The first time nuclear powered tankers were proposed was back in 1961, when the Atomic Energy Commission and The Maritime Administration awarded a contract to General Electric. The plan was to install boiling water reactors in conventional T-5 tankers.

The plan was eventually shelved because they were considered uncompetitive against conventional ships running on oil, which back then was just $15.30 a barrel adjusted for inflation.

Times have certainly changed, and with oil prices currently on the wrong side of $100 a barrel, and the world’s tanker fleet consuming more fuel (and expelling more CO2) than the global aviation industry put together, plans are underway to seek out ways to reduce rising costs and environmental concerns.

Shipping is highly sensitive to even modest rises in oil prices, and recent increases have had a significant impact on inflation as the cost of imports has increased sharply throughout America.

Recent developments to cut costs have included tankers powered by a computer-guided kite. The technology steals the principal from the popular water sport ‘kite surfing’. The 132 meter long kite could cut daily fuel costs by up to 20% or $1,600 a day, assuming there’s no head wind of course.

The cost advantage of a nuclear powered fleet is receiving growing attention, forwarded by proponents such as Adams Atomic Energies and the BNFL group.

They advocate several reasons why future merchant ships should consider going nuclear.

• Lower cost fuel. At current prices, reactor fuel costs 85 percent less than bunker fuel.
• Zero emissions. In crowded port cities, air pollution laws are becoming more stringent and costly.
• Concentrated fuel. Nuclear reactors can be built with fuel supplies lasting for many years.
• High power to weight ratio. Merchant ship owners are increasingly interested in rapid transits over long distances.
• The US Navy’s nuclear powered fleet of aircraft carriers are testament to their superior power and capabilities.

Nuclear Tankers aren’t something environmental pressure groups would relish, but with the cost of imports only set to increase further, and presidential candidates notably keeping an open mind on nuclear (Exelon, a leading nuclear-plant operator is a big donor of Obama), atomic tankers on the horizon can only be a matter of time.

Safe, clean, renewable… well not quite as safe a you thought. Following last month’s spectacular wind turbine self-destruction, which prompted the Danish climate minister to launch an investigation, 10 wind energy companies have formed a consortium to make wind turbines more reliable. A noble effort, but a little late for the 36 and counting instances of turbine failure, which the folks at the Industrial Wind Action Group are assiduously keeping track of.

But just think of the potential for having super-strength wind turbines and the power they could generate of we could keep them facing the wind? Ideas like this could pave the way for super massive jet turbines to harness predictable storm conditions such as the Katabatic wind in Antarctica.

In the meantime, the Reliawind Project led by Gamesa is seeking ways to enhance safety.

The world’s computing power should be moved from desktop computers and company servers to remote outposts where renewable energy such as wind and solar power is abundant, according to a Cambridge University computer expert.

With carbon emissions from computing set to rise rapidly in the coming decades, he said his idea could significantly reduce the contribution made by computers to climate change. “There’s something very special about computing power which is very different from heating your house,” said Prof Andy Hopper. “Computing power can be moved around the world and can be done anywhere in the world where the energy is available.”

According to UK government figures, business computing is responsible for 2.8m tonnes of CO2 emissions a year. The UK’s total emissions are just over 554.5m tonnes. Office equipment (of which computers make up about a third) is responsible for 15% of the emissions from a typical office.

Moving energy via the national grid entails significant losses. Hopper’s scheme would work by shifting computer operations to servers close to wind farms that are working at full tilt. On a global scale a network of energy producers could be called upon depending on where energy was most abundant at any time.

“I think it is very interesting to contemplate a world with a smallish number of server farms, huge ones, which are deployed in places where the energy is produced,” he told a conference at the Royal Society in London yesterday. “The whole point is that we are using energy that would otherwise be lost. It is more efficient, more appropriate, cheaper to use it in situ.”

Nintendo is apparently flunking its environmental responsibilities after scoring a 0/10 last year for company policy on handling toxic waste. Greenpeace claim it still doesn’t make enough effort to prove its ‘environmental credentials’ by openly presenting eco-friendly solutions.

While Microsoft has improved upon last year’s score of 2.7/10 by fast tracking plans to reduce toxic output, the latest Guide to Greener Electronics report on industry e-waste shows a marginal increase for Nintendo.
The report states: “Nintendo remains the odd one out of the 18 companies in the Guide, without any public time lines to eliminate the worst toxic chemicals or a global recycling policy for the millions of products it sells every year”

The latest Greener Guide to Electronics shows a marginal increase for the Japanese manufacturer, following last year’s report when Nintendo scored the lowest mark possible in the review.

“Nintendo remains the odd one out of the 18 companies in the Guide, without any public time lines to eliminate the worst toxic chemicals or a global recycling policy for the millions of products it sells every year,” said the report.

“If Nintendo has better policies why not make them public like the other 17 companies in the Guide?”
Of Nintendo’s direct competitors, Microsoft has improved its ratings in the three months since the last review by bringing forward a deadline to eliminate toxic PVC and chemicals which inhibit ignition, while Sony remains the leading console maker, although Greenpeace notes “it has yet to introduce any green innovation in the PlayStation.”
Greenpeace publishes the Greener Electronics Guide to highlight the electronics’ industry’s efforts to tackle e-waste.

This year, Samsung and Toshiba came out on top, with Nokia, Sony, Dell and Lenovo also noted for their public efforts to deal with toxic waste.

Like other eco-consumerists, I closely follow what Greenpeace are up to and praise their full frontal involvement with greener electronics. Their pressure group activities are of significant value, but they fail to address the real issues of the consumer electronics industry. Their activity at Cebit focused on an idea that manufacturers were more interested in being seen to be green than actually being green. Greenpeace wants manufacturers to make their products more recyclable and to reduce energy consumption - a fair point, but Greenpeace have so far failed to tackle head on the political hot potato of massive overproduction through unrestrained product commoditization.

Greenpeace focuses more on making green than making less…

The bottom line which Greenpeace should start making waves about

Electronics manufacturers today are experiencing historic revenues. The underlying reason is that electronics sold today are rapidly superseded by newer models so that they appear outdated. This has been most notable over the last 10 years.

The result has been a significant downward shift in a product’s life cycle which has helped to create the throw away society that we live in today. A decade ago you may have had a camera for 10 years – these days some will be looking to upgrade it after 10 months.

In the last 5 years Apple have sold nearly 100 million iPods. 5 years previous it took DVD players the same time to sell just 15 million units, which was a record at the time. In fact 21 Million 6th Generation iPod upgrades were sold in the last quarter alone.

Apple is not an extreme example. Blu-ray and LCD TVs are both projected to sell even more units over the next 3 to 4 years.

This level of production is now creating an e-waste crisis which can only partially be effected by making products which are relatively greener. Manufacturers need to be seen to be green, but they need productivity to keep expanding and the two cannot realistically co-exist – something that Greenpeace either entirely ignores or completely overlooks.

Being seen to be green has become more of a sophisticated marketing exercise, while productivity in the industry has increased more than 10 fold over the last decade.

As consumers we all love consumer electronics, and there is a way for us to be greener when buying them. trade 2 save the planet wants to encourage consumers to do what Greenpeace hasn’t really addressed: Reduce the demand for new consumer electronics by choosing to buy pre-owned electronics where possible - and importantly trade in that product to someone else when you no longer use it.

By doing this a product’s life span can be increased 4 or 5 fold - that’s 4 to 5 times less e-waste and 4 to 5 times less demand on energy by the global manufacturing industry.

Product life cycles are now so short that most pre-owned products show little sign of age or wear. All those iPhones bought last year which will be upgraded to the next 3G model will all be in great condition. Consumers could buy these pre-owned iPhones on auction sites, but a majority of consumers don’t because many aren’t confident of the condition and there’s no warranty if they develop a fault.

Trade 2 save will buy from customers who want to trade-in their old iPhones as well as other products. Every product traded-in will be tested and every product is then repackaged and sold on with a warranty so customers can feel confident about buying pre-owned.

Trade 2 save will stock all the major brands of consumer electronics, including Computing, Gaming, Cellphones, Movies and Apple. With increased confidence in pre-owned electronics and more companies providing this type of service, it may become as common to have a pre-owned laptop or iPhone as it is to have a pre-owned car. This is not what manufacturers will want because demand for new product imported from China would diminish.

The car industry fought the idea of second hand dealerships for decades. They eventually gave in and now they run their own pre-owned franchises. Imagine if today (like consumer electronics) 90% of all cars bought were bought brand new? America would be one massive rusty car dump. As it is, India and China are fast becoming the consumer electronics/e-waste dumps of the western world.

Manufacturers will claim credit for making products greener over the coming years, and making them greener is of vital importance. However, with productivity set to increase at the same rate as it has done over the last decade, the biggest cause of e-waste is being overlooked.

        Energy Consumption is an issue for Graphics Cards, however, to make any computer hardware greener, trading-in old graphics card in or buying pre-owned is a sure way of making sure it will stay off of the e-waste tip for some time to come. It’ll also stop the person you sell it to from buying a new one.

Chris Whittome

Source: Andrew Binstock at Greener Computing

In this column, I have previously examined energy-saving options on processors and hard disks. This time around, I’d like to examine one of the other principal energy sinks on the standard PC: graphics cards.

Graphics cards are a confusing area of technology because almost all the attention and press the cards receive is dedicated to the high-end, super-expensive cards favored by gamers and hardware aficionados. Those users live and die by the next release of whiz-bang features and the number of anti-aliased triangles that can be displayed.

But if you’re choosing graphics capabilities for a business system, the likelihood that anti-aliased triangles are important to your choice is close to nil. And that means that you’ll be able to save energy, because generally, the more powerful the graphics card, the more electricity it uses. 

How people use their computers determines what kind of cards they need, and the power that the cards will use. Most knowledge workers have very modest graphical needs. As long as they can see their Excel charts, enjoy basic Web 2.0 features, and view the occasional video clip on a single monitor, they are content. 

For many users, this capability is delivered by the video capabilities built directly into the motherboard. They don’t need a separate graphics card. The motherboard graphics system has modest but sufficient capabilities. This inexpensive option results in systems that consume less electricity.

The second tier of users consists of those who have somewhat more demanding needs. In the business world, these users tend to be software developers and “power users.” They don’t necessarily need faster graphics. Rather, they require a graphics card that can drive more than large LCD monitors. (By large, I mean a monitor that requires screen resolution greater than 1280 x 768.) The graphics cards required to drive multiple large monitors vary from entry-level to mid-level products. In most cases, the entry-level products are sufficient.

For example, software developers, who are a breed apart when it comes to system needs, rarely have to do more than display code, Web pages, and some basic animations. What they do need is multiple large monitors. So, for them video cards such as the Nvidia Quadro series are sufficient. For example, the Quadro NVS 290 supports two monitors at 1920 x 1200 resolution and consumes a mere 21 watts (with a street price of currently $160 or so). For users with somewhat higher requirements or those needing basic 3D graphics, the Nvidia Quadro FX 570 will almost surely suffice. (It supports two monitors at 2560 x 1600 resolution, has a street price of around $200, and requires 38W of power.)

One question that will surely arise in keeping graphics-card prowess and power consumption in line with user requirements is how to measure the graphics performance as experienced by the user. The most effective ways is with the ViewPerf benchmark developed by the Standard Performance Evaluation Corp. (SPEC).

SPEC is a vendor-neutral, hardware benchmarking organization. While most SPEC benchmarks must be purchased, ViewPerf is available at no cost at SPEC.org. Release 10 of the benchmark ships as a Windows program (while version 9 runs on Windows and Linux). It’s a large executable and takes a good 10 minutes to run. It finishes up by providing a table of six performance results for the graphics subsystem. Take the average of these and you have a single-number rating for the graphics capabilities. You can then test other cards to see whether they provide comparable performance. Some manufacturers, such as Nvidia provide their cards’ ratings on each of the tests, so you can perform highly detailed comparisons.

These comparisons are particularly important when it comes to the small group of users who require (or at least think they require) very high-end hardware. Ultra-high end graphics cards are monsters of consumption. For example, the Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 requires 171 watts of power (and sell for more than $3000). Typically, such cards are the domain of specialists who use high-end workstations. These include engineers doing very complex 3D modeling and some financial analysis.

Often, though, users’ requirements can be satisfied at lower prices and significantly reduced power consumption. To prove the point, the Nvidia 4600 has nearly the same performance profile as the 5600, but it costs half the price and consumes nearly 25 percent less power. Using SPEC tests will help determine performance metrics for cards; vendor spec sheets will tell you how much power each card consumes. In that way, you’ll be able to choose less power-hungry cards, without sacrificing performance.

In sum, the graphics card is a PC component that can easily consume the majority of a system’s power. As a result, it’s important to carefully match the user’s needs with the performance of a given card. By taking measurements of needs and capabilities and matching them carefully, you can significantly lower power consumption, heat generation, and, of course, the price tag.

Lenovo today introduced the industry’s first EPEAT Gold rated monitor – the ThinkVision L193p – as part of a new portfolio of PC monitors designed for business users. The portfolio of five new monitors also includes the ThinkVision L190x monitor featuring the slimmest bezel in the industry at just 6.6 millimeters.

“With the first PC monitor rated EPEAT Gold, Lenovo has achieved a milestone in the greening of the electronics industry,” said Jeff Omelchuck, executive director, Green Electronics Council. “The EPEAT system helps purchasers evaluate, compare and select PC products based on their environmental attributes. By developing a monitor that achieves EPEAT’s Gold ranking Lenovo is demonstrating its commitment to providing purchasers with high quality, environmentally responsible products.”

Lenovo now offers a complete EPEAT Gold rated solution by pairing the ThinkCentre A61e desktop with the ThinkVision L193p monitor. The EPEAT tool evaluates products based on 51 environmental criteria in the areas of reduction/elimination of environmentally sensitive materials, design for end of life, product longevity/lifecycle extension, energy conservation, end of life management, packaging and corporate performance. To earn EPEAT Gold status, the ThinkVision L193p monitor had to meet all 23 required criteria as well as at least 20 of EPEAT’s 28 optional criteria. The monitor is the first product in the EPEAT registry to use more than 25% post-consumer recycled content in its plastic parts.

“Lenovo has delivered a comprehensive line of energy efficient and environmentally responsible products, from notebooks to desktops to monitors,” said Jim Christensen, director, Global Desktop and Visuals Marketing, Lenovo. “We have more than 40 products that are listed within the EPEAT system with our whole line of Performance Series monitors rated at least EPEAT Silver. The EPEAT Gold rated ThinkVision L193p monitor is our first step toward our goal of elevating all of our monitors to this status.”

In addition to the EPEAT Gold rating, all of Lenovo’s new Performance Series monitors are TCO’03 certified by TCO Development. This certification addresses ergonomics, emissions, energy and ecology. All of Lenovo’s LCD monitors also meet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star® 4.0 requirements for energy efficiency also required by EPEAT. When combined with Lenovo’s ThinkCentre A61e desktop, the solution is 57 percent more efficient than previous Lenovo desktops paired with a 19-inch CRT monitor.

The 19-inch monitor’s 160/160 degree viewing angle, high contrast ratio, five milliseconds response time and support for high bandwidth digital content protection (HDCP) and analog and DVI-D signals provide users an excellent viewing experience. An ergonomic stand also provides flexibility for positioning the display.

ThinkVision Monitors Deliver Business-Class Performance Measuring just 6.6 millimeters, the ThinkVision L190x monitor’s bezel is the slimmest in the industry. This thinness makes it ideal for multiple monitor environments, helping eliminate the distraction that can occur from the seam between monitors. Pairing two of these 19-inch monitors provides more than twice the viewing area of a 27-inch monitor at considerably less cost. The monitor also provides a high contrast ratio of 1500:1 and color gamut to create vivid colors and four USB ports for connection to a variety of devices such as battery chargers. Users can also switch from portrait to landscape mode easily with the monitor’s automatic rotation function.

For single monitor business use, Lenovo’s ThinkVision L194 Wide monitor offers an excellent 16×10 wide viewing experience in a 19-inch widescreen with a high contrast ratio of 1000:1 and support for HDCP as well as analog and DVI-D signals. Lenovo’s ThinkVision L171 and L151 monitors provide quality business-class performance for the general purpose and back office applications.

The monitors follow Lenovo’s recent introduction of the ThinkVision L220x Wide monitor, the market’s first 22-inch widescreen monitor with a WUXGA resolution screen. Small enough to fit on a desk, the monitor provides rich colors and high resolution drawing less power than 24-inch monitors. Combined with the ThinkCentre A61e desktop, the monitor helps users save close to $30 in annual energy costs.

Pricing and Availability The ThinkVision L193p, L190x, L194w, L171 and L151 monitors start at $299, $379, $259, $239 and $199, respectively. They are available beginning in November through Business Partners or through www.lenovo.com.

The Lenovo is a step forward in power efficiency, howver, to make it truely green, we hope it will be traded in readil and bought and sold pre-owned at trade 2 save. Only then will we be happy with its performance.

About EPEAT EPEAT is a system to help purchasers in the public and private sectors evaluate, compare and select desktop computers, notebooks and monitors based on their environmental attributes. EPEAT also provides a clear and consistent set of performance criteria for the design of products, and provides an opportunity for manufacturers to secure market recognition for efforts to reduce the environmental impact of its products. EPEAT, whose development was supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, rates computer desktops, laptops, and monitors based on 51 environmental criteria. All EPEAT registered products must meet 23 mandatory environmental criteria. An additional 28 optional criteria are used to determine whether products earn EPEAT Bronze, Silver or Gold recognition. EPEAT is managed by the nonprofit Green Electronics Council, based in Portland, OR.

About Lenovo Lenovo (HKSE: 992) (ADR: LNVGY) is dedicated to building the world’s best engineered personal computers. Lenovo’s business model is built on innovation, operational efficiency and customer satisfaction as well as a focus on investment in emerging markets. Formed by Lenovo Group’s acquisition of the former IBM Personal Computing Division, the company develops, manufactures and markets reliable, high-quality, secure and easy-to-use technology products and services worldwide. Lenovo has major research centers in Yamato, Japan; Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen, China; and Raleigh, North Carolina. For more information see www.lenovo.com.

Just as people are buying more green products, the consumer now has the option of buying a green battery that is completely non-toxic, recyclable, and they can use it 200 times versus throwaway batteries. San Diego based PowerGenix has announced the launch of its new non-toxic batteries.

Its rechargeable nickel-zinc batteries have met the European Union’s requirements for the Reduction of Hazardous Substances as well as the union’s 2006 Battery Directive. The EU’s Reduction of Hazardous Substances, or RoHS, directive bans new electrical and electronic equipment containing high levels of toxic heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, mercury, and hexavalent chromium from the EU market.

The company’s batteries contain no lead, cadmium or mercury, which it said offers a cleaner environmental alternative to lead-acid and nickel-cadmium, or NiCd, batteries.

PowerGenix said its line of rechargeables serve as replacements for existing technologies, including nickel-cadmium which it said is being phased out by manufacturers and retailers in North America, the EU and Asia due to toxicity concerns. These could be replacing the batteries in current cellphones in the near future.

Backed by investors including the Angeleno Group, Advent International, Braemar Energy Ventures, Granite Ventures, OnPoint Technologies and Technology Partners, PowerGenix has taken in $30.8 million in three funding rounds, which Squiller said is relatively small.

“We basically developed the technology and the design,and put it into high-volume production in China, and we’ve done all of that for $30 million and, arguably, over about four or five years.”

The EU’s Reduction of Hazardous Substances, or RoHS, directive bans new electrical and electronic equipment containing high levels of toxic heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, mercury, and hexavalent chromium from the EU market.

Squiller pointed out that 30 million pounds of cadmium a year ends up in landfills from people throwing away their batteries and from the manufacturing processes associated with nickel-cadmium batteries.

Last November, M2E Power, which pulled in $8 million in funding for its kinetic energy-powered battery, said it was working on a D-cell battery sized solution for the military.

Squiller added “A nickel-zinc powered Prius battery pack would be 30 percent smaller and lighter (and would) … actually have more power than the nickel-metal hydride.”