Date:
Monday, February 6, 2012 - 7:30pm - 9:00pm
Check out Daniel Kammen in a debate about the California solar industry!
RAEL Brown-Bag Seminar (without the Brown Bags)
RAEL will once again be resuming its lunch seminars this term in the Energy & Resources reading room in Barrow's Hall every other Wednesday from 12:00-1:15 (hard stop).
The (tentative) dates are:
2/15 - Professor Robert Socolow (http://www.princeton.edu/mae/people/faculty/socolow/)
Discussion: SE4All goals, Dr. Socolow's paper "Wedges Reconfirmed" and the RAEL North America clean energy platform
2/22 - Sara Kamins (http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/PUC/
2/29 - Hunter Lovins (http://natcapsolutions.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=247&Itemid=53)
3/14 - Chris Jones (http://bie.berkeley.edu/chris)
(3/28 Spring Break) No Meeting...
4/11 -
Dan Kammen: "Reward Energy and Technology Innovators"
Publication Date:
January, 2012
Source:
Diablo Magazine
Dan Kammen was interviewed in the article, "A Brighter Tomorrow" by Justin Goldman of Diablo Magazine:
If you want an authority on the future of energy policy, Dan Kammen is your man. He is the director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Lab at UC Berkeley, and he served as the first director of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency for the World Bank Group.
Given your expertise in energy, what do you believe our priorities should be moving forward?
Solar opportunity or new trade war?
Publication Date:
December, 2011
The Solyndra uproar and the International Trade Commission Dec. 2 decision to investigate Chinese solar panel manufacturers for dumping their products below cost in the United States threatens to distract us from what we need most: a proactive, long-term clean and sustainable energy strategy.
If you look beyond the partisan politics that have recently engulfed the solar industry, two irrefutable facts stand out:
Journal:
SF Gate
Solar opportunity or trade war with US
Publication Date:
December, 2011
Source:
The Hill
Property-Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) Proposal
Publication Date:
December, 2011
The economic and environmental need to transition to a low-carbon economy is now at the forefront of energy science, engineering, and policy discussions in the U.S. and internationally. Former Vice President Gore has called for a 100% decarbonization over 10 years and California, Japan, and the UK are notable for a growing list of municipalities legislating 70% or more decarbonization goals over the next four to five decades. Thus far much of the effort has been focused on technology and policy solutions, with very little attention given to how this change can be enabled through financing.
Journal:
N/A
Dan Kammen: Time to Tackle Fossil Fuel Subsidies
Publication Date:
November, 2011
Source:
Clean Edge, Guest Blog by Dan Kammen It is sadly no secret that progress has been slow to vanishing on reaching a meaningful deal on climate protection, which many had hoped would emerge from the 2009 Climate Convention in Copenhagen, or the 2010 meeting in Cancun, Mexico. As we approach Durban and the 2011 version there is virtually no talk of a “global deal,” but there is some hopeful talk of significant public sector and private sector funding for meaningful action on specific topics, including energy access for all, and advancing the business environment for clean energy.
For example, there have been a series of business-led discussions and proposals on how to develop energy-efficiency master plans at all levels—company, municipality, and country. An exciting aspect has been the presence of so many innovative industry partners and governments that have not only developed, but started practicing important renewable energy and energy-efficiency solutions.
At the World Bank and in my role as a professor of energy at the University of California, Berkeley, I have been in many exciting meetings where the “enabling environment” of clean energy versus fossil fuel costs comes to the forefront of the conversation.
Appropriate storage for high-penetration grid-connected photovoltaic plants
.
2011. Appropriate storage for high-penetration grid-connected photovoltaic plants. Energy Policy.
Sustainable Hydropower: A New Flow of Ideas
Publication Date:
October, 2011
Source:
The Great Energy Challenge , National Geographic What can be done to diversify our clean energy technology options? In recent years we have seen a number of seemingly “old” technologies undergo a reassessment, and a reinvention. Geothermal power, once assessed as “an excellent source of baseload energy, but likely limited in commercially exploitable capacity” has undergone a renaissance.
Here’s the new view in the latest IPCC Special Report on Renewable Energy Sources:
In 2008, global geothermal energy use represented only about 0.1 percent of the global primary energy supply. However, by 2050, geothermal could meet roughly 3 percent of the global electricity demand and 5 percent of the global demand for heating and cooling.
That dramatic expansion of scope – a factor of 15 on a global scale – is a function of new technology options and forecasts for higher fossil fuel prices. But it is only one example.
Another technology undergoing a dramatic expansion of options is that of hydropower. Conventional dams, large and small, use either a natural, or more commonly, an artificial “head” or drop to harness energy.