Helios Power has been a strategic partner for the company in Bulgarian market starting from 2010. Since the beginning of 2012, China Sunergy has shipped a total of 22.32 MW to Bulgaria, on top of 18MW sold last year, which accounted for above 30% of the Bulgarian market in 2011.

Bulgaria’s solar market has gained pace since the country introduced a preferential feed-in-tariff in December 2006 and entered the European Union in January 2007. The first renewable energy projects were hydro-electric and wind, followed by solar, for which the country’s southern part with relatively warmer climate is well-suited. In recent years, Bulgaria’s energy grid has experienced some instability as demand sometimes outpaces supply during the daytime.  Power generated by solar installations has helped to moderate the supply of electricity to the grid.  Solar power industry has experienced rapid growth in Bulgaria, and companies like Mitsubishi and Helios Power have partnered to develop large-scale solar projects.

Yerussalimovo Solar Plant is located in the vicinities of Yerussalimovo Village, Southern Bulgaria. “This Solar Plant is the seventh of a series of PV projects that we plan to develop in the next couple of years. We rely on China Sunergy’s efficient products and services to achieve high project performance, and ultimately to guarantee the outcome of investments,” said Mr. Ivo Georgiev, Managing Director of Solaren Park Bulgaria EAD, which is a subsidiary of Helios Power.

Mr. Stephen Cai, CEO of China Sunergy commented, “We have built up a very large market share in Bulgaria. Our 18MW in shipments last year comprised nearly 32% of this market, which, according to the latest Solarbuzz report, totaled about 57MW in 2011. The Bulgarian market is forecasted by the same report to increase to 2.7 times last year’s level, to 152MW, in 2012. We hope to continue to maintain 30% market share this year, even considering the tripled market size. Bulgaria is a great example of high potential emerging markets for China Sunergy, and we believe we can build on the solid relationships we have there to sell more in the future.”

Source: China Sunergy Co., Ltd/PRNewswire-Asia

The panda-loving Chinese entrepreneur will place profits into an environmental fund and lower prices later on depending on the success of its iconic ingredient. Built on the lands of mainland China in the mountains of Ya’an in the Sichuan province, Panda Tea – as it is called – is set to be the next big thing.

This week Mr. An appeared in a panda suit selling his tea batches for £43,800 ($70,250) per kg. Explaining his reasoning for the extravagant price tag, An said: “Pandas absorb less than 30 percent of the nutrition from their food, and that means more than 70 percent of the nutrients are passed out in their faeces.”

Guinness World Records have declared his tea the most expensive in the world. One tea bag purchase is equivalent to 5,280 PG Tip tea bags in the UK.

Mr. An hopes his idea will help push more people in China to be more creative in their business ventures and ignite a trend to help their own country by taking responsibility and tackling individual environment issues.

“I just want to convey to the people of the world the message of turning waste into something useful, and the culture of recycling and using organic fertilisers,” An told the Telegraph.

The tea is described to be ‘fragrant’ and ‘smooth’, but many of those invited to try out the first batch of Panda Tea question whether the high price isn’t just a temporary hype.

Panda Tea is now available for purchase.

MidAmerican plans to build 176 wind turbines in Iowa by the end of 2012, which is a combination of the recent acquisitions of RPM Access’s 103.5 megawatt wind project, the 200.1-megawatt Eclipse Wind Farm and 101.2-megawatt Morning Light project from Clipper Windpower Development Group.

Earlier in December 2011, MidAmerican agreed to buy Topaz Solar Farm, a solar power farm situated between Los Angeles and California, worth $2 billion and the second largest solar plant under construction in the world.

Then by late January 2012, Buffett – the world’s third richest man – announced the formation of a new branch focused on the development of modern renewable energy. Its four units involve solar, wind, hydro and geothermal energy.

MidAmerican’s wind generation will total at 2,284.8 megawatts with the Iowa wind projects up and running. The Topaz Solar Farm on the other hand is expected to run from 2015, and will produce enough energy to power 160,000 homes.

Once the newest projects are completed, Buffett would have invested $9 billion in solar and wind utilities, with $4 billion in wind power investment in Iowa alone.

Foot Locker's Shoe Swap campaign – Photo courtesy of Foot Locker

Foot Locker are aiming to recycle 20,000 pair of old trainers into new products.

If you still have your old trainers reserved for the odd garden run, the cash-back scheme will be available throughout 67 stores across the UK until 8 April 2012.

Roughly 330 million pairs of trainers and shoes are purchased in the UK every year. The Salvation Army has reported that over 100 million pairs of footwear are thrown into UK landfills. This is equivalent to around 1.5 billion gallons of oil.

This is the second time the shoe recycling scheme is running with the help of I:Collect. Last year they helped transform up to 10,000 shoes into new products.

Paul Doertenbach from I:Collect said that the initiative is designed to raise awareness about the billions of tonnes of apparels and shoes that are thrown into UK landfills. “Rather than throw away old shoes and clothes, we are trying to highlight that these discarded objects can be reused,” he explained.

Customers can get a maximum of two vouchers per day per person to be spent on the day itself. Foot Locker will recycle every old shoe into a new product.

It makes Greenpeace wonder.

Year after year they commissioned a report into the greenest electronic suppliers.

Surprising enough, despite their decline in sales and change of marketing strategies, as well as the failure of their tablets conquering the market, HP took the lead in the Greenpeace Green Electronics Guide with a 5.9/10, making them no.1 in the charts. HP scored points across three main areas: Energy and Climate, Greenest Products and most Sustainable Operations – including the management of their supply chain.

HP has the best programme for measuring and reducing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) from its suppliers, disclosing emissions from its manufacturing at 3,500,000 tonnes CO2-e, with 91 percent of its first-tier suppliers reporting estimated emissions in 2009.

Dell topped into no.2 with their pledge and striving efforts to reduce emission by 40 percent by 2015, but their lack of a comprehensive range of green products made them lose out on some points.

HP and Dell are the only companies in the Guide that  effectively excluded the sourcing of paper from suppliers linked to illegal logging or deforestation.

Together with Apple (who only made it to fourth place), HP top-scored for its policies and practices on the sourcing of conflict minerals, for publishing its suppliers, and engaging effectively in the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition’s (EICC) conflict-free shelterprogramme.

The EICC creates great awareness regarding materials of chips and metal supplies. Industry interests are prompting leading companies in the electronics sector to investigate their own existing supply chains. This is to determine steps to promote responsible sourcing of specific minerals. Metals for chips and for our electronic appliances can come from many sources around the world, including mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which are estimated to provide approximately 18 percent of global tantalum production, 4 percent of tin, 3 percent of tungsten, and 2 percent of gold. Some of these mines in the DRC are controlled by militias responsible for atrocities that have been committed in the Congolese civil war.

Apple is now investigating a new concern, the issue of the employee environment. It is currently speculated by sources that conditions are similar to what Nike were experiencing in the ’90s. Apple so far are still dealing with the situation.

As for the rest, Samsung is placed at 7th, Panasonic 9th and Sony is featured at no.10 on the list.

The announcement appeared in Apple’s 2012 facilities report as part of the tech giants green commitments.

The firm hopes that the prospective 20-megawatt facility will deliver 42 million kWh of clean, renewable energy every year. It will benefit the Maiden centre with enough power to sustain Apple’s online operations, such as iTunes.

Apple commented: “Our goal is to run the Maiden facility with high percentage renewable energy mix, and we have major projects under way to achieve this – including building the nation’s largest end user-owned solar array and building the largest non-utility fuel cell installation in the United States.”

The company has implemented other sustainable facilities over time, including the LED lighting in all Apple Stores worldwide, and a solar thermal water heater in their Cork branch’s cafeteria.

Business Secretary Vince Cable announced the establishment of the very first GIB back in December 2011, which is designed “to accelerate private sector investment in the UK’s transition to a green economy”.

The location will be dependent on three criteria. Firstly the location must be one in which sufficient specialist staff are based for recruitment, secondly the organisation must be in a position where it can work closely with investment bodies, project developers, green technology providers as well as other parties, and thirdly the location must be cost effective with a “good value for money” attribute.

“The Green Investment Bank (GIB) will be a key component of the progression towards a green economy, complementing other green policies to help accelerate additional capital into green infrastructure,” the Department for Business disclosed in a press release.

“Its mission will be to provide financial solutions to accelerate private sector investment in the green economy. Capitalised with £3 billion, the GIB will play a vital role in addressing market failures affecting green infrastructure projects in order to stimulate a step up in private investment.”

It is said that Edinburgh in this instance has the backing from several Scottish investment funds, and is further promoted by an amalgamation of Scotland’s finance industry, its universities and energy companies. They claim that Edinburgh has the expertise to organise the GIB, which “would lack impact and openness if it were located in London” (BBC News).

With a private sector start-up capital of about £15bn aimed to last 4 years, it is hoped that by 2016 the GIB will have enough sway to deepen its relation with the private financial markets.

Owen Kelly, Chief Executive of Scottish Financial Enterprise told BBC News that the group has put together a strong argument for the UK government to consider Edinburgh, as the city is the most “complete financial services centre outside of London”.

A consensus will be reached at the end of February.

In the end, four of the big six are cutting their charges. EDF would cut their gas bills from 7 February by up to 5%. Scottish & Southern Energy (SSE) will follow with a 4.5% cut by 26 March effectively, while N Power promises a 5% cut from 1 February.

The nation’s favourite supplier, British Gas, stated they won’t reduce their gas price because they have already bought the gas in advance to supply half of the homes in Britain, but has reduced its domestic electricity by an average 5% on Thursday. Comparing utility prices online, ahead of this year’s winter, Ian Peters reassured the public that “this price reduction means British Gas is once again offering the cheapest standard electricity, on average, of any major supplier.”

They claim that with the instant change 5.3 million British Gas single rate electricity customers, on a variable tariff, will benefit from the price reduction, each saving an average of £24 on their annual electricity bill. Overall, this saves British customers more than £100 million a year.

It is estimated that this measure will reduce food waste by 40,000 punnets a week, totalling up to 800,000 strawberries, by prolonging their shelf life in the fridge with two additional days.

M&S promises to move forward with their sustainability policy to compete with all other supermarkets in becoming the most sustainable major retailer by 2014. Today, M&S revealed their revolutionary packaging that will avoid food waste in the hope of becoming a key example for other supermarket chains to follow.

A mixture of clay and minerals are patented in the strip, which absorb ethylene. Ethylene is a hormone that causes fruit to ripen and then turn mouldy. The addition of the strip during production will come at no additional cost to the consumer. This package is now firstly available to strawberries and will soon be produced for other food products.

“This technology is a win-win for our customers,” said Hugh Mowat, an agronomist at M&S. “Not only will their strawberries taste better for longer, but we really hope it will help them reduce their food waste as they no longer need to worry about eating as soon as they buy them.”

The British strawberry season starts from April and M&S gets around 1mln punnets per week during this period. This type of technology will help drop the levels of supermarket carbon footprint and will at the same time increase logistic benefits of strawberries that are imported from Egypt, Morocco, Spain and Israel.

Supermarkets such as ASDA had a similar idea last year to prolong freshness in the produces on their shelves, but abandoned it due to additional costs to their production. However, it is a topic that cannot be avoided as the government are urging companies to cut waste from their stores to a minimum.

It’s Fresh Director Simon Lee said: “Reducing food waste is a huge mandate for retailers. Improving shelf life and quality means people will be more satisfied with a product and ultimately consume more of it.”