Mar
10
Solar Thermal Power Is Coming On Strong
March 10, 2008 | Leave a Comment
A review of the players in thermal based solar shows some surprising numbers and valuable innovation. The base design of a mirror focused on a black tube filled with an oil base working fluid, while old is still coming on strong. Two prototypes have started up and ten, yes ten, are in or past the […]
Mar
7
A Truly Nice Development in Lighting
March 7, 2008 | 5 Comments
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute issued a press release for announcing the development of a new form of light emitting diode(LED) that produces polarized light. Rensselaer has awarded its Lemelson-Rensselaer Student prize to Martin Schubert for the new type of LED. The prize is for ingenuity, inspiration, dedication and understanding of the implication of innovations. The prizewinner […]
Mar
6
Plug-in And Hybrid Cars Are Coming, Like It or Not
March 6, 2008 | 3 Comments
Opposite to the drives to get more energy and fuel to market and pull down prices the effort to make more efficient vehicles is well underway. This week saw the Volkswagen announcement of a parallel diesel design and the Chevy Volt is an exemplary PR effort to get anticipation built for the series hybrid design. […]
Mar
5
Xcel Energy of Minnesota announced February 28th 2008 that they have signed to acquire the NGK sodium-sulfur batteries in the 50 kilowatt size. That’s right 50kw per module, and Xcel is getting 20 modules totaling 1 megawatt. As regular readers know, storage is the key to making the wind and other variable renewable energy sources […]
Mar
4
A New Source Of Oil?
March 4, 2008 | 10 Comments
The weekend news lightly covered the Chevron and Weyerhaeuser announcement about the next step in the agreement they had started back in April of 2007. A joint venture has been established called Catchlight Energy LLC. It may be much bigger news than many think. Monday’s post covered the University if Massachusetts’s release of the pdf […]