Alternative Energy

On the heels of the Trump administration’s announcement to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accord, National Geographic will re-release BEFORE THE FLOOD commercial-free and unauthenticated across its digital and TVE platforms as part of the network’s continued commitment to covering climate change.

I’ve received many questions over the past few months about Ingersoll Rand’s commitment to reducing energy demand and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Those questions intensified this week with news of the United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on climate change.

Sustainable Brands® recently announced Detroit Ento as the winner of the Sustainable Brands Innovation Open (SBIO) startup competition, co-sponsored by Whirlpool and with technology provided by YouNoodle and awards provided by Rivanna Natural Designs. The competition, culminating at SB’17 Detroit, May 22-25, attracted world-changing entrepreneurial teams with unique ideas to solving some of the world’s pressing environmental and social concerns.

Consumers could outspend utilities in the adoption of solar, storage, electric vehicles and other distributed energy resources (DERs), making it essential for utilities to track and integrate these DERs into their planning processes to benefit their customers and the grid. That is one of the key findings of a new case study from Black & Veatch and SEPA, which details the efforts of the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) to create such an integrated DER planning process.

Consumers Energy announced that it has started a new solar energy pilot program, giving Michigan residents another option to help build a clean future for our state. Consumers Energy’s new Solar Distributed Generation (DG) Pilot program allows customers to put solar panels on the rooftops of their homes, working with industry-leading solar provider SunPower to offer Michigan customers a full-service home solar solution.

Semtive, founded in Buenos Aires with an office in Silicon Valley, builds small wind turbines that function both on and off the grid in any weather conditions. These turbines need only a light breeze to activate, and they can work for individual households, businesses, and industrial applications.

Off Grid Electric is the world’s first distributed clean energy utility, providing affordable, solar energy to households that struggle with spotty or nonexistent grid access. They sell solar energy systems on a pay-as-you-go, lease-to-own model – costing some homes as little as $7 a month. That way, customers don’t have to worry about making a daunting financial investment upfront.

Over half of the world’s population is still not using the internet. Seemingly something out of a science-fiction movie, Altaeros Energies has developed the world’s first autonomous aerostat system to deploy energy and communication to more people at a fraction of the cost. In other words, they have effectively created a really tall cell tower (up to 600 meters off the ground) that can provide as much mobile coverage as at least 20 ground-based cell towers. Not only that, but this tethered airborne platform can lift a lightweight wind turbine up into the sky where winds are strong and consistent, harnessing exponential amounts of clean energy.