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Saturday, November 29, 2014

U S needs to change its lethargic energy policy to win clean energy race

China currently leads the way in clean energy race by being the worlds largest manufacturer of solar panels and wind turbines, and accounting for more than one million renewable energy jobs.

The United States has a lot of catching up to do, and this is something relatively unknown to U.S., something that America hasnt done too often. From the current perspective it looks like China could remain global clean energy leader for some time, mostly because of several major deficiencies in U.S. clean energy politics.

For starters, U.S. still doesnt have nationwide renewable energy standard. The standard on federal level would create excellent foundation for future renewable energy development because it would give investors long-term certainty by forcing electric utilities to gradually increase the percentage of renewable energy sources in their power supply.

U.S. president Obama used to spoke heavily about the nations clean energy future, but this talk has somewhat cooled down in the last year or so, likely because fossil fuel lobbies are still too powerful so there is still not enough interest in Congress to come up with the federal renewable energy policy.

Without federal renewable energy standard U.S. will fail to give China (and even EU) decent challenge in clean energy race. This could in long run jeopardize U.S. position as the worlds strongest economy.

U.S. needs to show that it means business, and it needs to show it fast, otherwise the gap will soon become too big. This means proper renewable energy policy, more research and funding, and also more focusing on creating strong renewable manufacturing base.

Strong renewable manufacturing sector is something that U.S. renewable energy industry is desperately in need of. Thanks to strong manufacturing base China now has over one million renewable energy jobs, and this is certainly an example from which U.S. can learn (together with more aggressive clean energy policy applied by China).

Renewable energy means both environmental and economic benefits. U.S. has abundance of renewable energy resources at its disposal, and this alone should be enough for U.S. to become more competitive on global clean energy market.

The U.S. energy policy will however require a total makeover, by taking an initiative instead of sitting behind and waiting for better times. The lethargic energy policy is the last thing U.S. needs right now. Unless youre a China, of course.

Friday, November 28, 2014

Is 3D printing an environmental win

Jeremy Faludi at GreenBiz.com has a look at the environmental impact of 3d printing - Is 3D printing an environmental win ?.

Technophilic environmentalists, including myself, tout the 3D printing revolution as a boon that could eliminate waste in manufacturing. But is that really true? Even if it is true, does it matter compared to the extra energy used? And what about toxins — does it release more, or less? No one has done this comparison before in a comprehensive, quantitative way, so some colleagues and I in the UC Berkeley mechanical engineering department set out to find the answers. The results were tricky and surprising.
First, lets bust a myth: 3D printing does not mean zero waste. There are many kinds of 3D printers, making things in very different ways; we measured two kinds. An "FDM" machine (such as a RepRap or Makerbot, sort of a hot glue gun with XYZ controls), actually can have a negligible percent waste, if your model doesnt need any support material to shore it up while printing. (Thats a big "if.") But we found that an inkjet 3D printer (which lays down polymeric ink and UV-cures it layer by layer) wastes 40 to 45 percent of its ink, not even counting support material, and it cant be recycled. Other researchers studying other kinds of 3D printers have found significant waste in some of them as well.
To see whether 3D printing will be a sustainability win, we compared it to machining by a computer-controlled mill (starting with a block of stuff and cutting away everything you dont want). We only looked at machining things out of plastic, because thats what these FDM and inkjet 3D printers do. Lets be clear: most plastic consumer products are not machined; theyre injection-molded. But 3D printing is not going to replace injection-molding for mass-manufactured products (plastic parts made in the millions). It is replacing machining for smaller runs (1 unit, 10 units, maybe 1,000 units).
We compared them by doing a life-cycle assessment (LCA) of the two 3D printers and the CNC mill, including the materials and manufacturing of the machines themselves, transportation, energy use, material in the final parts, material wasted, and the end-of-life disposal of the machines. ...
The 3D printers impacts mostly came from electricity use, which is simply a function of time, so anything that reduces the time spent running also reduces eco-impacts. The mills impacts were mostly from material use and waste, but energy use was significant too. The resources and manufacturing to make the machines themselves was a small portion of impacts when they run at high utilization, as shown above; but if you only make one part per week, those embodied impacts can be significant for the FDM and the mill.
The final verdict, then, is that 3D printing can be greener, if its the right kind (FDM); but again, the biggest environmental win comes from sharing the fewest tools so each has the most utilization. If you want to know more, the full study (with far more detail in methodology and results, including breakdowns of impacts by source for all 22 scenarios studied) has been submitted to the Journal of Rapid Prototyping. Be patient, though; peer-reviewed academic publications take a year or more to get published.