Elon Musk Thinks He Can Get You From NY to LA in 45 Minutes

Autopia | Wired.com:

• BY DAMON LAVRINC
• 07.15.13
• 4:06 PM

Elon Musk (Photo credit: jdlasica)

Elon Musk wants to revolutionize transportation. ... The serial entrepreneur envisions a future where mag-lev trains in enormous pneumatic tubes whisk us from Los Angeles to New York in 45 minutes. Need to be in Beijing tomorrow? No problem. It’s a two-hour ride away.

As crazy as it sounds, Musk is merely updating an idea that’s been around since the early 1900s, and

Image via CrunchBase

 at least one company is working on a functional prototype. But according to Wired sources, his involvement won’t be nearly as hands-on as Musk’s other endeavors at Tesla Motors and SpaceX.

The engineering behind the Hyperloop is similar to the old-school pneumatic tube systems used by banks to suck your deposit to the teller at the drive-through. But naturally, it’s more complicated than that.

A massive vacuum tube — mounted either above ground or even under water — would be combined with a magnetic levitation system used on conventional bullet trains. That means no friction, no wind resistance, no chance of collisions, and insanely high speeds.

Musk described the Hyperloop as “a cross between a Concorde, a railgun and an air hockey table,” at the AllThingsD D11 conference earlier this year. And in an interview with PandoDaily, Musk said the Hyperloop could form a fifth tent pole of modern transportation, joining cars, planes, trains, and boats, adding that because of its low energy usage and ability to get juice from solar power, it could generate more power than it would consume. But up until now, he hasn’t elaborated on his involvement.

Musk’s interest in the idea was sparked after researching California’s new high-speed rail project and realizing that it will be the slowest and — at $70 billion — the most expensive system on the planet. To his mind, there’s a better solution. The Hyperloop is it. And one firm unaffiliated with Musk is in the early stages of development.

ET3, a company based in Longmont, CO, is working on a Evacuated Tube Transport (ETT) system, which it describes as “space travel on Earth.” It uses two tubes — one for each direction — with 400-pound, passenger car-sized capsules that could house six people, each accelerated by linear electric motors. According to ET3, state trips would average speeds of around 370 mph, while international trips would hit that insane 4,000 mph mark. The company, which calls itself an “open consortium,” claims that it’s working with partners in China and has sold nearly 100 licenses for the technology. But ET3′s claims pose more questions than answers, particularly when considering you can buy your own license for the bargain basement price of $100.

But the idea for a vacuum-sealed high-speed transit system isn’t anything new. The “vactrain” conceptwas floated in the early 1910s and a paper written by physicist R.M. Salter and published by the Rand Corporation in 1972 titled the “Very High Speed Transit System,” or VHST, describes something very similar to what ET3 is developing.

But where Musk fits in remains a question. Sources close to the Tesla co-founder and CEO say he believes ET3 is on the right track, but is missing some key components, and that Musk has his hands full with Tesla and SpaceX, and would rather have some involvement in the development, with another entity taking the helm.

That lines up with a few responses Musk made on Twitter when asked about patenting the technology. “I really hate patents unless critical to company survival,” Musk Tweeted. “Will publish Hyperloop as open source.” When asked about partners, Musk said he’s “happy to work with the right partners. Must truly share philosophical goal of breakthrough tech done fast & w/o wasting money on BS.”

We’ll have to wait until August 12th to find out more.

'via Blog this'

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Trash To Cash: Mining Landfills For Energy And Profit

Fast Company

BY Ben Schiller Wed Sep 7, 2011

A Belgian company is working on removing the raw materials from dumps, making both energy and building materials out of them, and then redeveloping the land.


[Image: Flickr user D'arcy Norman]

… Dating from the 1960s, the Remo Milieubeheer landfill at Houthalen-Hechteren is a typical dump full of industrial waste and household garbage--16.5 million tons of it in all.
Hardly the sort of the place to get anyone excited.

Except, that is, Patrick Laevers, director of Group Machiels, the Belgian waste management company that owns the site. Laevers has a 20-year plan to excavate the entire expanse, recycling about 45% of its contents, and converting the rest into electricity.

Eventually, … he hopes to turn the site back to nature. What's more, Laevers thinks Houthalen-Hechteren could be the first of many such projects around the world. “We really believe this concept is the future, and that we can all benefit from it,” he says….

Machiels has formed a joint venture with Advanced Plasma Power, a U.K. energy-to-waste company that converts the non-recyclable residue into a mixture of clean-burning natural gas--which generates electricity for 100,000 homes--and a building material called Plasmarok.

Machiels hopes the scheme, which has cost hundreds of millions of dollars, will be fully operational in 2014….

Rolf Stein, CEO of Advanced Plasma Power, says “the mind boggles at the potential” for landfill mining--and not just for energy and recycling. Several companies with landfill sites near cities are looking to reclaim land for property development, he says. …

The concept of mining landfills has been around for years. In the 1950s, the Israelis took soil enriched with waste and spread it over orchards to improve earth quality of the land. And, in the 1980s, some U.S. states farmed landfill material for use in incinerators.

But it has taken rising energy prices and higher demand for recyclables (notably plastic and metals), to make landfill mining viable for companies like Machiels. That, and government support: A key part of the funding for the Houthalen-Hechteren project is coming from renewable energy credits….

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Waste To Energy Doesn't Just Go Carbon Free. It's Carbon Negative!! Get it!

The Green Living Guy blog
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 at 12:21PM
Source: Waste Management

Image via Wikipedia… The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has stated that the nation's waste-to-energy plants produce electricity with "less environmental impact than almost any other source of electricity."

When a ton of trash is delivered to a waste-to-energy plant, several things happen: the energy content of the waste is retrieved, metals are recovered and recycled and electricity is generated….
EPA's Municipal Solid Waste Decision Support Tool has demonstrated that a modern waste-to-energy plant provides for the avoidance of greenhouse gases through three different operations:

• For every megawatt of electricity generated through the combustion of solid waste, a megawatt of electricity from conventional, e.g., coal or oil-fired, power plants is avoided, creating a new savings of emissions of greenhouse gases, i.e., carbon dioxide.
• A modern municipal waste-to-energy facility separates ferrous and/or nonferrous metals for recycling. This is more energy efficient than mining virgin materials for the production of new metals such as steel. As a result, there is a significant energy savings and additional avoidance of greenhouse gas emissions.
• Image via WikipediaWhen a ton of solid waste is processed in a waste-to-energy facility, the methane that would have been generated if it were sent to a landfill is avoided. … Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, i.e., twenty-three times more potent than carbon dioxide.

In addition to the analysis using EPA's Decision Support Tool, a detailed, project analysis of a facility's contribution to solving the threat of global warming has been completed for a 1500-ton-per-day waste-to-energy facility in Saugus, Massachusetts.  The study determined about 270,00 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions are avoided annually because of this one waste-to-energy plant's operations. …

Image via WikipediaThe U.S. Conference of Mayors, through the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, has embraced the contribution of waste-to-energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. …

In addition, the newly formed Global Roundtable on Climate Change (GROCC) unveiled a joint statement on February 20, 2007 identifying waste-to-energy as a means to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the electric generating sector and methane emissions from landfills. This important recognition from the GROCC, which brought together high-level, critical stakeholders from all regions of the world, lends further support that waste-to-energy plays an important role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Image via WikipediaThe breadth of support for the GROCC position is evidenced by those that have signed the joint statement, including Dr. James Hansen of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and David Hawkins of the Natural Resources Defense Council's Climate Center, as well as entities as diverse as General Electric, Florida Power and Light, and Environmental Defense Fund.

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The Pitfalls of Pollution Allowance Trading

Managing POWER magazine

By Kennedy Maize
Although Congress killed the Obama administration's plans for a cap-and-trade program for controlling power plant emissions of carbon dioxide, many advocates of that policy approach, …continue to push for allowance trading. The argument is that trading mechanisms are more efficient than conventional command-and-control. But a new policy analysis from the environmental think tank Resources for the Future (RFF) highlights the problems cap-and-trade programs have faced in regulating emissions of sulfur dioxide and oxides of nitrogen. According to the analysis, changes in just one program—the sulfur dioxide rules—have wiped out some $3 billion in the value of utility-held emissions allowances.

Image via Wikipedia…[Says] the RFF analysis—"Banking on Allowances: The EPA's Mixed Record in Managing Emissions Market Transitions" —cap-and-trade programs have suffered from declining credibility and market support. Say Arthur Fraas and Nathan Richardson, "…[Changes] by regulators in the rules governing the use of allowances can significantly affect the certainty and credibility of the emissions-trading programs and the value of allowances. Such changes may lead to undesirable market behavior, including an emissions increase as sources use up or dump their banked allowances."

… The prototype trading programs for SO₂ and NO_x have all allowed utilities to bank excess pollution reductions, giving the allowance owners flexibility in timing and financing their reductions. But all of the programs changed substantially as time passed—particularly as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has sought to tighten caps over the years. ...

Image via Wikipedia"Because emissions allowances convey certain rights," says the RFF discussion paper, "it is important that emissions-trading programs maintain clear and consistent rules of the use of allowances in order to limit uncertainty and assure a smoothly functioning market." But that has not been the case, …

Pushed by internal and external policy and political dynamics, the EPA has repeatedly ratcheted down emissions targets, or caps. …[Says] the RFF discussion, "If banked allowances are used in the new, stricter program, emissions will be greater than desired in the short term until those banked allowances are drawn down. … [This] delay before the new caps 'bite' will be perceived as problematic and will create pressure to reduce or eliminate these 'excess' allowances."
"Striking the right balance" between the need for greater reductions and the value of banked allowances "is not easy," says the RFF paper, … "Though the problems have been consistent, the EPA's response has not” …
The damage to cost-effective reductions can be significant, says the analysis. … In the policy tug-of-war over new emissions reductions, environmental groups and their allies have pushed to eliminate the use of banked allowances, while business interests have argued for preservation of the value of the emissions.

Image via WikipediaPart of the problem is that the government has specifically avoided treating banked allowances as property; … Both Congress and the EPA have insisted through the law and implementing regulations that an allowance "does not constitute a property right." The RFF paper says the best way to understand the emissions allowances is to see them as "carrying some (but not all) of the rights in the property bundle. For example, holders can exclude others from using allowances they hold. But the statutory provisions and government agency decisions that create allowances limit allowance holders' rights." One of the problems in the property "bundle" is "the extent to which banked emissions allowances hold value as emissions caps decline and new programs are created."

… Although the EPA historically has sought to preserve the value of banked allowances during program shifts, most recently the agency proposed to wipe out banked allowances from the CAIR program to apply its successor "Transport Rule" regulatory regime. This EPA move, says the RFF paper, "represents a shift" in the EPA's traditional approach "that can only be detrimental to the overall efficiency of the EPA's cap-and-trade programs." …
—Kennedy Maize is MANAGING POWER's executive editor.

China’s Clean Tech Boom

 Image via Wikipedia

 

Bruce Usher, the former CEO of EcoSecurities, describes China’s path to leadership in renewable energy.

strategy+business magazine
by Laura W. Geller

China is fast becoming a clean technology leader. By 2008, it had become the world’s leading producer of solar panels, and last year it claimed the same title for wind turbines. Investment in clean tech in China in 2009 reached US$34.6 billion, compared with the United States’ investment of $18.6 billion. Bruce Usher, formerly the CEO of EcoSecurities Group PLC, a company that sources, develops, and trades carbon offsets from greenhouse gas emissions reduction projects, and now an adjunct professor of finance and executive in residence at Columbia Business School, has observed China’s growth in this sector firsthand. … Usher spoke with strategy+business in May about what he witnessed, what he learned, and what he sees as the future of clean tech in China and other emerging economies.

S+B: What did you observe on the ground as your business grew in China?
USHER: … What we found was that the industrial policy established by the Chinese government through the NDRC [National Development and Reform Commission] was very effective at stimulating development within the private sector. In our case, that meant stimulating the construction of clean energy projects, primarily small hydro and wind projects. Once the policies were in place, the private sector moved quickly. The banking sector tended to be quite supportive as well, in terms of availability of capital and attractive rates.

S+B: What are some of the unique benefits and challenges that China presents?
USHER: Based on my experience watching the way the clean tech industry has evolved in China, I’m convinced that the challenge of reducing carbon emissions is less about innovation and more about implementation. …[In] the U.S., for example, they are not getting implemented, or they are not getting implemented quickly enough. That’s where I was particularly impressed with my experience in China: There was an ability to get things done fast, and on a massive scale.

Because the Chinese government is more involved in industrial policy, it sets rules that are supportive, but that can also be restrictive. … We encountered some other fairly technical challenges working in China, but those were more than offset by the fact that things tended to get done very quickly as long as we worked within China’s strict regulations.

S+B: What does the future of clean technology in China look like?
USHER: …[The] big picture is they’re building massive numbers of coal-fired power plants as well, which produce an enormous amount of pollution, and that’s simply because they have such voracious demand for energy. They have to build these plants, or at least they believe they have to build them, to meet this demand. But the amount of hydro and wind development in China has also been massive for the last couple of years, and it’s very clear they will continue to grow this area in the years to come. The level of expertise coming out of China is only going to get higher. I see enormous development in the sophistication of the products being made in China, and I see more and more local development there, as well.

Looking ahead, something else interesting is happening in China with electric cars and battery technology. The country has experienced rapid growth in transportation infrastructure, and in some ways has a competitive advantage — the U.S. already has an infrastructure based on gasoline-powered vehicles, but because China’s is still developing, it is easier to make the transition to electric. We already see electric-powered two-wheeled vehicles everywhere in China, and I would be surprised if cars were far behind.

S+B: Do opportunities exist for other emerging economies to make a name for themselves in clean tech?
USHER: Emerging economies have one huge advantage over developed countries. To explain, I’ll use a cell phone example. Americans who travel to the developing world are often shocked by how well their cell phones work there. …[That’s] because these countries went straight to mobile, without a landline step in between. There are more cell phones in Africa than there are in North America today. …[We’re] talking about very simple phones. But cell phone coverage is ubiquitous in the developing world.

So if that can happen in cell phones, there’s reason to think that in clean energy or renewable energy, similar forces may be at work. Because their energy infrastructure is often very poor to begin with, and because there’s rapid growth and demand for energy, developing countries can leapfrog the sort of dirty, traditional energy that we have in our infrastructure in the United States. Similar to the electric car example above, they can go straight from no energy to clean energy, and that’s a huge advantage because clean energy is still more expensive than dirty energy, but incrementally so, and if you’re going from zero to building something, you might be willing to make that incremental investment. Here in the U.S., if we have to scrap our current infrastructure, that’s a huge additional cost. We need to start all over again, and that’s a big challenge.

S+B: Besides China, what emerging economy is making notable progress?
USHER: I think Brazil, … is an interesting example. What Brazil’s leaders recognized more than 20 years ago is that their country had a competitive advantage in its ability to produce cane sugar due to geography and expertise, and that it could convert that Image via Wikipediainto an energy product — ethanol — at a competitive price.

Building on that success, I think Brazil is taking some fairly innovative approaches to managing the resources of the Amazon. … Deforestation still goes on, no question about it, but the rate of deforestation has slowed significantly in the last couple of years, and government initiatives have contributed greatly to this improvement. Now, it’s not necessarily clean tech, but in many ways, it’s addressing a similar problem. It’s addressing climate change in a way that’s specific to Brazil.

Author Profile:

• Laura W. Geller is the deputy managing editor of strategy+business.