November 2008 Archives

The Green Blogger is off this week celebrating a food-binging holiday (so totally un-green!).

The blogger will report back on Monday, December 1, and will regale you about the green state of Black Friday shopping in America as she do her civic duty of helping the US economy.

Consulting firm Frost & Sullivan said Russia should start developing a renewable energy sector even though the country is the world's largest gas producer with rich oil and coal reserves.

Oil and gas production regions in Russia is faced with rapid decline, the firm said, and green energy development is imperative.

Geothermal, hydro and biomass could account for 80% of Russia's green energy potential and could supply as much as 30%++ of Russia's energy needs.

"The potential for Russian development of renewable energy is great and becoming recognized. With more robust government support in terms of renewable energy targets and Russian and foreign investors expected to actively explore the hidden potential of green energy in Russia, the green industry will be able to develop and to grow generating interesting opportunities."

I might be having a deja vu but I thought China already has strict melamine testing rules implemented following the melamine tainted pet food and toothpaste scandals last year?

According to ICIS news (subscription required), the Chinese government is proposing new standards to focus on melamine testing following this year's melamine-tainted dairy products scandal. Since September, several milk products in China were found to be tainted with melamine, an industrial chemical used in plastics and adhesives. Recalls were made around the world for dairy products contained with Chinese milk.

China is also expected to implement strong measures in managing the country's dairy supply chain from producers to distributors.

New laws and standards concerning China's dairy industry is expected to be implemented next year in October, according to the New York Times.

Ummm...October 2009?? Shouldn't they make haste in implementing stricter rules to avoid further contamination in their dairy products??

The American Chemistry Council (ACC) is battling another proposed plastic ban in California this time on food containers.

The California Ocean Protection Council (OPC) proposed yesterday a ban on polystyrene (the styrofoamy ones) take out containers as well as a statewide fees for plastic bag use as ways to clean out ocean litter.

OPC said full and partial polystyrene food container prohibitions have already been implemented in many California cities such as: Alameda, Aliso Viejo, Berkeley, Calabasas, Capitola, Carmel, Emeryville, Fairfax, Hercules, Huntington Beach, Laguna Beach, Laguna Woods, Los Angeles, Malibu, Millbrae, Oakland, Pacific Grove, Pittsburg, San Clemente, San Francisco, San Juan Capistrano, Santa Cruz, Santa Monica, Scotts Valley and West Hollywood.

You would think that recyclable materials and chemicals should do well with manufacturers and retailers looking for cheaper and more environment-friendly alternatives during a global economic recession.

Unfortunately the excess waste of the economic boom era as well as the current weak demand for products (thus the slow-down of manufacturing) seemed to have driven the supply balance to tilt more to its side.

According to a report from Greenbiz.com, the production slowdown in China because of the global economic recession is the major driver for the slump in demand for recycled materials in the US and the UK.

The State of Ohio is seeing green in soybeans, and not just from food and biofuel applications.

The Ohio Soybean Council (OSC), Ohio Bioproducts Innovation Center (OBIC) and Polymer Ohio, recently launched its "Cell to Sell" soy technology program to accelerate commercialization of soybean-based industrial products and chemicals. The program will reportedly provide credible, timely source of information to assist Ohio agricultural, manufacturing and research collaborators in the commercial development and utilization of soy-based products.

"The ultimate goal is to assemble as many soy technologies as possible into the database, evaluate them and perform a techno-economic analysis on the top technologies in a group session," said Kenneth Anderson, OBIC Soy Initiative Project Leader. "The process is expected to surface high potential soy products with industrial applications."

By the way, our friends from United Soybean Board just released their new and fresh soy chemicals of the month:

This could be one of the major reasons why Ford, GM and Chrysler are begging for bailout help in the US Congress: it's because the US car market is lagging behind Europe and Japan in terms of greeness.

According to automotive data provider Jato Dynamics, the US car market is slower to embrace fuel-efficient and low-emission cars compared to the European and Japanese car market. Poor selection of fuel efficient vehicles coupled with historic larger-vehicle tastes and relatively low gas prices (before) have all contribute toward a slow green transition in the US car market.

Jato noted that US demand for hybrid vehicles such as those made by Toyota and Honda surged mostly because of the higher fuel costs.

But why only blame the car makers? Maybe if US regulators would have been more strict in automotive carbon emissions, it could have force the Big 3 to change their "ungreen ways" much earlier??

This could be a big lesson for the chemical industry as well. Maybe US chemical companies should start implementing green chemistry as soon as possible so as to become more competitive not only in the domestic market but worldwide as well.

Unlike politicians' vague promises of a green economy, a study from Duke University pinpointed specific carbon-reducing technologies that has the potential for future green job creations in the US, and in fact is said to be already existing in some parts of the US.

Researchers at Duke's Center on Globalization, Governance & Competitiveness (CGGC) said technologies such as LED lighting, high-performance windows, auxiliary power units (APUs)for long-haul trucks, concentrating solar power, and Super Soil Systems (a new method for treating hog wastes), have already showed evidence of producing economic opportunities based on growth of some US companies that participate along the supply chain of these five industries.

"Until now, there was no tangible evidence of what the jobs are, how they are created and what it means for U.S. workers. We are providing that here," said Gary Gereffi, a Duke professor of sociology and lead author of the report. "We don't guess where the jobs are; we name them. Our report uses value chains to show that clean technology jobs are also real economy jobs."

Adding to this is a story from the New York Times about the growing green jobs in Iowa and Ohio on wind farms and solar manufacture.

Notice

This blog will be undergoing planned maintenance on the morning (UK time) of Thursday 20, November 2008. During that time you will be able to read this blog, but will not be able to post any comments. We expect full functionality to be restored in the afternoon of 20 November.

Thanks for your patience.

According to several news reports, majority of US folks (including Congress) are against bailing out the cash-strapped Big 3 automobile makers -- GM, Ford and privately-held Chrysler -- but there are worries especially within environmental groups if the financial crisis will push development of US electric and hybrid cars into the back-burner.

The report from Reuters said GM is still planning to launch its Volt plug-in vehicle in 2010 although the company is said to have canceled its planned announcement of the Volt's battery supplier at an auto show this week.

The big three are set to plea their case for bailout help in Congress today. Aside from the $25bn already set aside for them by Congress, the car makers are also hoping to get a piece of the $700 billion bailout pie.

Could it be possible that not giving them any bailout money(some of my tax money is in there too!) could still jump start the evolution of car manufacturing in the US towards plug-ins and hybrids, which these Big three should have done in the first place?!?!

While the bottled water industry is being besieged by environmental groups with its use of plastic bottles, the plastic industry, meanwhile, is finding a miraculous demand coming from the wine market.

Several wineries across the globe are switching some of their wines' bottle packaging from glass to PET (polyethylene terephthalate) to save transportation and packaging costs. Innovative PET wine bottles such as that of plastic producer Constar International, are now said to be shatterproof and oxygen-proof, which protects the flavor, aroma, and color of the wine inside the bottle.

Philadelphia-based Constar recently teamed up with French winery Boisset Family Estates, which is now packaging its "green" Beaujolais Nouveau wine with Constar's PET bottles. Boisset expects the retail price of the plastic bottled wine to be $12.99 compared to $13.99-$14.99 Beaujolais Nouveaus in traditional glass bottles.

Last year, UK supermarket chain Sainsbury started selling its plastic bottled wines, New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc and an Australian Rosé, as well as a Chardonnay and Cabernet Shiraz from Wolf Blass, one of Australia's biggest exporters of wine.

A study financed by the Marble Institute of America (MIA) reported that granite countertops will not turn anybody into a mutant.

The environmental and engineering consulting services, EH&E, analyzed different varieties of granite countertops and stones (around 115 varieties were tested) and reported that the quantities of radiation and radon emitted from the samples were all below average levels of concentration specified by the US Environment Protection Agency and [or] the European Commission standards.

There had been several media reports that came out in July stating potential radiation emitted from granite countertops, which has become very popular in US kitchens in the past few years.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Energy (DOE), and the Center for Resource Solutions awarded late last month their annual Green Power Leadership Awards to 25 organizations/companies who either purchase, supply or develop renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, low-impact biomass, and low-impact hydro resources) across the US.

Unfortunately, none of them is from the chemical industry.

The awards serve to recognize the leading actions of organizations, programs, and individuals that significantly advance the development of green power sources. It is curious to see why nobody from the chemical industry is recognized in these awards since it is one of the leading developer in the renewable energy market. And shouldn't the chemical industry be a big purchaser of green power since they helped developed this market in the first place?

I was watching the show 60 Minutes where the US President-elect Obama was being interviewed for the first time after winning the election.

According to Obama, despite that the price of oil has gone down energy and a green economy will remain at the forefront of his agenda along with trying to fix the economy.

"You know, oil prices go up, gas prices at the pump go up, everybody goes into a flurry of activity. And then the prices go back down and suddenly we act like it's not important, and we start, you know filling up our SUVs again. And, as a consequence, we never make any progress. It's part of the addiction, all right. That has to be broken. Now is the time to break it."

The bad news, according to a recent World Energy Outlook report from the International Energy Agency (IEA), is that rising global consumption of fossil fuels mostly coming from developing countries such as China, India and the Middle East will continue to drive up GHG emissions even if countries such as the US, Europe, Japan and other countries under OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) will reduce their emissions to zero.

A lot of acquisition activities seems to be happening recently in the global solar and wind markets. I guess with the volatile stock market these days, some companies are ripe for the picking. I do wonder if these M&A activities will continue next year and if this is a good omen or a bad one for the clean tech industry.

For now, here are this week's green news roundup.

Evonik borrows genome tools
Integrated Genomics has licensed its ERGO genomics platform to specialty chemicals company Evonik. Scientists from Evonik's Science-to-Business Center Biotechnology will use the ERGO™ system to optimize their production strains and find new methods for high yield production of specialty chemicals.

Japanese solar plant grows
Kyocera is building a new solar cell manufacturing facility in Yasu City, Shiga Prefecture, said to be the company's largest plant in Japan. Production is scheduled in the spring of 2010 with estimated output of 300 megawatt to 650 MW by March 2012.

Maybe our friend amorris19 got something about Dow Chemical's CEO Andrew Liveris being a candidate for Energy Secretary after all.

Dow just announced today its own energy plan for America, something like what T. Boone Pickens has been doing before the election but much more expanded to other than just renewable energy.

According to Dow, volatile natural gas price in the past 20 years have resulted in a net loss of 120,000 chemical industry-related jobs in the US and more than 3 million jobs in the manufacturing sector.

"The U.S. is on a course to spend more than $500 billion per year to import oil -- nearly the amount authorized one time for the financial rescue package recently passed by Congress," said Liveris "At Dow, we believe a new comprehensive energy policy is critical to the overall economic health of the nation."

Maybe a low carbon economy might give jobs back not only to the US manufacturing sector (solar, wind, hybrid cars) but to the now jobless members of the financial institution as well.

I received an email this week about the growing carbon trading market and the current need for consultants, bankers, brokers, investors and traders:

Dear Doris,

As I'm sure you are aware the Kyoto / Carbon space continues to grow exponentially, and there is an ever increasing demand for talented people who can service the requirements of industry players; whether it be Consultancies, Project developers, Aggregators, right through to Energy trading, Investment Banking and Private Equity.

XXXXXX XXXXX has had a dedicated Carbon recruitment desk for over 18 months, when it became apparent that this market was set to become an industry in itself. The roles we typically deal with all stem from Kyoto's Mechanisms; CDM/JI and Emissions Trading, and our coverage and geographical reach is as extensive as the market demands. We boast an impressive track record of permanent placements for roles ranging from CDM/JI Originators to Brokers to Consultants to Co2 Traders in companies ranging from small Carbon Aggregators ranging to major Financial Institutions, in countries ranging from UK to Europe to South America to Russia, and most recently USA.

If you are interested to find out what opportunities we currently have on our books, or if you are looking to expand your existing Carbon finance set up; please get in touch and I'm sure we will be able to provide an appropriate solution to meet your needs.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind Regards

XXXXX XXXXX
Company Name

-COMPANY LOGO HERE-

We do have to remember that regulating a low carbon economy might be needed in order to avoid another financial disaster in the future.

The American Institute of Chemical Engineer's (AIChE) Centennial annual meeting in Philadephia next week will prove to be an exciting event especially with its much-awaited 10th annual Chem-E car competition in November 16.

Different US university teams will race small cars powered by their futuristic idea of alternative fuels from different chemical reactions such as beef liver and hydrogen peroxide, Mentos® and Coca Cola®, and homemade fuel cells.

If you want to get kids to be excited in green chemistry, this is definitely one way to do it. I wish we had this type of competition when I was taking my bachelor in ChE!!

AIChE officials said the conference will also look back at life-changing chemical engineering innovations - from catalytic converters in cars; other clean energy technologies; the development of unique materials such as Tupperware, Styrofoam, and nylons; to medical breakthroughs in pharmaceutical production and drug delivery.

No, I am not talking about using your nose to sniff bad milk odor in grocery shelves for melamine contamination. The California-based company Electronic Sensor Technology (EST) said they have developed a method using their zNose product for detecting and measuring melamine in less than 3 minutes and without modifying the sample for testing.

EST CEO Teong Lim said the current cost of melamine testing per sample ranges from around $120 in the US to $145 in China. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) method reportedly requires 85 minutes of preparation before the 20 minute (GC-MS) testing. Other fast-screen method (LC/MS) takes 14.5 minutes after sample preparation, according to Mr. Lim.

Using zNose as a pre-screening tool will reduce sample testing costs as only samples that indicate melamine are subjected to the costly testing methods.

I was imagining an equipment that looks like a nose but I guess that will be bad for the company image...

Glycerine, a byproduct of biodiesel production, is proving to be a really versatile chemical with this new breakthrough from Oxford University in the UK.

Oxford researchers said they were able to produce methanol directly by catalytic hydrogenolysis of glycerine using a precious metal catalyst in industrially mild conditions of just 100°C temperature and a 20 bar pressure of hydrogen gas.

The researchers said around 90% of the world's methanol comes from natural gas so the new production method offers a cost-effective alternative. I do wonder how much the catalyst will cost though?? Catalysts seem to be a very profitable business these days in developing green chemistry.

But I digress.

The Oxford gycerine-to-methanol technology has been patented by the University's technology transfer company, Isis Innovation. Unlike other glycerine-to-methanol method, the researchers said theirs is a more direct, efficient, and lower cost route.

I intentionally delayed the weekly news roundup so the birthday post will be prominent all day yesterday (did I mention I like receiving congratulation comments??).

Here is last week's green news. It seems that there are a lot more gloom-and-doom scenario from various energy-intensive industries - chemicals, steel, paper, power, and other industrial and manufacturing sectors - now that the administration and Congress became more blue-blooded (figuratively-speaking).

Lithium battery buyout
Private equity firm Arsenal Capital bought Ferro Corporation's fine chemicals business, which is a big manufacturer of electrolytes and materials used for lithium batteries, ultracapacitors and other energy storage devices.

Silica in green tires
Rhodia and Dow Corning will develop and commercialize new silica/silane products principally to help reduce the rolling resistance of tires and hence reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions in automobiles.

I just received a suggestion from amorris19 that Dow Chemical's Andrew Liveris should be picked as Obama's new Secretary of Energy. He (or she) reasoned that Dow should know firsthand the need to conserve and diversify domestic energy resources; the need to focus on energy efficiency (starting from manufacturing to transportation/distribution to consumer); and the need to accelerate development in alternative energy.

He (or she) got a point in there although there will definitely be a misgiving among the public that he will be biased in favor of energy companies (another Cheney in administration perhaps?)

But whoever will be picked as Obama's new cabinet members (and federal agency leaders if replaced) will heavily impact the chemical industry. So who do you suggest should be appointed in the following cabinet spots and agencies?

1. Secretary of Energy
2. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner - pharma, food, cosmetics...
3. Environmental Protection Agency Secretary
4. Secretary of Agriculture - Note: biofuels are big in here!
5. Consumer Products Safety Commissioner

Any other agencies I've missed?? Oh yeah, somebody suggested too that Oprah Winfrey should be his press secretary...

November 8 was the blog's one year anniversary and I am glad to say that within a year, the blog has been able to generate almost 500 posts (460 right now and counting) and almost 100 comments (1 million++ if you count junk comments)!

According to the higher beings who track the blog's progress, the number of hits the blog had this year jumped from 155 total visits in January to 2,308 in October. The blog had total page views of 4,105 and total unique users of 2,064 last month compared to the meager 286 page views and 119 unique users in January.

Now that Obama is going to be the next president and the US Congress will be dominated by the blue party, there were a lot of optimism in the green sphere as well as slight pessimism (sometimes diplomatically called cautiously optimism) in the chemical and manufacturing sectors.

According to ICIS news, there are high expectations from major environmental groups that the Obama administration will be in favor of tightening chemicals regulations as well as more legislation on climate and pollution control.

Their wish list for the new Congress includes among others a passage for a cap-and-trade bill; a chemicals control bill that is likened (or better) to the European Union's chemical regulation Reach (registration, evaluation and authorization of chemicals); and renewal of the special tax on chemical producers to fund clean-up projects at polluted sites around the country.

The plastic industry has often been heard this year accusing several US municipal governments of making them their scapegoat by supplementing city coffers with taxes or charging fees for the use of plastic products such as water bottle or supermarket bags.

They might be right this time when Mayor Bloomberg of New York City announced its plans to charge New Yorkers a nickel for each plastic bag they use at every store (any kind of store even your favorite deli in the street corner). This, along with other city budget cuts, is in order to plug New York City's expected $4bn budget shortfall for the next two years, according to the New York Times.

Early this year, the New York City Council opted to mandate recycling of supermarket plastic bags across the city instead of a ban. This move was highly applauded by the American Chemistry Council's (ACC) Plastics division. The ACC has been battling bag bans [or fees] from other cities in California, Washington, Oregon, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and in Hawaii.

Just last week, the ACC said the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts, rebuffed a bid to ban plastic bags and instead opted to expand recycling.

With the big losses in Wall Street, I guess Mayor Bloomberg has to go back to the drawing board and look for smaller piggy banks such as plastic bags...and maybe even plastic bottled water tax in the near future...

Scientists from my birth country, the Philippines, are said to have developed band-aids made from the fibers of the edible mushroom volvariella volvacea (incorporated in fibrous materials from agro-industrial wastes, alginate or stabilizer and textile fiber).

The mushroom induces the repair of tissues while inhibiting microbial growth. The band-aid itself is said to be non-toxic, non-allergenic, biodegradable, hydrophilic and permeates oxygen.

This beats the freshly-plucked guava leaves my grandmother used to plaster my scratched and (sometimes wounded) knees during my precocious years.

A very exciting green event is going to be held in January next year in San Francisco.

ICIS Chemical Business (the magazine I work for) is co-sponsoring a roundtable event within a newly launched green chemistry program called GreenExchange at InformexUSA, an annual tradeshow for buyers and sellers in the fine, custom and specialty chemical manufacturing industry.

ICIS' features editor Clay Boswell will host the GreenExchange Breakfast on Thursday morning, January 29, at 7:30 AM, which will feature discussions by executives and research scientists that currently hold innovative green technology patents and policy solutions.

The speakers at the event will include:

• John Warner, co-author of 'Green Chemistry: Theory and Practice' and expert on how green chemistry principles can be incorporated into commercially relevant applications.

• Maureen Gorsen, head of the California Department of Toxic Substances, will speak about the State's Green Chemistry legislation recently signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

• Ronald Gebhard, Ph.D., R&D Director, DSM Pharmaceutical Products, will speak on the topic of sustainability through metabolic pathway engineered bugs.
  

• Christopher Gann, Chief Executive Officer of Genomatica, Inc., will discuss a bio-manufacturing process that has the potential to let global chemical producers make the same standard bulk chemicals at lower costs and with renewable inputs.

The Green event will also have a recognition program for general exhibitors that offer a diversity of technologies, with one or more dedicated to eco-friendly chemicals.

Plastic producer SABIC says it was able to help Jay Leno's lean green 650 horsepower EcoJet machine to be more fuel efficient using the company's lightweight Lexan GLX resin.

The talk-show host of the Tonight Show has been working with General Motor's design team in building his biodiesel-fueled EcoJet supercar, which combines racecar-like performance and muscular design with "green principles".

SABIC Innovative Plastics' Lexan GLX polycarbonate resin coated with their abrasion-resistant Exatec® 900 glazing is said to allow GM's Advanced Design Studio to create a sleek yet durable glazing elements for the EcoJet,including windscreen, side windows and roof panel.

"Using Lexan GLX resin instead of glass enabled the car a weight savings of about 50 percent for better fuel economy," says Sabic. "The American Plastics Council reports that for each 10 percent reduction in vehicle weight, mileage increases by 7%."

Silicone manufacturer Dow Corning said it made significant progress in reducing their waste partly through its materials conversion program, which converts or recycles its waste, scrap and off-spec silicone materials instead of sending them to landfill or incineration. Materials are then reprocessed into new products that meet customers' specifications.

In Europe, the company said it was able to reduce 80% of its waste in Seneffe, Belgium plant, and 10% in its Barry, Wales site. The Barry plant was also able to use a recycled solvent which reduced the plant's overall amount of waste solvent.

In North America, Dow Corning said it was able to reduce consumption of natural gas and carbon dioxide emissions by burning hydrogen at its Midland, Michigan plant; reduced the amount of solvent used in a coating process in Midland using recycled solvents; and reduced emissions of greenhouse gases through energy reduction at its Carrollton, Kentucky plant.

In China, the company was able to recycle more than 80 percent of the waste at its Zhangjiagang (ZJG) sealant plant as well as reduced generation of nonhazardous silicone and solvent streams in the plant by 50% through the first half of 2008.

Not only is the company able to reduce waste but I'm sure part of their operational costs this year received a pretty good cut as well.

The Environmental Protection Agency put out its voluntary Responsible Recycling Practices for electronic waste materials, which can be used as guidelines for accreditation programs to verify that electronic recyclers in the US and outside the US are handling, recycling and even refurbishing their materials in a safe and responsible manner.

The guidelines target materials such as cathode ray tubes (CRTs) and CRT glass; circuit boards (unless they have had batteries and mercury-containing items removed and are lead free); batteries; and items containing mercury and/or polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), both in EOL equipment and when separated as components.

I was eating breakfast while surfing the web, and thinking of serious election-aftermath stuff to post in the blog when this news about this week's ongoing World Toilet Summit in Macau caught my attention.

At first I was amused by the notion of a global toilet expo and all the crappy notions that could be attached to it. Reading the event's objectives, however, made me realize how the lack of sustainable sanitation worldwide is getting to be one of the biggest problems that every human being should consider and think about.

It is estimated that 2.6 billion people (40% of the global population) are currently without proper sanitation facilities. The United Nations has set a mandate to halve this figure by 2015 as part of its Millennium Development Goals. For those who doesn't care, just think about viral diseases that could spread in an instant across the globe just because of lack of sanitation in one country.

With this critical issue, businesses and corporations could benefit not only in enhancing their sustainability image by doing humanitarian services (e.g. funding, providing sanitation treatment systems and maybe mass-produced toilets for free??), but this could be a potential breeding ground (pun not intended) for new green technologies.

Think about waterless toilets in countries lacking water or solar-powered self-cleaning commodes. Recyclable systems that convert waste into biogas to provide hot water for bathing and washing purposes was also recommended by the World Toilet Organization (ok, I admit I still find humor with this name).

WTO says the event will also feature innovative showcase of leading edge sanitation solutions which include air quality management, cleaning and maintenance, design and systems, facility management, mobile toilets, sanitary ware and fittings, sewerage management, waste and water treatment, and other related services.

It has been a very exciting night waiting for the outcome of a historic US presidential election and I just want to share the news to the green blog readers that Senator Barack Obama won.

More analysis to come in the days ahead on how the incoming new administration, with the democratic party now going to occupy both the legislative and executive branch, will affect the green industry in the US.

Here is a better insight on Obama and McCain's green positions from Sustainablebusiness.com

McCain is said to have a 24% green voting record while Obama has an 87% green voting record according to the League of Conservation (LCV) Voters Scorecard. Also, the oil and gas industry reportedly donated $1.7 million to Senator McCain and $500 thousand to Senator Obama.

"The 110th Congress began with great promise of bringing about a new energy economy, especially with the first increase in fuel economy of cars and light trucks in a generation," said LCV Legislative Director Tiernan Sittenfeld. "The success of 2007 should have led to even more progress in 2008, but a vocal minority of Big Oil allies instead turned the year into a series of missed opportunities and major steps backward."

Here's another energy-based issue that both US presidential candidates seem to agree on: the development of clean coal.

According to the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), both Obama and McCain recognized the need for clean coal technology in order to utilize abundant coal resource in the US for energy source.

"I am a big proponent of clean-coal technology and I want us to move rapidly in developing those sequestration technologies that are required. A huge percentage of our electricity is generated by coal. What we need to do though is to put clean coal technology on the fast track and that means money. It means investment in research." - Obama

"Perhaps no advancement in energy technology could mean more to America than the clean burning of coal and the capture and storage of carbon emissions. This single achievement will open vast amounts of our oldest and most abundant resource. And it will deliver not only electricity but jobs to some of the areas hardest hit by our economic troubles." - McCain

I just voted this morning for my presidential pick and it is a thrill to be part of an historical event. I don't know if this will help but for those who are still yet undecided and maybe looking at Obama and McCain's stands on oil and energy, here are some of what they have to say about these issues (courtesy of Google).

Obama:
"I'll invest $150 billion over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy -- wind power and solar power and the next generation of biofuels; an investment that will lead..."

"energy is going to be key in dealing with Russia," he said, adding: "If we can reduce our energy consumption, that reduces the amount of petro dollars that they have to make mischief around the world"

A colleague of mine (and several readers of the green blog) expressed a spreading sentiment of uncertainty whether the current financial crisis and the price downfall of crude oil will put a brake in the investment surge towards renewable energy and other clean technologies.

Venture capital investments for cleantech companies have done well for the past 3 quarters, according to both Cleantech Group and Ernst & Young.

In the US, Ernst & Young reported investments in cleantech companies reached a record $1.6 billion in Q3 2008, up 55% from the previous quarter. A total of $3.3 billion was invested in the first three quarters of 2008, surpassing the figure for the same period last year by 71%.

Companies who deal with solar, energy efficiency, alternative fuels, hybrid transportation, and water, were some of the big green financing recipients this year.

Ernst & Young does not expect investments to slow down next year:

"In light of challenging economic times, the US cleantech market may be entering a transitional period. However, the structural market drivers of the cleantech sector remain intact, suggesting that the prospect for long-term market development is positive," says Joseph Muscat, Americas Director of Cleantech and Venture Capital, Ernst & Young LLP.

"Factors such as technological advances, consumer demand and programs at both the federal and state-level help to create the conditions needed for long-term growth in cleantech."

A report from NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) said methane emission in the atmosphere is on the rise again across the globe.

The rise in Northern Hemispheric emissions may be a result of very warm conditions over Siberia throughout 2007, potentially leading to increased bacterial emissions from wetland areas. Potential cause for an increase in Southern Hemispheric emissions is still less clear.

"It is too early to tell whether this increase represents a return to sustained methane growth, or the beginning of a relatively short-lived anomaly," researchers said.

The green blog is waiting with bated breath for who will be the US' next president come Wednesday. Both Obama and McCain promised funding for renewable energy, which is good news for the chemical industry overall. Environmental proponents and green groups, however, are definitely rooting for the democratic candidate whose party seems more inclined in tightening environmental standards in the US.

Whoever wins, it will be interesting to find out how the green industry will fare under a new US leadership.

For now, here is this week's news roundup.

CO2 to fuel coming soon
Carbon Sciences anticipates the completion of a prototype that will demonstrate its innovative biocatalytic CO2 to fuel process by Q1 2009. The company's ultimate goal is to license this technology to oil and gas companies and large CO2 emitters.

I'm having a little difficulty finding newly launched green chemicals from last month. Could it be that some of the laboratories are taking a break? Or maybe companies are a little bit prudent these days in launching new products. We'll just wait and see for the rest of the year...

1. Low global warming blowing agent - Honeywell has begun selling its hydrofluoroolefin HFO-1234ze blowing agent for one component foam and aerosol and applications in Europe. The blowing agent has zero ozone-depletion potential and meets EU regulatory requirements for reducing the use of high global-warming-potential (GWP) substances.

2. Green water-borne paint - Kansas companies Premier Paint 2000 & C3 Technology, along with California-based Tech Line Coatings have introduced their water-borne clear coat for the automotive paint market, which is said to exceed EPA standards on volatile organic compounds (VOC) emissions. The coating, which is expected to be commercialized in January 2009, reportedly does not contain isocyanates.