Author: Tom Kessler

(Photo: Alstom)

Wind industry manufacturer Alstom today joined officials of the Amarillo Economic Development Corporation to begin construction of its 115,000 square foot wind turbine assembly plant in Amarillo, Texas.

The facility, which is scheduled to be operational in 2011, is expected to create 275 full time engineering, production, and technical support jobs when the plant is at full capacity. The project was announced earlier this week in Dallas at the American Wind Energy Association’s WINDPOWER 2010 conference.

“The North American wind power market—already one of the strongest in the world—is projected to continue to grow as legislators, regulators, NGOs, and the public seek the benefits that clean, renewable wind power is perfectly suited to deliver,” Alfonso Faubel, Alstom Wind Vice President, said in a statement. “Amarillo is the ideal location for Alstom’s wind power manufacturing hub in North America because it is centrally located in an area that is expected to create a substantial number of new wind power projects over the next several years.

“In addition, Amarillo has invested in the infrastructure needed to transport the sizeable equipment to potential sites all across North America and the resources needed to train its work force to be as productive as possible.”

Workers at the Amarillo facility will assemble the “nacelles” — i.e., the generator, gearbox, and control systems — that make up a wind turbine. The nacelles will be transported to sites where they will be combined with blades and a tower to create the complete wind turbine generator.

Alstom Wind, headquartered in Barcelona, Spain, has thus far installed or is installing over 1850 wind turbines in more than 100 wind farms, corresponding to a total capacity of over 2200 megawatts.

Green job facts

Project: Wind turbine assembly facility
Location: Amarillo, Texas
Total jobs: 275 full-time
Specialties: Engineering, production, and technical support

Related video from Alstom

Artist's rendering of what will be the largest "net zero" public school in the U.S.

From Green Right Now Reports

Irving Independent School District has broken ground on the largest “net zero” public school in the United States. The Texas school district’s Lady Bird Johnson Middle School is designed to produce as much energy as it uses, thereby reducing operating costs for the district and shrinking the school’s carbon footprint.

To reduce energy consumption, the school is designed to meet LEED Gold specifications and will feature increased insulation, high-efficiency glazing, daylighting, and an Energy Star kitchen. The school also will use permeable paving to reduce runoff and harvest rainwater and grey water for irrigation.

Charter Builders of Dallas was awarded the $29 million contract to manage construction of the new school. The 150,000-square-foot facility will produce its own energy via solar panels, geothermal energy harvesting and wind turbines. If the school produces excess energy, the district could sell energy to a local electric provider, creating a potential revenue source for the district.

“Net-zero buildings help reverse negative trends associated with climate change. Irving’s new middle school will consume approximately half the energy that a typical middle school building consumes,” Scott Layne, the school district’s Assistant Superintendent for Support Services, said in a statement.

Scheduled to open in August, 2011, the building will serve as a three-dimensional learning space, teaching students environmental responsibility through practical, hands-on experiences with geothermal science, rainwater collection, solar panel usage, and wind turbine efficiency.

In addition to Charter Builders, planners who helped the school district develop the concept for the new school included architect Corgan Associates, Inc. and consultant IEG Engineers.

By Nicole Kilmer
MyStateline.com

ROCKFORD, IL – The Sustainable Sites Initiative™ (SITES™) announced the selection of Rockford Park District’s Loves Park Playground Development project as one of the first landscapes to participate in a new program testing the nation’s first rating system for green landscape design, construction, and maintenance.

The project will join more than 150 other projects from 34 states as well as from Canada, Iceland, and Spain as part of an international pilot project program to evaluate the new SITES rating system for sustainable landscapes, with and without buildings. Sustainable landscapes can clean water, reduce pollution, and restore habitats, while providing significant economic and social benefits to land owners and municipalities.

>> Read the full story

Greenpeace sign on Dell HQ in Round Rock, Texas (Photo: WeAreAustin.com)

From WeAreAustin.com

The environmental protection group Greenpeace hung a large banner at Dell’s Round Rock headquarters Wednesday morning, saying the company hadn’t kept its promise of eliminating certain chemicals from its products.

Greenpeace claims that Dell promised to eliminate chemical byproducts such as PVC plastic and brominated flame retardants. The company has pushed that deadline back to 2011.

The banner, addressing CEO and founder Michael Dell, proclaimed “Michael, what the Dell? Design out toxics!” It was hung by climbers Wednesday morning and removed by workers a few hours later.

From Green Right Now Reports

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today awarded its Clean Air Excellence Award to America’s Greenest Campus. The winners – the college with the greatest number of participants, and the college with the greatest per-person carbon reduction – were each awarded $5,000 for sustainability projects of their choosing. University of Maryland, College Park (with 2,257 participants) and Arizona’s Rio Salado College (with 4.4% carbon reduced per person) were the victors.

The nationwide contest engaged college students through social media and on-campus organizing, encouraging participants to track their energy use and reduce their carbon footprints.

Carbon output wasn’t all that college students reduced during America’s Greenest Campus. The results reflected $4.25 million in savings and significant energy/resource reductions across the board:

• 186,705 therms of gas
• 156,743 gallons of gasoline
• 154,838 tons of paper
• 28.41 million gallons of water
• 5,984 megawatt hours of electricity

America’s Greenest Campus, the nation’s largest on-campus energy efficiency campaign, is a partnership between SmartPower, the nation’s leading non-profit marketers of clean, renewable energy and energy efficiency, and Efficiency 2.0, the premier online energy efficiency software company for utilities and governments, with support from the U.S. Department of Energy.

America’s Greenest Campus will re-launch this fall.

NASA images show the central Gulf Coast. In the bottom view, elevations below 10 meters (33 feet) above sea level have been colored light blue. These low coastal elevations are especially vulnerable to flooding associated with storm surges.

From Green Right Now Reports

Between 1960 and 2008, the population in coastline counties along the Gulf of Mexico soared by 150 percent, more than double the rate of increase of the nation’s population as a whole. This area, which faces ongoing challenges in Gulf hurricanes and new threats from the BP oil spill, is now is home to nearly 14 million residents, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report issued today.

The Gulf Coast’s population growth over the period surpassed that of coastline counties along the Pacific (110 percent) and Atlantic (56 percent). The region has experienced double-digit rates of population increase each decade since 1960. The Gulf Coast was home to six of the eight U.S. coastline counties with the fastest population increases over the 48-year period, led by Collier County, Fla., which grew by 1,900 percent (from 15,753 to 315,258). At the same time, the region contained six of the 11 coastline counties most frequently hit by hurricanes during that time, with Monroe County, Fla., leading the list with 15, and Lafourche Parish, La., tied for second with 14.

The Census Bureau report, “Coastline Population Trends in the United States: 1960 to 2008,” examines population trends along the country’s saltwater edges – coastline counties – and their shares of coastline states during the period. It analyzed trends in the growth and decline, geographic distribution and density of the coastline population. It also incorporated historical data on the trajectories of hurricanes striking the U.S. coastlines to gauge the coastline population’s experience with hurricanes.

“Coastline counties along the Atlantic and Gulf, as well as the Hawaiian Islands, account for nearly two-thirds of the nation’s coastline population and are home to four of the nation’s 10 most populous counties,” Steven Wilson of the Census Bureau’s Population Division and co-author of the report, said in a statement. “As hurricane season begins, this report should put into perspective the number of Americans living along the coast who might be affected.”

The report also frames the potential damage from predicted rising seas as the result of global warming.

All in all, 87 million people, or 29 percent of the U.S. population, live in coastline counties, including more than 41 million in Atlantic and 32 million in Pacific counties. In 1960, only 47 million lived in coastline counties.

Other report highlights include:

• The number of housing units along the Gulf of Mexico’s coastline increased by 246 percent from 1960 to 2008, compared with 130 percent in the Pacific and 98 percent in the Atlantic coastline regions and 121 percent for the U.S. as a whole. The number of housing units along the U.S. coastline grew from 16 million to 36 million during this time.
• On average, the 11 coastline counties that were hit by 11 or more hurricanes from 1960 to 2008 increased in population by nearly 179 percent and had a housing unit increase of 255 percent. Among these counties, only Hyde, N.C., lost population (-10.1 percent) and only St. Bernard Parish, La., lost housing units (-2.6 percent).
• The coastline share of Maine’s total population climbed by 9 percentage points from 1960 to 2008. New Hampshire, Virginia and Alaska also had increases of more than 5 percentage points. In contrast, the share of Maryland’s population in its coastline counties dropped 14 percentage points and California’s by 10 points.
• Excluding Alaska, the average density of coastline counties increased from 260 people per square mile in 1960 to 480 in 2008. On average, they are twice as densely populated as noncoastline counties. Among the coastline states, only the coastline sections of New York (between 1970 and 1980), Louisiana (from 1980 to 1990 and 2000 to 2008) and Mississippi (from 2000 to 2008) had declines in population density during any decade.
• New York County (Manhattan), N.Y., is the most densely populated coastline county, with nearly 72,000 people per square mile in 2008. Between 1960 and 2008, Orange County, Calif., and Pinellas County, Fla., joined the list of the 20 most densely populated coastline counties, with Orleans Parish, La., and Westchester County, N.Y., dropping off.
• Nearly half of the nation’s coastline population in 2008 was in either California (29 percent) or Florida (16 percent).
• Most coastline counties (223 of 254) experienced population gains from 1960 to 2008, including all counties from the southern coast of North Carolina through Mississippi, and all counties from California through Washington.

From Your4state.com

MIDDLETOWN, MD – The heavy snow that slammed the Four State region in February seems like so long ago, but many are still dealing with the aftermath. One Middletown man, whose greenhouse collapsed under the weight of the snow, is rebuilding and he’s taking the “green” in greenhouse to a whole new level.

>>Watch the video

From Green Right Now Reports

Whatever the state of the political debate about climate change, the issue increasingly looks settled in the board room. Despite challenging economic conditions and regulatory uncertainty, global executives believe that the climate change agenda will significantly impact business performance and strategy over the next few years according to a new survey by Ernst & Young.

The survey, “Action amid uncertainty: the business response to climate change,” found that corporate executives expect to make significant investments to deliver both cost savings and revenue generation opportunities relating to climate change. Seventy percent plan to increase spending on climate change initiatives between 2010 and 2012. Nearly half plan to spend between 0.5 percent to more than 5 percent of their revenue on climate change initiatives. For a U.S. $1 billion company, this represents an anticipated spend of $5 million to $50 million annually.

Three hundred global corporate executives from 16 countries with at least $1 billion in annual revenue participated in the survey conducted during spring 2010.

“Corporate leaders are not letting the lack of global standards and regulations slow their climate change investments,” Steve Starbuck, Americas Climate Change and Sustainability Services Leader at Ernst & Young LLP, said in a statement. “Other market drivers, such as equity analysts’ growing interest in climate change performance, are prompting a further need to act and be more transparent,”

Consumers and equity analysts are two of the factors driving this investment trend, Ernst & Young says. Corporate climate change activities are being driven by evolving customer demands according to 89 percent of survey respondents. Some sectors, including automotive, consumer products, and technology, unanimously agree that changing customer preferences have created significant drivers for action and innovation. Meanwhile, equity analysts are increasingly linking the business response to climate change and company valuations. Over 40 percent of the senior executives surveyed believe that equity analysts currently include climate change-related factors in company valuations.

Energy efficiency is at the top of the list as 82 percent of respondents plan to invest in this space over the next 12 months. About half of the respondents confirm new ventures, such as spin-offs or start-up businesses, as an area for focus. Additionally, 65 percent of executives intend to focus investments on new products and services.

Ninety four percent of respondents see national policies as important or very important in shaping their climate change strategies, although 81 percent recognize the importance of global or international policies.

“Keeping abreast of national climate change legislation and business incentives across jurisdictions will prove challenging, but necessary for many businesses, even those that do not traditionally regard themselves as multi-national due to the connectivity of supply chains and markets,” Dr. Lorraine Stephenson, Ernst & Young Partner and Oceania Climate Change Leader, said in a statement. “Businesses will need to prioritize investments to capture opportunities and mitigate risks in response to the growing number of climate change policies, in developing and developed countries, since the December Copenhagen meeting.”

Other key findings from the survey include:

• In the developing economies of China and India, executives rank product development as the top challenge to achieving their goals, 97 percent and 72percent respectively. Respondents in Australia, Canada, U.S., Japan, Germany and France indicate that regulatory and compliance issues present primary challenges in the next two years.
• Approximately 66 percent of respondents are discussing climate change programs with their suppliers and 36 percent of respondents are already working directly with these stakeholders to decrease the carbon in their supply chains.
• Transparent reporting is gaining momentum, as 64 percent of respondents report greenhouse gas data in an annual corporate social responsibility or sustainability report. Of the organizations that say they report, 62 percent verify their data through an independent, third-party.

The Ernst & Young study was performed by Verdantix, an independent analyst research organization focused on sustainable business. Respondents were drawn from across 16 countries and 18 industry sectors.

From Green Right Now Reports

Five hybrid aerial-lift trucks were unveiled today at Verizon’s Long Island headquarters, the first of 160 alternative-energy vehicles that the company said it will add to its fleet in New York this year.

The five vehicles, also known as bucket trucks, have batteries that help power the engine and also provide the sole power for the mechanical boom that raises a four-sided platform, or “bucket,” to enable a technician to work on overhead telephone lines or other equipment. In the traditional versions of Verizon’s bucket trucks, the mechanical booms are powered by the trucks’ gasoline or diesel engines.

Heavy-duty chargers that plug into an electrical outlet are used to recharge the hybrid trucks’ batteries. The batteries will be recharged at night, when power demand from the nation’s grid — generally the cleanest and most efficiently produced energy — is low, Verizon said.

(Video from Verizon)

On an annual basis, each of Verizon’s five plug-in hybrid trucks is expected to use 750 to 1,500 fewer gallons of fuel and cut greenhouse gas emissions by an estimated 7 to 14 tons over the traditional models they replace. Verizon said the hybrid system is also quieter than traditional models, which helps cut noise pollution. The five trucks will be based at the company’s Woodbury garage and primarily serve the northern and central areas of Nassau County.

“Using lower-carbon alternatives to power our fleet and our highly intelligent broadband networks are just some of the ways we’re reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” James Gowen, chief sustainability officer for Verizon, said in a statement. “We’re proud of the fact that as we increase the sustainability of our business we’re also contributing to improved air quality in New York.”

Verizon also said it will roll out more than 1,100 alternative energy vehicles across the country this year, and increasing use of biodiesel and flex-fuel (E85) to power 470 vehicles. The company will operate approximately 250 alternative energy vehicles in New York by the end of 2010.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson today presented the 2009 President’s Environmental Youth Awards to students from around the country for their outstanding contributions in helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve air quality and protect America’s waters. The awards were presented during a ceremony in Washington D.C.

Here is the list of winners from the EPA:

EPA Region 1

Project T.G.I.F.: Turn Grease Into Fuel
Westerly Innovations Network/Westerly Middle School
Westerly, Rhode Island

This group of middle school students, who are passionate about community service, decided to do their part in tackling global warming by creating a sustainable project to collect the town’s waste cooking oil, refine it into biofuel, and then distribute it.

The students presented their project to the local town council and convinced them to place a grease receptacle at the town’s transfer station to collect waste cooking oil from residents. The group also convinced 64 local restaurants to donate their waste cooking oil, which is a by-product of fried food. To collect the waste oil from restaurants and the transfer station, the students collaborated with a local company to collect the waste oil and bring it to a biodiesel refinery where waste cooking oil is recycled into biofuel. Funds received from the refinery for the recycling of the waste oil were used to purchase Bioheat^®, a biofuel, from a local distributor to give to local charities.

This project has been, and continues to be, a success for the environment and local families in need of heating assistance. To date, this project has collected over 36,000 gallons of waste oil and produced 30,000 gallons of biofuel a year, which eliminated 600,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere. The students have donated 4,000 gallons of Bioheat^® to local charities and helped 40 families with emergency heating assistance.

Another important part of the project is educating school children and local residents about energy alternatives. The students have made numerous presentations to the local elementary school and local residents to encourage them to participate in the T.G.I.F. project and to teach them about alternative energy sources, the town’s recycling program, and global warming.

From Green Right Now Reports

Honeywell and DuPont today announced a joint venture to produce a new environmentally safer refrigerant for use in automotive air conditioning systems. The new refrigerant has 99.7 percent lower global warming potential (GWP) than the current refrigerant, the companies said.

Current automotive air conditioners use hydrofluorocarbon HFC-134a, which is rated at a global warming potential of 1430. The European Union’s Mobile Air Conditioning Directive requires that, starting in 2011, all new vehicle models use a refrigerant with a GWP below 150, and by 2017, all new automobiles sold in Europe will be required to use a low-GWP refrigerant.

The new refrigerant developed by DuPont and Honeywell has a GWP of 4, which is 97 percent less GWP than the new regulation requires, according to the companies

Under the agreement, DuPont and Honeywell will share financial and technological resources with the intent to jointly design, construct and operate a world-scale manufacturing facility for the new refrigerant, known as HFO-1234yf. The product meets European Union regulatory requirements for lower GWP refrigerants for automobile air conditioning systems. DuPont and Honeywell said they developed the product jointly but will market and sell it separately.

The companies plan to begin supplying the refrigerant in the fourth quarter of 2011 in time to meet the European Union regulatory requirement.

California's Big Basin (Photo: California State Parks Foundation)

From Green Right Now Reports

The National Trust for Historic Preservation today unveiled the 2010 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places, an annual list that highlights important examples of the nation’s architectural, cultural and natural heritage that are at risk of destruction or irreparable damage. The list includes Virginia’s Wilderness Battlefield, site of one of the most important engagements of the Civil War and the first meeting of legendary generals Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant, now battling a big box retailer.

National Trust president Richard Moe announced the 2010 list at another of the most endangered places — Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan A.M.E. Church, which is the national cathedral of African Methodism and a landmark of African-American heritage and civil rights advocacy.

The 2010 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places (in alphabetical order):

California's Montana de Oro State Park (Photo: Steve Sieren | National Trust for Historic Preservation)

America’s State Parks and State-Owned Historic Sites — This year, nearly 30 states have experienced cuts to parks’ and sites’ budgets, and a recent survey estimates as many as 400 state parks could close. These state park systems include places of national significance — from Native American historic sites to Revolutionary War forts to Civil War battlefields to country estates — and welcome an estimated 725 million visits every year.

From Green Right Now Reports

Waste Management, Inc. today announced it participated in a $6.9 million strategic investment in MicroGREEN Polymers, Inc. as part of a Series B round of financing. Houston-based Waste Management joined Seattle-based WRF Capital, Northwest Energy Angels and other private investors in the funding.

MicroGREEN is a plastics company that uses patented technology to reduce the amount of plastic required for the production of consumer products, thereby significantly lowering raw material costs. The company said the new funds will be used to increase engineering, sales and marketing staff, and expand its commercial production capabilities for a wide range of consumer products.

Arlington, Wash.-based MicroGREEN said its Ad-air technology creates bubbles within solid-state plastics to expand the plastic and improve its functionality by creating an internal microcellular structure that is lighter in weight, more insulating, strong and highly reflective. The technology does not involve petrochemical blowing agents or volatile organic compounds in the manufacturing process, and is said to work especially well with recycled PET (rPET) – the world’s most recycled plastic, commonly used to create beverage bottles.

Later this year, MicroGREEN will begin offering a line of Ad-air enhanced rPET sheets in various gauges for converters to transform into consumer products and packaging. The company also plans to launch its first converted product – a low-density, thermally-insulating beverage cup that is recyclable and is itself made from recycled material. MicroGREEN is initially targeting consumer foodservice applications, which according to Global Industry Analysts will represent an over $16 billion market in the United States by 2015.

In a recent lifecycle inventory and analysis study of hot beverage cups conducted by Franklin Associates, Ad-air technology as applied to a recycled PET hot beverage cup has the lowest total amount of energy required to produce a hot beverage cup and the lowest total solid waste as measured in both volume and weight when compared to expanded polystyrene (EPS) and coated paperboard hot beverage cups, the two most commonly used in the market today.

Waste Management said the investment in MicroGREEN Polymers complements its recycling operations and will help the company meet two of its sustainability goals: tripling the amount of recyclables it processes by 2020, and investing in emerging technologies for managing waste.

“Investing in new technologies and companies, such as MicroGREEN Polymers, will enable us to extract more value from the materials we manage than anyone else in our industry,” Pat DeRueda, president of WM Recycling, said in a statement. “As North America’s largest residential recycler, we handle a growing stream of PET and other plastics that can provide the feedstock for Ad-air technology. This could create more value from the materials we recover at our recycling facilities every day.”

From Green Right Now Reports

Environmentally minded teens looking for a place to interact, share ideas and learn about careers and university programs can turn to a new social networking site Planet Connect.

Designed by teens – the best advisors on social networking – Planet Connect was launched this spring by the National Environmental Education Foundation in partnership with The Weather Channel. Students will find lots of info about environmental topics and about environmental clubs and activities around the country.

The networking capabilities of the site allow students across the country to share exciting environmental news tidbits and strategies for having an impact in their schools and communities.

“In many ways students are leaders in the climate change discussion, and The Weather Channel is proud to partner with Planet Connect in this exciting environmental exchange,” Lynn Brindell, executive vice president of strategic marketing at The Weather Channel, said in a statement.

From Green Right Now Reports

With severe budget cuts looming ahead, San Jose Parks Foundation today announced the launch of “ParkForce,” a membership campaign that offers residents the opportunity to provide private sector support to protect and preserve city parks and trails.

San Jose Parks Foundation, a nonprofit organization,will begin fund raising through direct mail, online and in targeted public parks and plazas throughout San Jose. ParkForce memberships are available to anyone who donates to the foundation.

“The people of San Jose have a chance to act before the budget cuts have their impact. Parks have a profound impact on many aspects of our lives, from the health of children and seniors to the look and feel of a neighborhood to property values,” San Jose Parks Foundation Executive Director James Reber said in a statement. “The coming budget cuts could have a very negative impact on all city parks. By building a strong ‘ParkForce’ membership we can protect and preserve – and in some cases enhance – our parks and trails. The work of the Friends of San Jose Rose Garden proves that a community effort can be a force for good in our city parks.”

Residents and businesses in San Jose have watched as budget cuts have taken their toll on a variety of city programs. The current deficit projections mean even deeper cuts for San Jose’s department of Parks Recreation and Neighborhood Services. Anticipating that this might happen, PRNS took action a few years ago to help organize and fund the San Jose Parks Foundation, which brings private funds to public parks.

Basic memberships begin at $60 for a family. Associate memberships begin at the Trailblazer level of $125. All funds raised by San Jose Parks Foundation will support programs, services, and capital needs of San Jose’s public parks, trails and community centers. Detailed information is available online at the FaceBook page for San Jose Parks Foundation.

Here are breaking news videos on the Gulf oil spill: