Blogs
Energy From Your Tranquil Pond
November 30, 2007 11:24 am | CommentsEnergy News: There are biofuel critics who say America can never grow enough raw material for the technology to be affordable and ubiquitous, but some scientists believe algae is a better option. At the University of Minnesota, they're figuring out how to make algae grow very fast, and how to get up to 15,000 gallons of oil per acre -- that is 750 percent more yield than
Get Your Low-Energy Computing with a Catch
November 27, 2007 11:21 am | CommentsEnergy News: Three stories about energy efficiency, focusing on computers, landed in my inbox today -- with a big fat asterisk attached. The stories are: Google Plans Renewable Energy Push -- they want to make one a gigawatt of clean energy cheaper to produce than the same amount of coal; HP Enters Two Renewable-Energy Contracts -- they're using solar and wind power for facilities in San Diego and Ireland; and Climate Savers Computing Initiative Empowers Smarter Computing Choices -- there's an online catalog of green desktops and servers, but it's only for companies that pay to join
Gone With the Wind, Part 2: Maglev Tech
November 27, 2007 5:44 am | CommentsProductive Product: What if you could eliminate all of the material friction in a windmill? (And why is this our third consecutive Efficiency Zone lead in question form?) No ball bearing is that good, but you could use maglev technology to just suspend the turbine blades in air. Magnetic levitation is more common for high-speed train research
Gone With the Wind, Part 1: The Sailboat
November 27, 2007 5:40 am | CommentsProductive Product: It was good enough for Columbus, Magellan, and Ellison, but is wind power -- the sail -- better in some cases than modern engines for oceanic cargo ships? A few companies are voting affirmatively. A blogger for Network World writes, "A kite the size of a football field will provide most of the power for a German
Nuclear Bathtub Full of Controversy
November 26, 2007 5:57 am | CommentsProductive Product: What if nuclear power were mass-produced in portable battery-like containers? That's the mission of Hyperion Power Generation, a start-up based on the research of Los Alamos National Labs scientist Otis Peterson. The bathtub-sized device with no moving parts could power 25,000 homes for five years, and Hyperion is poised to build 4,000 around
Utilities' Perspectives on Green Biz
November 26, 2007 5:29 am | CommentsEnergy News: "Making a Business of Energy Efficiency: Sustainable Business Models for Utilities" is the topic of next month's Edison Electric Institute meeting in Washington. The EEI is an electric company association and the agenda focuses on money -- not customers, the environment, or technology. There is an interesting
A Call For Green Holiday Tech
November 20, 2007 11:53 am | CommentsOp-Ed: Ah, winter: the holidays, the Superbowl, snow sledding and nasty weather, the hassle of decorating, and what to get the engineer who has everything? We here at ECN figure the answer to that last point -- high-tech for the holidays -- is best derived from you, the readers.
Lithium, Ultracaps Merge for Hybrid Power
November 19, 2007 11:13 am | CommentsProductive Product: Maxwell Technologies is working with China's Lishen Battery to design hybrid lithium-ultracapacitor products, Maxwell officials said today. Immediately, Lishen will start making lithium cells adjacent to ultracapacitors in the same package, while preparing to merge lithium with ultracapacitors in individual hybrid cells by summer 2009.
UCLA Puts Twist on Flexible Batteries
November 16, 2007 10:53 am | CommentsProductive Product: UCLA researchers are able to print batteries on flexible circuits by using nanotube inks, NewScientist reports. There are similar projects, such as at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and it's not immediately clear how the UCLA project differs. However, NewScientist explains
Energy Harvesting in the Military
November 16, 2007 9:18 am | CommentsProductive Product: I wrote about energy harvesting a few times before, and now there's a practical application: power for field soldiers. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported on M2E Power, a Boise, Idaho start-up that says it has a (no pun intended) more efficient way to perform energy harvesting -- the general idea of energy harvesting from mechanical movements traditionally does work but hasn't been worth the trouble.
But What About the Sunburn on My Ear?
November 13, 2007 8:50 am | CommentsProductive Product: Not everyone can live in a solar-powered European city or build a solar-powered cubist house, but Iqua Ltd.'s solar Bluetooth headset will soon be available to all, the Register reports. Will it work when the skies are cloudy or dark? Will it have comparable sound quality and between-charges life to standard headsets? Will it cause any sunburn on your ear?
PV Start-up Shines in NREL's Eyes
November 12, 2007 7:14 am | CommentsEnergy News: More from the NREL: they announced that a photovoltaics start-up, Wakonda Technologies, is the winner of the Clean Energy Entrepreneur of the Year award. Wakona's name derives from a native American word regarding spirit and nature; they're working on thin films of gallium arsenide for solar cell substrates. Typically thin-film
An Efficient Hodgepodge of News
November 7, 2007 9:06 am | CommentsOp-Ed: Plenty of energy-efficiency news piled up while I was on vacation last week. Much of the time I was at the Mountain View, Calif. Computer History Museum, where they happen to be hosting a few Smart cars. That made me wonder what I was missing back home, so here are
US Energy Lab Gets High-Tech Home
October 29, 2007 11:32 am | CommentsEnergy News: Colorado didn't get a World Series victory, but here's something they can be charged up about: tomorrow the National Renewable Energy Lab will break ground on its new home there. From the press release, Secretary [Samuel] Bodman also is expected to announce two renewable power projects at NREL and
Germans Win Solar Decathlon
October 24, 2007 6:55 am | CommentsEnergy News: Congratulations to the students of Technishe Universität Darmstadt for winning the 2007 Solar Decathlon's top prize of US $100,000. The event involved students from 20 schools who all brought solar-powered homes to the National Mall in Washington, D.C. There are beautiful pictures and videos but here are some of mine from
