>”According to CEFC CEO, Oliver Yates waste management has been a growing issue in Australia for all levels of government and with recycling rates remaining fairly constant, the country will need to seek solutions to its increasing dependence on landfill.

[…]

The company added that the facilities will generate cost competitive, base load energy and a lower emissions outcome than current grid electricity sources.

The investor also noted that while both projects will be eligible for Australian Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) for the majority of the energy produced, their financial viability is not reliant on RECs.

The investment is also expected to help to encourage further waste to energy facilities across the country and facilitate access to private sector funding for similar projects in the future which divert waste from landfills, increase recycling rates, recover energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

CEFC said that its finance for the New Energy facilities takes its total investment in waste-to-energy projects to over $150 million, and that it has another $280 million of waste to energy proposals in its project pipeline that would unlock a further $1.0 billion in additional finance.

Technology

According to New Energy, its low temperature gasification process ‘cooks’ waste over a 16 to 24 hour period at temperatures of between 600°C and 875°C during which small amounts of air and steam are introduced.

This is said to break the molecules in the waste which are converted into a syngas that contains molecules such as methane with a high energy content.

The syngas is combusted to heat water and produce steam, either for use as either heat or for electrical generation. This secondary oxidation stage is said convert the syngas into water vapour and carbon dioxide.

The exhaust gases are cleaned and filtered, which the company said to neutralises acidic gases such as sulphur dioxide, as well as particulates and heavy metals. It is then released to the atmosphere.”<

>"Russia recently clinched a US$400-billion deal to feed China around 38 billion cubic metres of natural gas via pipelines at a chummy price of $10-$11 per million cubic feet, shaking up an industry that is used to fetching $14-$18 per mcf from Asian markets.

The deal, along with a new trend of setting prices linked to gas prices rather than the traditional crude oil benchmarks, could upset British Columbia’s dream of launching a liquefied natural gas export industry.

“Clearly with so much LNG supply capacity set to come on stream, Asian buyers have more power to bargain for lower prices in LNG contracts, lowering the potential prices Canadian producers would receive, and could squeeze the economics of certain LNG projects,” TD said in a note published Thursday.

The deal has already created ripples across LNG-dependent markets such as Japan. This week, 38 Japanese lawmakers said they plan to lobby Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to revive a stalled Russia-Japan natural gas pipeline."<

>The northeast First Nations have lived with oil and gas for 60 years, and understand the economic opportunities that could flow LNG.  But they also worry just how much more the region can take.  

Site C Dam and LNG together would cause massive disruption of the land, air and water.  Their polling shows 50% of their members are uncertain about LNG in particular, and 20% are vehemently opposed. 

Many fear an Alberta-Tar-Sands-scale industrialization coming to their territories.

“That’s what we’re afraid of.  If LNG goes through, they’re predicting upwards of 50,000 to 60,000 new frack wells… and all the associated infrastructure that goes with it: roads, pipelines, seismic, drilling.  It’s scary,” said Tribal Chief Logan.

“We’re not opposed to creating a good economy for everybody, but there has to be some type of sustainable development.  We can’t drink the water up there any more.”

“There’s more and more moose, rabbit and beaver organs that we’re finding that have [puss-like] abscesses on them.  Sometimes we open an animal and it smells almost rotten.”<

"The U.S. Energy Department  announced $10 million to test prototypes designed to generate clean, renewable electricity from ocean waves and help diversify America’s energy portfolio. The Energy Department-supported demonstrations at the U.S. Navy’s wave energy test site off Hawaii’s island of Oahu will help develop reliable wave energy options and collect important performance and cost data for wave energy conversion (WEC) devices.

The Energy Department plans to test two WEC devices at depths of 60 and 80 meters at the open-water site offshore from Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe Bay. These projects will enable the Energy Department to evaluate technology performance, reliability and cost of energy to achieve cost-competitive wave energy deployments in the future.

The two-phase demonstration projects will focus on WEC devices in the late stages of technology development–those ready to be tested at close to full-scale in the open-ocean environment. The first phase of this fundingopportunity will optimize designs and plan for the deployment and testing of WEC systems. The second phase will support permitting, fabrication, deployment, retrieval, and decommissioning of these systems after 12 months of testing and data collection."