Ecobella Blog

By Chuck Squatriglia

August 26, 2009

The Japanese government wants the EV evangelists at Better Place to electrify some of Tokyo’s taxis, and the cabs with cords could be on the road by January. They will use the Silicon Valley startup’s swappable batteries, which can be replaced in about the time it takes to fill a gas tank.

The pilot program between Better Place and Nihon Kotsu — Tokyo’s largest taxi company — will be the first real-world test of the innovative battery-swap technology. Better Place says the ability to quickly and easy change a dead battery is essential to eliminating the “range anxiety” that makes EVs a tough sell. Tokyo is a perfect proving ground because the city has about 60,000 taxis — more than New York, Paris or Hong Kong. Although those taxis represent just 2 percent of the vehicles in Japan, they account for 20 percent of the CO2 that country’s automobiles produce, said Kiyotaka Fujii, president of Better Place Japan.

“Japan has a very large taxi market,” Fujii said at a press conference, according to Japan Times. “I believe EVs with switchable batteries will spread to many other Asian countries, if they succeed in Japan.”

The pilot program is starting small — really small. Better Place says “up to four newly modified and fully operational” electric taxis will serve the Roppongi Hills neighborhood of central Tokyo. Better Place plans to build one of its $500,000 battery-swap stations in Roppongi Hills to keep the cars going.

But Better Place and Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry — which commissioned Better Place for the pilot program — have big plans. Better Place says it anticipates building 100 battery swap stations within the next decade and converting all of Tokyo’s taxis to electricity. It isn’t clear who’s going to build those cars, though. Although several automakers — most recently Mitsubishi with its iMiEV and Nissan with its Leaf — promise to begin selling electric vehicles, so far only Renault is building one with a swappable battery.

Still, taxis are a logical place for the technology because they can work from a centralized location — in this case, a battery swap station — and the economies of scale offered by a massive fleet could make the technology more cost-effective.

“Battery-switchable EVs are effective as vehicles that get a lot of use, such as taxis and cars used for car-sharing,” Minoru Nakamura, the crude oil distribution unit manager at the ministry’s Natural Resources and Energy Agency, said, according to Japan Times.

You can see the battery swap station in action here and check out our coverage of Better Place here.

Photo of a taxi in Tokyo’s Roppongi Hill neighborhood. megabn/Flickr

Source: Wired

George Ahn

CEO

TRIRIGA

Home Depot battled negative headlines in May when shareholders voted down a resolution to enforce more rigid and transparent energy efficiency measures. The resolution proposed that the organization assess company-wide energy use from its buildings, transportation and supply chain. It also urged Home Depot to set energy use reduction targets and report findings and progress to shareholders.

While the measure did not pass, it received support from the $20 billion Connecticut Retirement Plans and Trust, the advisory firm RiskMetrics Group (RMG), and other investors in the $7 trillion Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR). Despite the outcome, the resolution foreshadows a future in which shareholders increasingly require reports on energy efficiency improvements and climate change risk. Organizations that fail to put the right systems in place today to meet these reporting requirements will suffer.

Findings from CERES, a coalition of investors, environmentalists and public interest groups, report that “the resolution filed with Home Depot is one of a record 67 global warming resolutions filed with 58 U.S. companies and two Canadian companies as part of the 2009 proxy season.” The findings confirm that companies must start to disclose risks from climate change now and provide stakeholder groups with a plan to mitigate those risks.

Further, despite the evidence that climate change disclosure will quickly transition from a proposal to an imperative, many companies have not started to track or abate their carbon emissions.

In fact, according to a 2009 report co-authored by CERES, over 76 percent of the S&P 500 fail to even mention climate change in SEC filings. This is surprising given that, according to a September 2008 McKinsey survey of 1,453 international executives, 50 percent said that environmental issues ranked among the top three areas that would most affect shareholder value in the next five years. While organizations appreciate investors’ concerns, they often lack the tools necessary to address them.

Further evidence that organizations will face more stringent demands from shareholders comes from INCR, an alliance of over 80 institutional investors and financial firms that collectively manage more than $7 trillion in assets. INCR has suggested that congress mandate climate change disclosure in SEC filings, and INCR Director and CERES President Mindy Lubber states, “climate change is a bottom line issue and investors have a right to know which companies are best positioned for the emerging clean energy global economy.”

To meet shareholder climate risk reporting requirements, organizations need technology that not only measures their current carbon footprint, but also manages abatement opportunities, facilitates emissions reduction initiatives and tracks progress and ROI. To gain a sense of where and how to start reporting, consider real estate. Buildings represent 48 percent of energy consumption and present the most significant opportunities to reduce environmental impact, improve operating costs, and demonstrate carbon reduction accountability.

With a technology framework that can identify underperforming building locations, provide a set of analysis tools to evaluate different carbon reduction options, and manage those options through to completion, organizations can address even the most exacting shareholder resolutions.

Investors will use a number of tools to determine how well companies address risks from climate change, including the Global Framework for Climate Change Disclosure, the Carbon Disclosure Project, CERES, and SEC Filings. Companies should seek out technology solutions that provide flexible reporting platforms to facilitate carbon reporting to multiple agencies. All else being equal, companies that adequately disclose and address risks from climate change will be rewarded with higher valuations and a lower cost of capital.

As your organization evaluates shareholder demands, ask yourself this: do you have the right tools to disclose your impact on the environment, or will you, like Home Depot, face climate nondisclosure backlash and risk losing shareholder support?

George Ahn is President and Chief Executive Officer of TRIRIGA. He has more than 18 years of software industry leadership.

Source: Environmental Leader

JULY 31, 2009

By ANDREW BATSON, Wall Street Journal

Tariffs Remain Low by Global Standards

BEIJING — Cities across China are raising the price of water, in moves that try to balance the need to conserve an increasingly scarce resource with the effects on a public used to low fees.

The city government of Luoyang, in central Henan province, prepared to hold a public meeting Friday to argue for a proposed water-price increase of 40% to 48%. Water prices in the dry region haven’t risen since 2003, which the government says is exhausting meager supplies and keeping the local water utility in the red. At least half a dozen other major cities have raised water prices in the past few months.

The changes reflect a growing official consensus that low prices are part of China’s water-shortage problem, since they give companies and households little incentive to use water carefully. The government is also spending billions of dollars on a controversial system of canals to divert water from the flood-prone south to the dry north.

The amount of water available per person in China is just one-quarter of the world average. The World Bank has estimated that water shortages cost China about 1.3% of its annual economic output, with a further 1% lost to water pollution.

“Given the underpricing of water in China and its environmental consequences, I feel it is wise for governments to take the opportunity of low inflation pressure to adjust the water tariff,” said Jian Xie, a senior environmental specialist at the World Bank.

Shanghai raised residential water prices 25% in June and plans a 22% increase in November 2010. The central city of Zhengzhou raised water fees 25% in April, and officials say prices will have to change more rapidly in the future.

There has been “strong public reaction” to the price increases in some cities, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a notice in early July. Some local news reports have suggested the price increases are being driven more by corporate greed than a real need to conserve water. The agency, which supervises the prices of regulated goods like water, said local governments need to take public concerns into account as they plan for necessary price increases.

The eastern city of Nanjing raised residential water prices 12% in April but also rolled out subsidies to reduce the impact on low-income households.

The rise in water bills has upset consumers even in cities where rates haven’t been rising. Zheng Hong, a lawyer in Beijing who lives with seven family members, says his household spends 60 yuan to 70 yuan ($8.78 to $10.25) a month for tap water. He is against any price increases. “The lower, the better,” he says. “Compared to my hometown in Henan province, the water prices in Beijing are already pretty high.”

China’s water prices are still low by global standards, even with the average residential water fee in major cities now up 3% since the end of 2008, to 2.44 yuan per ton. Average water prices in Europe are anywhere from four to 10 times higher, according to Deutsche Bank estimates.

—Sue Feng contributed to this article.

Write to Andrew Batson at andrew.batson@wsj.com

Source: WSJ

Two years into development, innovative startup enables path to energy independence; Unveils proprietary production system capable of supplying unlimited quantities of renewable fuel at costs competitive with fossil fuels

Cambridge, Mass.—July 27, 2009—Joule Biotechnologies, Inc., today unveiled a revolutionary process that harnesses sunlight to directly convert carbon dioxide (CO2) into liquid energy. This eco-friendly, direct-to-fuel conversion requires no agricultural land or fresh water, and leverages a highly scalable system capable of producing more than 20,000 gallons of renewable ethanol or hydrocarbons per acre annually—far eclipsing productivity levels of current alternatives while rivaling the costs of fossil fuels.

“There is no question that viable, renewable fuels are vitally important, both for economic and environmental reasons. And while many novel approaches have been explored, none has been able to clear the roadblocks caused by high production costs, environmental burden and lack of real scale,” said Bill Sims, president and CEO of Joule Biotechnologies. “Joule was created for the very purpose of eliminating these roadblocks with the best equation of biotechnology, engineering, scalability and pricing to finally make renewable fuel a reality—all while helping the environment by reducing global CO2 emissions.”

Joule’s transformative process leverages highly-engineered photosynthetic organisms to catalyze the conversion of sunlight and CO2 to usable transportation fuels and chemicals. The scalable system facilitates the entire process—from sunlight capture to product conversion and separation—with minimal resources and polishing operations. This represents a significant advantage over biomass-derived biofuels, including newer algae- and cellulose-based forms, which are hindered by varying obstacles: costly biomass production, numerous processing steps, substantial scale-up risk and capital costs.

The modular design is engineered to meet demand on a global scale while requiring just a fraction of the land needed for biomass-based approaches. It can be easily customized depending on land size, CO2 availability and desired output. The functionality is proven and can readily scale from smaller operations with limited land to extensive commercial plants.

Joule liquid energy has up to 100 times the energy storage density of conventional batteries, and can be very efficiently stored and transported with no degradation of power.

Joule liquid energy meets today’s vehicle fuel specifications and infrastructure, and is expected to achieve widespread production at the energy equivalent of less than $50 per barrel. The company’s first product offering fuel, will be ready for commercial-scale development in 2010.

Source: Joule Biotechnologies