Tag Archives: Sustainable

Booming oil inventories in Catoosa, while East Coast price differences persist

An article in Bloombergbusinessweek (September 27, 2012) describes growing oil stocks in Catoosa, Oklahoma where oil generated in the Dakotas come to wait. A shortage of pipeline capacity to the East Coast means that prices in the East continue to … Continue reading

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Google’s “RE < C" initiative and impact

An article in Fortune (July 23, 2012) describes an effort by Google to initiate projects to drive the cost of renewable enery (RE) to becom elower than the cost of coal (C) based sources. Server farms account for 2% of … Continue reading

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Should The Japanese and European governments assist automakers with demand growth ?

An article in the Wall Street Journal (September 15, 2012) describes a request by the CEO of Nissan, Carlos Ghosn, to the Japanese government to intervene to make the yen exchange rate more favorable to local production and encourage alternate … Continue reading

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Corn trade restrictions, price increases and the impact on the urban poor

An article in the Economist (September 15, 2012) describes impact of the recent drought in the US, coupled with ethanol blending requirements for fuel on a spike in corn prices. Similar choices by other drought stricken countries and price sticker … Continue reading

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The high cost impact of choices made for the GM Volt hybrid vehicle

An article by Reuters (September 10, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/10/us-generalmotors-autos-volt-idUSBRE88904J20120910) describes General Motors as losing $ 49,000 on each Volt it builds. The costs are due to developmnt and tooling costs, number of unique parts in the battery pack and motor as … Continue reading

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Protocol Diversity slows wireless home energy management

An article in the New York Times (September 5, 2012) describes the slow adoption of software controlled wireless technologies to manage home energy usage and blames it on protocol diversity. Protocols refer to the codes used by devices to communicate, … Continue reading

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The impact of incompatible fast charge plugs on electric vehicle growth

An article in the New York Times (August 31, 2012) describes two incompatible fast charging plugs – one standard, CHAdeMO, developed by Nissan, Mitusbishi and others, with separate prongs for slow and fast charges, installed in over 1,500 chargers. The … Continue reading

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40 % of US food produced is wasted – what is the impact ?

A paper produced by NRDC called “Wasted: How America Is Losing Up to 40 Percent of Its Food from Farm to Fork to Landfill”, suggests that 40 % of US food produced or $ 165 billion of value is wasted. … Continue reading

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A shortage of jute bags hurts storage of a bumper wheat crop in India

An article in the Wall Street Journal (June 23, 2012) describes the large wheat harvest in India, but a shortage of jute bags. Indian law specifies that 100% of the wheat should use jute bags, to protect the industry and … Continue reading

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The interaction between the Renewable Fuel Standard, drought and hunger

An article in the Opinion section of the Wall Street Journal (August 11, 2012) describes the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS, which requires use of 13 billion gallons of ethanol based fuel this year and 36 billion gallons by 2022) and … Continue reading

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