NASA’s Puffin: The Personal Electric Air Vehicle

allternative energy news

Mark Moore, an aerospace engineer, is the person who dreamed about the Puffin. Puffin is a single seated electric powered airplane. Moore conceptualized the idea of electric aircraft for his doctoral degree. Operating it from your house is as simple as taking out your car from the garage. You can launch this aircraft from your own home because of vertical take-off and landing. Mark Moore is trying to combine the best feature of a plane and a helicopter into a hybrid known as the Puffin. The Puffin is not some abstract reality that is not going to take a concrete shape.

Moore is an expert in small aircraft flying system. He is working with NASA, MIT and the National Institute of Aerospace to turn Puffin into a reality. This electric aircraft would be 12-foot (3.7 m) long, and have a 14.5-foot (4.4 m) of wingspan. Puffin is already a hit in the Internet community. Moore himself tells the whole story, “The animation of the Puffin on YouTube has gotten more 648,000 hits in a week. Until the concept was mentioned in the media Jan. 19, the video had only been clicked on a couple of thousand times since it was uploaded to the NASAPAV channel last November.” The animation was created by Analytical Mechanics Associates graphic designers.

Another characteristic of the Puffin is it can take pilot up to 50 miles at a cruising speed of 150 mph. It’s also lightweight, totaling up to just 181kg when fully loaded with the batteries. But its greatest advantage without doubt is the zero carbon emission. The design would be powered by a total of 60 horsepower through electric motors, which are designed to be able to fail any two powertrain components on either side and still produce the required power to hover. It has a cruising speed of 150 mph (241 kph), but cruises more efficiently at lower speeds The range with current battery technology would be about 50 miles (80 km).

Moore draws the analogy between actual puffin bird and his own puffin. Puffin’s wings also look quite small for flying. Moore’s creation aircraft would also have small wings. He states another similarity between his bird and nature’s bird, “But it’s also apparently called the most environmentally friendly bird, because it hides its poop. So the vehicle is environmentally friendly because it essentially has no emissions. Also, puffins tend to live in solitude, only ever coming together on land to mate, and ours is a one-person vehicle.”

Puffin would be a hybrid of helicopter and small aircraft. Like a helicopter it would stand upright on the ground. Its tail consists of 4 legs that act as landing gear. It lifts off like a helicopter. When it hovers and leans forward to fly horizontally it gives the appearance of a hang-glider. Next step of the NIA will be to fly a remote control one-third size model. This experiment will enable them to validate theorems made in academic studies, with the particular emphasis on exploring the transition from hover to forward flight.

Starbucks profit soars as customers come back

By Hibah Yousuf,CNN money

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- There may not be a Starbucks on every corner any more, but Americans are finding their way back into the upscale coffee retailer's stores.

Starbucks' profit surged in the quarter ended March 28, topping Wall Street forecasts and prompting the coffee retailer to boost its forecast for 2010.
The world's largest coffee chain reported earnings of $217.3 million, or 28 cents per share. Stripping out restructuring charges, Starbucks posted an adjusted profit of 29 cents per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, who typically exclude one-time items from their forecast, were looking for earnings of 25 cents per share.

Sales jumped 9% to $2.5 billion, beating analysts' expectations of $2.4 billion. Starbucks (SBUX,Fortune 500)shares rose nearly 2% on the news in aftermarket trading, after rising 0.5% during regular hours.

Over the past two years, Starbucks cut costs by closing hundreds of stores, trimming its workforce, overhauling its food menu and adjusting drink prices. The changes finally took hold last quarter, when the company reported a profit that quadrupled its earnings from a year earlier.
Since then, Starbucks has teamed up with Burger King to serve Seattle's Best Coffee and announced it will pay out dividends to shareholders for the first time ever beginning Friday.

Same-store sales, which measure sales at stores open at least a year and are a key gauge of customer traffic, climbed 7% in both the United States and international markets.

U.S. growth was driven by a 5% rise in spending and a 3% uptick in traffic, marking the first increase in more than three years. "An important milestone" for the company, said chief financial officer Troy Alstead.

"Clearly, customers are opening up their wallets and coming back to the brand," said Bart Glenn, analyst at D.A. Davidson.

With business reinvigorated in the United States, Alstead said Starbucks' "best days lie ahead of us." He expects the lion's share of growth for the company to be in opening more stores overseas, with China being the largest market.

Oil falls towards $83 after U.S. inventories soar

Reuters

Oil fell toward $83 after soaring U.S. inventories signaled demand in the world's top energy user is lagging the recovery in the global economy.

The International Monetary Fund on Wednesday said the world's recovery from recession had been quicker than expected, raising forecasts for growth this year.

However the IMF report and robust data on Chinese imports, failed to overcome investors' unease over the Greek debt saga, sapping the euro while the yen benefited.

Crude inventories in the United States rose unexpectedly last week, government statistics showed on Wednesday, while fuel supplies climbed more than forecast.

"The unexpected increase in crude inventories speaks of a bearish outlook," said Serene Lim, a Singapore-based oil analyst at ANZ. "Demand has not really kept up with the economic recovery."

West Texas Intermediate crude for June, the U.S. benchmark, slid 31 cents to $83.37 a barrel by 0341 GMT.

U.S. crude prices are under pressure from last week's 1.8-million-barrel stockpile gain at the Cushing, Oklahoma pricing point reported by the Energy Information Administration, which accounted for most of the 1.9-million-barrel increase logged at a national level.

For chart watchers, U.S. crude is bound to continue in a falling trend, targeting $82 a barrel.

At more than 34 million barrels, landlocked crude inventories at Cushing are nearing the level at which they trigger a disconnection of WTI from global oil markets.

Front-month ICE Brent fell just 17 cents to $85.53 a barrel on Thursday after rising a day earlier on data showing strong Chinese demand, diverging from falling U.S. crude. June Brent was trading more than $2 higher than June WTI.

China's apparent oil demand in March rose 12.3 percent from a year earlier, the 7th double-digit increase in a row, Reuters calculations showed from official data released on Wednesday.

"There could be some support from Chinese demand, looking at how strong the economic growth is," Lim said. "There is high demand because of the spring seasonal peak from agriculture."

Rising consumption in China, the world's second-largest oil user, has helped support crude prices as demand from developed economies struggles to rebound from the recession.

U.S. demand for distillates including heating oil and diesel fell 0.1 percent in the past four weeks from a year earlier, the EIA said. Inventories climbed 2.1 million barrels to 148.9 million barrels, eclipsing a forecast rise of 800,000 barrel.

And gasoline stocks rose 3.6 million barrels to 224.9 million barrels, by far topping projections by analysts polled by Reuters who had forecast a build of 400,000 barrels. (Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Maryland Passes 'Benefit Corp.' Law for Social Entrepreneurs

By John Tozzi businsseweek

Maryland today became the first state to legally create a new corporate form known as a “benefit corporation” that will let social entrepreneurs codify their missions in their corporate charters.

The law is modeled on proposals by B-Lab a Berwyn, Pa.-nonprofit that certifies socially responsible companies. The law lets entrepreneurs commit their for-profit ventures to a specific public good, and requires them to report on contributions to that goal and submit to auditing of their impact. Having official “benefit corporation” status allows entrepreneurs to consider stakeholders like employees, communities, or the environment in business decisions. Under existing corporate law, company directors can face lawsuits if considering outside stakeholders is seen to damage the financial interest of shareholders.
We wrote nearly a year ago on the difficulty social entrepreneurs have fitting their hybrid missions of making money and doing good into existing corporate forms. The tangled arrangements they get into (nonprofits controlling for-profits, etc.) can be costly to set up and limit their ability to raise money from outside investors. Adopting the “benefit corporation” form signals that our economic institutions — in this case the laws that govern corporations — are catching up with the growing interest in the social enterprise sector.(This was one of two big ideas on my radar this year.)If you care about accelerating the development of this emerging marketplace, the first step is providing the legal infrastructure,” Jay Coen Gilbert, one of the co-founders of B-Lab, told me last week.

He says the new legal designation could unlock new capital for social ventures from investors who want to park their money in mission-driven companies. “I think it’s becoming increasingly not only acceptable but sought after by mainstream investors,” Gilbert says.

Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, a Democrat, signed the bill today, along with other bills at the end of Maryland’s legislative session. The bill, sponsored by Democratic state Sen. Jamie Raskin, passed Maryland’s Senate unanimously and passed the House by a vote of 135-5.

A similar proposal is pending in Vermont. California lawmakers are considering related legislation to allow “flexible purpose corporations” that would let companies protect their social missions, without the affirmative requirements that the “benefit corporation” law puts in place.

Glass Fibers to Store Hydrogen Fuel for Cars

I find this story interesting for both the technological perspective and the political perspective. Let’s get the political perspective out of the way first. This is an article that has been circulated by the Associated Press.

It was picked up and published by Iran’s Teheran Times online newspaper. The article itself is about how a group of Israeli scientists have developed a method for storing hydrogen fuel using small glass filaments. I may be naïve, but in my mind this shows that scientific knowledge is not constrained by political boundaries.

Now, let’s move on to the technological perspective. A group of Israeli scientists working for C.En ltd in Geneva, Switzerland have developed a method to use glass filaments the size of a human hair to store H2.

According to the article, “These 370 glass capillaries are bundled into a glass tube called a capillary array, about the width of a drinking straw. The scientists say 11,000 such arrays will fuel a car for 400 kilometers (240 miles), take less than half the space and weight of tanks currently installed in the few hydrogen cars now available.”

One of the problems of using metal hydride tanks for storing hydrogen fuel has always been the weight. Adding weight to the vehicle not only wears down the vehicle more quickly but takes away from its power and range. Lighter tanks mean more power, range and less wear and tear on hydrogen cars
Yesterday I talked about researchers using magnesium nanoparticles to store hydrogen and today its glass filaments. Just by the shear numbers of scientists and researchers attacking the hydrogen storage problem from different angles, we cannot help but to have a breakthrough in hydrogen tank technology sooner rather than later

Petrom joins wind power race

By Roxana Petrescu www.zf.ro

Petrom, the biggest local company and the only producer of petroleum and gas in Romania, has joined the European energy giants with billions of euros in budgets, buying a wind farm project in which it will invest 100 million euros until 2011. Compared with the projects announced thus far, the size of the wind farm that Petrom will develop in Dobrogea, 45 MW, is not very impressive, but there is a hint in the step taken by the company.

"This is a signal that investments must continue. Investments are the factor that helps the economy rebound.
In addition, there are opportunities on the market and prices are better compared with 2008," says Mariana Gheorghe, Petrom's chief executive, who runs a 3 billion-euro business.

A total of 13 billion euros were invested in wind power projects in Europe last year, with Romania missing yet another opportunity to create jobs and bring new money into the economy while the crisis was going on, with only 3 MW installed locally, that is a turbine and a half.

Things seem set to drastically change in 2010, given that CEZ (Czech Republic) alone will have 139 turbines running by autumn. Spain's Iberdrola, worldwide wind power leader, says that it will build the world's biggest wind farm in Dobrogea by 2017, whose capacity will stand at 1,500 MW, which is higher than that of two reactors of the Cernavoda nuclear plant. The two projects alone entail investments of over 3 billion euros, double the budget the Transport Ministry has for motorways and national roads in one year. Other wind power investors include Enel (Italy), Verbund (Austria) and Energias de Portugal.

Dollar rises on risk aversion

By Julianne Pepitone CNNMONEY.com

Dollar rises on risk aversion

The dollar gained strength against major rivals Monday, as stocks churned on continued concern about fraud charges brought against Goldman Sachs.
What prices are doing: The dollar gained ground against the euro, rising 0.1% to $1.3487. The greenback rose 0.2% against the British pound, trading at $1.5337.
The dollar was up 0.2% versus the yen at ¥92.37.

What's moving the market: U.S stocks churned monday after the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday charged Goldman Sachs(GS FORTUNE 500) with drefauting investors.On friday the blue-chip Dow lost 1.1% while the broader S&P 500 plunged 1.6%.

The stock indexes extended losses earlier in the session Monday, sparking a flight to safety. The dollar tends to get a boost when stocks fall, as the dollar is considered a safe haven. Stocks managed to recover later in the day, but the greenback held onto some strength.

What experts are saying: "Friday's movement down in stocks shows we could be in the correction phase of the recent risk rally," said Brian Dolan, chief currency strategist at Forex.com. "That's going to be supportive for the dollar overall."

Dolan noted that stocks fell in early trade Monday despite Citigroup's (C,Fortune 500) report of a better-than-expected 4.4 billion$ quartely profit
"We've had mostly positive data, so stocks had every opportunity to push higher," Dolan said. "But they didn't, and that's a hallmark that the market has run into exhaustion."

In the coming weeks, the euro will hold around $1.33-$1.37, Dolan predicted. If the European currency falls below $1.32, that could push it even lower. Versus the yen, the dollar will trade in a range to ¥91 to ¥93.50, he expects.