Sep
20
Changing Natural Gas Into Liquid Fuels & Chemicals
September 20, 2010 | 7 Comments
Perhaps one of our times most prolific scientists, Angela Belcher at MIT, came up with a system that cheaply and efficiently turns methane into liquid chemicals and fuels. Belcher then developed it further in a startup called Cambrios Technologies, which she cofounded. The system was then spun out into Siluria in 2008, when Cambrios focused [...]
Sep
17
Going For Green Jet Fuel
September 17, 2010 | 11 Comments
Of all the petroleum uses flight is the one where energy density, the weight of a fuel per the energy within, is crucial for performance. At about 8% of the total use of petroleum, aviation fuel is a clear target. Two biofuel companies are headed for taking a share from fossil oil. So far many [...]
Sep
16
The NuScale Reactor Gets Closer to Production
September 16, 2010 | 8 Comments
At this moment NuScale’s small modular nuclear reactor is leading the U.S. field of nuclear power sets that are smaller, modular and less expensive to install. Nuclear fission’s major stumbling block is the huge investment needed to put a plant into operation. The total dollars now runs in the billions for a custom designed, large [...]
Sep
15
Miscanthus Gets a Growth Examination
September 15, 2010 | 2 Comments
Miscanthus has for the temperate American Midwest likely the largest yield potential for biomass of the contending crops. The plant does pose the lignin and cellulose problems, but confidence is high those plant products will get solutions for fuel production. Its in the field, where the production happens getting sunlight and soil nutrients into biomass [...]
Sep
14
Refuelable Zinc Air Battery Returns as a Fuel Cell
September 14, 2010 | 19 Comments
Fifteen years ago John Cooper, PhD working at Lawrence Livermore National Lab had worked out a zinc air battery that could be refueled so to speak. Actually what Mr. Cooper had invented was a zinc air fuel cell power unit based on the properties of the zinc air battery. It remains a vastly intriguing high [...]
Sep
13
On the Path to Full Spectrum Photovoltaic Solar Cells
September 13, 2010 | 9 Comments
The maximum use of incoming solar radiation relies on using the full spectrum of the light and infrared radiation. There’s a lot of power in the infrared – not something the current photovoltaic cell is harvesting. Photovoltaic solar cells convert energy from the sun into electricity by absorbing light. However, different materials absorb light at [...]
Sep
10
The Faster Cheaper Cleaner Jet Engine
September 10, 2010 | 9 Comments
This writer and many of you readers are of the need for speed crowd. Lower elapsed and transit times are good for not waiting for distance to meander by. Not that meandering isn’t a worthwhile way to travel, but for economy and the reality of life its just too much time waiting for transiting and [...]
Sep
9
A New Player In Waste Heat Recovery
September 9, 2010 | 3 Comments
According to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s 2008 report (a pdf), more than two-thirds of the fuel used to generate power in the United States is lost as heat. The report claims the U. S. has the lowest energy productivity (a measure of how much raw energy goes into every dollar of GDP) of any [...]
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