the industrial sector for industrial/manufacturing processes such as product drying.As the graph's data show, greenhouse gas emissions from industrial processes (16.8%) are greater than from transportation fuels (14.0%) and pretty close to emissions from power plants (21.3%). While the U.S....
