Tag Archives: launch
Cool Planet Announces Launch of Cool Terra™ Biochar Soil Amendment
Reduces Atmospheric CO2 and Increases Crop Yields Field trial opportunities available through the Cool Planet biochar team October 15, 2013 08:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time GREENWOOD VILLAGE, Co. & AMHERST, Mass.–(EON: Enhanced Online News)–Cool Planet Energy Systems, a developer of small-scale bio refineries for the conversion of non-food biomass into biofuels and soil enhancing biochar, announced today the launch of their biochar soil amendment product “Cool Terra™” for commercial agricultural trials. Rick Wilson, Vice President of the Cool Planet Biochar Group, made the announcement at the 2013 US Biochar conference. Cool Planet has assembled one of the top biochar research teams in the world to develop and produce high-performance biochar soil amendments designed for specific applications. The company plans to continue expanding application opportunities with selected partners in the agricultural community leading to commercial product release in 2014. “We are excited about the opportunity to combine science with the real life practical experience of our agriculture industry partners to progress the use of biochar. This work will allow our Carbon Negative fuel technology to improve crop production while delivering environmental benefits” . “We are excited about the opportunity to combine science with the real life practical experience of our agriculture industry partners to progress the use of biochar. This work will allow our Carbon Negative fuel technology to improve crop production while delivering environmental benefits,” said Cool Planet CEO Howard Janzen. Cool Planet, a sponsor of the 2013 North American Biochar Symposium, will discuss the potential impact of the market-driven application of biochar in decarbonizing the atmosphere at the conference being held in Amherst, MA Oct 13 – 16. Cool Planet has shown yield improvements consistently averaging 60% and input reductions of 40%, combined with accelerated growth rates, in commercial field trials in California, enabling cost-effective farming in regions with structured drought such as California and Arizona. “We are already in commercial trials with our proprietary Cool Terra™ biochar soil amendment, and with this launch we plan to add new partners that will lead to large-scale commercialization,” said Rick Wilson of Cool Planet. “We are also making experimental quantities of our activated biochar available through our website.” About Cool Planet Cool Planet is deploying disruptive technology through capital efficient, small scale biorefineries, to economically convert non-food biomass into high-octane, drop-in biofuels. The process also generates value through biochar production, which can be returned to the soil, with the “Cool Terra™ product enabling fertilizer and water retention for increased crop productivity, and more robust plant health. The process can be carbon negative, removing over 100 percent of the carbon footprint for every gallon used, reversing the consequences of fossil fuels. Cool Planet’s technology has a broad portfolio of pending and granted patents. Global investors include BP, Google Ventures, Energy Technology Ventures (GE, ConocoPhillips, NRG Energy), and the Constellation division of Exelon. Connect with Cool Planet on Facebook at facebook.com/CoolPlanetEnergySystems, on Twitter at twitter.com/CoolPlanetFuels and at www.coolplanet.com. Contacts Cool Planet Energy Systems Mike Rocke, +1-940-584-0490 mr@coolplanet.com or Commercial Biochar Sales +1-888-564-9332 biochar@coolplanet.com Continue reading
China Launches First Carbon Market In Shenzhen
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ccf2987e-d808-11e2-9495-00144feab7de.html#ixzz2WeKodNcr By Kathrin Hille in Beijing China saw its first-ever domestic transaction in the right to discharge carbon dioxide at the launch of its first pilot carbon market on Tuesday, moving the world’s largest CO2 emitting country closer to capping such pollution. A power plant of Shenzhen Energy Group, a state-owned utility, sold an emission permit for 10,000 tonnes to the Guangdong arm of state oil group PetroChina for Rmb28 ($5) a tonne and another 10,000 tonnes to Hanergy, a privately owned power generator and solar-panel maker, for Rmb30 a tonne, according to the Shenzhen Carbon Exchange. “This means that our country has taken a key step in establishing a carbon market,” the exchange said in a statement. Carbon markets allow companies to buy permits to emit carbon dioxide from those that burn less fossil fuels. They thus help set a price on emissions, a mechanism that aims to encourage companies to reduce such pollution and invest in cleaner technologies. The trading scheme, launched in a grand ceremony in the presence of local and national policy makers, is the first among seven regional trading platforms to start operating this year or next to help the government decide in 2015 whether to set up a nationwide carbon market. “This is further proof that China recognises the need to address climate change,” said Dan Dudek, head of the China programme of the US non-profit group Environmental Defense Fund. However, some experts say the scheme is little more than a drop in the ocean considering China’s massive total emissions and the country’s pressure to keep its economy growing fast enough to continue lifting people out of poverty. The Shenzhen pilot involves 635 local companies which account for 26 per cent of the city’s gross domestic product and 38 per cent of its CO2 emissions, or about 30m tonnes – a tiny amount compared with the 8bn tonnes China emitted in 2012. The enterprises that participate in the Shenzhen scheme, which have been allotted permits for total emissions of 100m tonnes between 2013 and 2015, are set to reduce their carbon intensity by close to 7 per cent over the next two years, the exchange said. But the pilot market starts at a difficult time for global carbon markets including the world’s largest, the EU’s Emissions Trading System, which is struggling with record price falls as the sluggish economy exacerbates an oversupply of emissions permits. The prices of the first permits sold on the Shenzhen market were about 25 per cent lower than benchmark prices in the EU Emissions Trading System, where permits were trading for €4.65 a tonne at midday on Tuesday. That is nearly 90 per cent higher than in April, when prices collapsed after the European Parliament voted down a bid to tighten the flailing market, but well down from July 2008 when benchmark prices were nearly €30 a tonne. Chinese observers said the government was likely to move cautiously to avoid any adverse impact as China’s economy is slowing as well. “Progress will depend on the government’s determination,” said Lin Boqiang, an energy economist at Xiamen University. “The question is what impact it will have on the market – unlike other commodities, for example when you buy oil you get oil, here you spend money and the only thing you get is a contribution to the global climate.” Experts say what the Shenzhen scheme and the other regional pilots that are expected to follow can achieve is also limited by the lack of a nationwide legal framework. “Unless the government sets up a binding framework, it will be very difficult to determine fair transactions, and trading will be hampered,” said Mr Lin. Additional reporting by Li Wan Continue reading
South Korea To Launch Ambitious Carbon Trading Scheme, Says Report
South Korea is preparing to introduce the world’s most ambitious emissions trading scheme, potentially paving the way for carbon costs as high as $90 a tonne for many of the country’s key industries. That is the stark conclusion of a major new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) and Ernst & Young, which hails the proposed scheme as the world’s most ambitious carbon-pricing policy but warns that changes to the proposals may be required before the scheme is introduced in 2015 to avoid “punitive” costs on industry. “If the government implements the scheme without any changes, it will have major implications for Korean companies,” said Richard Chatterton, lead analyst for carbon markets at BNEF, in a statement. “A carbon price will lead to higher power prices and impose additional costs on industrial firms. The government is mitigating the impact for covered entities by handing out most allowances for free, but costs could still rise quickly.” The report calculates that if South Korea adheres to its national target of cutting emissions to 30 per cent below business-as-usual levels by 2020 emissions reductions delivered through the planned emissions trading scheme would have to reach 836 million tonnes between 2015 and 2020. But it also predicts the “need to reduce emissions will, however, exceed the options available within industrial companies and from the country’s current fleet of gas fired power stations”, meaning that the target is likely to be missed and the price of carbon in the scheme will effectively be set by a $90 a tonne penalty price for company’s exceeding their emissions cap. The government hopes that businesses will be able to comply with the cap by accelerating the shift toward lower carbon energy sources, such as gas, renewables, and carbon capture and storage plants. But the BNEF report warns that the cost of such technologies is likely to be significantly higher than the penalty price, meaning many firms are likely to opt to exceed their targets. It recommends that the government consider a number of options to improve the proposed scheme, including relaxing the number of offset credits companies can use to count towards their carbon target or loosening the over-arching cap on emissions. “The challenge is to put in place a carbon price high enough to impact investment decisions, but low enough to transition smoothly towards a carbon-constrained economy,” said Milo Sjardin, head of Asia research for BNEF, in a statement. “With the proposed design, demand and supply within the ETS are not well-matched and will lead to unnecessarily high carbon prices. Policy-makers will need to look at cost containment measures closely while not compromising the ambitions of the scheme.” However, Yoon Joo-Hoon, senior manager at Ernst & Young, warned that while changes to the proposals could be made businesses still needed to be preparing now to the likely impact of the scheme, arguing that firms should be looking at carbon mitigation options and developing a plan for operating effectively under an emissions trading scheme. Continue reading
