Green Energy Resources (GER) provides wood fiber fuels, including wood chips, sawdust and biomass for various applications, including power production and for raw materials for cellulosic ethanol production.  GER’s wood products comply with the Kyoto Protocol and meet all European Union regulatory requirements, so they can be used in the EU as well as the U.S.

GER made news recently when it began offering carbon offset credits to its customers.  These allow companies that operate in markets that have carbon caps to offset any shortfalls in their carbon emissions.

According to the company’s web site, GER’s products are certified with the UTCS eco-mark.  UTCS is an acronym for Urban Tree Certification System.  A recent Reuters article states that GER developed the UTCS certification and describes it this way:

UTCS (urban tree certification system) is a NYS and internationally recognized urban forest management plan developed by GER CEO Joseph Murray.  UTCS certification system is a socially responsible and environmentally friendly methodology to recycle government approved forestry and non-forest industry generated waste wood.  UTCS includes chain of custody documentation (a tracking system from origin to end user) and 3rd party verifications of sourcing.

So GER certifies its own products, which is quite unusual.  I haven’t been able to find any independent verification of the UTCS certification mark, and the description from the Reuters article quoted above is from the “About Green Energy Resources” text which was probably taken from GER’s marketing materials.

A search of the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office’s trademark database reveals that GER has not filed a trademark or certification mark application for UTCS.  Indeed, UTCS wouldn’t be eligible for federal certification mark registration because a certification mark is used not by its owner, but by others whose products or services are certified by the owner of the mark.

LynxStreet.com is a new  web site that serves as an online intellectual property (IP) exchange for environmentally-friendly technology.  The site provides a “virtual trading floor” that links inventors with investors, venture capitalists, governments and others who can provide the resources to commercialize and implement green ideas and technology.  (see the LynxStreet page on Squidoo)

The site is divided into three trading floors:  patents, patents pending and “conceptual,” where inventors can offer their ideas for sale or license.  A prospective buyer can browse such categories as air quality, greenhouse gas reduction, radioactive contamination and waste reduction & recycling.  The site even has want ads so people searching for specific green IP can post their particular needs. 

A one-year membership costs about $50 for either a patent buyer or a patent seller.  LynxStreet charges a $1,090 flate fee for a successful licensing agreement and takes a commission on any successful sale starting at 10% for a sale of up to $1,000 and diminishing as the sale value increases.

LynxStreet’s success may depend on the network effect, i.e., the site will be useful to people only if enough other people use it.  Assuming it does take off, with LynxStreet and the launch of the Eco-Patent Commons (Commons) earlier this year, patent owners now have the tools to either sell their clean technology or donate it while those seeking green ideas can either browse the free green IP through the Commons or search the pay-to-play listings on LynxStreet.  It will be interesting to see which model proves better at implementing clean technology.

The ink had barely dried on Paice LLC’s (Paice) new hybrid vehicle patent when the Florida-based hybrid technology company once again accused Toyota of infringement.  U.S. Patent No. 7,392,871 (’871 patent) issued on July 1st, and Paice filed suit the same day in federal court in Marshall, Texas.

The bare bones complaint (paicecomplaint.pdf) alleges that Toyota directly infringes the ‘871 patent by making and selling the Highlander hybrid SUV and the Lexus RX400h hybrid SUV and that the carmaker induces and contributes to infringement by encouraging others to operate the vehicles.  The complaint asks the court for an injunction, compensatory damages, treble damages for willful infringement and an award of attorney fees.

The ‘871 patent is the latest in a family of patents that cover improvements upon Paice’s U.S. Patent No. 5,343,970 (’970 patent).  The ’871 patent claims a hybrid vehicle having three AC electric motors each with an AC-DC converter. 

The patent explains that providing three motors (one is a starting motor, the other two are traction motors) conveys mechanical and efficiency advantages such as eliminating the need for a fore-and-aft driveshaft and allowing traction control to be centrally accomplished by a microprocessor.

Paice’s assertion of the ‘871 patent opens a new front in a series of battles with Toyota.  Two prior lawsuits involved the ‘970 patent.

In one of those suits, the Prius and other Toyota hybrids were found to infringe and Paice was awarded $4.3 million in damages.  (see my previous posts on that case here, here and here).  Toyota tried to appeal all the way to the Supreme Court, but the Supremes refused to hear the case.  Another suit, also in the Eastern District of Texas, is pending.

I depart from intellectual property issues today to report on a significant environmental law decision out of Georgia that could have major implications for the carbon capture and sequestration market. 

On June 30th, the Fulton County Superior Court overturned a decision of the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) issuing a permit to Longleaf Energy Associates, LLC (Longleaf), a shell company owned by LS Power, to build a 1200 megawatt coal-fired power plant in Early County, Georgia.  (see the Rethink Georgia press release here and the greentech media story here)

The key to Judge Thelma Wyatt Cummings Moore’s decision (longleaf-decision.pdf) was the Supreme Court’s ruling last year in Massachusetts v. EPA that carbon dioxide is an “air pollutant” subject to regulation under the federal Clean Air Act (Act).

Under the Act and the EPA’s regulations, certain areas of the country designated “attainment areas” must keep pollution levels within prescribed air quality limits (Early County is once such attainment area).  This includes the requirement that any new “major emitting facility” (a term that includes fossil fuel-fired electric plants such as the Longleaf facility) obtain a permit and abide by the emissions limitations outlined in the permit.

Major emitting facilities like the Longleaf facility must incorporate the “best available control technology” (BACT) to limit pollution.  This BACT analysis entails a determination by the permitting authority of the maximum reduction of each regulated pollutant for the particular project.  The emissions limitations in the facility’s permit must be set based on that “best available control technology.”

The Sierra Club and the Friends of the Chattahoochee (Petitioners) challenged the Georgia EPD’s decision to issue a permit for construction of the Longleaf plant.  After an EPD administrative law judge (ALJ) dismissed the challenge and upheld the permit, the Petitioners appealed to the Fulton County Superior Court alleging that the ALJ erred by making no findings on, among other things, carbon dioxide emissions, including failing to require that the EPD do a BACT analysis.

The court agreed with Petitioners and found the ALJ’s decision erroneous for deferring to the EPD’s inadequate permitting process.  In particular, the court found that, because carbon dioxide is an air pollutant under the Act, a BACT analysis should have been conducted by the EPD to set a carbon dioxide emissions target for the Longleaf project.

The immediate result is that the Georgia EPD will have to conduct a carbon dioxide emissions analysis, and Longleaf and its developers, LS Power and Dynegy Inc., will have to comply with the resulting emissions target to build the power plant. 

If other states follow the Georgia ruling, future coal-fired power plants will have to be designed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions if they are to gain regulatory approval.  One way to do that is to equip new plants with carbon capture and sequestration technology.  Thus, the decision could increase the demand for the technology and be a welcome boost to the carbon capture industry.

In a recent post, I wrote about one of A123 Systems’ (A123) new products - the Hymotion Plug-in Conversion Module, which can convert the Toyota Prius into a plug-in electric vehicle and boost its mpg to over 100 for the first 30-40 miles of driving.

Last month saw more good news for the Boston area battery maker.  First, the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) announced that it had signed a three-year deal with A123 to support the company’s efforts to develop more powerful and longer lasting batteries for hybrid-electric vehicles.

Under the Cooperative Research and Development Agreement, NREL and A123 will research new techniques for improving thermal management in transportation batteries.

A123 also got a boost for a different application of its battery technology - using batteries to get more power out of the electric grid.  CNET recently reported that some electric utilities (unnamed for now) have made a deal with A123 to use its lithium ion batteries to help stabilize the grid (see the greentech media story).

Several of A123’s patents and applications, including U.S. Patent No. 7,348,101, U.S. Patent No. 7,261,979 and U.S. Application Pub. No. 2007/0166617, cover various aspects of lithium ion battery technology.   A123’s patented battery technology reduces the amount of time necessary for charging and loses relatively little capacity and power over numerous charge/discharge cycles. 

The continuing good news for A123 indicates that the company is widely viewed as a winner.  Significantly for A123, it also demonstrates the versatility of its technology for use in a variety of applications.