In what they are calling a "clear and easy choice" for the future of the renewable energy industry, the Florida Alliance for Renewable Energy (FARE), announced today their endorsement of State CFO Alex Sink for Governor and encouraged every organization, business and individual involved in the renewable energy industry to do the same.

Growth Energy, the coalition of U.S. ethanol supporters, today welcomed four new producing plants to its membership. The four new producers bring total plant membership up to 64 and will join Growth Energy's 41 Associate Members and more than 18,000 individual Growth Force Members. Growth Energy is the largest coalition of ethanol producing plants in the United States.

Many investors find the prospect of selecting individual stocks simply too daunting. For those investors interested in investing in peak oil, but uncomfortable with the risks and moral dilemmas inherent in oil company stocks, there is another option: Powershares Global Progressive Transportation Portfolio (PTRP).

The huge turbines at the Guanting Wind Farm are popular backdrops for photos of newly married couples who find the 60-meter-tall structures a symbol of modernity; an endearing addition to the distant mountains, corn fields and lake a few dozen kilometers outside bustling Beijing.

The Treasury Department recently issued a series of FAQs in an effort to clarify when projects will be treated as having "begun construction" for purposes of the section 1603 grant. As you may be aware, a project that otherwise qualifies for the grant but is not placed in service before the end of 2010 may still be eligible for the grant if construction on the project is begun in 2009 or 2010 and the project is eventually placed in service before the applicable "credit termination date." The new FAQs address a number of the unanswered questions. However, the framework adopted by the Treasury Guidance and the new FAQs is complex, and there appears to be a considerable amount of confusion among developers about how the "beginning construction" requirement can be met. Therefore, we thought it important to issue this alert.

Ethanol manufacturer Mascoma announced that it has acquired Canada-based SunOpta BioProcess Inc. (SBI), a division of SunOpta Inc. The two companies will now combine SBI's fiber preparation and pretreatment technologies with the consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) technology of Mascoma bringing Mascoma a step closer towards its full commercialization of cellulosic ethanol.

Turkey plans to connect to the European electrical grid this month using GE's smart grid technology. The Turkish Electricity Transmission Company (TEIAS) will now be able to buy and sell power in the European electricity market, hopefully expanding the reliability and availability of energy, especially renewable energy, throughout all of Europe.

The U.S. has some of the best biomass resources in the world. The ironic thing is, we ship a lot of it over to Europe, where they put it to good use for heat and electricity.

The Peace Corps announced late last month that the U.S. Department of State will provide $1 million to fund the program in support of the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas (ECPA). The money will help Peace Corps efforts that increase rural access to energy, mitigate the effects of climate change, and support the use of renewable energy and energy efficient technologies in Central and South American communities.

We've heard many promises about large-scale facilities for cellulosic ethanol and diesel, but so far we haven't seen many promising results. This week, Honeywell and Rentech said they'll be working together to build a co-production facility that will produce high amounts of fuel and electricity by 2012.

Whilst its European neighbours are forging ahead, France is today beginning to realise the potential of this highly versatile and renewable energy form. With its vast and well structured agriculture and agro-alimentary sector, France in reality has an outstanding potential to become a leading European player in biogas.

Coming on the heels of yesterday's announcement that California is moving closer to setting grid energy storage mandates for utilities in the state, today Pike Research released a new report that says the grid energy storage market could reach as much as $35 billion by 2020.

The purpose of this series on peak oil investments has been to highlight companies outside the oil sector that are likely to benefit from increasing oil prices. This article explains why we should expect oil prices to rise. (Note: scroll to the end of this article to find a link to all the articles in this series.)

As policymakers consider energy and environmental goals, renewable portfolio standards (RPS) are one popular tool to encourage the development of renewable power resources. These regulations, also called renewable electricity standards, typically require utilities to source a specified percentage of their power from qualified renewable sources. States adopt RPS programs to incentivize the development of new capacity, reduce their carbon footprints and mitigate volatility in fossil fuel prices. While such regulations do have cost impacts to ratepayers, proponents argue that their benefits exceed their costs.

This week saw two major partnerships between large energy companies and smaller cellulosic biofuel producers.

A new government study shows that Americans are using less energy overall and making more use of renewable energy resources.

On 30th August begins the new TREE (Transfer Renewable Energy & Efficiency) series of seminars for employees of ministries and multipliers from 57 countries at the Renewables Academy, Berlin. The goal is to train relevant stakeholders on technical, economic and legal aspects of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies, so as to provide an effective framework for market growth in the countries of origin. As part of the scholarship program there will be 11 seminars in different technology priorities, online courses and brochures provided with legal questions. Participants will learn which technology is suitable for which sites, how best the political environment can be shaped more efficiently, what funding mechanisms can be used, as well as aspects of project management. Seven more seminars will be held in South Africa, Mexico, Malaysia, the UAE and India on Solar Thermal Power Plants and Project Finance for Renewable Energies.