Lonnie Johnson, an inventor who has worked for NASA and created the Supersoker has started working in Atlanta to find alternative sources of energy and has created a lithium based battery that will work in cars as well as a new engine.

To Learn More About Lonnie Johnson’s Projects Click Here

RELATED STORIES

Award-Winning Black Engineer May Have Solution To Gulf Oil Spill

VIDEO: 14-Year-Old Black Student Develops New Surgery Technique

WASHINGTON — The Louisiana federal judge who struck down a six-month ban on deepwater oil drilling has sold many of his energy investments, a financial disclosure report released Friday reveals.

U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman’s disclosure report, which covers investments for 2009, shows he owned eight energy-related investments including stock in Exxon Mobil Corp.

However, in an attachment to the report, the judge said he sold his Exxon Mobil stock this June when he was hearing the oil spill case.

Click below to view photos of the oil spill:

Start Gallery

In last year’s disclosure report, Feldman owned up to 16 energy-related investments.

Among the assets sold was stock in Transocean, the Switzerland-based company that owned the drilling rig operated by BP that is now spewing oil into the Gulf .

Feldman, a 1983 nominee of President Ronald Reagan, struck down the Obama administration’s six-month moratorium on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, disputing what he said was the government assumption that because one rig exploded, others posed an imminent danger.

On Thursday, Feldman refused to place his ruling on hold while the government appeals.

Feldman’s Exxon Mobil stock in 2009 was valued at $15,000 or less and produced an income of less than $1,000.

The judge has an investment in Ocean Energy valued between $15,001 and $50,000, which produces interest valued between $1,001 and $2,500.

Other holdings include investments in Provident Energy Trust, El Paso Corp., Energy Transfer Equity, Basic Energy Services, Valero Energy Corp. and Crosstex Energy LP.

Values of investments and income are expressed in ranges rather than precise amounts.

An Associated Press analysis has found that more than half of the federal judges in districts where the bulk of Gulf oil spill-related lawsuits are pending have financial connections to the oil and gas industry. This could complicate the task of finding judges without conflicts to hear the cases.

Federal judicial rules require judges to disqualify themselves from hearing cases involving a company in which they have a direct financial interest.

However, financial conflict rules have some leeway. For example, a judge does not have to step aside if investments are part of a mutual fund over which they have no management control.

Further, mere ties to companies or entities in the same industry, no matter how extensive, do not require disqualification.

RELATED STORIES

Obama To Extend Moratorium On Offshore Drilling

Judge Overturns Obama’s Offshore Drilling Moratorium

From NY Times:

President Obama summoned Americans on Tuesday to a “national mission” to move away from reliance on oil and develop alternative sources of energy, demanding that Congress move quickly to overcome “a lack of political courage and candor.”

Speaking to a national television audience from the Oval Office, Mr. Obama also promised a long-term plan to make sure that the gulf states suffering from the oil spill are made whole again. He said he was appointing Ray Mabus, the secretary of the Navy and the former governor of Mississippi, to develop a Gulf Coast restoration plan in cooperation with states, local communities, tribes, fishermen, conservationists and gulf residents.

“Today, as we look to the gulf, we see an entire way of life being threatened by a menacing cloud of black crude,” Mr. Obama said. “We cannot consign our children to this future. The tragedy unfolding on our coast is the most painful and powerful reminder yet that the time to embrace a clean energy future is now.”

Click here to read more.

Text continues after gallery …

Start Gallery

RELATED STORIES

White House: Obama Ready To Seize Oil Spill Claims Process

134-Year-Old Louisiana Oyster Company Forced To Close

Amount Of Oil Spilled May Be Twice The Original Estimate

KABUL, Afghanistan – U.S. geologists have discovered vast mineral wealth in Afghanistan, possibly amounting to $1 trillion, President Hamid Karzai’s spokesman said Monday.

Waheed Omar told reporters the findings were made by the U.S. Geological Survey under contract to the Afghan government.

“The result of the survey … has shown that Afghanistan has mineral resources worth $1 trillion,” Omar said. “This is not an overall survey of all minerals in Afghanistan. Whatever has been found in this survey is worth $1 trillion.”

Omar refused to provide details, referring reporters to the Ministry of Mines. An official at the ministry refused to discuss the survey, saying details would be released at a news conference later this week.

A 2007 report by the USGS said most of the data on Afghanistan’s mineral resources was produced between the early 1950s and 1985 but much was hidden and protected by Afghan scientists “during the intermittent conflict over the next two decades.”

The New York Times reported the $1 trillion figure in Monday’s edition and quoted senior American officials as saying untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan are far beyond any previously known reserves and were enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself.

Americans discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, including iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium, according to the report. The Times quoted a Pentagon memo as saying Afghanistan could become the “Saudi Arabia of lithium,” a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and cell phones.

“There is stunning potential here,” the newspaper quoted Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command as saying. “There are a lot of ifs, of course, but I think potentially it is hugely significant.”

Geologists have known for decades that Afghanistan contained substantial mineral resources, including copper, gold and cobalt. But the resources have never been fully exploited because of decades of armed conflict and poor infrastructure. The Times said huge lithium deposits were found in Ghazni province — much of which is effectively under Taliban control.

During a visit last month to Washington, Karzai said his nation’s untapped mineral deposits could be even higher — perhaps as much as $3 trillion.

The mineral resources are a “massive opportunity,” Karzai said at a May 13 event with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton held at the U.S. Institute of Peace.

The report in the Times said the USGS began aerial surveys of Afghanistan’s mineral resources in 2006, using data that had been collected by Soviet mining experts during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. Promising results led to a more sophisticated study the next year.

Then last year, a Pentagon task force that had created business development programs in Iraq arrived in Afghanistan and closely analyzed the geologists’ findings. U.S. mining experts were brought in to validate the survey’s conclusions, and top U.S. and Afghan officials were briefed.

“I think it’s very, very big news for the people of Afghanistan and that we hope will bring the Afghan people together for a cause that will benefit everyone,” Karzai’s spokesman, Omar, said. “This is an economic interest that will benefit all Afghans and will benefit Afghanistan in the long run.”

So far, the biggest mineral deposits discovered are of iron and copper, but finds include large deposits of niobium, a soft metal used in producing superconducting steel, as well as rare earth elements and large gold deposits in Pashtun areas of southern Afghanistan, the report said. Many of those areas are too dangerous because of Taliban activity.

Charles Kernot, a mining analyst with Evolution Securities Ltd. in London, said it typically takes three to five years to get a lithium mining operation up and running. Factors include how close the deposit is to power sources and other infrastructure and the size of the deposit.

And large lithium deposits may not mean an automatic windfall — given competition and the uncertainty of the market.

“Bolivia wants to expand its lithium mining operations dramatically over the next few years so there is a risk of oversupply if demand from electric cars does not meet expectations,” Kernot said.

RELATED STORIES

War On Terror Has Cost Almost $1 Trillion

Blackwater Accused Of Using Tax Dollars For Prostitutes And Strippers

Start Gallery

From MSNBC:

President Barack Obama on Wednesday wrapped himself in green themes and even imagery — including a fighter jet that uses a plant-based fuel — but that wasn’t enough to convince any environmental groups that his plans for offshore drilling were a fair compromise on the path to a clean energy future.

While Republicans criticized the proposed new leases in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic as limited, environmental activists were as vigorously opposed — but for reasons having to do with oil spills and carbon emissions tied to climate change.

For many activists, the sense was one of betrayal.

GALLERY: President Obama

Start Gallery

“Today’s announcement is unfortunately all too typical of what we have seen so far from President Obama — promises of change, a year of ‘deliberation,’ and ultimately, adoption of flawed and outdated Bush policies as his own,” said Brendan Cummings, senior counsel at the Center for Biological Diversity, which has made a name for itself by filing endangered species lawsuits.

“Drilling our coasts will do nothing to lower gas prices or create energy independence,” added Michael Brune, who recently took over as director of the Sierra Club. “It will only jeopardize beaches, marine life, and coastal tourist economies, all so the oil industry can make a short-term profit.”

Instead, environmental groups said, greater effort should be placed on renewable energy, improving vehicle mileage and making other energy uses, from refrigerators to home heaters, more energy efficient.

Click here to read more.

RELATED STORIES

Obama To Open Offshore Drilling Areas For First Time

Obama Promises Clean Energy to World Leaders

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration is giving a jolt to the futuristic “smart” electric grid, hoping to more quickly bring America’s power transmission system into the digital age.

President Barack Obama, during a visit to a solar energy facility in Arcadia, Fla., announced Tuesday that he is making available $3.4 billion in government support for 100 projects aimed at modernizing the power grid. The projects include installing “smart” electric meters in homes, automating utility substations, and installing thousands of new digital transformers and grid sensors.

RELATED: Obama Promises Clean Energy to World Leaders

White House officials provided details of the initiative prior to the president’s scheduled visit to Florida Power & Light Co.’s DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center, the largest photovoltaic electricity facility in the country.

Officials have argued that a more modern grid is needed to give consumers better control over their electricity usage and costs, and to spur development of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar.

The $3.4 billion in grants from the government’s economic stimulus program will be matched by $4.7 billion in private investments, the officials said. The smallest grant will be $400,000 and the largest $200 million.

“We have a very antiquated (electric grid) system in our country,” said Carol Browner, assistant to the president for energy and climate change. “The current system is outdated, it’s dilapidated.”

Browner said the federal funding will spur the needed modernization of the grid and set the stage for the smooth introduction of large amounts of electricity from wind or solar sources into the transmission system.

Matt Rogers, the Energy Department official involved in the program, said the 100 projects were selected from 400 proposed. The money would be distributed over the next two months and the work is expected to be done over the next one to three years, he said.

RELATED: Obama Chooses Chu For Energy Secretary

The push to essentially bring modern computer and communications technology to the electric grid has been under way for some time but has gained momentum with the prospect of billions of dollars in federal support.

Rogers said the government funds will allow installation of 18 million smart meters and 1 million other in-home devices as well as more modern thermostats to allow homeowners to better monitor their electricity usage. The government and industry want to deploy 40 million smart meters — wall-based units that can monitor how much electricity various appliances use and turn them off when energy is costlier to consume — within the next several years.

Other projects funded under the program will result in the installation of 850 sensors to allow utilities to better monitor the grid; the installation of 200,000 digital transformers to reduce the risk of power outages; and the automation of 700 grid substations.

“This will save or create tens of thousands of jobs,” said Jared Bernstein, chief economist and economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden. He said the jobs will include equipment installers and electrical engineers as well as communications systems analysts and data entry clerks.

A $200 million grant will go to Energy Smart Florida, a program involving Florida Power & Light that plans to install 2.6 million smart meters in homes and advanced monitoring systems in the grid substations, said Browner.

“The impact of this will be felt throughout Florida,” she said.