Support These Fledgling Technology Companies Any Way You Can

People keep asking me what companies I support. That's a tough one. I support all renewable energy companies in one way or another. Some I simply agree with the principle while others I would write a donation check out to. Others I keep track of and just pass that info along. The following is my list of ones that I would actively support beyond just passing their name along. I firmly believe that the success of our national/global crisis here relies on these companies getting their act together and producing millions of their products. Without them, the rest can't compete with the entrenched big energy companies enough to produce the much needed competition. Let's dig in.

There are two categories of companies we need to stand behind. One is publicly known and the other is staying quiet until they get to a certain stage. Unfortunately, patent timelines play a role in the decisions of the latter. I know this because my company is in this boat as well. However, that being said.

Solar PV is making progress on it's own and actually can't keep up with demand. It also is helping TODAY'S peak problem but will create an opposing one down the road unless it incorporates about 30% equivalent in storage. We need solar thermal which captures heat to be stored and THEN turned into energy (all three forms a home needs - elec, heat, cooling) The companies making progress are:

Large scale solar thermal has numerous players already making large progress and don't need individual support in my opinion. They have shown storage capability but it is not economically justified yet. It is also expensive at this scale due to redundancies and safeguards required. The 5 basic technologies involved are: A group of long straight Parabolic Troughs concentrating sunlight on a long tube. They rotate to track the sun in it's daily travels across the sky and have the potential to store the collected heat. Freznel reflectors use do this with a stationary pipe and rows of tracking mirror strips. Power Towers use thousands of 2-axis tracking mirrors to reflect the sun to a receiver on top of a large tower. Storage is possible as well. Dish-Stirling systems use one large satellite dish (50 + ft) to track and reflect the sun to a Stirling heat-powered engine mounted to its focus. The last one is a solar greenhouse power tower. It consists of a few mile diameter greenhouse collecting heat underneath it which rises to its high point in the center and then exits to a very tall chimney to create a draft. This wind flow is captured by wind turbines.

Medium scale solar thermal best fits a small department store roof or over a parking lot:

Darren Kimura's Sopogy in Hawaii (and now Phoenix), stored solar heat, cooling and electric via sun following troughs feeding an organic Rankine turbine.

Paul Passarelli's Solar and Thermal Systems, Inc. in CT, stored solar electric and heat via sun tracking troughs feeding another Rankine turbine.

Residential scale solar thermal has

J. D. Sitton's Infinia in Kennewick, WA, solar electricity only (no storage) via 2-axis sun tracking dish directly feeding a Stirling engine.

My company, Pillar Efficiencies (not publicly released yet) for stored solar heat, cooling and electricity via stationary skylight style minitroughs feeding a proprietary new Stirling engine.

Large scale and small scale wind has many companies doing well on their own. You can purchase from them or you could support a couple innovative new technologies that may be game changing.

Magenn is making high flying lighter than air squirrel cage style generators for medium scale sites.

Superturbine, Inc. offers multiple rotors coaxially on the same shaft for home to utility scale applications. I think they are also behind the buoy mounted wind turbine towers with multi-rotors as well. I'm waiting for them to float a jinormous structure of these up into the jet stream to capture the 300 mph wind there that blows 95% of the time. :-)

Biofuel comes in many forms and from many sources. Your mileage may vary, but.... One I really like that is just breaking out of the lab is:

Sapphire Energy which is making natural 91 octane gasoline from algae and sunlight while filtering CO2 from the air and 'dirty' from dirty water.

Transportation has many new car options that show promise of offering a cheap green car but I am strongly behind a personal mass transit alternative that is better in every single way I can compare it to a car:

Skytran offers a system so cheap and flexible that a terminal can be placed every other block that can take you at 45 (town) to150 (rural) mph directly to your destination terminal. It can incorporate the power lines found on power poles and it is fully automated to allow one-way shipment of everything from a gallon of milk to a pallet of goods to your innebriated buddy or schoolkid. It uses so little power that a solar canopy over it could fully power it.

Interconnection to get them all working together
Keep in mind that there are many more. Some are ready and some quietly need RD&D support. Others like the ones I mention above that don't need individual support still need to be promoted to the decision makers to get the larger scale projects built. I'm STRONGLY biased towards those creations that cut our ties from the public utility because the more balance we have opposing them, the less we'll be dependent on them down the road. They're already over-promoting wind and PV without a smart grid, which only leads to reliance on them making large scale backup power. That's how the current monopoly was created.

If you have any others you would like to see added to this list, or if you have information suggesting the removal of one, lets hear about it. Keep in mind that they have to be a solution on all fronts, not just technically possible. There are many other reasons why people won't buy a technically good idea. Maybe in the next blog post I'll write up what Pillar is working on and we'll see what you guys think of a system that may just have it all. Til next time... Pass these around to generate more awareness.