Feature Article

Access to clean, affordable and reliable energy has been a cornerstone of the world’s increasing prosperity and economic
growth since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Our use of energy in the twenty-first century must also be sustainable. Solar and water-based energy generation, and engineering of microbes to produce biofuels are a few examples of the
alternatives. This Perspective puts these opportunities into a larger context by relating them to a number of aspects in the

An interplanetary energy crunch looms. Will NASA keep a nuclear tiger in its tank, or put the sun in its sails?

A mega solar park planned just 10 kilometres from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant trumpets new Japanese investment in solar power.

This study used ZIP code level data from the 2000 US Census to investigate the influence of local environmental, social, economic and political variables on the distribution of residential solar PV arrays across the United States. Current locations of residential solar PVs were documented using data from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Open PV project. A zero-inflated negative binomial reression model was run to evaluate the influence of selected variables. Using the same model, predicted residential solar PV shares were generated and illustrated using GIS software.

This study investigated the use of effective microorganisms (EM) for enhancement of biogas production through composting of solid pyrethrum remains after extraction of pyrethrins (marc). The laboratory scale experiment involved composting of the waste as substrate mixed with EM at different ratios consisting of a control, substrate with EM at of 1:250, 1:500, and 1:1000 v/v. Results show highest production of biogas at EM ratio 1:500 v/v, while biogas produced at EM ratio of 1:250 v/v had the highest methane yield.

In 2010 and 2011, Republicans and Democrats in the United States proposed mandating clean electricity generation. Research has now analysed public support for a national clean energy standard (NCES) and found that the average US citizen is willing to bear an annual 13% increase in electricity bills in support of a NCES that requires 80% clean energy by 2035.

The potential for power generation from geothermal energy in China is vast but as yet largely untapped.

About 40 kilometres from Delhi, in the bustling real estate market of Noida-Greater Noida, lies the biggest irony that the renewable energy industry faces. Indosolar, the country’s largest manufacturer of solar photovoltaic cells, has set up a 400 megawatt unit. Its entrance is slick and ultra-modern, typifying the product it manufactures. Stepping into the 28,000 square metre production unit, one is struck by the shimmering clean, futuristic and sleek production line, symbolic of the clean future that solar power promises.

This article compares the land use in solar energy technologies with conventional energy sources. This has been done by introducing two parameters called land transformation and land occupation. It has been shown that the land area transformed by solar energy power generation is small compared to hydroelectric power generation, and is comparable with coal and nuclear energy power generation when life-cycle transformations are considered.

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