Offshore wind power refers to the construction of wind farms in bodies of water to generate electricity from wind. Unlike the term typical usage of the term "offshore" in the marine industry, offshore wind power includes inshore water areas such as lakes, fjords and sheltered coastal areas, utilizing traditional fixed-bottom wind turbine technologies, as well as deep-water areas utilizing floating wind turbines. As of October 2010, 3.16 gigawatt (GW) of offshore wind power capacity was operational, mainly in Northern Europe. More than 16 GW of additional capacity will be installed before the end of 2014 and the United Kingdom and Germany will become the two leading markets. Offshore wind power capacity is expected to reach a total of 75 GW worldwide by 2020.

After a successful tour in 2009 and 2010, with more than 18,000 visitors in 19 cities, The Energy Union Tour will finish up in Brighton and London with an impressive grand finale in March 2011. First up on the final tour schedule is an impressive penultimate event in the coastal city Brighton. This will combine a daytime exhibition and discussion programme (‘Our City, Our Future’) from 1st – 5th March at the Jubilee Library in association with Friends of The Earth, as well a highly anticipated show at Coalition on the 5th of March featuring Coldcut’s Matt Black (Ninja Tune) and the awesome Skrillex on his European debut tour. Following the Week/end in Brighton is the final gig of the UK tour in London on Tuesday, March 8th,, 7pm. Matt Black will be presenting an exclusive Coldcut audiovisual production at the Darwin Lecture Theatre of UCL, in the form of a ground-breaking piece of VJ cinema about Intelligent Energy.

Intelligent Energy can be a source of power for a sensor in a farmer's field or atop a suspension bridge, or for a light switch, cell phone, thermostat or computer keyboard or “for-the-road” products. The example of Logitech's wireless keyboard is just one out of many innovative products, which work without conventional batteries. The trick is to draw small amounts of current from tiny solar arrays, then send the current to products that use power-stingy components. “Renewable Energy” is beginning to have a slightly different meaning for many hardware engineers. For them, it's a matter of putting energy directly into their products, rather than into the electrical grid.

In 2010 large scale photovoltaic (PV) plants with a cumulative power of more than 2 GWp (Giga Watt / Peak) were connected to the grid. Market leader was Germany with more than 1 GWp new power capacity installed, closely followed by Italy and the Czech Republic. Among Asian countries it is worth to mention China with several large scale PV power plants put into service.

Rock and Roll used to be about excess. Loud, sweaty, wild, sexy musicians that didn’t give a damn about anything but making music. Well times have changed. With more and more musicians organizing “carbon neutral tours”, packaging their albums in recycled materials and some are even using solar power to record their music. Possibly using sustainable guitars. “Rolling Stone”, a U.S.-based magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture, recently published a list of the 15 most eco-friendly rockers. The good news is that increasingly artists are attempting to take responsibility and move toward greener alternatives, either by cutting back on their use of harmful products like fuel and plastic or by devoting time and money to promoting environmental causes.

From 29 November to 10 December, environment officials and ministers are meeting in Cancún in Mexico for the UN climate change conference to continue efforts towards an international deal on cutting carbon emissions. They are working on a global agreement to succeed the Kyoto protocol - which came into force in 2005 and commits rich countries to cut their emissions by 2012 - after the talks at Copenhagen last year failed to replace it.

Sad news this time in our Energy Union blog: Hermann Scheer, one of the world’s leading advocates for solar power, has died at the age of sixty-six. The German economist and politician helped make Germany a renewable energy powerhouse and inspired many across the world to expand the use of solar power.

Energy Union presents a newly created Youtube channel on Intelligent Energy. This is the first channel on Youtube concentrating on such a wide range of Energy issues. One of the aims is to filter and curate a quality selection of videos on the following topics: Intelligent Energy: Energy Efficiency / Intelligent Energy: Renewables / Intelligent Energy: Transport / Caution: climate in chaos / Action: what we can do. Currently there are over 130 videos on the channel.

After successful tour stops in Croatia, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Germany, Energy Union is visiting Belgium for a tour stop in Oostende on August 15th as part of the Paulusfeesten Festival.

Worldwide, 2010 is on track to become the warmest year on record. Scientists at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies reported recently that the average global temperature was higher over the past 12 months than during any other 12-month period in history. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has released corroborating data, adding that the past four months, including June, have each individually been the hottest on record as well.

Energy Union is proud to announce a new collaboration: The RES Compass project. It is funded by the European Commission (Intelligent Energy Europe program) and aims to increase the number of qualified people available to meet the emerging demand for renewable energy professional in order to help ensure the success of renewable energy across Europe.

How renewable energies can be used more effectively in the future to transform salty seawater and brackish water into drinking water is the subject of a current study named “ProDes Roadmap” issued by an EU Intelligent Energy initiative led by WIP Munich named “ProDes” (Promotion of Renewable Energy for Water Production through Desalination).

The energy consumption of search engine usage on the Internet has been a hot topic in the beginning of last year, especially for Google. The environmental impact of searches has been analyzed and has led to a story which made world wide news. Since then Google has announced a lot of “green projects” on their website, adding up to their huge corporate solar panel installation in California. Apart from Google many other search engines are on the market and some of them label themselves “eco-friendly” or claim to “safe the rainforest”.

After a successful start of the tour in Croatia and Slovenia, Energy Union is visiting Bulgaria for a tour stop in Sofia on June 19th as part of Park Life Fest. Furthermore Friends of the Earth Bulgaria organize a panel discussion on the topic of “Climate Change and Transport in the Big Cities”.

“Passive Houses” are buildings with an excellent thermal insulation quality, and are equipped with a ventilation system that is able to re-extract thermal energy from the discharged air. Therefore theses buildings work without a conventional heating system, as they take their heat energy from inhabitants (about 70W per person!), solar radiation and a minimal backup system for long cold periods in wintertime.

In April European Renewable Energy Council (EREC), a project partner of Energy Union, outlined in its new report “RE-thinking 2050” a pathway how the European Union can switch to a 100% renewable energy supply for electricity, heating and cooling as well as transport, examining the effects on Europe’s energy supply system and on CO2 emissions.

According to a recently released analysis by the International Energy Agency (IEA) up to a quarter of the global electricity production could be archived through solar electricity by 2050.