Mar
16
The Base For Perfume Makes a Great Base for Fuel
March 16, 2012 | 2 Comments
Research presses on for better plant oils to make fuels. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) has engineered E.Coli bacteria to produce significantly more of the compound methyl ketone from glucose. Methyl ketones are a class of chemical compounds we’re most familiar with in fragrance and flavoring products and might provide the […]
Mar
15
On the Path to Much Better Lithium Ion Batteries
March 15, 2012 | Leave a Comment
Regular readers may recall that the silicon electrode for lithium ion batteries is the current leading candidate for a big capacity increase. A study led by Chongmin Wang at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) has been published online in the journal Nano Letters examining a new type of silicon-carbon nanocomposite electrode. […]
Mar
14
More Natural Gas For the Glut
March 14, 2012 | Leave a Comment
Soon America won’t be alone with a glut of natural gas. Statoil, the Norwegian oil company, made big oil industry news late last month announcing it had found huge volumes of natural gas off the coast of Tanzania thus confirming east Africa’s reputation as one of the energy world’s most promising new frontiers. The area […]
Mar
13
Bit ‘O Gold Makes a Better Fuel Cell
March 13, 2012 | Leave a Comment
Brown University chemists have built a triple-headed metallic nanoparticle that is reported to perform better and last longer than any other nanoparticle catalyst studied in fuel-cell reactions. The study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society reports the key is adding gold to the catalyst formation process to yield a more uniform crystal […]
Mar
12
Trouble for Andrea Rossi and His E-Cat
March 12, 2012 | 13 Comments
Andrea Rossi, the inventor and organizer of the E-Cat LENR or cold Fusion thermal energy production device has a new problem. It looks like another tempest of vague grounds. Steven Krivit, the sometimes to some folks notorious writer of heavily biased opinion on cold fusion and once in a while other energy fields broke out […]