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What do you, or anyone else, know about Pinacle Digest? Is this outfit legit or just another pump & dump pitch? TIA.
FWIW I hit the recommended button below your comment. Thanks for adding your support to the column.
Your idea sounds good unless it could be considered as extortion. But yes, IRS does reward informers of tax evasion rather than avoidance. I believe avoidance is legal while evasion is not.
Anyone know the outcome of today's lawsuit hearing?
I stuck my toe in the MOSH waters with a small gamble two years ago, with a basis of .15/share, which I still have. My main concern here is that this appears to be akin to a class action suit where nobody but the lawyers gets anything substantial, if at all. Looks like that's not the case here, but stranger things have happened before.
Is this the same judge that is hearing the class action suit? She is also the judge in the MOSH vs. PXD case.
HC Home - HC (A-Z) - Court Agenda - County Directory -
Home | Courts | Civil | Judge Sharon McCally Search
334th Civil Court
Judge Sharon McCally
Harris County Civil Courthouse
201 Caroline, 15th Floor
Houston, Texas 77002
General Civil Court Information
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Court Phone: (713) 368-6500
Clerk: Danielle Jimenez 713-368-6500
Assistant Clerk: Stevens Mathai 713-368-6500
Coordinator: Walter Bucko 713-368-6492
Bailiff: Lloyd Williams 713-368-6503
Court Reporter: Susan Leediker 713-368-6493
Here's the web site link:
http://www.justex.net/Courts/CIVIL/CIVILCourt.aspx?crt=25
Here's a copy of what's on the Anadarko page re: JDZ
Joint Development Zone (JDZ)
165,000 gross acres
JDZ Block 3 - 51% WI; Anadarko operator
1 exploration well in 2007 - 2008
3D seismic reprocessing underway
If you don't mind my asking, who is your broker? I use Scottrade and have had the same problem buying this and other penny stocks online. I've stayed with them so far only because they have an office that I can get to easily.
I tried to place a buy order with Scottrade online tonight and they wouldn't accept the order because there was no bid and ask quoted. What's with that?
Same with Scottrade. eom.
Are you charged a higher commission when you have to call to make a trade instead of doing it online? That's what Scottrade does to me.
Intersting observation from RB's Worldwater (WWAT) board. The implication is that alternative energy is not just an environmental imperative but a national security issue as well.
By: grock_again0
28 Dec 2006, 08:23 AM EST
Msg. 6777 of 6783
Jump to msg. #
New Axis of Oil
President Ahmadinejad of Iran
President Putin of Russia
President Chavez of Venezuela
Cleric Al-Sadr of Iraq
These 4 guys now control a large portion of the world oil. Are these guys friends of the US?
A little competition for WWAT?
Open Energy Corporation Acquires WaterEye And Its Proprietary Remote Water Monitoring Systems
Friday December 22, 8:59 am ET
Company Plans to Demonstrate First Commercial Suncone Desalination Product in the First Quarter of 2007
SOLANA BEACH, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Open Energy Corporation (OTC BB: OEGY - News), a renewable energy company focused on the development of solar technologies that produce renewable energy, fresh water and related resources, today signed a definitive agreement to acquire privately-held WaterEye Corporation in an all stock transaction worth approximately $3 million.
David Saltman, President and CEO of Open Energy Corporation, stated: "This is a strategic acquisition for our company. WaterEye has developed proprietary remote monitoring and display technology for water systems, with customers that include GE Water, Siemens, Dow, Dupont and Poseidon Resources. This same monitoring package will be important as we launch Suncone CSP systems next year."
Saltman continued, "Tom Wolfe, founder and president of WaterEye, will join our management team as Open Energy's Senior Vice President of Engineering and Development. He and his engineering team in Grass Valley are already coordinating with our CTO, Ron Gangemi, to complete the engineering and industrial design of Suncone Desal. We are working to demonstrate our first commercial unit in the first quarter of 2007."
Tom Wolfe commented: "The ability to utilize solar energy to desalinate water is very exciting. Up to 50% of the cost of producing potable water is directly attributable to energy consumption. Many areas of the world where fresh water is most needed lack access to grid power or simply can not afford the costs of diesel fuel. Once we demonstrate the capabilities of SunCone Desal, I think many organizations around the world will take notice."
About Open Energy Corporation
Open Energy Corp. focuses on the development and commercialization of renewable energy products and technologies for a wide range of applications including solar energy, power production, and water desalination. The Company pursues these objectives through acquisitions, strategic partnerships, technology transfer opportunities, and other business strategies. The Company's mission is to harness the power of sun to meet the growing resource demands of sustainable 21st Century development.
About Water Eye
Water Eye is headquartered in Grass Valley, California and provides secure ASP based remote monitoring and diagnostic services to the water and wastewater treatment industries. This proprietary software grew out of the Company's work as system integrators and software developers for ultra pure water systems refineries, power stations, municipal water treatment plants, and high tech manufacturing facilities. WaterEye president Tom Wolfe is one of the pioneers in reverse osmosis technology. He has also designed large and small systems utilizing ion exchange, micro-filtration and thermal disinfection. He is the author of numerous reports and publications in the field.
Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements:
Except for statements of historical fact, the information presented herein constitutes forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the company to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include general economic and business conditions, the ability to acquire and develop specific projects, the ability to fund operations and changes in consumer and business consumption habits and other factors over which Open Energy Corporation has little or no control.
Contact:
Integrated Corporate Relations, Inc.
Investor Relations
John Mills, 310-395-2215
jmills@icrinc.com
or
Media
Michael Fox, 203-682-8230
mfox@icrinc.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: Open Energy Corporation
I like it too, but why no positive market reaction? eom
I wonder why the NR didn't say which city it is, other than "northeast of Mexico City"? Is this already known & have I missed it?
Joe was a candidate for a local office on the Florida ballot. I wonder whether he got elected? That may be why he hasn't been around lately.
Terry Hallinan, are you the former District Attorney for the City of San Francisco Terrence Hallinan?
Nice post, however the country is spelled Colombia and its people are Colombians. I know, picky, picky.
Contentious Solar Licensing Issues Still at Play in California
Last year's solar licensing restrictions were stripped from Million Solar Roofs bill -- well, not exactly.
by Jesse Broehl, Editor, RenewableEnergyAccess.com
August 31, 2006
Should electricians only be doing this work? Surprisingly, that question is still on the table in California.
Los Angeles, California [RenewableEnergyAccess.com] California's solar community is relishing a series of solar energy victories in '06, including the passage and signing last week of SB1, the Million Solar Roofs bill. But there still remain some unanswered questions, chiefly: what happened to last year's well-publicized divisions between labor groups and the solar community over licensing? Well, the good news is that licensing didn't get hijacked in SB1 at the expense of the solar industry as it did last year. The bad news is, it still could.
The bottom line is that there are no concrete items in SB1 that change what type of licensing is required for solar work in California, but the bill instructs the state licensing board to revisit the current guidelines and to make any changes they see fit.
The solar energy and wider environmental community is both impressed and delighted that SB1 was signed into law. It was a long time coming and it's unquestionably the largest piece of solar legislation in the entire nation -- including any federal incentives. And given the size of California's market, it bodes well for the rest of the domestic solar industry. The bill, authored by state Sen. Kevin Murray, struck a successful balance between competing factions -- a feat not achieved in '04 and '05 when similar legislation was brought forward in the state assembly.
One reason it succeeded is that the large, $3.2 billion funding component was approved this past January by the state's Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which is arguably more insulated from special interest leverage. But another key reason SB1 survived the legislative gauntlet this year is that licensing requirements saying who can and cannot install solar photovoltaic (PV) projects were left out.
The quick, essential background is that most solar installers and project integration companies, roughly 300 in the state, perform their work based on a C-46 license. This started out as a solar thermal water license and has evolved to encompass solar photovoltaic (PV).
Last year, when some influential factions of California's major electrical union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), saw the financial size of the solar pot being debated in the legislature, they wanted a piece of the action. The IBEW went on to insist that all future work related to California's Million Solar Roofs bill would have to be done with a C-10 license, a license specific to electricians' work and one that, not coincidentally, most solar installers do not have, and most IBEW members do have. Not surprisingly, the two sides butted heads with animosity and impasse prevailing over negotiation and compromise. With a collapsed consensus, the bill died on the assembly floor by the end of the summer and the legislative session.
Fast forward to this summer where, much to everyone's relief, the same vitriolic topic largely stayed out of the bill -- but not entirely. The bottom line is that there are no concrete items in SB1 that change what type of licensing is required for solar work in California, but the bill instructs the state licensing board to revisit the current guidelines and to make any changes they see fit.
In other words, licensing issues have not gone away but rather are very much in play.
"One thing I think will be very interesting to see played out is this licensing issue. I'm not surprised this was pushed out of the bill," said Aaron Nitzkin, VP of Solar Operations for Old Country Roofing, who recently joined Old Country Roofing to incorporate solar PV into their roofing business.
Nitzkin comes down somewhere on the middle of this debate. He acknowledges it will be a major issue, likely a traumatic one, if there's a push to require a full electrician's license (C-10) for all future California solar work. On the other hand, he feels the barriers to entry on the C-46 license are too low.
Someone like Chris Anderson, Chief Operations Officer at Borrego Solar, a bay-area solar contractor, thinks they're just fine.
"A lot of solar contractors only have the C-46 and many came from the solar thermal side. But the C-46 exam truly addresses both thermal and PV," Anderson said. "And the C-10 I took in 2005 had not a single question related to PV."
Anderson has both a C-46 and a C-10 license, which means he could stand to benefit if some change were made to push out C-46 licenses from solar work, but he is strongly against that. He thinks if the state licensing board considers any changes to the requirements for solar work in California, it should be a mild effort to strengthen the PV side of the C-46 test, but not to try and make the C-10 -- the electrician's gold standard -- into more of a solar test.
Referring to what happened last year, Anderson said, "the labor unions saw the solar industry was about to have lots of dollars pumped into it and they jumped on board. It wasn't for safety, it was basically a way to hijack the process and protect their own interests. I'm happy to see it didn't pass even though I have a C-10."
While the Million Solar Roofs bill recently signed by the Governor didn't include last year's controversial provision, Les Nelson, Executive Director of the California Solar Energy Industries Association, is still concerned that the state licensing board is required to reevaluate the guidelines.
"What SB1 does is revisit the whole thing again as an accommodation to the unions so they can try to see if they can undo the C-46 license again," Nelson said. "There is no question that there has been an effort to make it so only C-10s can put in PV, those are the electrical contractors."
Nelson said the licensing board considered the issue last year when it ruled that both licenses should qualify, but he's worried about them being forced to revisit the issue again because "when you put it back on the burner again, who knows what's going to happen."
With these fears acknowledged, Nelson does take some comfort in the words of Bob Raymer, Technical Director for California's Building Industry Association (CBIA). In his prominent position, Raymer has a good understanding of different and competing industries all lumped within the building industry. He says the CBIA strongly supported the Million Solar Roofs bill, specifically its latest incarnation this year that lacked some hard-to-swallow components including what he called "severe" contractor restrictions.
He said "a host of problems would have arisen" from a provision of requiring only a C-10 license to install solar. "A lot of electricians haven't been on a roof in years. There was a real health and safety concern. We wanted to make sure that you have knowledgeable people with talent and understanding to do the appropriate work."
With regard to the current SB1 law redirecting the debate to the state licensing board, Raymer does not believe the board would put a severe restriction on who can and cannot do solar work in California.
"I don't think you'll see anything odd coming out of this," Raymer said. "You'll probably have three or four licenses that can take part. You're not going to see this limited to C-10."
But like most important solar issues in California, licensing might be one to keep an eye on.
Publisher's note: This is the last article written by Jesse Broehl, Editor, for RenewableEnergyAccess.com. Jesse is moving on to join Windpower Monthly. All of us at RenewableEnergyAccess.com wish him the best and much success.
POST A NEW COMMENT
Reader Comments (1)
Author:
Al Shur
Date Posted:
September 1, 2006
While there are less than 250 C-46 licensees working in California there are over 12,000 C-10's.
Many of the C-10 contractors do some solar projects even though solar may be a small part of their business. Even with this "part time" solar commitment from most C-10's there are over 600 C-10 contractors that do solar work exclusively. There are really two issues here. C-46 license was established more than 2 decades ago for solar hot water. 20+ years ago PV wasn't connected to the grid, today it is! Almost all of the systems are connected to the utility electric grid and have lethal voltages available to the installer, the customer, and workers working for the utilities.
The C-10 license is not the real issue. The issue is that employees working for a C-10 solar contractor must meet a minimum standard of expertise/training and the C-46 contractors oppose this!
How can we build a sustainable environment without building a sustainable economy for the workers involved?
Comment 1 of 1
Contentious Solar Licensing Issues Still at Play in California
Last year's solar licensing restrictions were stripped from Million Solar Roofs bill -- well, not exactly.
by Jesse Broehl, Editor, RenewableEnergyAccess.com
August 31, 2006
Should electricians only be doing this work? Surprisingly, that question is still on the table in California.
Los Angeles, California [RenewableEnergyAccess.com] California's solar community is relishing a series of solar energy victories in '06, including the passage and signing last week of SB1, the Million Solar Roofs bill. But there still remain some unanswered questions, chiefly: what happened to last year's well-publicized divisions between labor groups and the solar community over licensing? Well, the good news is that licensing didn't get hijacked in SB1 at the expense of the solar industry as it did last year. The bad news is, it still could.
The bottom line is that there are no concrete items in SB1 that change what type of licensing is required for solar work in California, but the bill instructs the state licensing board to revisit the current guidelines and to make any changes they see fit.
The solar energy and wider environmental community is both impressed and delighted that SB1 was signed into law. It was a long time coming and it's unquestionably the largest piece of solar legislation in the entire nation -- including any federal incentives. And given the size of California's market, it bodes well for the rest of the domestic solar industry. The bill, authored by state Sen. Kevin Murray, struck a successful balance between competing factions -- a feat not achieved in '04 and '05 when similar legislation was brought forward in the state assembly.
One reason it succeeded is that the large, $3.2 billion funding component was approved this past January by the state's Public Utilities Commission (PUC), which is arguably more insulated from special interest leverage. But another key reason SB1 survived the legislative gauntlet this year is that licensing requirements saying who can and cannot install solar photovoltaic (PV) projects were left out.
The quick, essential background is that most solar installers and project integration companies, roughly 300 in the state, perform their work based on a C-46 license. This started out as a solar thermal water license and has evolved to encompass solar photovoltaic (PV).
Last year, when some influential factions of California's major electrical union, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), saw the financial size of the solar pot being debated in the legislature, they wanted a piece of the action. The IBEW went on to insist that all future work related to California's Million Solar Roofs bill would have to be done with a C-10 license, a license specific to electricians' work and one that, not coincidentally, most solar installers do not have, and most IBEW members do have. Not surprisingly, the two sides butted heads with animosity and impasse prevailing over negotiation and compromise. With a collapsed consensus, the bill died on the assembly floor by the end of the summer and the legislative session.
Fast forward to this summer where, much to everyone's relief, the same vitriolic topic largely stayed out of the bill -- but not entirely. The bottom line is that there are no concrete items in SB1 that change what type of licensing is required for solar work in California, but the bill instructs the state licensing board to revisit the current guidelines and to make any changes they see fit.
In other words, licensing issues have not gone away but rather are very much in play.
"One thing I think will be very interesting to see played out is this licensing issue. I'm not surprised this was pushed out of the bill," said Aaron Nitzkin, VP of Solar Operations for Old Country Roofing, who recently joined Old Country Roofing to incorporate solar PV into their roofing business.
Nitzkin comes down somewhere on the middle of this debate. He acknowledges it will be a major issue, likely a traumatic one, if there's a push to require a full electrician's license (C-10) for all future California solar work. On the other hand, he feels the barriers to entry on the C-46 license are too low.
Someone like Chris Anderson, Chief Operations Officer at Borrego Solar, a bay-area solar contractor, thinks they're just fine.
"A lot of solar contractors only have the C-46 and many came from the solar thermal side. But the C-46 exam truly addresses both thermal and PV," Anderson said. "And the C-10 I took in 2005 had not a single question related to PV."
Anderson has both a C-46 and a C-10 license, which means he could stand to benefit if some change were made to push out C-46 licenses from solar work, but he is strongly against that. He thinks if the state licensing board considers any changes to the requirements for solar work in California, it should be a mild effort to strengthen the PV side of the C-46 test, but not to try and make the C-10 -- the electrician's gold standard -- into more of a solar test.
Referring to what happened last year, Anderson said, "the labor unions saw the solar industry was about to have lots of dollars pumped into it and they jumped on board. It wasn't for safety, it was basically a way to hijack the process and protect their own interests. I'm happy to see it didn't pass even though I have a C-10."
While the Million Solar Roofs bill recently signed by the Governor didn't include last year's controversial provision, Les Nelson, Executive Director of the California Solar Energy Industries Association, is still concerned that the state licensing board is required to reevaluate the guidelines.
"What SB1 does is revisit the whole thing again as an accommodation to the unions so they can try to see if they can undo the C-46 license again," Nelson said. "There is no question that there has been an effort to make it so only C-10s can put in PV, those are the electrical contractors."
Nelson said the licensing board considered the issue last year when it ruled that both licenses should qualify, but he's worried about them being forced to revisit the issue again because "when you put it back on the burner again, who knows what's going to happen."
With these fears acknowledged, Nelson does take some comfort in the words of Bob Raymer, Technical Director for California's Building Industry Association (CBIA). In his prominent position, Raymer has a good understanding of different and competing industries all lumped within the building industry. He says the CBIA strongly supported the Million Solar Roofs bill, specifically its latest incarnation this year that lacked some hard-to-swallow components including what he called "severe" contractor restrictions.
He said "a host of problems would have arisen" from a provision of requiring only a C-10 license to install solar. "A lot of electricians haven't been on a roof in years. There was a real health and safety concern. We wanted to make sure that you have knowledgeable people with talent and understanding to do the appropriate work."
With regard to the current SB1 law redirecting the debate to the state licensing board, Raymer does not believe the board would put a severe restriction on who can and cannot do solar work in California.
"I don't think you'll see anything odd coming out of this," Raymer said. "You'll probably have three or four licenses that can take part. You're not going to see this limited to C-10."
But like most important solar issues in California, licensing might be one to keep an eye on.
Publisher's note: This is the last article written by Jesse Broehl, Editor, for RenewableEnergyAccess.com. Jesse is moving on to join Windpower Monthly. All of us at RenewableEnergyAccess.com wish him the best and much success.
POST A NEW COMMENT
Reader Comments (1)
Author:
Al Shur
Date Posted:
September 1, 2006
While there are less than 250 C-46 licensees working in California there are over 12,000 C-10's.
Many of the C-10 contractors do some solar projects even though solar may be a small part of their business. Even with this "part time" solar commitment from most C-10's there are over 600 C-10 contractors that do solar work exclusively. There are really two issues here. C-46 license was established more than 2 decades ago for solar hot water. 20+ years ago PV wasn't connected to the grid, today it is! Almost all of the systems are connected to the utility electric grid and have lethal voltages available to the installer, the customer, and workers working for the utilities.
The C-10 license is not the real issue. The issue is that employees working for a C-10 solar contractor must meet a minimum standard of expertise/training and the C-46 contractors oppose this!
How can we build a sustainable environment without building a sustainable economy for the workers involved?
Comment 1 of 1
From today's San Francisco Chronicle
Free wireless a high-wire act
MetroFi needs to draw enough ads to make service add profits
Ryan Kim, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, August 21, 2006
It used to be that laptop owners were just tickled to find a free wireless Internet hot spot.
But what was once a freebie limited to cafes, hotels and airports is now spreading citywide.
For that you can thank Google, which earlier this year won a bid with Earthlink to offer free Wi-Fi in San Francisco. The search engine company also started a free Wi-Fi service in its hometown of Mountain View last week.
Its pioneering work has helped highlight a trend within the municipal wireless movement: free citywide Wi-Fi. And no company has done more in this area than MetroFi, a startup also headquartered in Mountain View.
The 4-year-old company, the brainchild of former Covad executives, is aggressively promoting a service in which advertisers pay the bills while consumers get free broadband throughout a wide coverage area.
Industry observers are closely watching MetroFi to see if the free Wi-Fi service will soar or crash, taking the company with it. Critics wonder whether the model can generate enough advertising to turn a profit and whether companies like MetroFi have enough capital to build their networks.
So far, MetroFi has erected a huge network in the South Bay that covers most of Santa Clara, Sunnyvale and Cupertino and includes downtown San Jose -- a contiguous zone that the company says reaches 250,000 people, more than any other single Wi-Fi service in the country.
The company, which has free wireless networks in several areas in San Francisco, is working on a project in Foster City. In addition, it recently won a contract to set up a free network in Portland, Ore., and is preparing to establish a network in Concord. It also has bids out on a handful of California municipal projects, including Sacramento, Riverside and Santa Monica.
MetroFi's network is easy to use. Once users log on, they are greeted by a short ad and then a permanent advertising bar that runs along the top inch of their browser. The ads are swapped regularly and feature promotions from local accountants, car dealerships and Toshiba and Sony. Users can download files at a speed of 1 megabit per second (256 kilobits per second for uploads), which is comparable to DSL and faster than the 300 kilobits per second promised by Google in San Francisco.
MetroFi Chief Executive Officer Chuck Haas said that users can immediately appreciate free Wi-Fi and there's no reason a company can't survive by giving people what they want.
"There is no proven Wi-Fi model yet, but we believe free is the best. Everyone loves free. You don't have to pull out your credit card if you just want to use your laptop," said Haas. "If you're on for an hour at Starbucks, our incremental cost is zero. We may have made only a dime or a quarter off of you, but do that many times and you can see that's a good business model."
The gospel of free city Wi-Fi is finding eager converts. Portland selected MetroFi in part because of its free service. Concord officials said they are offering MetroFi a franchise for the same reason. Silicon Valley leaders, who are trying to build a huge outdoor network from Daly City to Santa Cruz, recently narrowed their list of finalists to three vendors, including MetroFi, partly because they all said they could offer a free level of service.
And in one of the more publicized cases, Sacramento officials reopened bidding for a citywide project earlier this year. They had selected vendor MobilePro to build the network, but said that after seeing Google and MetroFi plans for free service elsewhere, they wanted a free network, something MobilePro said it could not deliver.
"We felt that if other jurisdictions can achieve a perceived higher level of service, in order to really benefit our citizens we should be demanding more of our vendors," said Dean Peckham, senior project manager for Sacramento's economic development department.
MetroFi is already gaining a loyal following. Bill Shafer, a Seattle businessman who was visiting customers in Silicon Valley, recently stopped by a Cupertino Starbucks. After struggling to get Internet access with his paid T-Mobile hot spot account, Shafer went looking for other networks and found MetroFi's system.
"It was the first thing that came up and it had the strongest connection," Shafer said. "It's great. It's free, so I don't have to pay."
Scott Pettersen, a 50-year-old high-tech marketing writer from San Jose, said the advertising is pleasantly subtle and doesn't interfere with his online browsing.
"The ads are not obtrusive, they don't hit you over the head," said Pettersen, who logs on from various coffee shops. "It's subtle so I don't mind."
Gaining popularity
While subscription services are still the rule in most cities and are being rolled out in Philadelphia and Anaheim, some observers said the free movement is likely to be more popular as more cities adopt it. There are about 250 municipal projects under way across the country. IDC estimates the market will grow from $88 million this year to $512 million by 2010.
"If they can do it in Portland, cities will ask, why not here?" said Esme Voss, founder of muniwireless.com. Cities often copy each other's bid requests, she said, so when free service is requested by one, the next city will do the same.
But other analysts say municipal wireless networks are still too new to determine whether advertising can support a free service. Craig Settles, who runs Successful.com, a municipal wireless consulting firm, conducted a survey of 176 businesses in July and found that 57 percent would be unwilling to advertise on free networks. And many businesses said they would be willing to spend less than $100 a month on ads.
"It's not that a free network can't work, but it's more a question of has your city proven its consumers and businesses can support a free network," Settles said.
Godfrey Chua, a wireless analyst at IDC, said it's going to be challenging for companies like MetroFi that don't enjoy brand recognition like Earthlink, which charges for Wi-Fi subscriptions. And, Chua said, the company hasn't reached a position where it can enjoy economies of scale to lower operating costs.
"MetroFi is out ahead of the pack pitching this business model," Chua said. "They're the guinea pig. Whether it works, we'll just have to see."
But Haas, for one, isn't worried. Although he won't share financial or customer information, he said the company will turn a profit soon. It has a stable of more than 100 advertisers who pay between a few dollars and $150 for every thousand consumer views.
Paid service available
In addition to its free product, MetroFi operates a $20-per-month advertising-free service with full customer support, which accounts for 5 to 10 percent of its users.
The company said that it can also make money by turning its city partners into major customers. Portland, for example, said it will pay up to $16 million in the first five years to provide the network for municipal workers.
But ultimately, Haas said, MetroFi will succeed because equipment costs are low and customer-acquisition costs are almost zero because the company doesn't advertise. Unlike traditional telecom companies that build wire-based networks that must be placed underground, Wi-Fi providers can get started more cheaply by placing antennas atop light poles.
And because most customers don't require billing or customer support, the company can concentrate on providing the service without incurring a lot of operating costs.
"If we were DSL or cable, none of those have cost structures that allow you to do it free. Wi-Fi does," Haas said. "The capital is less than the operating expense because you don't have big license fees and no cable or fiber in the ground."
Other companies are taking note of the free trend.
For its bid in Riverside, MetroFi is teaming up with AT&T, one of a handful of partnerships the telecom giant has struck with Wi-Fi providers this year. AT&T officials said they chose MetroFi, in part, to gauge the success of its free service.
AnchorFree, a Sunnyvale company that offers five free neighborhood hot spots in San Francisco, is now making the transition to free citywide projects.
"If you look at the Internet, everything is free. It seems like the new Web is all about that," said Denis Hiller, a spokesman for AnchorFree. "If you give people what they want they will suck it up and generating money won't be an issue."
MetroFi has big plans
The Mountain View Internet provider operates free wireless broadband services that reach 250,000 people in the Bay Area, including Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Cupertino, downtown Concord, downtown San Jose and select hot spots in San Francisco, such as the Civic Center, Ferry Building and Portsmouth Square in the Financial District. It is setting up free wireless networks in Foster City, Corona (Riverside County), Ontario (San Bernardino County), Portland, Ore., Aurora, Ill., Naperville, Ill., and Plano, Texas.
E-mail Ryan Kim at rkim@sfchronicle.com.
Thanks, I guess I just got excited over old news. eom
I couldn't tell from reading about these sales when they took place? This quarter, last one or ? Anyone know when the sales went on the books? TIA
Wolfin, thanks for the info. eom
I wonder if Mobilepro is involved in this Oakland study.
By Barbara Grady, Business Writer
Inside Bay Area, Oakland Tribune August 7, 2006
OAKLAND officials are thinking of joining the WiFi age and deploying a municipal wireless network to give their citizens and workers free Internet access.
WiFi networks allow people to access the Internet from various "hot spots" around a city from laptops or handheld wireless devices without plugging into a jack or needing a specific Internet service account. Commercial WiFi hot spots exist in hotels and coffee shops in most cities, including Oakland.
But free municipal WiFi networks, which are under planning in major cities from San Francisco to Philadelphia, are designed to give broad Internet access coverage from outdoor and indoor locations across a city.
Only a handful of smaller cities have WiFi networks up and running — such as in Cupertino, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale in the Bay Area; and Tempe, Ariz., and St. Cloud, Fla., elsewhere. No major cities have them yet.
In Philadelphia and San Francisco, the plans are based on a desire to bring more citizens into the digital age and help city departments with mobile workers such as police, fire, public works and recreation workers. San Francisco also hopes to extend its sparkle as a technology leader.
In Oakland, an informal group of city officials, tech-savvy citizens, school officials, librarians and business people have been meeting regularly for several months to figure out how to move Oakland to a WiFi future.
"We are in the very early stages," said Bob Glaze, Oakland's chief technology officer, who heads this group. "We've gone out and taken a look at what other cities have done, at other initiatives out there," he said.
A major step was reached in July when the group persuaded a committee of the Oakland City Council to fund a "needs assessment" study and find a consultant to help Oakland determine what kind — as in size and architecture — of WiFi network it needs.
Technically, WiFi networks are wireless local area networks or LANS created by installing wireless digital signal access nodes on high buildings to receive and transmit signals to devices, much the way cellular towers transmit signals for cell phones. WiFi nodes are spaced farther apart than cellular nodes and presumably have greater capacity, so they're cheaper to deploy. Also, WiFi is a digital connection, using the 802.11 standard, and thus is geared to Internet access and use of the Internet for transmission.
Still, because WiFi is so new, there are varying technologies for a city to choose from such as Wireless Mesh or WiMAX, two variations of WiFi that differ in the area covered and in reliability.
These wireless Internet access technologies could bring what landline technologies of digital subscriber lines and cable modems now bring to customers who pay for them. Part of the incentive for municipal WiFi is to "bridge the digital divide" that keeps people who can't afford $30 or so a month for Internet access from a phone or cable company from having high-speed Internet access.
Based on the planning done by Philadelphia, one of the first large U.S. cities to plan a WiFi network, a WiFi network can be deployed for about $50,000 per square mile and could be provided to that entire city for $7 million to $10 million.
Cities that have begun planning WiFi networks have devised ways to pay for them. The San Francisco and Philadelphia plans involve a mix of free and subscription services, starting with basic free Internet access for all and then
WIFIIBusiness 2offering a higher speed service for those who want to pay. The paying service would be the revenue needed to build and maintain the network.
EarthLink Inc., of Atlanta, is the vendor supplying many of the WiFi networks under development, including one just finished in Anaheim and the ones planned in Philadelphia and Milpitas. EarthLink also won the bid with partner Google Inc. of Mountain View to build San Francisco's network. Another network provider, MetroFi Inc. of Mountain View, is supplying networks to Cupertino, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale.
A group called the Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force has received seven bids to build and operate a giant WiFi network across many towns, stretching from San Mateo south to Santa Cruz and east to Fremont.
The Berkeley City Council is considering whether to build a WiFi network and Boston is considering putting a nonprofit corporation in charge of building and operating a citywide WiFi system.
Oakland's ad hoc committee, which Glaze heads, includes entrepreneur Anietie Ekanem, who has built a WiFi network in West Oakland that provides inexpensive wireless Internet access and is deploying WiFi networks in Africa. Ekanem is providing the committee with the technical know-how his company, Wireless Africa Inc., has developed in building networks.
The Oakland committee group also includes people from the chamber of commerce who have been talking with local businesses to get a sense of their needs. Businesses, schools, libraries, universities and neighborhood nonprofits will be surveyed about how they might use a wireless network and if they'd be willing to support it financially — that is through advertising or subscriptions.
"They'll do a stakeholder analysis," said Scott Peterson, director of public policy at the Oakland Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce. "We'd like this to be something that addresses all the different parts of the community, residents, businesses, students, city services."
Oakland already knows it wants its network to bring Internet access to poorer neighborhoods, Glaze said. "Some neighborhoods have no DSL and no wireless" access because commercial providers have not made it available.
If "needs assessment" sounds like government bureaucracy in process, it's actually said to be a very important step in the WiFi business.
That's because WiFi networks are a new phenomenon — only a few suburban networks are already up and running across the country, though hundreds are in the planning/building stages. Consequently, there's little history to say which WiFi business model and architectural plan works best.
"We're learning vicariously from San Francisco, which found out pretty quickly you just don't start shooting out radio waves and everybody is connected," Peterson said. San Francisco received six bids from network vendors willing to build and operate WiFi and in April it chose a joint bid from Google and EarthLink, which plan to deploy a network that will be free to all, with a faster service option for those who want to pay. Terms of this contract are still being negotiated with San Francisco city officials.
Most cities have grappled with the question of how to financially support a WiFi network. Some cities, such as Anaheim and St. Cloud, Fla., are not offering a free network, just one that is cheaper to access than commercial wireline varieties. Another model proposed in some cities — and which Google first proposed for San Francisco — is free access for everyone that would be supported by advertising that shows up on screens when users access the Internet.
Then there are questions of how big a network should be.
"You really need to tailor this to your own city. That is why you have to get the needs assessment in first," Glaze said.
Craig Settles, an Oakland resident who runs a national consulting service on WiFi and who has written a book about it, said the lesson in WiFi plans to date as it sweeps the country is that one size — or plan — does not fit all.
"The first driver of needs depends on the city," Settles said. "If you take some other city's model or some other city's RFP and drop it in, that won't work," he continued. RFP refers to request for proposals with specifications of what gear and capacity is wanted.
In Philadelphia and San Francisco, the stated goal of the WiFi network is to bring all citizens into the digital age, since some cannot afford commercial connections to the Internet, and to improve city services that depend on mobility, like public works and emergency services.
In Anaheim, by contrast, the driver was to improve tourism, the city's main industry. Anaheim is the home of Disneyland.
Glaze said Oakland also envisions medical uses and school information dissemination as key uses in Oakland.
To determine if a WiFi network would really be useful in these situations, the committee decided it will solicit proposals for pilot projects from schools and nonprofits on using a free municipal wireless network to improve some function.
With all this studying going on, when might Oakland actually see a municipal WiFi network?
"My optimistic estimate is the that by the end of 2007 we'll see active stuff out there — a vendor out there installing it," Glaze said. "If we can truly do a good assessment and be clear on what the needs are, this is doable."
Business Writer Barbara Grady can be reached at (510) 208-6427 or bgrady@angnewspapers.com.
They have 4 days or what?
DOE Publishes Research on Cellulosic Ethanol's Potential
July 12, 2006
Washington, DC [RenewableEnergyAccess.com] The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released an ambitious research agenda for the development of cellulosic ethanol as an alternative to gasoline. The report outlines a detailed research plan for developing new technologies to transform cellulosic ethanol -- a renewable, cleaner-burning, and carbon-neutral alternative to gasoline -- into an economically viable transportation fuel.
"Biofuels represent a tremendous opportunity to move our nation toward a reduced dependence on imported oil."
-- Alexander Karsner, DOE Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy The 200-page scientific roadmap cites recent advances in biotechnology that have made cost-effective production of ethanol from cellulose, or inedible plant fiber, an attainable goal. Cellulosic ethanol is derived from the fibrous, woody portions of plant matter (biomass).
"Cellulosic ethanol has the potential to be a major source for transportation fuel for America's energy future," said Under Secretary for Science Raymond L. Orbach. "Low production cost and high efficiency require transformational changes in processing cellulose to ethanol. DOE's Genomics: GTL program is poised to help do just that."
The roadmap, which responds directly to the goal recently announced by Secretary of Energy Samuel W. Bodman of displacing 30 percent of 2004 transportation fuel consumption with biofuels by 2030 that was set in response to the President's Advanced Energy Initiative, identifies the research required for overcoming challenges to the large-scale production of cellulosic ethanol to help meet this goal. This would include maximizing biomass feedstock productivity, developing better processes by which to break down cellulosic materials into sugars, and optimizing the fermentation process to convert sugars to ethanol.
The focus of the research plan is to use advances in biotechnology -- first developed in the Human Genome Project and continued in the Genomics: GTL program in the Department's Office of Science -- to jump-start a new fuel industry whose products can be transported, stored and distributed with only modest modifications to the existing infrastructure and has the ability to fuel many of today's vehicles.
The new roadmap was developed during a December 2005 workshop hosted jointly by the Office of Biological and Environmental Research in the Office of Science and the Office of the Biomass Program in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE). The success of the plan relies heavily on the continuation of the partnership between the two offices established at that workshop.
"Biofuels represent a tremendous opportunity to move our nation toward a reduced dependence on imported oil," DOE Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Alexander Karsner said. "We fully intend to use all of our resources and talent to support the President's goal of breaking our addiction to oil, while also enhancing our energy security."
Citgo to stop selling gas to U.S. stations
From Associated Press via Yahoo!
Venezuela-owned Citgo Petroleum Corp. has decided to stop distributing gasoline to some 1,800 U.S. stations, shedding a lackluster segment of its business while forcing the owners of those stations to find other suppliers.
While it may create some logistical headaches for gasoline retailers in the short term, the move should not have any impact on the nation's overall fuel supply.
Citgo, which is wholly owned by Venezuela's state oil company, currently has to purchase 130,000 barrels a day from third parties in order to meet its service contracts at 13,100 stations across the U.S. This is less profitable than selling gasoline directly from its refineries.
Instead, the Houston-based company has decided to sell to retailers only the 750,000 barrels a day that it produces at three U.S. refineries in Lake Charles, La., Corpus Christi, Texas and Lemont, Ill., according to a statement late Tuesday.
That will mean that over the next year Citgo will cease distributing gasoline in 10 states and stop supplying some stations in four additional states, Citgo spokesman Fernando Garay said Wednesday.
Chavez has long claimed that parts of Citgo's business produce losses for Venezuela and constitute a subsidy for the U.S. economy.
Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez has also charged that Citgo isn't profitable enough and that its parent, state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA, could at some point sell off some of the company's refineries.
However, in a sign of the apparently lucrative relationship between the two companies, PDVSA announced Wednesday that it has so far earned $400 million in dividends this year from Citgo.
The states where Citgo will stop selling gasoline are: Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma and South Dakota. A limited number of stations in Illinois, Texas, Arkansas and Iowa will also be affected.
Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter and the U.S. is its top buyer. The United States relied on Venezuela for about 11 percent of its oil supply in 2005.
Scientists turning stalk into bio-oil
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-06-30 06:42
Scientists from the University of Science and Technology of China said Thursday they have made a breakthrough in reducing the cost of converting crop stalks, chaff and sawdust into bio-oil, an alternative source of energy.
Bio-oil produced with the scientists' technology is 56.8 percent cheaper than diesel oil and 39.1 percent cheaper than heavy oil, said Professor Guo Qingxiang with the Biomass Clean Energy Laboratory of the university, in east China's Anhui Province.
Guo pointed out, however, that bio-oil only produces two fifths of the heat from the same amount of diesel oil and only half that of heavy oil, Guo said.
The technology, which can produce more than 6 kg of bio-oil from 10 kg of sawdust and 5 kg from stalks, has passed appraisals by the provincial department of science and technology, Guo said.
Producing one ton of bio-oil in the Chinese lab only costs about 100 U.S. dollars.
The lab also invented a machine that can process 120 kg of biomass per hour.
Scientists in a number of countries began researching how to convert biomass into an liquid energy source in the 1980's. The process is known as pyrolysis liquefaction technologies, which decompose biomass using heat which then turns it into liquid. The high cost of conversion has so far prevented scientists from making an economically feasible energy product.
Some scientists in the Netherlands and Germany are also doing research in the field, Guo said.
"The Chinese government will subsidize the application of the lab's technologies," said Cui Weiping, an official with the office of countryside energy of Anhui Province.
More than 700 million tons of stalk and chaff are left over from harvest every year. Traditionally they were burned, causing not only pollution but also a huge waste of energy, according to Guo.
Bio-oil can be used directly in heating boilers and as fuel for motor vehicles after further refining. Ethanol can also be extracted from bio-oil.
A little competition coming?
WASHINGTON, June 30 (Reuters) - First Solar Inc., which makes solar modules using a proprietary thin film semiconductor technology, said on Friday it is planning an initial public offering of as much as $250 million in common stock.
Credit Suisse and Morgan Stanley will underwrite the IPO, according to a preliminary offering document filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
It said it is seeking a Nasdaq listing under the symbol "FSLR." (FSLR.O: Quote, Profile, Research)
Does anyone know what the Yuma City Council decided as to whether to reopen bidding?
Naval Facilities Engineering Command
https://portal.navfac.navy.mil/portal/page?_pageid=181,3446360,181_5049637&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
I would nominate Ossie Davis or Morgan Freeman for the part.
Well, I guess he should know:
I don't know how old this article is, "Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican who is the leading voice in Congress for more fences, said the costs of building fences are much lower than the government expenses associated with illegal immigration, including huge sums spent on incarcerating immigrants convicted of crimes in the United States."
Former Congressman Hunter is now sitting in jail having been convicted of accepting bribes and kickbacks. I just love it when these corrupt politicians, who always complain about poor people trying to find a better life, are found to be criminals themselves.
Thanks, I'm in northern California, but where's the map?
Works for me! Thanks.
New Map for ERHE Shareholders
Good morning,
I've just created a map for ERHE shareholders to show ERHC Energy company offices, Nigeria and Sao Tome locations and shareholder home Zip Codes. Unfortunately the mapping program doesn't have the capability to show the JDZ blocks, but I'm hoping that shareholders will add their Zip to the map. You don't have to give out your real name, just use an alias if you want to. This way we can see what parts of the world we live in and make it easier to see how to get together regionally. Let's watch our company grow!
Log onto:
www.frappr com/erhcenergyowners (Insert the dot before com)
New Map for ERHE Shareholders
Good morning,
I've just created a map for ERHE shareholders to show ERHC Energy company offices, Nigeria and Sao Tome locations and shareholder home Zip Codes. Unfortunately the mapping program doesn't have the capability to show the JDZ blocks, but I'm hoping that shareholders will add their Zip to the map. You don't have to give out your real name, just use an alias if you want to. This way we can see what parts of the world we live in and make it easier to see how to get together regionally. Let's watch our company grow!
Log onto:
www.frappr com/erhcenergyowners (Insert the dot before com)
Open Energy (OEGY), formerly Barnabus Energy, is now on Raging Bull.
http://ragingbull.lycos com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=OEGY
(add the dot before com)
A new map has been created for shareholders to show where Open Energy, formerly Baranabus Energy Inc., projects and shareholders are located. Add your Zip Code to the map and include project locations I've omitted. Let's watch our company grow!
Log on to www.frappr com/openenergyshareholders (add the dot before com).
A new MOBL shareholders map has been created. Check out the web site below and add your city to the map. Let's see where we are. TIA
www.frappr com/mobileprocorporationshareholders
Add . before com