India-U.S. deals, China-U.S. deals, environmental concern in Asia, and more green business news

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"$175-m worth deals on clean energy signed"—reliability high.
Indian and U.S. companies recently signed joint venture deals worth $175 million in the renewable energy sector, according to Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Director General for the Foreign Commercial Service at the U.S. Department of Commerce Suresh Kumar. Article lists deals. From The Hindu.

"Chinese Solar Project Developers Tackling U.S."—reliability high.
Chinese firms are getting into project development for solar farms in the U.S. "Wells Fargo on Monday said it will fund 'over $100 million' worth of projects to be developed by GCL Solar Energy, a subsidiary of the Hong Kong-based GCL-Poly Energy Holdings." GCL-Poly claims to be the largest maker of silicon wafers for solar cells. See The GigaOM Network.

"Concern Over the Environment Rises in Asia"—reliability medium.
"climate change and environmental issues have moved up Asia’s list of worries, often topping any concerns about the global economy, according to opinion polls released over the past two weeks." Discusses studies by HSBC and by Civic Exchange. Strong economies and environment-related disasters have affected attitudes. From The New York Times.

Companies, Industries, Markets and Supply Chains

"Biodiesel plant set to open in Baton Rouge"—reliability high.
A 75-million-gallon-a-year biodiesel plant owned by Tyson Foods and fuel manufacturer Syntroleum Corp. is coming on line soon. It uses leftovers from Tyson’s meat-processing factories and eateries, including chicken fat, beef tallow and grease as its feedstock. Comments about U.S. biofuels markets. See Biofuels International. [While the companies complained that the plant needs tax breaks to be successful, Tyson Foods may also be avoiding substantial waste disposal costs.]

"Sonoma Wine Unveils Solar Cogen Installation"—reliability high.
"Sonoma Wine Company is now getting heat and electricity from its 272-kilowatt (kW) solar cogeneration system at its winery operations in Graton, California." The system was installed by Cogenra Solar and "displaces approximately 64,000 kilowatt-hours and 12,500 therms of natural gas annually" under a 15-year heat and power purchase agreement. The Cogenra panels have both PV and solar water heating components. From Environmental Leader. Press release here.

"Asian buyers, emissions in focus at green palm oil meet"—reliability high.
The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil has seen certified palm oil increase to 7% of production driven by European demand. But it wants to get Chinese and Indian buyers, who take 40% of global production, to increase purchases of sustainable oil to keep the certified segment growing. Discussions of problems facing the RSPO and its standards system. Reuters story. [Creating a premium segment within an agricultural commodity market.]

"P2 Web App Calculates Energy Savings for Lighting Retrofits"—reliability high.
"Precision-Paragon (P2), a division of Hubbell Lighting, has launched a free web app that helps business owners calculate energy and cost savings for commercial and industrial lighting upgrades. P2 says about 40 percent of the electricity used in a typical commercial building is consumed by lighting." See Environmental Leader. The calculator is here.

Government and Regulation

"EU adopts stricter rules on industrial emissions"—reliability high.
"New EU legislation adopted today will bring down industrial emissions from large combustion plants across the EU, bringing several environmental and health benefits to Europe's citizens, like an expected reduction in premature deaths of 13,000 per year." More details on the provisions and implementation of the new rules. See Environmental Expert.