The cost of manufacturing organic LEDs will need to fall dramatically if they’re ever going to be a competitive lighting technology — i.e. attractive to mainstream consumers. GE announced today it has demonstrated a roll-to-roll manufacturing process that spits out organic light-emitting diodes the same way newspaper presses spit out tomorrow’s news. The company is calling it a “major milestone,” and said the process could also be adapted to produce organic solar PV cells and rollup displays. “It’s now easier to envision OLEDs becoming another high-efficiency GE offering, like LEDs, fluorescent, halogen or high-efficiency incandescent,” said Michael Petras, vice-president of electrical distribution and lighting at GE Consumer and Industrial. The demonstration comes after a four-year, $13 million research collaboration between GE Global Research, Energy Conversion Devices (ECD), and the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology. ECD’s subsidiary, United Solar Ovonic, is using the approach to mass-produce its flexible Uni-Solar brand solar laminates, the company said.

Montreal-based Enerkem is making solid progress on the construction of a 1.5-million gallon cellulosic ethanol plant that will use old creosoted powerline poles as its main feedstock. Construction of the plant began last October and the next phase will be the installation of gasification and gas conditioning equipment, followed by the “catalytic islands” that will convert the syngas into cellulosic ethanol. “Unlike other gasification technologies, which are limited to using the gas for production of heat and electricity, Enerkem’s synthetic gas is conditioned for use as a chemical feedstock in the manufacturing of higher value-added products, such as cellulosic ethanol and other biofuels,” said Enerkem president Vincent Chornet. The company expects to announce other projects in the near future that include the use of municipal solid waste as feedstock. Last November I wrote about how railway giant Canadian Pacific had struck a deal to have its old wooden railway ties gasified and ultimately used to generate electricity.

NOTE: Just noticed today that GreenField Ethanol, the largest ethanol producer in Canada, has appointed an executive to lead up the company’s new cellulosic ethanol division. More evidence that the cellulosic approach, while still not ready for prime time, could be here faster than people think.

My Clean Break column today takes a look at Toronto-based WhalePower Corp., which believes it has a better way to make blades for wind turbines and fans. The idea is to design the blades with bumps or “tubercles” on their leading edge, similar to what you see in nature on humpback whale flippers. There’s been steady progress on the wind turbine side, but WhalePower is taking advantage of the much shorter product design cycle for industrial fans. It has already signed a non-exclusive licensing agreement with the largest industrial ventilation fan maker in Canada, Envira-North, which plans to launch a line of fans based on the unusual design at the end of April. Stephen Dewar, vice-president of business development at WhalePower, believes the increased performance (up to 20 per cent more efficient), reduced noise, and better handling of air with the fan design will go a long way toward demonstrating why the tubercle design will also work for wind turbine blades. The thinking is that wind turbines equipped with these blades can tap much lower wind speeds because the bumps on the blades dramatically delay stall.

It’s an interesting story to follow.