Teru Talk
Newsletter
Volume I, Issue
7
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April 11,
2011
Teru Talk
by Michael Theroux
(pronounced
"Terú")
Teru Talk
learned this week that Teru
has been holding back (I
know; it's hard to
believe). It seems
he has been writing
articles and white papers
for years, long before this
website came to be, and
stashing them away. Teru
Talk will be posting them
over the next few weeks and
the first one is special
because it was written in
2009 (BTT) and the subject
is the theme of our
website:
Waste Conversion for
Resource
Recovery
Teru's Trash
Talk
Conferences come and
conferences go, but what
are you gonna DO about it,
that’s what I’d like to
know … The 8th Annual
California Biomass
Collaborative Forum on
April 5th and 6th has
indeed come and gone,
and Teru Talk will be
sifting gold nuggets
from gravel for a couple
weeks. The pages of
notes and stack of cards
are daunting, yet unless
you work those business
cards you collected and
actually follow up on
the main contacts you
made, it’s just another
rodeo. Looking around
the room, we all saw a
whole lot of very
familiar faces. Many of
us have been, as Doug W.
put it, “chewing this
same bone” for quite
some time. Chin up …
there WERE signs of
progress, and maybe that
tunnel light wasn’t a
train, after all. Stay
tuned here, for help in
sorting out the lessons
learned.
Hey Rube!
Now, I’d
bet Google thinks their
donation of one billion
core-computing hours will
be used to find a global
cure for insomnia, or some
other dread disease. I’ll
bet nobody has considered
that all that heavy-handed
data crunching might just
work out a cure for our
Energy Sickness, this
addiction to trading blood
for oil. I just think that
there SHOULD be an
“academic
researcher” out
there somewhere who
could use that
number-crunching to wean us
off of Dinosaur Juice
(that’s very crude
oil, folks) once and
for all. So contact the
best and brightest
data-crazy researchers in
our industry and tell ‘em
about Exacycle, Google’s
class act. See this week's
Action Item
below.
LCFS
Advisory Panel Releases
First Meeting
Summary
The Low Carbon Fuel Standard
(LCFS) Advisory Panel has
released a summary of its first
meeting held on February 16,
2011.
04/09/2011
White House
Releases Blueprint for a
Secure Energy
Future
The Blueprint for a Secure
Energy Future released last
week by the Obama
administration outlines a
three-part strategy: (1)
Develop and Secure America’s
Energy Supplies, (2) Provide
Consumers with Choices to
Reduce Costs and Save Energy,
and (3) Innovate our Way to a
Clean Energy Future.
04/09/2011
Trillium
FiberFuels Receives SBIR
Grant
Oregon
based Trillium
FiberFuels has received a Small
Business Innovation Research
(SBIR) grant to advance their
cellulosic ethanol development.
04/09/2011
H.R. 1425
Reauthorization of SBIR
includes
VCs
The US House of Representatives
met on April 7, 2011 to
consider H.R 1425, a bill that
in part calls for 3-year
reauthorization of the Small
Business Innovative Research
(SBIR) grant program.
04/09/2011
Plasco
Energy Secures $143MM
Financing
Pacific
Northwest investment bank
Cascadia Capital and the Soros
Management Fund have both
recently engaged in what is now
totaling a $143 million
financing round for Canadian
waste to energy firm Plasco
Energy Group, Inc.
04/08/2011
Clenergen
Secures $8MM for Integrated
Biopower
Development
Clenergen Corporation has
acquired a 1.5MWe Anaerobic
Digestion (AD) Biomass power
plant near Salem in Tamil Nadu,
India. The plant operates using
chicken litter as a source of
feedstock in order to generate
renewable electricity.
04/08/2011
Gwinnett
County, Georgia Constructs
Co-Digestion BioGas
Plant
A co-digestion “gas to energy”
plant under construction at the
F. Wayne Hill Water Resources
Center in Gwinnett County,
Georgia, will convert sewage
biosolids, fats, oils, greases
and other wastes into renewable
energy.
04/08/2011
Energos MSW
Gasification Plant Receives
First-of-Class
ROCs
United Kingdom (UK) based
Ener-G subsidiary Energos
operates an advanced
gasification facility for
conversion of municipal solid
waste to energy on the Isle of
Wight, UK.
04/08/2011
APS Seeks
Small Renewable
Projects
The Arizona Public Service
(APS) is seeking a variety of
renewable energy generation
projects in the range of 2 to
15 megawatts (MWe) generating
capacity.
04/07/2011
Rhode Island
Considers Waste Cooking Oil
Reuse Legislation
Last month, Teru Talk reported
that the Environmental Council
of Rhode Island (ECRI) was
exploring development of a
waste food collection program.
04/07/2011
Weltec
Biopower Builds AD Biogas
Plant in
Latvia
German AD
specialist Weltec Biopower GmbH
is constructing their second
anaerobic digestion (AD) biogas
facility in the town of
Limbaz
̌
i in north-western Latvia,
about a dozen miles inland from
the Baltic Sea.
04/07/2011
Agilyx
Investors Back Their Waste
Plastics to Synthetic Crude
Process
Waste
Management Inc. has made a
strategic investment in
Oregon-based Agilyx
Corporation, bringing this
newest round of financing to
$22 million.
04/04/2011
The Week's
Action
Items
Due
05/31/2011: Proposals for
Google’s Exacycle Program
Grants
Google is
donating one billion computing
hours to science. Google’s
Exacycle for Visiting Facility
is designed to “address grand
challenges in science and
engineering” by offering
visiting scientists staff and
CPU resources.
04/09/2011
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