It is amazing how some major US corporations go out of their way to set up research and development teams and projects, often doing pure research to bring new innovations to the marketplace.
It has often been said that a well-run R&D program can pay off dividends in multitudes of 10 or even a 100 of the money spent on their research.
It is nice to see that Google is investing heavily on renewable and alternative energy research.
There was a very interesting article published recently in Fast Company Magazine titled; "New Google Research & Development Team Charged with Making Renewable Energy Work for the Market" by Tim Carmody published on June 7, 2011.
"Google's energy investments have always been complicated, between philanthropy & business, trying to be responsible to both shareholders and the planet.
Google wants to take the long view, identifying genuinely transformative possibilities in energy generation and transmission & securing its own high-energy-needs future.
On the other hand, the company is looking for places where it can make an immediate technological impact and generate a solid return on its investment.
" Okay so, Google will be working to develop prototypes mostly wind and solar, but also continued work with things like the Bloom Power Project (fuel cell technologies).
All good, but in my view wind energy just isn't going to do it, and solar will need quite a bit more R and D until the technology is truly viable from a cost standpoint, after all coal, oil, natural gas, is packed pretty tightly with energy.
Thus, it makes more sense to me if the Google Team will take another look at ocean wave energy first.
Why do I believe they should look at ocean wave energy? Because if we are considering wind power, then we should consider that the water in our oceans is 750 times denser than air, and it is a constant flow, unlike the wind which often doesn't blow at all.
Wind power is unreliable, so even if it is made to be more efficient, it can never be the perfect answer to win our alternative energy future.
Now then, I like the idea of energy efficiency, and energy without pollution as much as anybody else, but we need to get down to brass tacks, and back to reality.
We need to do what works, and put our energy and research into places which have the greatest potential for that possible future.
Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think on it.