Nuclear Power For Your Car

September 18, 2014 | 1 Comment

University of Missouri-Columbia (MU) researchers have created a long-lasting and more efficient nuclear battery. Its built from a radioactive isotope called strontium 90 that boosts electrochemcial energy in a water-based solution with a nanostructured titanium dioxide electrode with a platinum coating collecting and effectively converting energy into electrons.

(a), Schematic view of the testing setup for platinum/nanoporous titanium dioxide under irradiation and a photograph of the Strontium-90/Yittrium 90 source with gas bubbles attached to the outer surface of the PET film. (b), Schematic diagram and photograph of the platinum/nanoporous titanium dioxide electrode.  Click image for more info.

(a), Schematic view of the testing setup for platinum/nanoporous titanium dioxide under irradiation and a photograph of the Strontium-90/Yittrium 90 source with gas bubbles attached to the outer surface of the PET film. (b), Schematic diagram and photograph of the platinum/nanoporous titanium dioxide electrode. Click image for more info.

The idea has many high power applications such as a reliable energy source in automobiles and also in complicated applications such as space flight. Its a superlative idea that is now working.

The research paper “Plasmon Assisted Radiolytic Energy Conversion In Aqueous Solutions,” was published in Nature and is available in full at this writing.

Jae W. Kwon, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering and nuclear engineering in the College of Engineering at MU said, “Betavoltaics, a battery technology that generates power from radiation, has been studied as an energy source since the 1950s. Controlled nuclear technologies are not inherently dangerous. We already have many commercial uses of nuclear technologies in our lives including fire detectors in bedrooms and emergency exit signs in buildings.”

The nuclear name part is going to be the problem. After all, strontium 90 is a long way from uranium 235 or plutonium 244 (atomic numbers respectively, 38, 92 & 94). Strontium 90 is a beta emitter, the radiation energy that powers the battery. Still, beta emitters are not something a home shop operator should be working with, as light shielding is required. Sealed within few millimeters of aluminum would do.

Kwon explains the system, “Water acts as a buffer and surface plasmons created in the device turned out to be very useful in increasing its efficiency. The ionic solution is not easily frozen at very low temperatures and could work in a wide variety of applications including car batteries and, if packaged properly, perhaps spacecraft.”

The MU battery demonstrates that liquids can be an excellent media for effective energy conversion from radioisotopes. The water based ionic fluid is also contributes to the shielding. The battery is also a direct conversion method producing electric power straight from energetic particles rather than an indirect conversion methods such as collecting electricity from the secondary energy forms of heat or light.

How the battery works is the beta particles produce electron-hole pairs in semiconductors via their loss of kinetic energy and can contribute to the generation of electric power.

So far the solid beta decay battery design problem has been serious radiation damage to the lattice structures of semiconductors and subsequent performance degradation due to the high kinetic energy of the beta particles pounding the solid construction to pieces.

The MU battery stands out with the major benefit of utilizing a liquid-phase material and the liquid’s well-known ability to efficiently absorb the kinetic energy of beta particles. The fluid absorbs the energy and passes much of it to the semiconductor.

This is where the innovation or breakthrough comes in. Since the advent of nuclear power, liquids have been intensively studied for use as a radiation-shielding material. Large amounts of radiation energy can be absorbed by water. When radiation energy is absorbed by an aqueous solution, free radicals can be produced through radiolytic interactions. The MU battery demonstrates a new method for the generation of electricity using a device that separates the radiolytic current from the free radicals by splitting the water.

plasmon-assisted radiolytic water splitter.  Click image for more info.

plasmon-assisted radiolytic water splitter. Click image for more info.

The water splitter is composed of a nanoporous semiconductor coated with a thin platinum film to produce a specially designed metal-semiconductor junction. For the semiconductor they used a very stable and common large band gap oxide material, titanium dioxide (white paint pigment), because of the large band gap oxide materials offer as a semiconducting catalyst that can improve the radiolysis yield.

What happens is during the spitting high-energy beta radiation the device can produce free radicals in water through the loss of kinetic energy. In a meta-stable state, the free radicals are recombined into water molecules or trapped in water molecules. Then the free radicals produced by the radiation can be converted into electricity by a plasmon-assisted, wide band gap oxide semiconducting material.

How good is this first lab theory test battery? Hold on to something . . .

The maximum energy conversion efficiency of the MU battery was approximately estimated to be 53.88%. This is an astonishing number for a first trial design.

That’s enough for a news type of posting. For more information the paper can be read in full online at this writing. Some of you are going to realize that strontium 90 has a half life of 28.79 years. The implications of that thought are mind boggling.


Comments

1 Comment so far

  1. MattMusson on September 18, 2014 7:22 AM

    Somewhere Al Gore is pondering a disturbance in the Force.

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