I came across this press release from the U.S. National Energy Technology Laboratory that talks about a “novel” way to monitor whether carbon dioxide is leaking from underground storage sites used for CCS applications.

Researchers co-injected carbion dioxide and chemical tracers into an underground storage site. The tracer makes it possible to differentiate CO2 from the experiment from naturally occurring CO2. They then placed bee hives about 150 metres upwind and downwind of the site, where CO2 from underground was intentionally released as part of the experiment. The idea is that pollen from surrounding flowers would collect the CO2 and be marked by the tracer. As bees gather the pollen, they bring it back to their hives, where researchers collect samples for analysis. If there’s no tracer, there’s presumably no leak.

While a novel idea, I’m not sure I’m comforted by the idea of having bees used to track CO2 leaks over hundreds of years. Also, I wonder if there ever was a major leak whether it would just kill the bees — that to me, is a pretty good sign that something is wrong. Problem is, it would also kill the humans in the area. As a way to pre-test the ability of a site to hold CO2, however, this could be one approach worth employing.

I first wrote about Catch The Wind back in November and in the 10 months that have passed the company with the “spider sensor for wind turbines” (my wording) has made some solid progress. The company’s sensor, called the Vindicator, can detect wind speeds and direction up to 1,000 metres away, giving a wind turbine’s control system enough time to adjust blades and nacelle position accordingly. Over time, this improves the efficiency of the turbine and reduces wear on components and blades. In March the company announced its first commercial sale and the launch of a small field trail. Today, it announced a relatively large field trial with Canadian Hydro Developers, the largest wind developer in Canada.

As part of the trial, Catch The Wind will install eight test units of its Vindicator on eight Canadian Hydro turbines that are part of a 15-turbine wind farm in Pincher Creek, Alberta. The plan is to do a side-by-side comparison of the turbines with the sensor with the turbines without the sensor. Canadian Hydro is willing to do this because it’s an older wind farm and the warranties on the Nordex N60 1.3 megawatt turbines have expired. (more…)

This has nothing at all to do with the issues I usually cover on this blog, but being a hockey fan — I’m Canadian, after all — I must express great delight that a U.S. bankruptcy court judge, bless the man, has granted Jim Balsillie a chance to bid for the Phoenix Coyotes NHL team. Balsillie is the co-chief executive of Waterloo, Ont.-based Research In Motion (the BlackBerry maker), and he’s a huge fan of hockey. He has put in a generous bid for the Coyotes, one that the judge called the “highest and best.” But the NHL doesn’t want Balsillie in the old boys club, largely because Balsillie wants to move the Coyotes to a true hockey town — Hamilton, Ontario — but also because they don’t like Balsillie’s aggressive style, which is all-too-rare for a Canadian businessman, IMHO.

Go Balsillie, Go!

I have a short article about efforts to establish dot-eco as a new top-level domain as ICANN, the regulatory body in charge of the Internet’s addressing system, prepares to accept proposals early next year. Two groups have so far expressed a desire to become the official registry for dot-eco — one group, based in California, is Dot Eco LLC and is backed by former U.S. vice-president Al Gore and a number of U.S.-based environmental organizations; the other group, based in Vancouver, B.C., is called Big Room Inc. and is backed by former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev (through his group Green Cross International), the David Suzuki Foundation, and WWF International.
Both companies have set up Web sites to build support for their bids. The Gore-backed group is more U.S.-centric and seems more focused on climate change, while the Gorbachev-backed group has a more international flavour and wants to embrace environmental issues (including climate change) more generally. Find Dot Eco LLC here and Big Room here.

Creating .eco as an Internet address extension could be beneficial, but it could also enable corporate greenwashing. And major questions are bound to emerge, like: Can you register www.coal.eco or www.climatechangeisahoax.eco? The good news is that both groups want to take a portion of proceeds from the sale of these new addresses and donate them to environmental causes. It will be interesting to see as 2010 approaches whether any other bidders come out of the woodwork.

UPDATE: The folks at Dot Eco LLC were upset that I didn’t include a comment from them in the above story, so I gave them a chance to comment on this blog post. Here’s what Minor Childers, co-founder of Dot Eco LLC, had to say:

The chief economist at the International Energy Agency says peak oil is nigh and that we, as a society, need to start seriously planning for a world without it. Dr. Fatih Birol, in an interview with the U.K. Independent, said total production of oil is likely to peak within 10 years and that most of the biggest oil fields in the world have already hit peak and are declining rapidly. His comment that the peak will come in 10 years is far earlier than most governments are planning on, if they’re planning at all. Some believe we’ve already hit peak, at least when we talk of “conventional oil” production.

“One day we will run out of oil and we have to leave oil before oil leaves us, and we have to prepare ourselves for that day,” Dr. Birol said. ”The earlier we start, the better, because all of our economic and social systems are based on oil, so to change from that will take a lot of time and a lot of money and we should take this issue very seriously.”

 He went on to say that with peak comes higher and higher prices and increased concentration of power in the handful of countries in the Middle East that have a 40-per-cent share of the market and likely more in years to come. The timing of that interview couldn’t have been better for Nissan, which unveiled its new LEAF electric car over the weekend.

Nissan plans to start selling the LEAF in late 2010 and hopes to go into mass production in 2012. This is a slick-looking car, one that promises to be affordably priced. And unlike other offerings, the battery will be leased, putting all the risk in the hands of Nissan. As I said before, there’s been too much focus on GM’s Chevy Volt, as if it’s the only electric game in town. Fact is, there are many plug-in vehicles — hybrids and all-electrics – being launched between 2010 and 2012. It’s a good sign, because these are the kinds of products we need to transition away from oil, as Dr. Birol so widely advises. We also need several models to enter the market to encourage more investment in the infrastructure needed to support these cars.

Dr. Birol’s  warning and Nissan’s unveiling of the LEAF (among other EV announcements of late) add even more weight to Ontario’s proposed subsidy for purchasers of plug-in hybrid and all-electric vehicles. (more…)