Science and Technology:
¶ Wind to hydrogen: In Falkenhagen, Germany, a little town about 45 miles east of Berlin, E.On is closing in on putting to work a system that uses power from a nearby wind farm to turn water into hydrogen, which is then shot straight into the area’s natural gas system. [EarthTechling]
World:
¶ Creating jobs a breeze if we use natural resources. Ireland’s resources in onshore, near-shore and offshore wind energy realizable in the coming decades have been calculated at 1,990 GW. The total US and Europe electricity generation capacity in 2010 was 1,971 GW. [Irish Independent]
¶ Mongolia has opened its first wind farm, a landmark $122 million project that aims to shift the country’s reliance on coal and tackle the pollution choking its capital Ulan Bator. A total of 31 turbines are expected to power 5% of electricity needs of the country. [CoalGuru.com]
US:
¶ After spending more than five years pursuing plans for a coal-burning power plant in Texas, Omaha-based Tenaska says it has dropped the plan and will focus on the development of natural gas-fueled and renewable facilities. [LubbockOnline.com]
¶ VW America’s manufacturing facility in Chattanooga embodies the sum total of Think Blue, the latest five-year (2012-2018) iteration of the automaker’s global sustainability initiative. [CleanTechnica]
¶ Large, community solar-power arrays are popping up across Colorado. Spurred by a pilot program by Xcel Energy, the state’s largest electricity provider, 22 “solar gardens” are being built from Aurora to Grand Junction, with more to come. [Denver Post]
¶ With little public notice, managers of the government-controlled landfill at the Nevada National Security Site have changed their rules to accept containers of nuclear waste that are five times more radioactive than now allowed. [Las Vegas Review-Journal]
… Nevada’s governor is telling the federal government the state does not want highly radioactive waste of the type that could be used to build a “dirty bomb” buried in a shallow pit at the former national nuclear proving ground north of Las Vegas. [St. George Daily Spectrum]
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