[Graeme]

Look out: Fossil fuels may be out-innovating green tech

Scrappy green-tech start-ups aren't the only ones who make big bets on technology.

A spate of articles this week points to the fact that new technologies in the fossil fuel industry are making it harder for alternative clean energy technologies to get a larger foothold.

A New York Times article this week says new techniques allow drillers to tap oil and gas from a variety of "unconventional sources" that were once considered too difficult, a shift that changes the global picture on energy supply.

The most dramatic example in the U.S. is freeing natural gas from shale rock, largely in Pennsylvania and Texas, using a method known as hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking." In just a few short years, the supply of shale gas has slashed the costs of natural gas--and brought the ire of people concerned about the impact on water supply.

In a column earlier this week, inventor and investor Nathan Myhrvold said the emergence of cheap natural from fracking has challenged the notion that fossil fuel prices will keep rising. The "miracle" of shale gas "has changed that calculus, much to the chagrin of Silicon Valley venture capitalists who caught the green-energy bug," he wrote.

A Houston Chronicle columnist also argues that innovation in fossil fuels, particularly hydraulic fracturing, has done as much to harm the prospects of clean tech as the failure of solar company Solyndra and the subsequent political fall-out.

Without a doubt, low fossil fuel prices certainly aren't helping alternatives get off the ground. Cheaper power generation from natural gas means that solar and wind have had a harder time competing on price, a dynamic which reverberates through other areas such as energy efficiency. Tempered oil prices, meanwhile, make it harder to make an economic argument for buying plug-in electric vehicles or biofuels.

Fossil fuel technology doesn't stop at "fracking." Aided by powerful supercomputers, the oil and gas "majors" are able to find new deposits in more and more locations, notably offshore. Once considered uneconomic, the tar sands in Canada are now a major source of oil. Hydraulic fracturing can even be used to release oil from rock in some locations.

cnet

[Graeme]

10 Reasons Renewable Energy May Beat the Projections

Five percent? That's the EIA's projected global increase in renewable energy generation by the year 2035. You'd think that nearly 30 years of technological, business and environmental inroads would make a bigger dent in the world's future energy mix.

Aren’t we supposed to be living the solar dream by then? Won’t we be driving to the beach in algae-powered vehicles? Won’t we all revel in our views of majestic wind turbines? The utopian vision of our energy future may not exist in our lifetimes, but it has to have a better outlook than the one released this week.

The short of the report: By 2035, world consumption is going to rise more than 50 percent. (So, yes, that’s five percent growth on 50 percent more power). We’re going to be just as reliant on fossil fuels as we are now. And our carbon problem is going to get worse — much worse. But the International Energy Outlook is quick to point out that it doesn’t take into account any policy changes that may affect the energy mix across the world. The renewable industry knows better than anyone that policy is king, and that the success of a growing industry is tied directly to that government support.

The world currently revolves around prices for fossil fuels, especially oil. There are other factors at play, though, that could make renewable energy a bigger player in the decades ahead.

Third World Emergence:

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said that renewable energy will lead developing nations out of energy poverty. So it stands to reason that in places like Sub-Saharan Africa and India, renewable energy will find a growing market. But his statements are in stark contrast to the report, which finds that developing nations will drive the energy consumption, but not necessarily with renewable sources. There are, however, some hopeful signs led by large corporations and small communities. In areas often powered by fuels like kerosene, there is little existing infrastructure with which to compete. Some large-scale projects, such as what we are seeing in Kenya, may prove that massive wind farms or large geothermal plants are the best ways to power growing economies. One look at a solar insolation map shows how vast and untapped large-scale solar is as a global energy source. Or will the solution include more small-scale and localized approaches, such as what is being done in Bangladesh? Developing nations are fairly new as investment areas, so successful projects early on could go a long way toward turning economies toward renewables and away from fossil fuels.

Grid Parity and New Technology:

renewableenergyworld