Greenbang's top 10 energy stories of 2011

What topics did Greenbang readers find most interesting in 2011? Following is a look at the 10 most-read stories of the past year:

1. Who’s the leading smart-city brand? Which companies are leading the way in helping the world’s cities become smarter, more connected and more efficient? This article provided an overview of our study, “The Greenbang Smart Matrix™ – Smart Cities: How brands compare on marketing vs. capability in the smart-city space.” The key finding? There remain a number of disconnects and opportunities between what companies do and what they say they do.
2. US funds tallest molten salt tower in the world. A look at the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project, a 100-megawatt molten salt concentrating solar power tower plant under development in Nevada. The SolarReserve project, backed by a $737 million loan guarantee from the US Department of Energy (DOE), will be the first facility of its kind in the US. The solar plant will store extra energy in molten salt, in effect allowing it to continue providing sun-generated electricity to the grid even at night.
3. What energy innovations will lead the way in 2012? This post described five startups vying for the US Department of Energy title of “America’s Next Top Energy Innovator.” They include Vorbeck Materials, which is working to develop lithium-ion batteries store that can twice as much electricity at high charge and discharge rates as current technology; TrakLok, which is using GPS technology and satellite communications to track and monitor containers in transit; IPAT, a firm researching methods for lower-cost, more efficient titanium powder-making; e-Chromic, which is working to develop a new thin-film window material that reflects sunlight on demand; and Umpqua Energy, a company developing a system that lets a gasoline engine operate in an “extreme lean burn mode” for improved gas mileage.
4. Taipei boasts world’s greenest skyscraper: TAIPEI 101. A  profile of the 1,667-foot (508-meter) tower in Taipei that’s earned the US Green Building Council’s LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Platinum certification, the highest level for energy efficiency and environmental design. Innovative design and technology enables the tower to use 30 percent less energy than the average skyscraper, reducing energy costs by some $700,000 a year.
5. From inspired to awful: 8 definitions of smart buildings. What makes a building “smart”? This article looks at definitions from eight different organizations, with descriptions ranging from the dry — “A smart building is the integration of building, technology and energy systems” — to the elegant: “solutions that turn buildings into living organisms: networked, intelligent, sensitive and adaptable.”
6. Incentives fire up UK solar market. A summary of the Greenbang report, “The UK’s Feed-in Tariff: Impact, response and market trends for the decade ahead.” The study found that the British government’s now-threatened feed-in tariff for renewable energy projects helped spark the installation of more than 10,000 solar photovoltaic arrays — most of them on household rooftops — in just six months.
7. In land of photovoltaics, Europe is king. A look at the latest growth in the world’s solar photovoltaic market, with Europe dominating in terms of installed capacity. Germany is the undisputed leader, having added 6.5 gigawatts of new capacity to an existing installed base of 9.8 gigawatts.
8. Smart meters, demand response exert growing impact in US. A look at how both demand response and advanced energy metering are spreading rapidly across the US. By June 2011, 13.4 percent of electricity meters in the US — 9.7 million in all — featured advanced “smart” technologies, compared to 8.7 percent in 2009. Demand response programs have also increased significantly, with the potential nationwide capacity growing from 27,189 megawatts (MW) in 2009 to 31,702 MW in 2010.
9. Futuristic lighting tech that’s here now. Images and descriptions of some of the latest innovations in modern, energy-efficient lighting, from light bulbs that can be wirelessly controlled with Android devices to a lighting control and energy management system that uses power line carrier (PLC) technology to communicate over existing power lines.
10. “Age of cheap energy is over”: IEA chief. Nobuo Tanaka, then chief of the International Energy Agency (IEA) says the world is at a point where a global energy makeover can’t come fast enough. “The age of cheap energy is over,” he said. “The only question now is, will the extra rent from dearer energy go to an ever smaller circle of producers, or will it be directed back into the domestic economies of the consumers, with the added benefits of increased environmental sustainability?”