Register for our authors list to receive regular calls for papers on sustainable energy.

Authors should be active professionals in the field of sustainable energy. They should also be fluent in English and have good writing skills. Check our growing gallery of authors. 

We offer authors a highly personalised approach to publish your paper on our website receiving well over 100,000 visitors per month. Depending on your preference, we can offer your paper for free download (maximum exposure) or request users to register before download (lead generation). We also intend to invite selected papers for a presentation by webinar.

We welcome papers on sustainable energy that push the boundaries. In particular, we're always looking for the following:

• case studies of innovative projects
• briefing papers on emerging technologies
• descriptions and impact assessments of innovative programmes
• white papers on energy policy

Papers should be submitted in Word format, with text and graphics ready for publication. Leonardo ENERGY however reserves the right to review and edit papers, but the author gives the final approval for publication. Contributions should adhere to our terms of use.

 

Zdzislaw Chlodnicki, Wlodzimierz Koczara, and Nazar Al-Khayat

This paper presents a hybrid on-line UPS system (H-UPS). The system is based on an on-line (double conversion) UPS, consisting of two controlled energy storage systems. The first one is a static energy storage system based on supercapacitor bank. The second energy source is adjustable speed generating system supplying DC link voltage. A control concept of the UPS operation, according short and long failure of the supply utility voltage is developed. The 5 kW H-UPS is designed, built and tested. The control unit is built using DS P processor based on Shark from Analog Devices. The design and system stability tuning is achieved using PSIM software. Laboratory tests confirm high quality of the produced AC voltage during transients (voltage failure) and during steady state operation without external supply voltage.

Math Bollen, Mark Stephens, Kurt Stockman, Bill Brumsickle, Saša Djokiæ, Alex McEachern, José Romero Gordon

This paper presents the status of the work, by April 2008, in C4.110, a joint working group by CIGRE, CIRED and UIE. Contributions of the working group are: a summary of voltage dip characteristics; a methodology to assess the performance of a complete installation and; recommendations for testing and immunity of equipment.

Heat pump reduces energy and water consumption dramatically

When talking about a heat pump, most people will think of a system taking heat at low temperature from the ground, the air, or a water reservoir. However, other configurations are possible. Sony City, the new Sony headquarters in Tokyo, receives heating and cooling from a heat pump connected to a nearby sewage water treatment plant.

By recycling the heat from the sewage plant, the system achieves a Coefficient of Performance (COP) of 5.19, which is exceptionally high. It means that the building receives 5.19 units of energy for each unit of primary energy that is consumed.

By Stefan Fassbinder

Incandescent lamps are cheap but tend to have short lifetimes. The light emitted by incandescent sources is perceived as particularly pleasant because these hot radiators generate a continuous (or full) emission spectrum. But this very fact means that they waste much of the electrical energy supplied to them. Compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) are actually the least compact of all the various lamps commercially available at present (Figure 1). While CFLs are certainly energy efficient, replacing an incandescent light bulb with a CFL is not just a matter of screwing out one lamp and screwing in the other. While the CFL thread fits the lamp holder socket, the lamp doesn’t always suit the luminaire – and it is not uncommon for users to reject the energy-saving CFL on aesthetic grounds.

Vu Van Thong, Johan Driesen, Ronnie Belmans

This paper provides a state of the art of current electrification situation in the world, many parts are lighted but still one quarter has no access to electricity. The dark part happens in poor and developing countries with most people in rural and remote areas. To light the the rest of the world, in other words, is to provide electricity to the rural areas. With innovation of technology, reduction in production costs and flexibility in sizes and types, distributed generation can be a good solution for this process. Some technical, operational, micro-grid and financial issues are discussed.

RETScreen International is a unique decision support tool developed with the contribution of numerous experts from government, industry, and academia. Over the coming months, Leonardo ENERGY will be publishing a series of webcasts on energy project analysis using RETScreen.

 

Click the button if you wish to be informed when we make additions to this page.

 

	Combined Heat and Power Project Analysis This webcast examines the use of combined heat and power systems. View webcast (22 minutes)
	Photovoltaic Project Analysis This module discusses the operation and application of photovoltaic energy systems, such as the one located on the roof of the National Research Laboratory in Varennes, Quebec, Canada. View webcast (45 minutes)
	Small Hydro Project Analysis This module has three objectives. These are first, to review the basics of small hydro systems; second, to illustrate key considerations in small hydro project analysis; and third, to introduce the RETScreen Small Hydro Project Model. View webcast (45 minutes)
	Wind Energy Project Analysis This module introduces wind energy project analysis. It has three objectives. These are first, to review the basics of wind energy systems; second, to illustrate key considerations in wind energy project analysis; and third, to introduce the RETScreen Wind Energy Project Model. View webcast (35 minutes)

Concentrating photovoltaics (CPV) offers one of the most promising utility-scale, renewable energy technology options. Many companies are testing their CPV products and some have already launched commercial offers.

This documentary presents interviews with some industry representatives present at ISFOC (CPV Institute in Puertollano, South of Spain).

Register for updates on concentrating photovoltaics

By Daniel Kottick

The Israel Electric corp. deployed a nationwide Power Quality Monitoring System (PQMS). The PQMS monitors the quality of supply of all of its high voltage costumers, as well as a sample of its medium voltage customers. The PQMS monitors both the voltages and the currents. The PQMS has been operational since October 2005. The paper presents preliminary measurement results obtained from the PQMS.

We would appreciate your vote on this poll (1 question), concerning how you feel about the Leonardo ENERGY initiative. Also, your comments are very welcome and will be carefully considered.

An ethical as well as an economic question

If we continue business-as-usual, climate change — according to both the worst prognoses and the more optimistic ones — will confront humanity with serious consequences and a high price tag. However, the cost to society of mitigating climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions is also high. So inevitably, the question arises: what we should do? Pay today for mitigating climate change or pay later to deal with its consequences?

This question is most often presented as a mere economic problem. Not so, says John Broom in the Scientific American article 'The ethics of climate change'. The answer, he maintains, also entails ethical decisions.

John Broom refers to the 'Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change' by Nicolas Stern and the UK Treasury, and to the studies of William Nordhaus at Yale University. While Stern concludes that urgent action to control Greenhouse Gas emissions is required, Nordhaus’s position is that the need to act is not acute. Broom identifies and explains the premises at the basis of this contradictory outcome.

A ranking according to carbon footprint per capita

As centres of energy consumption, the US metropolitan areas should play a leadership role in fighting climate change. That was the starting point for the report 'Shrinking the Carbon Footprint of Metropolitan America' by The Brookings Institution. The report investigates

• the contribution of US cities to carbon emissions
• their potential to reduce this contribution
• the federal policy actions that are needed to achieve such a reduction

The starting point for this investigation is a calculation of the average carbon footprint per capita for the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas. This ranking takes road transportation and residential energy use into account. The city with the largest greenhouse gas emissions turned out to be Knoxville, Tennessee, while the least emissions per capita were found in Honolulu, Hawaii.

With this in-depth, 6 part, 20 minute survey, Leonardo ENERGY invites maintenance professionals and related professionals (production managers, quality control managers and site managers) to give their input on the following topics:

• the way their organisation identifies, analyses and measures power quality problems,
• the global experience of PQ phenomena, impacts and solutions within their organisation,
• and the education and support materials they may need to improve their site power quality.

By participating in this survey:

• you will be given a copy of the report conclusions as soon as they are published,
• you will help provide building maintenance professionals a benchmark for power quality problems in the world and by sector of activity,
• and you will help us develop appropriate and very useful support materials that you can use everyday to identify and solve power quality issues.

We thank you in advance for your time and invite you to answer the survey here.

Driving rural development

The Beijing Olympic Games have certainly made us all aware of China’s ability to tackle massive projects. When it comes to generating hydroelectricity, the country has proven itself equally successful with the construction of the much-contested Three Gorges Dam. But hydroelectric generation in China is not limited only to such huge scale projects. In recent years, the country has become one of the most successful adopters of small hydroelectric facilities (plants up to 25 MW) as a means of achieving carbon emission free rural development.

The total installed capacity of small hydroelectric plants in China is estimated at approximately 50,000 MW and growing at about 6,000 MW annually.