July 30, 2008
OIL SCHMOIL...
The US is deciding whether or not to open up new areas for more oil exploration on the hope that it can save a few pennies in several years? You have to see right through this as a last ditch attempt by Mr. Bush to satisfy his friends who want more money in the oil companies coffers rather than a true attempt to resolve the current "energy crisis" being manufactured in the US for political purposes.
I suspect they know that if a Democrat comes into power, their chances of opening up these fields disappears...for a while. So rather than spend that money on more renewables, he'd rather take a last stab at this crazy scheme which really won't make a dent in american's pocketbooks.
How sad that energy policy in the country which uses the most is being so myopic at the highest level.
Sass
Posted by sass at 06:08 PM | Comments (2)
July 24, 2008
Performance Problems
China has removed cars from Beijing streets in anticipation of the Olympics in order to reduce pollution.
This is yet more proof that the rampant economic development, without a care for the environment, risks choking the very economies that created the issue. Comes back to balance doesn't it? Anything out of balance doesn't last and the double digit growth rates in China had to come back to bite it given that not a care has been given to environmental concerns during this phase.
Now athletes are pondering whether or to cancel appearances because of their concerns over their performance levels. Its amazing that so little has been done so late and that the organizing committee took
for granted that China would make good on its word to have the air ready.
The night is darkest before the dawn I heard in the Batman Movie, and so it is true for the summer olympic games. I am sure they will do as good a job as last minute attempts will permit and by the skin of their teeth
get away with it. Yet this darkness for the games means that future ones will be more vigilent in verification
of environmental status prior to committing games to an area where athletes chances of breaking world records will be reduced, not because they can't, yet because they won't be given a fair chance.
Sass
Posted by sass at 02:17 PM | Comments (0)
July 08, 2008
Killing me softly with carbon...
G8 world leaders get together, tap each other on the shoulder for doing so great, make superb announcements of intent, and then fail to deliver because the targets are then said to be "too ambitious". Sound familiar?
I believe there is progress being made, yet I often feel like there is a mutual self-love club amongst these leaders who rarely openly challenge each other in a manner so as to force the other to come off their stools. Kyoto was supposed to deliver something, now the G8 says another. Is there one country in the world which has met its carbon reduction targets to date? If so, kudos to them. If not, it is indicative of either not enough effort or too ambitious plans, often verbalizes for political scores of the day.
Although I offer no solution to the self-proclaimed leadership issues, I believe that we are at least on the right track now, and this should accelerate should an american administration begin to take the environment a bit more seriously. Oil has its place....for now. The question is not whether or not it will be replaced by carbon neutral energy sources, but when it will be eradicated.
It begs the question...what will the middle eastern countries which depend on oil revenue do once their revenue source is cut off? hmmmm....
Sass
Posted by sass at 01:37 PM | Comments (0)
August 08, 2007
China Olympics Pollution Problems
The Olympic Committee finally woke up and admitted that some of the events at the 2008 China Olympics may be affected by the pollution problems their rampant growth has created.
I had blogged months ago that this would happen and here we are. Long events such as marathons and cycling will be most affected yet I wonder how athletes are going to feel knowing that the quality of the air will affect their abilities to achieve records?
This is the first evidence that uncontrolled economic growth, with wanton disregard for the environment, is going to cause havoc on the Olympics. Shall we guess what will be added as criteria to the selection committee's list for the next ones?
Sass
Posted by sass at 11:11 AM | Comments (2)
April 22, 2007
Happy Earth Day!
What are you doing for Mother Earth today? Walking or biking instead of taking your SUV? Cutting down on the use of disposable diapers (not likely if you want your baby to be comfortable and you are not in a situation where you use resusable ones)? Using cloth bags instead of disposable plastic ones?
Guess what? Most of us won't change much today. We'll talk a talk, yet we won't walk the walk. Laura Turner Seydel, daughter of Ted Turner, walks the walk. Her new home is showcased at www.ecomanor.com and she is heading up Earth Day events, in addition to several commitments to agencies and foundations, like the Captain Planet Foundation, which ICP Solar is now sponsoring.
The question becomes...when are we affected enough so that we actually make a decision to make a difference? Is it the big deal made about one day that is important?
All I know is that we can make a difference, step by step, one at a time. However if we listen to governments in the North American continent today, the feds are saying that Kyoto would kill our economy so let's all forget about it. They are saying they have their own plans to reduce carbon emissions and these are the same people that are funded by oil companies and dine with their lobbyists.
My response? Go out there on Earth Day and participate in any local event you can. Make a difference by showing your kids that this is important enough. They are the generation that will really take this to the next level because they will have to, not because they will only want to.
We must embrace conservation and we must embrace the use of benign, renewable energies. Not in 30 years. Not in 20. Now. It is indeed the best earth day to date and hopefully next year's will be better than this one. And if we can continue that trend, then one day, it will be no longer necessary to have an Earth day, because actions that protect our earth will be first and foremost in our daily DNA make-up and we won't have to use single day celebrations to remind ourselves of this great thing called the preservation of that being which feeds us and our families each day...Mother Earth!
Ancient North American proverb says: "We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children".
Happy Earth Day folks! From Google and Yahoo, come some interesting new logos for today:
Posted by sass at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)
April 19, 2007
When playing with oil is like playing with fire...
With President Hugo Chavez setting May 1st as the deadline of an ambitious plan to wrest control of several oil projects from US and European companies, a showdown is looming over access to some of the most coveted energy resources outside the Middle East.
The implications of this and the continuous change in control over global oil reserves from private entities to national companies are start for the Western world. Being far more political, the national companies pose a far greater energy security threat than people like Saddam Hussein ever did.
So the key is how to mitigate this increased politicization of the global oil? Perhaps by more than a "token" shift in energy subsidy policy towards renewables. Europe has a 20/20 target being 20% renewable by 2020. Is this enough? Why just Europe? While so much focus is placed on the benefits of renewable energy for climate change, how about energy independance and security? Nobody can take your roof from you unless by force. The sooner we have all of our rooftops covered in solar tiles, the sooner we own our future and thus our security.
Sass
Posted by sass at 02:13 PM | Comments (0)
March 10, 2007
Conservation and Creation
The drive to reduce dependency on fossil fuels took another upward swing this week with the announcement in Europe of agreement on targets to boost use of renewables to 20% of power by 2020.
What is additionally significant is that there are draft laws that may also doom the incandescent bulb to its grave since it is recognized that fluorescents, and the upcoming LED technologies, are far more efficient and can play a significant role in reducing power consumption, and thus carbon emissions (from the oil burning technologies).
This reminds me of the philosophy I have been professing at ICP Solar which is that every little bit counts. You don't have to buy a solar system for your home at $50,000 to contribute to the reduction of greenhouse gases. Simply using a small solar system (like our Sunsei models) to reduce battery failures or the use of grid-electricity, even in such small contributions, can build up when you consider that hundreds of thousands of people are doing the same.
Don't mean to sound like a commercial for our solar power products, yet the truth is that you don't have to wait until solar power is competitive with other sources, you can get on the bandwagon today. As long as you deal with a brand you can trust, you'll be sure to be doing your bit, as well as benefiting from solar power's convenience.
Sass
PS> I am now searching for my next car and have determined to search the category by "most green". "Walk the talk" they say...
Posted by sass at 10:54 AM | Comments (0)
March 04, 2007
Bush's Brazil Bio-deal...
Word comes that the Bush administration is negotiating a bio-ethanol alliance with Brazil, the world's leader in renewable energy. Many people in fact think that countries like Germany or Japan are the world leaders, yet the fact is that while they may lead in solar power, the country of Brazil has for a long time moved its economy towards energy independance through the creation of a complete infrastructure delivering bio-ethanol across every city and highway in Brazil.
In reading article linked above, it struck me how the USA has a 0.54per gallon import tariff against Brazil's ethanol, in order to protect the American farmers now growing the seed of ethanol (corn) while also protecting the high price of regular oil-based fuels.
Just one question hit me...what happened to the word "free trade"? Is it only relevant when the developed country is dominant or desirous of cheap commodity supply which is could not otherwise produce?
Sass
Posted by sass at 08:05 PM | Comments (0)
February 25, 2007
Hollywood Green...not what it used to be!
Tonight is the long awaited Academy Awards in Hollywood and with each gathering of stars, you always know there is going to be a popularity contest.
This year it seems that green no longer means the amount of "greenback" (dollars) that stars make per movie. It has morphed into meaning "how environmental can I show my lifestyle and raison-d'etre (reason for living) to be!". Everyone is tripping over themselves from the charity work they do to the kind of vehicle they drive... and frankly I THINK ITS AMAZING AND SUPPORT EVERY BIT OF IT!
Who cares why people support the environmental wave....as long as they do it in a way that helps the cause. The only exception I will make is where their actions will hurt people or break laws which are elected (see previous post about Michael Crighton's book 'State of Fear').
Al Gore will be there arriving with Orlando Bloom in a green-mobile. So will Penelope Cruz (who wouldn't want to be in THAT car ;), and so will a host of companies getting their "green products" promoted (Toyota with its hybrid, for example).
I hope many of you sit to watch and enjoy the festitivites tonight. It will be interesting to see who wins the "Green Oscar Award" for best performance in the category of green living...
Sass
POST OSCAR UPDATE: AL GORE ACCEPTS ACADEMY AWARD FOR "AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH". See this link for other celebrities making green cool... To paraphrase Mr. Gore...Whether you are RED or BLUE..you should be GREEN!
Posted by sass at 12:34 PM | Comments (3)
November 27, 2006
When energy kills...
I read this morning about more coal minings deaths in China. 53 dead fathers/brothers/husbands. What a crying shame that we don't see the light of investing so much more in renewables to rid ourselves of these risky entreprises all in the name of energy supply.
Take just ONE fiscal year of combined profits of all the coal and oil companies in the world and you'll probably reach a figure which exceeds ALL of the investment in solar power to date throughout its entire history.
Particular quandry is created for me when I see that China WANTS to bring about a solar power revolution yet focuses first on a wind-based strategy which simply mimics the current grid, rather than the huge potential of all its existing roof tops where the sun could create immediate impact without so much as another square metre of land being used up to house a windmill.
Hopefully the central government of China soon realizes that its greatest potential escape from the most dangerous coal mines in the world lies right atop the buildings it has raced to build and which have created in large part the shortage of energy it faces.
Sass
Posted by sass at 01:32 AM | Comments (1)
September 11, 2006
A day in Manhattan I'll never forget...
It was at about 630AM on September 11th, 2001 that I awoke in the Grand Central Hyatt Hotel in NYC, preparing for the day's energy conference sponsored by CIBC World Markets. The night before, we had visited Lehman Brothers, a major finance firm which wanted to get involved in solar energy companies. The meeting took place at 6PM in Tower 7 of the World Trade Center.
Arriving at the World Trade Center at about 530PM, I was in awe at its size. Although I had been to New York several times for personal reasons, this business trip was special. We had driven the company car down through New Hampshire where we had stopped for a meeting on the 10th AM, then continued onward to New York City. Simply walking into the buildings lifted your business spirit. We walked through Towers 1, then 2 and finally got to 7 after a bit of a detour. We'd never been, so frankly even getting lost in them was OK. We finally arrived at Tower 7 a few minutes late for our meeting which then ended at about 730PM.
Having breakfast at the Grand Hyatt on the 11th, we could not know how fateful it was to have scheduled the meeting for the 10th at the WTC, rather than morning of 11th. Since the conference started at 9AM, there was no way to miss it anyways. By 10AM, the conference was over. We were advised that the WTC had been hit by one plane, then another. Needless to say, we heard all the sirens going off and went straight to our rooms to glue our eyes onto the TV sets watching CNN's coverage.
It was all so unbelievable to us to watch what was going on the TV, until the sirens went off in our own building. There was a bomb scare at Grand Central Station and we had to run down the 26 flights of stairs because the elevators were unusable by patrons. The scare turned out to be a false alarm yet it was our first venture onto the streets. We could see smoke rising at the southern end of the island of Manhattan in a manner you just really aren't prepared for.
At around 330PM that afternoon we heard that the mid-town tunnel had been opened for those wishing to exit Manhattan. We packed up our bags and left onto FDR. As we headed north onto FDR the radio announcer then mentioned that the George Washington bridge was also now open. Since that was our best route to Montreal, we modified our trip plan and headed straight there. We were off the island by about 5PM and virtually alone on the road heading to the Canadian border.
We arrived at the Canadian border only 5hours thereafter (record time) to be greeted by 3 barricades and filters of authorities, each requesting our passports and asking us virtually the same questions. After some verifications, they let us through and we were homeward bound, arriving in Montreal at about 1030PM that night. Five and half hours for a trip which usually takes 6-7 hours of "legal limit" driving!
Through this all, my job (as I saw it) was to keep "cool". I had personnel of ICP Solar in planes above Pennsylvania and in the southern US. It took only a few minutes to confirm that one was OK in the south, yet several hours before we knew if the other was in that plane which was commandeered by its passengers to avoid being used as yet another missile. Luckily, he was not on that plane, yet not far away either. My wife was back home with young children and for the few minutes when the cellulars were dead and we could not dial out of the hotel, she obviously was fearing the worst. I finally managed to get word through my office to all my family that I was OK and in a "relatively" safe place. Who was to know what was safe and what wasn't, yet there was no sense in making anyone feel any worse than they already did.
Thinking back to 5 years ago, I know how lucky I am that our meetings were not for the morning of 11th at the WTC and how lucky we were to get out of Manhattan as quickly as we did. It simply wasn't OUR time to go. Each of us on this earth have been affected in some way, shape or form by Sept. 11th. All I know is that we all need to find a better way. Leading people to want to destroy each other to the point of killing thousands of innocent civilians in one single act cannot be what G-d meant for us when he created the Earth we inhabit. Some people danced in the streets the day of September 11th, yet I cannot help but feel sorry for them. Their plight in life must be so bad that they rejoiced at the deaths of others, simply because they have so little value for life themselves. When you have nothing to lose and blame this on others, your enemy's despair becomes your reason for happyness. How sad is that?
I don't pretend to have any answers. I simply ask that we focus some energy on the questions. It is the only way that one day, leaders will emerge that can resolve the issues that led to this event, (and others before and since), which are at the root cause of the evil we lived on that day. Some people feel that military force with its bombings and invasions will stop the kind of energy that created the evil which engulfed us on that day. I happen to see things differently.
Sass
Posted by sass at 06:50 AM | Comments (5)
July 25, 2006
California Power Rush spells...CPR through solar power!
California rolling blackouts again? Shades of a few years past when I was interviewed by CNN.
At that time, I invoked industry to take up the mantle and use solar power to help alleviate and support the standard grid. What has been learned since? Do we see some improvements that will prevent the general blackouts which occurred years ago?
While some blamed deregulation and the power companies, we can also see by this interview with Charles Feldman of CNN that it had much to do with the state's lack of support of new generating technologies, as well as politics or anything else involved in the equation.
So how far has California come from there? Well, for one, Californians elected a governor who is totally pro-solar in Arnold Schwarzenegger. Then, we know that Palo Alto has become the darling of the nanotech of solar with new companies like Nanosolar and Miasole establishing operations there that promise to turn the solar world with disruptive technologies. Plus, the fact is that with the utilities more aware of the potential for catastrophe and the public's lack of patience should this occur again, they have taken steps to permit greater import in times of crisis.
Finally, the California Energy Commission has created programs that will turn California into the next Germany in terms of government support, thanks in large part to the Governator's support.
In the end, we are still looking at potential planned rolling blackouts. Perhaps a little less helter skelter than last time, however still showing that we have a long way to go before we reach energy security, safety and independance in the largest state in the USA.
Sass
Posted by sass at 04:50 PM | Comments (0)
January 10, 2006
Like a rollin....
Too cool was tonight's Rolling Stones concert at the Bell Centre in Montreal.
We won these two front row center tickets at a breast cancer function that ICP Solar sponsors back in September. I had many offers to sell them, yet figured it was a once in a lifetime opportunity (while Jagger is getting younger, I'm not!) to see the Stones live and what a great choice I made to hang onto them.
They played a mix of old and new. While appreciating some of the new, you can't help but boogie to "Satisfaction" with extra fervor. And when Keith Richards played a new ballad, I was thinking about the Stones' brand and how they had carefully crafted it over the years, staying loyal to it and never swaying away. Cool bunch of older guys that stay in relatively good shape, have a very particular sound and consistently entertain in their own magical manner. Focus is on the music with no outlandish effects.
Tonight's concert featured a moving stage that went up and down the hall giving almost everyone a "front-row" feeling, alteit for a short while and a backlight system which was not really overstated. The focus remained on the music and entertainers (including a lovely female backup who took center stage during a Ray Charles' "Night time is the right time" remake).
Givers gain. I gave at a charity, and we received a very entertaining and memorable evening together. Oh well, tomorrow is another day of sunshine...
Sass Peress
Posted by sass at 12:17 AM | Comments (0)
January 09, 2006
See-ee-sss
WOW! I go away for two weeks and come back to news of the greatest show we've ever had in Las Vegas at the recent Consumer Electronics Show.
Everyone under the sun seemed to come to our booth at the show in larger volume and with greater interest in our line of products than ever before. Nevermind we had supercharged Arlene with our supercharged team ready to answer all needs. It simply was the best result we could have hoped for.
Some competitors were so impressed with our line, they even posed for pictures with our newest creations. You could see from their looks that they knew right then and there that ICP had moved the market once again. Sunsei was a huge smash hit. Expect to see lots of press on the line in the upcoming season, particularly in the key RV and boating markets.
Solar has not yet hit the masses as it will in the next decade, but we've created something that will surely attract a whole new audience to it. Hold onto your hats, it's going to be an interesting first quarter, particularly that the demand is far outstripping supply worldwide and that is making for some strange bedfellows...
This all just goes to prove that with so much more time on my hands, I will actually finally be able to gravitate out of direct detail handling and back to the "helicopter view" that every team needs to be led into the future. Do you know what your CEO has in mind next for your company? Does he/she have a vision which you can share, eat up and be a part of? Let's just say that it was great to go through 2005 but I'm much more looking forward to 2006 in that regard.
Sass Peress
Posted by sass at 06:33 PM | Comments (1)
August 09, 2005
Letting the sunshine do good...
September 9th is the date. For anyone who cares to join in this cause, my ICP team will be volunteering at the Linda Saab Annual Breast Cancer Golf Tournament here in Montreal, Canada. Its' an annual event started by a fine gentleman who lost his wife to that terrible disease. Hole sponsorhips are $300 and playing is $150CAD. The ICP team volunteers its day in support as the hole monitors, drink dispensers and fun providers. Support is welcome from across the globe. Givers get...remember?
For more information, contact Issy (my amazing assistant) at idossantos@icpsolar.com or +1.514.270.5770 x147. Merci. Thanks. Xie Xie. Todah Rabah. Choukran. Gracias. Gracie. Kamsamnida. Arigato. Danke schön. Shnorhagallem. Tashakkur. Shukriya. Diolch yn fawr iawn.
Posted by sass at 05:47 AM | Comments (1)