Green Gold – EcoVillages and Permaculture

Green Gold – Documentary by John D. Liu
A clear extraordinary path to sustainability…

“It’s possible to rehabilitate large-scale damaged ecosystems.” Environmental film maker John D. Liu documents large-scale ecosystem restoration projects in China, Africa, South America and the Middle East, highlighting the enormous benefits to people and planet of undertaking these efforts globally.

John D. Liu (environmental photographer), Geoff Lawton (designer of Permaculture), Jordanian Princess Basma bint Talal (permaculture enthusiast)

More information:

http://eempc.org/

What If We Change social media project:

http://www.whatifwechange.org

NIGER DELTA – MALI PROJECT: http://www.whatifwechange.org/index.php#/stories/158

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Greening the Desert
Geoff Lawton (designer of Permaculture)

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Dryland Permaculture Strategies
-Bill Mollison, Father of Permaculture

Bill Mollison Father of Permaculture Shares his Wisdom on Dryland Systems, to find out more about Bill and his work please visit; http://www.tagari.com

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Ecovillages and Permaculture: a reference model for sustainable consumption?

This is a documentary about ecovillages and permaculture seen from a sustainable consumption perspective. The intention is to show an example of lifestyles that take sustainability to the extreme, living and consuming in a way that causes minimum impact on the planet.

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Food Forest
by c2agriculture.com

Saving Lives through Clean Cookstoves: Ethan Kay

The BioLight is an amazing solution not just because of what it does, but HOW it does it.

What it will do is save millions and millions of lives around the world, half of which are under the age of 5.
It does this by providing a smoke free alternative to the toxic open flame and smoke that is currently used by almost half of the world.
It also provides enough electricity to power a cell phone, and lighting to do homework at night.
All from whatever natural fuel source is available, wood, cow dung, bio scraps, etc.

How it will sold and marketed is just as important…
As a full cultural integration… it will be presented to the tribal elders first.
From there it will integrate as a way to bring financial independence to tens of thousands that will sell, service and distribute.

It will be affordable… and have an average return on investment to the end user of less than 7 months.
Enurgy, Inc. will be supporting this project in some fashion in the very near future.

This is one of those products that will really make a difference in the world.
Pleaese watch the TEDx video below.

Peace,
Bruce

BioLite develops and manufactures advanced energy products that make cooking with wood as clean safe and easy as modern fuels while also providing electricity to charge cell phones and LED lights off-grid. We feel a strong sense of responsibility not just to develop products that work well but also to create businesses that make a positive contribution to the global community.

Ethan Kay:
Building on his doctoral dissertation, Ethan’s project as a Sauvé Scholar was to collaborate with BioLite to bring to market smokeless cookstoves for low-income families in developing countries. He helped BioLite design and develop its: channel partnership and scaling strategy; pilot programs; end-to-end value chain; and carbon financing model. He also plans to publish at least two articles in prestigious journals, focused on debunking the so-called ‘poverty penalty’ and codifying the common pitfalls of market-based poverty alleviation strategies. He also served as Lead Technical Expert on the World Bank’s 2012 ‘State of the Cookstove Sector’ report. Ethan had a 30-minute nationally televised interview on social entrepreneurship with Robert Scully on PBS; delivered a TEDxMontreal Talk on indoor air pollution and ultra-clean cookstoves; and gave several lectures at McGill’s Desautels Faculty of Management and Concordia’s Department of Communication Studies. He also submitted an article for publication debunking the so-called ‘poverty penalty’.

Ancient Knowledge – Health-Revolution – Energy-Consciousness – Pi-Phi-Fibonacci Sequence – Zero-Point

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 1

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 2

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 3

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 4

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 4.5

Ancient Mysteries/Knowledge Part 5

“The Ancients” knew much more than given credit for regarding Life, The Universe, Astronomy, Advanced Mathematics, Magnetism, Healing, Unseen Forces etc.
Encoded knowledge is information that is conveyed in signs and symbols and we can find this knowledge all over the world. All these ancient sightings and geometric patterns (Sacred Geometry) symbolise unseen forces at work. We are being lied to by the media. Modern archaeologists don’t know what they’re talking about. “The Ancients” were not stupid or primitive. We just failed to de-code this knowledge conveyed in signs, symbols and ancient artwork. This kind of information is kept hidden from the public.

Scientists dont know what holds the universe together, the answer is sound and unseen forces. Matter is governed by sound frequencies. There is much more to life than we can perceive with our 5 senses. The question then becomes “who or what governs unseen forces?” What is behind the symmetry throughout nature? (Golden Ratio, Phi, Fibonacci Sequence etc.) It simply cant be just coincidence, in my opinion there is an intelligent mind / consciousness behind all this that keeps it all together.

Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the copyright act 1976, allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as critisicm, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statue that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.

24/7 Concentrated Solar Energy

Gemasolar, near Seville, Spain – the first Concentrated Solar Thermal Power plus molten salt storage (CSP+) plant to produce energy 24 hours per day.

This power tower plant produces 20MW, enough to power 25,000 homes but much bigger CSP+ plants are now being in the Middle East and the US that will produce 100MW and 150MW. Even larger CSP+ plants are possible.

http://www.torresolenergy.com/TORRESOL/gemasolar-plant/en

It is the station’s capacity to store energy that makes Gemasolar so different because it allows the plant to transmit power during the night, relying on energy it has accumulated during the day.

The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi (left) with Spain’s King Juan Carlos at last year’s opening of the solar power plant. Torresol Energy is a joint venture between the Spanish engineering group Sener, which holds 60 percent, and Abu Dhabi-financed renewable energy firm Masdar. “I use that energy as I see fit, and not as the sun dictates,” Arias explained. As a result, the plant produces 60 percent more energy than a station without storage capacity because it can work 6,400 hours a year compared to 1,200-2,000 hours for other solar power stations, he said. “The amount of energy we produce a year is equal to the consumption of 30,000 Spanish households,” Arias said, an annual saving of 30,000 tonnes of CO2. Helped by generous state aid, renewable energies have enjoyed a boom in Spain, the world number two in solar energy and the biggest wind power producer in Europe, ahead of Germany.

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Abengoa will have the Support of Banco Santander in Developing the World’s Largest Concentrating Solar Power Plant
Solana, which is being built in Arizona, will be the first solar plant in the United States with the ability to store energy.

April 20, 2012
Seville, April 20, 2012.- Abengoa (MCE: ABG), the international company that applies innovative technology solutions for sustainable development in the energy and environment sectors, has announced that it will collaborate with Capital Riesgo Global, a subsidiary of Banco Santander, which will become a financial partner in the development of Solana, the largest concentrating solar power plant in the world. The plant, which is currently being built by Abengoa in Arizona, will have a production capacity of 280 MW gross and will be the first solar plant in the United States with the ability to store energy.
Capital Riesgo Global will invest $125 million in exchange for an equity stake in the project. The total investment for Solana is around $2,000 million. Abengoa obtained a federal loan guarantee for approximately $1.45 billion in December 2010 from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Loan Programs Office to finance this project. This investment, which has been approved by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), will reduce Abengoa’s own capital requirement contribution and is fully compatible with the potential entry of a tax equity investor in the project.
Solana is the first large-scale plant to be developed by Abengoa in Arizona. With a capacity of 280 MW gross, it will be the largest concentrating solar power plant in the world. Concentrating solar power is a mature technology that, due to thermal inertia and storage, allows the plant to produce dispatchable electricity throughout the day, averting intermittency that other renewables experience, such as wind and photovoltaics. The plant was recently visited by the United States Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar. Construction work is on track to begin producing energy by summer 2013, having achieved almost 50 percent of progress in construction so far. The project has already created more than 1,300 direct jobs and will soon reach 1,600. Solana will generate enough energy to supply 70,000 households and will prevent the emission of 475,000 tons of CO2 per annum.
Abengoa currently has more than 1 GW of solar capacity under construction around the world. It also has a total of 543 MW in operation and is the only company in the world to construct and operate concentrating solar power plants using both tower and parabolic trough technologies.

http://www.abengoasolar.com/corp/web/en/acerca_de_nosotros/sala_de_prensa/noticias/2012/solar_20120419.html

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NREL Report: Thermal Storage Gets More Solar on the Grid
February 14, 2012

http://www.nrel.gov/news/features/feature_detail.cfm/feature_id=1788
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Abengoa’s first plant at the Castilla-La Mancha Solar Complex goes into operation
Abengoa reaches 593 MW installed capacity with the latest plant going into operation.

June 27, 2012
Seville, June 27, 2012 – Abengoa (MCE: ABG), the international company that applies innovative technology solutions for sustainable development in the energy and environment sectors, has begun operation of Helios 1, the first of the two parabolic trough plants in the Castilla-La Mancha Solar Complex. The complex, located in the municipalities of Arenas de San Juan, Villarta de San Juan, and Puerto Lápice, province of Ciudad Real (Castilla-La Mancha), is made up of two identical 50 MW plants.
Helios 1 has a total of 360 collectors covering approximately 110 hectares (280 acres), which is the equivalent of more than 150 soccer fields. The plant will produce enough energy to serve 26,000 Spanish households.

In line with the Abengoa’s commitment regarding the environment and sustainability, the power station will result in a significant reduction in energy and fuel use. Furthermore, the facility will abate the emission of 31,400 tons of CO2 per year.
Abengoa has become the world leader in installed solar capacity with a total of 593 MW in commercial operation and 1,060 MW under construction throughout Europe, America and Africa.

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Puerto Errado 2 Thermosolar Power Plant (PE2) | Case Study
Linear Fresnel Concentrating Solar Power (LFR CSP): 30 MW

Commissioned in early 2012, Novatec Solar Espana’s 30 MW Puerto Errado 2 Thermosolar Power Plant is the world’s first and largest utility-scale, grid-connected linear fresnel reflector solar CSP power plant.

Novatec Solar Espana’s 30 MW Puerto Errado 2 Thermosolar Power Plant is similar in design (and built at the same site) as their 1.4 MW Puerto Errado 1 plant. Puerto Errado 1 was completed in 2009 and was the first linear fresnel reflector concentrating solar power (LFR CSP) plant to be connected to the public transmission grid.

Technology

The plant employs a dry-cooled Thermodyne SAS steam turbine for reduced water usage and incorporates a Ruth single-tank thermocline thermal storage system, utilizing hot water and saturated steam, for efficient steam buffering. The project is built on a 170 acre site and has (28) rows of LFR mirrors.

Linear fresnel reflector technology (LFR) has concentrating solar power’s best land-to-electricity ratio due to a compact design and the potential use of space below the support structures. LFR technology uses flat or slightly curved mirrors to focus sunlight on to a linear receiver to boil water, generating 270 C to 500 C high-pressure direct steam to power the steam turbine genset. The direct steam technology eliminates the need for costly heat transfer fluids and heat exchangers. With simplified plant design, lower capital investment, and lower operational costs, LFR systems are among the most economical solar SCP technologies.

Project Development

Headquartered in Germany, project developer and operator Novatec Solar was founded in 2006 and operates on a global scale. Novatec has developed a patented design for solar fields using unique linear Fresnel collector technology. Novatec Solar’s expertise is in the manufacture, supply and turnkey delivery of direct solar steam generators for a range of applications including power stations, desalination plants and industrial processes. To date, Novatec LFR CSP completed projects are limited to the two (2) Puerto Errado plants and the (under construction) Liddell Solar Thermal Station in Australia.

Levelized Cost of Energy

In 2011, the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook (AEO2011) estimated that the best case scenario levelized cost of energy (LCOE) for a generic new commercial-scale thermosolar power plant would be $0.1917/kWh. In a 2011 report from greentechmedia, “Concentrating Solar: Ready for Take Off or Stalled on the Launchpad?”, which looked at solar CSP in more detail, AREVA’s compact linear fresnel reflector CSP (dry cooling, no storage, similar to Novatec Solar Espana’s technology) was estimated to have a LCOE of $0.137/kWh, the lowest LCOE for any solar CSP technology without thermal storage.

Location:

•Calasparra, Spain

Project Status:

•Construction start: 2010

•Commissioning: March 2012

Rated Capacity:

•30 MW

Annual Production:

•49.0 GWh per year (expected)

Capacity Factor:

•18.6%

Carbon Offset:

•16,000 tons per year

Owner:

•Tubo Sol PE 2 S.L. (developer/ operator: Novatec Solar Espana)

Construction:

•Novatec GmbH & Company KG

Generation Offtaker:

•Iberdrola SAU. 25-year PPA at $0.36876/kWh ($0.29572 after 25-years)

Generation Technology:

•Novatec Solar modular linear fresnel reflector CSP collectors.

•Direct steam generation, with dry-cooled Thermodyne SAS steam turbine

Cost:

•Unknown

Michael Pawlyn: Using nature’s genius, biomimicry in architecture

3D Printing for Automated Construction

Contour Crafting: Automated Construction: Behrokh Khoshnevis at TEDxOjai

Behrokh Khoshnevis is a professor of Industrial & Systems Engineering and is the Director of Manufacturing Engineering Graduate Program at the University of Southern California (USC). He is active in CAD/CAM, robotics and mechatronics related related research projects that include the development of novel Solid Free Form, or Rapid Prototyping, processes (Contour Crafting and SIS), automated construction of civil structures, development of CAD/CAM systems for biomedical applications (e.g., restorative dentistry, rehabilitation engineering, haptics devices for medical applications), autonomous mobile and modular robots for assembly applications in space, and invention of technologies in the field of oil and gas. His research in simulation has aimed at creating intelligent simulation tools that can automatically perform many simulation functions that are conventionally performed by human analysts. His textbook, “Discrete Systems Simulation”, and his simulation software EZSIM benefit from some aspects of his research in simulation. He routinely conducts lectures and seminars on invention and technology development.

From PopSci:

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-08/researcher-aims-print-3-d-print-entire-houses-out-concrete-20-hours

“It would use a movable gantry taller than the house you want to build. Concrete pours out and is set down layer by layer, like a typical 3-D printer would sinter plastic together. It could be ideal for emergency housing, commercial or low-income structures, but it could also be used to print out customized luxury homes, according to Khoshnevis. Or, he adds, it might be ideal for the moon or Mars. “Contour Crafting technology has the potential to build safe, reliable, and affordable lunar and Martian structures, habitats, laboratories, and other facilities before the arrival of human beings,””

http://www.contourcrafting.org/

Reinvent Fire: Change Energy Use Forever

Reinventing Fire: Bold Business Solutions for the New Energy Era offers market-based, actionable solutions integrating transportation, buildings, industry, and electricity. Built on Rocky Mountain Institute’s 30 years of research and collaboration in all four sectors, Reinventing Fire maps pathways for running a 158%-bigger U.S. economy in 2050 but needing no oil, no coal, no nuclear energy, one-third less natural gas, and no new inventions. This would cost $5 trillion less than business-as-usual—in addition to the value of avoiding fossil fuels’ huge but uncounted external costs.

Protected: Ayeli Synchronicity Center

How we re-grew a rainforest – Willie Smits

By piecing together a complex ecological puzzle, biologist Willie Smits has found a way to re-grow clearcut rainforest in Borneo, saving local orangutans — and creating a thrilling blueprint for restoring fragile ecosystems.

SunPower Solar panels may be the most efficient and durable in the industry

SunPower Corp. (NASDAQ: SPWR), the leading commercial solar installer in the US, announced today that it’s begun commercial production of its most efficient solar cell to date.

Its third generation Maxeon solar cell is rated at 24% conversion efficiency of sunlight to electricity.

SunPower is known as a “premium” solar cell manufacturer. Its solar panels cost more but they’re the most efficient and physically attractive on the market.

All the contacts are on the back of SunPower’s solar cells, giving them a sleek, homogeneous black look.

Maxeon, which measures a tiny 160 millimeters, also has the contacts on the back. Solar panels contain about 128 solar cells and produce more energy per square meter compared to conventional crystalline solar cells.

It also has low reverse-bias breakdown voltage to deliver better performance in shady and dusty conditions, and a better temperature coefficient for increased energy harvest in hot environments. The new Maxeon solar cell offers improved aesthetics with a consistent, homogenous, sleek black look.

Last year, SunPower sold a majority stake to French oil giant, Total and then SunPower purchased Tenesol, another solar company owned by Total, to consolidate solar under one division.

And it launched a $105 million fund to finance residential solar leasing projects.

Also last year, SunPower produced the first Sustainability Report in the solar industry, joining 80% of the world’s largest company who annually disclose environmental, social, and corporate governance data.

Just yesterday, the trade group, Solar Energy Industries Association, asked the industry to adopt the document, Solar Industry Commitment to Environmental and Social Responsibility, which promotes standards throughout the industry.

The article is from: http://www.sustainablebusiness.com