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The Headlines

Europe’s wind and gas power neck and neck
Bank of America stands up to BP
Alaskan state official defends oil over bears
East coast governors collaborate on wind
Nearly extinct species of turtle offered hope
Airships making a comeback

The Details

Europe’s new wind and gas power neck and neck

Startlingly progressive news from across the pond! The European Wind Energy Association reports that the amount of new power generated by wind turbines in Europe this year will be comparable to, if not greater than the amount of new power generated by natural gas this year.

New natural gas was top dog in European power generation, but since 2008 it has been lagging behind new wind. Just to make sure we’re clear, we aren’t saying wind produced more power than all the natural gas in the European Union. We’re saying that since 2008, more new wind power has been created than new natural gas power, which is still pretty great.

The European Union can now generate 85GW of wind power, and if the past few years is any indication, they’ll only be adding more.

Bank of America stands up to BP

In a fiscally responsible and possibly moral move, an executive within Bank of America Merrill Lynch handed down an order last week telling the company’s traders not to engage in oil trades with British Petroleum beyond June of 2011.

The unnamed executive did not state a reason for doing so, but cutting down on trades with a counterparty helps to protect banks against risk that a company will be unable to meet its long-term obligations. Bank of America has good reason to assume BP won’t be able to pay up, with the company running up a huge tab for oil spill cleanup in the Gulf, boycotts taking place across the United States, and their stock plummeting.

Bank of America is not one of BP’s biggest trading counterparties, but perhaps they will set a trend for larger banks to follow.

Alaskan state official defends oil over bears

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service has a plan to save the increasingly rare polar bear. They want to establish more than 187,000 square miles of Alaskan land as a polar bear “critical habitat”. Critical habitat by definition is the area that contains features essential to the conservation of the species, so unless the United States was for some reason anti-polar bear, giving them this essential land would seem like a no-brainer.

Not so, says Doug Vincent-Lang, endangered species coordinator for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. Vincent-Lang believes the cost of setting aside this land for the polar bear is not worth the protection.

Polar bears spend the majority of their lives living on sea ice, hunting for food above and below the ice. This also happens to be prime territory for oil drilling. The establishment and designation of preserved land would lead to development project delays, additional consultations and litigation, which would cost the oil industry.

It should be noted though, that giving this land to the polar bear, a threatened species, would only cost the oil industry a lot of money, not the taxpayer.

East coast governors collaborate on wind

Ten governors from East coast states, Republican and Democrat alike, have shaken hands on the development of wind energy farms on the Outer Continental Shelf.

Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and Virginia governors officially created the Atlantic Offshore Wind Energy Consortium, which according to the Department of Interior is expected to generate thousands of jobs in manufacturing, construction, and operations relating to new wind energy development.

Not many states have come out in direct opposition to more offshore oil drilling, but now that these ten states have banded together, the “neighbor effect” should stop any new drilling from taking place.

Nearly extinct species of turtle offered hope

Ever hear of the mangrove terrapin? If you haven’t don’t feel bad. As of right now, there are only 20 mangrove terrapins left in the entire world, including those in captivity.

For decades the mangrove terrapin has been hunted for its eggs and for its value in traditional medicine. And it doesn’t help that it’s hard to get them to mate and lay eggs. Conditions have to be just right.

But recently, expert zoologists at the Schoenbrunn zoo in Vienna, Austria managed to create just the right setting for females to lay their eggs. Now, the precious eggs are the next best hope for the preservation of this extremely endangered species.

Airships making a comeback

Now before you scream “Oh the humanity!”, airships, also known as zeppelins, are improving and are coming closer and closer to becoming a viable transportation method.

Recently, the world’s new largest airship, the Bullet 580, was launched. It measures 235 feet in length which is 40 feet longer than the Goodyear Blimp. It can stay afloat for over 48 hours and developers are hoping to add to that number, eventually keeping the Bullet 580 up in the air for a full week at a time.

So why should we even attempt to use airship technology when we’ve had such bad past experiences? A high-altitude airship acting as a ‘stratellite’ fills a gap between conventional aircraft and satellites. An airship is less expensive to launch than a satellite would be, and could be used for surveillance in defense and security applications, surveying natural resources, agriculture, and forest fires, and for telecommunications.