Energy

Fusion We Can Believe In?

Greg Schnippel — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 14:12:33 -0800

Working on a shoestring budget, researchers have found no reason why a low-cost approach to nuclear fusion won't work.

Obama Transition Looks at Space-Based Solar Power

Greg Schnippel — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 06:57:12 -0800

The Obama transition team is considering the idea of turning solar power generated by orbiting satellites into electricity that can be used on the ground.

Better Control for Fusion Power

Greg Schnippel — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:59:34 -0800

Physicists at MIT have addressed one of the many technological challenges involved in harnessing nuclear fusion as a viable energy source by demonstrating that pulses of radio frequency waves can be used to propel and heat plasma inside a reactor.

Pentagon Eyes Orbiting Power Station

Greg Schnippel — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 21:16:44 -0800

Military planners responsible for finding space resources to support troops on the ground think the time may be ripe to advance the 40-year-old space solar power concept to help reduce the logistics train behind forward-deployed forces.

IBM takes Grid to the Clouds and Aids Solar Research

Greg Schnippel — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 07:29:13 -0800

IBM today announced that it is teaming up with Harvard University to launch a new worldwide grid project aimed at finding ways to make solar energy cheaper and more efficient.

Cyborg Leaf Makes Working Solar Power Plant

Greg Schnippel — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:22:19 -0800

A team of US chemical engineers has extracted photosynthetic molecules from plants and attached them to thin sheets of gold, creating a photosynthesising cyborg.

Space Solar Power and the Khyber Pass

Greg Schnippel — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 18:06:54 -0800

Taylor Dinerman shows how space solar power can help landlocked and resource-poor countries escape the "economic chains forged by geography."

Plumbing the Oceans could bring Limitless Clean Energy

Greg Schnippel — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:43:12 -0800

As the price of fossil fuels soars, private companies from Hawaii to Japan are racing to build commercial Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) plants which generate energy by exploiting the difference in temperature between seawater near the surface and deep down.

Mini Nuclear Plants to Power 20,000 Homes

Greg Schnippel — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 11:53:26 -0800

Nuclear power plants smaller than a garden shed and able to power 20,000 homes will be on sale within five years, say scientists at Los Alamos, the US government laboratory which developed the first atomic bomb.

Solar Power Game-Changer: 'Near Perfect' Absorption of Sunlight, from all Angles

Greg Schnippel — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 07:14:09 -0800

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have discovered and demonstrated a new method for overcoming two major hurdles facing solar energy. By developing a new antireflective coating that boosts the amount of sunlight captured by solar panels and allows those panels to absorb the entire solar spectrum from nearly any angle, the research team has moved academia and industry closer to realizing high-efficiency, cost-effective solar power.