Spremberg, Germany is a stone’s throw from the Czech border, and used to have the unfortunate moniker of “stinky town” due to the high levels of pollution.  Kinda gross, I know.  But the city is trying to turn that around in an unprecedented way: by operating the first ever coal-based power plant that is designed to capture and store the carbon dioxide produced.

Technology Review tells us that a Swedish firm, Vattenfall, is behind the conversion of this formerly-polluting power plant.  The process is semi-confusing, so bear with this somewhat long block quote from the article.  I mean, Technology Review is published by M.I.T., so should I really try to paraphrase?  The odds of me getting it right are slim to nil.

Vattenfall’s small 30-megawatt plant burns the lignite in air from which nitrogen has been removed. Combustion in the resulting oxygen-rich atmosphere produces a waste stream of carbon dioxide and water vapor, three-quarters of which is recycled back into the boiler.

By repeating this process, known as oxyfuel, it is possible to greatly concentrate the carbon dioxide. After particles and sulfur have been removed, and water vapor has been condensed out, the waste gas can be 98 percent carbon dioxide, according to Vattenfall.

This waste gas, for the time being, will trucked 150 away from the city and injected 3,000 meters (approximately a billion miles) underground.

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It’s been a big week for investment in thin-solar technology with more than $400 Million being raised by two industry companies.  With NanoSolar raising $300 Million and AVA Solar bringing in over $100 Million the future is looking bright the next generation of solar collection technology.

The huge push for thin solar comes from its low cost, durability and efficiency at capturing incoming solar energy.  Some estimates put the technology bringing over $15 Billion in revenue by the year 2015 as efficiency continues to improve while costs steadily plummet.

Nanosolar, based in San Jose, California, plans to put the new capital to work expanding its production plants in San Jose and Berlin, Germany.  AVA Solar will put its $104 Million dollar in newly raised capital toward completing a production facility in Colorado where the company is based.

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Let’s face it, bike helmets have virtually no fashion sense whatsoever. We’re all happy to overlook this fact given that these much needed devices do wonders for protecting our noggins should we have the misfortune of crashing. Still the typical protective helmet looks more at home on top of one of the Transformers than on a fashion conscious bicyclist cruising around town on two wheels.

All that’s about to change however with the new line of styled out bike helmets from the Danish company Yakkay. It’s a simple concept to be sure. Take a hard, spherical bicycle helmet (seen below) then fit a cool looking hat on top of it and voila!, you’ve gone from trashy to classy by simply giving your bike helmet a cover of its own (like those above).

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The picturesque German town of Marburg is experiencing some green growing pains resulting from a new law passed by its town council.  The law, as reported in the NY Times, which requires town residents to install solar heating panels on not only all new buildings but also on existing structures that undergo renovations or install new heating units or roofing.  Those who fail to comply with the new regulation will face a stiff fine of 1,000 Euros.  While fewer town residents disagree with new constructions needing to install the solar panels, the portion of the regulation pertaining to existing buildings has sent many Marburgers into an uproar that the ordinance is an infringement on private property rights.

A battle of wills soon ensued, with the regional government of Giessen threatening to overturn the law, followed by the Marburg ton council countering that they would bring judicial action in a higher court to keep the ordinance in place.  The issue stands in legislative limbo right now.

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• NPR’s Fresh Air has an interview with Andrew Stanton, director of Wall-E (which I loved!) Give a listen to hear him talk about the inspiration he finds in everyday objects.

• Also on a Wall-E related note, apparently folks are all a twitter about new I-Phone problems, while one Wall-E fan sees a problem with all the commotion.

takepart to learn how you can recycle your dead Apple products.

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The world’s richest nations and emerging economies joined together at a summit on the island of Hokkaidou, Japan to commit to long range cute in global greenhouse emissions. They concluded their meetings today, calling climate change “one of the great global challenges of our time.” Good news, right? Well, not just yet.

Yesterday, leaders of the G8 (United States, Japan, Germany, France, Canada, Italy, Britain and Russia) pledged to cut emissions of heat-trapping gases in half by 2050. But the Group of 5 emerging economies (China, India, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa) refused to sign onto that goal. They are holding out until rich nations like the United States take more aggressive steps to cut pollution over the next decade.

“It is good that the developing countries have embraced the principal of a global target that they will participate in,” Philip Clapp of the Pew Environmental Group said. “It would have been better if the United States and the other G-8 countries would have been willing to step up to the plate and make a strong commitment about what they would do over the next 10 years.”

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Dust (directed by Hartmut Bitomsky)

This is a film I loved so much in theory and am so glad it is exactly how it is, that being said it wasn’t easy to watch. Bitomsky’s tale of the small particles that keep the cleaning industry afloat is simply collection of interviews and information all about what dust is and how we interact with it. There is no real arc or story, although he starts out with the smallest application of dust and brings the tale full circle with talk of the military and the formation of the earth.  Dust it seems is more complicated than one might think.

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Geothermal power is experiencing a boom in Germany thanks to forward-thinking legislation there.  The new law has made it financially feasible to drill wells deep enough to hit the high temperature water in the earth’s crust necessary for this clean energy source. 

In 2004 less than 0.4% of Germany’s electricity supply came from geothermal energy.  But after a renewable energy law that went into effect that year set prices at .15 Euro/kilowatt hour a construction boom was set off from which several new power plants are beginning to come online.

Geothermal electricity production has the advantage of being available all day, every day in the locations where drilling for it is feasible.  In volcanic locations like Iceland the technology is already used extensively due to the closeness of heated pools of water to the earth’s surface and subsequent ease of accessibility. 

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The Danish provocateur Lars von Trier is at it again. The director of the tear inducing Breaking the Waves and Dancer in the Dark and the anti-American Dogville and Manderlay has moved on larger topics, specifically the Antichrist:

Lars von Trier’s next film will be called Antichrist. The story concerns a couple retreating to a cabin in the woods to recover from the death of their child. Filming on Antichrist begins this summer in Germany, where the film’s producers secured funding. This marks the first time that Von Trier will work in Germany. [Guardian]

Even though his films are always controversial, they always ignite discussion on topics that need more time in the media, like misogyny, sexism, violence, greed and faith.

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On 60 Minutes last night Murat Kurnaz, an ex-terror detainee, spoke about the torture he received while in Kandahar and eventually Guantanamo. Kurnaz, a German citizen of Turkish descent, was traveling in Pakistan for religious reasons when he was picked up by police and handed over to the Americans.

The story comes roughly a month before the release of Errol Morris’ new film Standard Operating Procedure. I’ve written about the film a lot here on TakePart, both because it’s a Participant Productions film that I’m very proud of and also because I’m simply a huge Errol Morris fan. What’s especially exciting is that the film not only comes at a critical time in terms of the information it presents, but also that the film is getting a lot of praise, including winning the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.

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