For all of humanity’s impressive innovations, sometimes, Mother Nature really does know best. And as such, we’ve learned everything we can from her, including this latest graphene solar cell breakthrough inspired by none other than moth eyes. According to new reports, researchers from the United Kingdom’s University of Surrey carefully examined these insects’ eyes in order to create graphene sheets that they say are “the most light-absorbent material ever created.” Best of all, the graphene based cells won’t have to be outside in order to harvest the sun’s energy — rather, it’ll be able to absorb indirect sunlight as well as ambient energy from everyday items found at home.
Related: Solar gadgets will make charging less frequent, not eliminate it forever
“We realized that the moth’s eye works in a particular way that traps electromagnetic waves very efficiently,” Professor Ravi Silva, head of the Advanced Technology Institute at the University of Surrey, told Newsweek. “As a result of our studies, we’ve been able to mimic the surface of a moth’s eye and create an amazingly thin, efficient, light-absorbent material made of graphene.”
Speaking with Electronics Weekly, Silva added, “Moths’ eyes have microscopic patterning that allows them to see in the dimmest conditions. These work by channelling light towards the middle of the eye, with the added benefit of eliminating reflections, which would otherwise alert predators of their location. We have used the same technique to make an amasingly thin, efficient, light-absorbent material by patterning graphene in a similar fashion.”
The incredibly thin sheets of graphene are actually just one-atom thick and are comprised of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb lattice. But don’t let the delicate arrangement and rubber-like flexibility fool you — the material is 200 times stronger than steel and is also more conductive than copper. The hope is that graphene and these moth eye-inspired sheets will be able to unlock new possibilities within the Internet of Things, or power a host of different devices. As Newsweek notes, everything from flexible smartphones to artificial retinas could benefit from the new material.
“For many years people have been looking for graphene applications that will make it into mainstream use,” said Silva. “We are finally now getting to the point where these applications are going to happen. We think that with this work that is coming out, we can see an application very close because we’ve done something that was previously thought impossible: optimizing its incredible optical properties.”
GE has a crazy new plan to harvest CO2 from the atmosphere and use it to store solar energy
Effectively, GE hopes to use the CO2 as an enormous battery whose chief purpose would be to store solar energy.
Although the sun is a great source of energy, it’s rather undependable —
after all, the sun has to be out in order for us to capture its rays.
“That’s the grand challenge,” Stephen Sanborn, senior engineer at GE
Global Research said in a statement. “We need to make renewable energy
available to the grid when it is needed.”
And
that’ll happen with the help of the significant CO2 reserves scientists
have been storing for ages. The process would work in two stages
— first, solar energy would be captured and kept in a liquid of molten
salt. Then, extra energy from the power grid would cool CO2 into dry
ice. When power is needed, the salt would turn the dry ice CO2 into what
is known as a “supercritical” fluid, which is matter that does not have
specific liquid or gas phases. The supercritical fluid would in turn
flow into a CO2 turbine called a sunrotor, whereupon energy would be
disseminated as needed.
It
sounds plenty complicated, but according to Sanborn, it’ll actually be
incredibly cost-effective. “It is so cheap because you are not making
the energy, you are taking the energy from the sun or the turbine
exhaust, storing it and transferring it,” he says. The scientist claims
that sunrotors could operate with 68 percent efficiency, which is
significantly better than today’s most effective gas power plants, which
are only 61 percent effective. “The result is a high-efficiency,
high-performance renewable energy system that will reduce the use of
fossil fuels for power generation,” Sanborn says.
We’re
still around five to ten years away from seeing these babies in action,
but don’t despair, environmental activists — there is a way to fight
greenhouse gasses. And in a way, it’s with greenhouse gases themselves
In the United Kingdom, threatened animals need all of the habitat they can get—even if it’s under solar panels.
That’s the idea behind a joint project by
conservation group Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and
alternative energy firm Anesco that aims to create and restore natural
habitats at solar farm sites in the U.K.
By planting wildflower meadows and restoring natural grasslands in the “unused” margins between solar panel rows, the team hopes to attract insects, bees, and butterflies to the sites and provide food and nesting spots for birds.
It could be a boon to the region’s threatened bird species, which have seen marked declines in the last 40 years, with tree sparrow populations dropping 93 percent, turtledoves declining 89 percent, and skylarks falling 51 percent.
The U.K. has lost nearly 44 million breeding birds since the late 1960s, according to the British Trust for Ornithology’s The State of the UK's Birds 2014 report. And populations for 60 percent of all native species have declined over the last 50 years, the RSPB reported.
One reason is the continued loss of habitat because of agriculture and urbanization.
Solar farms—while providing emission-free renewable power—aren’t known for protecting wildlife. Placing thousands of photovoltaic panels in rows along the ground will inevitably affect wildlife, says Stephanie Dashiell at the Nature Conservancy.
RELATED: U.K. Renewables Beat Coal Power for the First Time Ever
But the size of the project and the amount of land clearing and grading is a big factor.
“For smaller facilities [less than 50 megawatts], such as the facilities that Anesco develops, this type of mitigation is a promising way to minimize impacts to wildlife from the development of solar facilities,” said Dashiell, who is an energy associate project director for the conservancy in California. “However, the success of such measures greatly depends on the size of the facility, the ability to install panels without grading and fencing the land, and the ecosystem in which the facility is being sited.”
Dashiell has researched the impacts of large-scale photovoltaic facilities in California that have displaced thousands of desert tortoises in the Mojave Desert and kit foxes and giant kangaroo rats in the San Joaquin Valley. She said there haven’t been any good examples of habitat restoration in California sites, noting that solar companies often make up for wildlife impacts by restoring habitat elsewhere.
Anesco operates more than 500 megawatts’ worth of ground-mounted solar panels across the U.K. and Wales, meaning thousands of acres of habitat could soon be restored. In the first phase of the project, RSPB experts are visiting solar farm sites to help identify habitat restoration measures that would benefit animals deemed to be under the most serious threat.
“Over the next few years, we will be working with Anesco to further improve the habitats created at their solar farm sites across the U.K.,” Darren Moorcroft, RSPB’s head of species and habitats conservation, said in a statement. “It is an excellent opportunity to develop habitats for nature in need of our help, showcasing how a renewable energy business and wildlife conservation can be delivered in unison.”
The recommendations by RSPB’s research team will also be implemented in Anesco’s biodiversity management plans for future solar farm sites.
“It’s promising to see this type of collaboration occur for smaller-scale PV projects in wetter ecosystems that can easily be restored,” Dashiell said, adding that she hopes monitoring is done to compare the wildlife differences between sites that are restored and those that are not.
In California, which has half of the United States’ entire solar capacity, the arid landscapes aren’t as easy to restore once they’ve been disturbed and would require water—a scarce resource in the region.
Scotland
is poised to generate more than 50 percent of its electricity from wind
power and other renewable sources this year, according to a government
report released Thursday.
October to December figures were not included in the report. But the trend suggests that Scotland has surpassed the government’s official target of generating half its annual electricity consumption, or about 19 thousand gigawatt hours, from carbon-free sources by 2015—averting the emission of more than 12 million tons of greenhouse gas pollution in the process.
Scotland’s renewable energy production has surged since 2013—when renewables made up 44.4 percent of the electricity supply—in parallel with three years of sustained economic growth. Four of Europe’s 10 biggest land-based wind farms are located in Scotland.
That puts the United Kingdom’s northernmost country among the top producers of renewable energy in the European Union. Norway is powering its grid almost exclusively with hydropower and is a net exporter of wind energy, while Austria and Sweden each generate more than 60 percent of demand from renewables. Germany, the world’s fourth-largest economy, produces about a third of its annual electricity supply from wind, solar, and other renewables.
Denmark last week announced that wind power supplied 42 percent of its electricity in 2015—a world record for wind.
“What we’re finding from countries like Scotland, Denmark, and Germany is that you can have a high percentage of renewable generation on your grid, and it won’t affect reliability,” said Scott Clausen, a policy and research associate at the American Council on Renewable Energy.
Scotland has pledged to generate the equivalent of 100 percent of its electric power demand with renewables by 2020, and 30 percent of overall energy demand, including transportation and heat.
U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron last year effectively canceled government subsidies meant to encourage solar and wind power investments. “The impact has been an unnerving of the industry,” Banks said
“That’s not the way to reassure investors who are trying to invest millions of pounds in renewable energy development,” he added. “You add to that a government that is hell-bent on imposing nuclear power on the U.K., and it’s like they’re looking two ways at the same time. They say renewables are too expensive but are willing to use taxpayer money to support even more expensive nuclear power.”
Clausen sees lessons for the United States in Scotland’s renewable power progress, as well as a cautionary tale of how shifting government policies might slow it down. The U.S. now gets about 17 percent of its electricity from renewables. Wind, solar, geothermal, and other sources generate about 10 percent, while hydropower supplies the rest.
“I think Scotland, even though they have crafted their goal in an interesting way, sent a signal that got their market going,” Clausen said. “It demonstrates the effectiveness that policy can play in encouraging renewable energy development.”
Noting that in 2015 Congress extended two important tax credits for green energy development, Clausen said the U.S. is poised for “very big gains in renewable generation.”
Renewable power is growing faster than either natural gas or coal in the U.S., with the federal Energy Information Agency forecasting a 9.5 percent increase in green energy in 2016.
With 29 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico enacting mandates for renewable energy, the costs for both solar and wind power have dropped sharply in the past five years, Clausen said. These “renewable portfolio standards” require utilities to increase the percentage of wind, solar, and other carbon-free sources of power by anywhere from 10 to 30 percent. California has set a target of 33 percent by 2020, and it aims to get half its electricity from renewables by 2030.
But a big expansion of solar and wind energy in the U.S. would likely pay for itself when taking into account the jobs and tax revenue created by new power projects, as well as the public health benefits of reducing air pollution and cutting the carbon dioxide emissions driving climate change, Clausen said.
“We now get to make the low-cost argument,” he said. “You want to save money? You should build renewables.”
This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction 1/29/16: An earlier version of this article misstated how much of Scotland's annual electricity demand is likely to have been met by renewables in 2015. That amount is 19 thousand gigawatt hours.
A solar power plant in California, built with a $1.6 billion
taxpayer-guaranteed loan, is in danger of being shut down entirely
because it is producing only a fraction of the energy that the owners
promised. The plant only generated 45 percent of expected power in 2014
and only 68 percent in 2015, according to government data.
What's more, it is producing electricity at a cost of $200 per megawatt hour -- six times the cost of electricity produced by a natural gas-fired plant.
The Daily Caller:
But this turkey of a power plant can't even do that. I don't mind solar power at all and I can't wait until it becomes economically viable. The photovoltaic systems are improving in efficiency all the time and the price is coming down.
But once again, government is deciding who wins and who loses and it gave the Democratic Party contributors at Google a taxpayer-guaranteed loan that, at present, looks like is going to turn around and bite us in our sustainable buttocks.
When it's time to construct a solar mega-plant, investors will be beating down the doors looking to get in on it. That's not happening now, nor is it likely to happen anytime soon
Described by the company as the first hybrid solar-wind renewable energy technology in the renewable energy market, the tower at the center of the system generates a downdraft that drives the wind turbines positioned around its base. This is done by using a series of pumps to carry water to the top of a tower standing up to 2,250 ft (685 m) tall, where it is cast across the opening as a fine mist. The mist then evaporates and is absorbed by hot, dry air, thereby cooling the air and making it denser and heavier than the warmer air outside the tower.
This water-cooled air then falls through the hollow tower at speeds up to and in excess of 50 mph (80 km/h). When it reaches the bottom of the tower, the air is directed into wind tunnels that surround the base, turning wind turbines that are contained within the tunnels. Although the system requires large amounts of water, the bulk of the water emitted at the top of the tower is captured at the bottom and recirculated through the system, being pumped back up to the top with some of the power generated by the wind turbines.
In this way, the company claims the system can generate electricity 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, when located in a hot, dry area – although electricity generation would be reduced in winter. Depending on the tower's geographical location, electricity generation could also be supplemented through the use of vertical "wind vanes" that would capture the prevailing wind and channel it into the tower.
Solar Wind Energy says it has developed proprietary software capable of determining a tower's electricity generation capabilities based on the climate in geographic regions around the globe. Using the software, the company says it can predict the daily energy outputs of a tower based on its location and size.
Based on the most recent design specifications, the company says a tower designed for a site near San Luis, Arizona, would have a peak production capacity on an hourly basis of up to 1,250 MWh on sunny days. However, when taking into account the lower generation capabilities during the winter months, the average hourly output per day comes out to approximately 435 MWh.
The company points out that once built (using conventional materials, equipment and techniques), its towers are capable of operating throughout the year independent of wind speeds with virtually no carbon footprint, fuel consumption or waste generation.
Earlier this year, Solar Wind Energy gained the necessary local entitlements to pursue development of its first tower near San Luis, Arizona. The project got a leg up earlier this week when it announced a financing agreement with JDF Capital Inc., which will provide up to US$1,585,000 to the company. Solar Wind Energy says it is also exploring potential sites in Mexico, which along with the Middle East, Chile and India, would be an ideal location for the technology in terms of climate.
The video below explains how the Downdraft Tower works.
Source: Solar Wind Energy Inc.
Scientists have found a way to recycle sunlight and boost the amount of energy captured from the sun's rays.
These Solar Farms Help—Not Harm—Birds and Bees
By planting wildflower meadows and restoring natural grasslands in the “unused” margins between solar panel rows, the team hopes to attract insects, bees, and butterflies to the sites and provide food and nesting spots for birds.
It could be a boon to the region’s threatened bird species, which have seen marked declines in the last 40 years, with tree sparrow populations dropping 93 percent, turtledoves declining 89 percent, and skylarks falling 51 percent.
The U.K. has lost nearly 44 million breeding birds since the late 1960s, according to the British Trust for Ornithology’s The State of the UK's Birds 2014 report. And populations for 60 percent of all native species have declined over the last 50 years, the RSPB reported.
One reason is the continued loss of habitat because of agriculture and urbanization.
Solar farms—while providing emission-free renewable power—aren’t known for protecting wildlife. Placing thousands of photovoltaic panels in rows along the ground will inevitably affect wildlife, says Stephanie Dashiell at the Nature Conservancy.
RELATED: U.K. Renewables Beat Coal Power for the First Time Ever
But the size of the project and the amount of land clearing and grading is a big factor.
“For smaller facilities [less than 50 megawatts], such as the facilities that Anesco develops, this type of mitigation is a promising way to minimize impacts to wildlife from the development of solar facilities,” said Dashiell, who is an energy associate project director for the conservancy in California. “However, the success of such measures greatly depends on the size of the facility, the ability to install panels without grading and fencing the land, and the ecosystem in which the facility is being sited.”
Dashiell has researched the impacts of large-scale photovoltaic facilities in California that have displaced thousands of desert tortoises in the Mojave Desert and kit foxes and giant kangaroo rats in the San Joaquin Valley. She said there haven’t been any good examples of habitat restoration in California sites, noting that solar companies often make up for wildlife impacts by restoring habitat elsewhere.
Anesco operates more than 500 megawatts’ worth of ground-mounted solar panels across the U.K. and Wales, meaning thousands of acres of habitat could soon be restored. In the first phase of the project, RSPB experts are visiting solar farm sites to help identify habitat restoration measures that would benefit animals deemed to be under the most serious threat.
“Over the next few years, we will be working with Anesco to further improve the habitats created at their solar farm sites across the U.K.,” Darren Moorcroft, RSPB’s head of species and habitats conservation, said in a statement. “It is an excellent opportunity to develop habitats for nature in need of our help, showcasing how a renewable energy business and wildlife conservation can be delivered in unison.”
The recommendations by RSPB’s research team will also be implemented in Anesco’s biodiversity management plans for future solar farm sites.
“It’s promising to see this type of collaboration occur for smaller-scale PV projects in wetter ecosystems that can easily be restored,” Dashiell said, adding that she hopes monitoring is done to compare the wildlife differences between sites that are restored and those that are not.
In California, which has half of the United States’ entire solar capacity, the arid landscapes aren’t as easy to restore once they’ve been disturbed and would require water—a scarce resource in the region.
“Due
to the difference in ecological conditions, and the difference in the
scale of the solar PV projects in the U.K. versus California, the Nature
Conservancy continues to support an approach to solar energy
development that directs projects to locations that have the least
impact to wildlife, thus avoiding the greatest impacts to wildlife,”
Dashiell said.
http://www.takepart.com/
This European Country Is Set to Get Half Its Electricity From Renewables in 2016
Scotland is showing how other nations can ramp up carbon-free energy
without compromising the power grid.
October to December figures were not included in the report. But the trend suggests that Scotland has surpassed the government’s official target of generating half its annual electricity consumption, or about 19 thousand gigawatt hours, from carbon-free sources by 2015—averting the emission of more than 12 million tons of greenhouse gas pollution in the process.
Scotland’s renewable energy production has surged since 2013—when renewables made up 44.4 percent of the electricity supply—in parallel with three years of sustained economic growth. Four of Europe’s 10 biggest land-based wind farms are located in Scotland.
That puts the United Kingdom’s northernmost country among the top producers of renewable energy in the European Union. Norway is powering its grid almost exclusively with hydropower and is a net exporter of wind energy, while Austria and Sweden each generate more than 60 percent of demand from renewables. Germany, the world’s fourth-largest economy, produces about a third of its annual electricity supply from wind, solar, and other renewables.
Denmark last week announced that wind power supplied 42 percent of its electricity in 2015—a world record for wind.
“What we’re finding from countries like Scotland, Denmark, and Germany is that you can have a high percentage of renewable generation on your grid, and it won’t affect reliability,” said Scott Clausen, a policy and research associate at the American Council on Renewable Energy.
Scotland has pledged to generate the equivalent of 100 percent of its electric power demand with renewables by 2020, and 30 percent of overall energy demand, including transportation and heat.
U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron last year effectively canceled government subsidies meant to encourage solar and wind power investments. “The impact has been an unnerving of the industry,” Banks said
“That’s not the way to reassure investors who are trying to invest millions of pounds in renewable energy development,” he added. “You add to that a government that is hell-bent on imposing nuclear power on the U.K., and it’s like they’re looking two ways at the same time. They say renewables are too expensive but are willing to use taxpayer money to support even more expensive nuclear power.”
Clausen sees lessons for the United States in Scotland’s renewable power progress, as well as a cautionary tale of how shifting government policies might slow it down. The U.S. now gets about 17 percent of its electricity from renewables. Wind, solar, geothermal, and other sources generate about 10 percent, while hydropower supplies the rest.
“I think Scotland, even though they have crafted their goal in an interesting way, sent a signal that got their market going,” Clausen said. “It demonstrates the effectiveness that policy can play in encouraging renewable energy development.”
Noting that in 2015 Congress extended two important tax credits for green energy development, Clausen said the U.S. is poised for “very big gains in renewable generation.”
Renewable power is growing faster than either natural gas or coal in the U.S., with the federal Energy Information Agency forecasting a 9.5 percent increase in green energy in 2016.
With 29 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico enacting mandates for renewable energy, the costs for both solar and wind power have dropped sharply in the past five years, Clausen said. These “renewable portfolio standards” require utilities to increase the percentage of wind, solar, and other carbon-free sources of power by anywhere from 10 to 30 percent. California has set a target of 33 percent by 2020, and it aims to get half its electricity from renewables by 2030.
But a big expansion of solar and wind energy in the U.S. would likely pay for itself when taking into account the jobs and tax revenue created by new power projects, as well as the public health benefits of reducing air pollution and cutting the carbon dioxide emissions driving climate change, Clausen said.
“We now get to make the low-cost argument,” he said. “You want to save money? You should build renewables.”
This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction 1/29/16: An earlier version of this article misstated how much of Scotland's annual electricity demand is likely to have been met by renewables in 2015. That amount is 19 thousand gigawatt hours.
Government-Backed Solar Plant Producing Only a Fraction of the Energy Promised
What's more, it is producing electricity at a cost of $200 per megawatt hour -- six times the cost of electricity produced by a natural gas-fired plant.
The Daily Caller:
These disappointing results at high prices could be the solar plant’s undoing. California Energy Commission regulators hoped the plant would help the state get 33 percent of its electricity from green sources, but now the plant could be shut down for not meeting its production promises.Ivanpah — which is owned by BrightSource Energy, NRG Energy and Google — uses more than 170,000 large mirrors, or heliostats, to reflect sunlight towards water boilers set atop 450-foot towers that create steam to turn giant turbines and generate electricity.There's also the problem that pilots have when flying over or near the plant:
The plant was financed by $1.6 billion in loan guarantees from the Department of Energy in 2011. When the solar plant opened in 2014, it was hailed as a great achievement by Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz.
“This project speaks for itself,” Moniz said when the project went online in early 2014. “Just look at the 170,000 shining heliostat mirrors and the three towers that would dwarf the Statue of Liberty.”
“Ivanpah is the largest solar thermal energy facility in the world with 392 MW of capacity — meaning it can produce enough renewable electricity to power nearly 100,000 homes,” Moniz said.
Moniz’s optimism aside, the project faced huge problems from the beginning. NRG Energy asked the federal government for a $539 million federal grant to help pay off the $1.6 billion loan it got from the Energy Department.
NRG Energy said the plant had only produced about one-quarter of its expected output in the months after it opened. The company needed an infusion of cash to help keep the project afloat.
That was only the beginning of the company’s problems. Environmentalists quickly attacked the project for killing thousands of birds since it opened. Many birds were incinerated by the intense heat being reflected off Ivanpah’s heliostats.
he Associated Press cited statistics presented by environmentalists in 2014 that “about a thousand… to 28,000” birds are incinerated by Ivanpah’s heliostats every year.
“Forensic Lab staff observed a falcon or falcon-like bird with a plume of smoke arising from the tail as it passed through the flux field,” according to a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service report from 2014.
“Immediately after encountering the flux, the bird exhibited a controlled loss of stability and altitude but was able to cross the perimeter fence before landing,” FWS reported.
Pilots have also reported seeing a “nearly blinding” glare emanating from Ivanpah while flying over the solar plant. The Sandia National Laboratory reported in 2014 Ivanpah was “sufficient to cause significant ocular impact (potential for after-image) up to a distance of ~6 miles.”The reason the owners requested the government-guaranteed loan is because no investor in their right mind would take a flyer on what amounts to gigantic experiment. A two billion dollar plant and it's not supposed to make a profit -- just to demonstrate that solar power can be generated at industrial levels.
But this turkey of a power plant can't even do that. I don't mind solar power at all and I can't wait until it becomes economically viable. The photovoltaic systems are improving in efficiency all the time and the price is coming down.
But once again, government is deciding who wins and who loses and it gave the Democratic Party contributors at Google a taxpayer-guaranteed loan that, at present, looks like is going to turn around and bite us in our sustainable buttocks.
When it's time to construct a solar mega-plant, investors will be beating down the doors looking to get in on it. That's not happening now, nor is it likely to happen anytime soon
http://www.gizmag.com/
Invelox wind turbine claims 600% advantage in energy output
SheerWind, a wind power company from Minnesota, USA,
has announced the results of tests it has carried out with its new
Invelox wind power generation technology. The company says that during
tests its turbine could generate six times more energy than the amount
produced by traditional turbines mounted on towers. Besides, the costs
of producing wind energy with Invelox are lower, delivering electricity
with prices that can compete with natural gas and hydropower.
Invelox takes a novel approach to wind power generation as it doesn’t rely on high wind speeds. Instead, it captures wind at any speed, even a breeze, from a portal located above ground. The wind captured is then funneled through a duct where it will pick up speed. The resulting kinetic energy will drive the generator on the ground level. By bringing the airflow from the top of the tower, it’s possible to generate more power with smaller turbine blades, SheerWind says.
As to the sixfold output claim, as with many new technologies promising a performance breakthrough, it needs to be viewed with caution. SheerWind makes the claim based on its own comparative tests, the precise methodology of which is not entirely clear.
"We used the same turbine-generator (with a given load bank) and mounted it on a tower as is the case for traditional wind mills," SheerWind told Gizmag. "We measured wind speed and power output. Then we placed the same turbine-generator system (subjected to the same load), again we measured free stream wind speed, wind speed inside the INVELOX, and power. Then we used the power-speed relationship over 5 to 15 days (depending on the test), and calculated energy in kWh. Six hundred percent more energy was for one of the days. [...] The improvements in energy production ranged from 81 percent to 660 percent, with an average of about 314 percent more energy."
All else being equal, it would seem to be the latter category that is the most useful indicator.
Besides power performance and the fact it can operate at wind speeds as low as 1 mph, SheerWind says Invelox costs less than US$750 per kilowatt to install. It is also claimed that operating costs are significantly reduced compared to traditional turbine technology. Due to its reduced size, the system is supposedly safer for birds and other wildlife, concerns that also informed the designers of the Ewicon bladeless turbine. Finally, the system also makes it possible for multiple towers to network, that is, to get power from the same generator.
Utility-scale availability of Invelox is slated for 2014.
Invelox takes a novel approach to wind power generation as it doesn’t rely on high wind speeds. Instead, it captures wind at any speed, even a breeze, from a portal located above ground. The wind captured is then funneled through a duct where it will pick up speed. The resulting kinetic energy will drive the generator on the ground level. By bringing the airflow from the top of the tower, it’s possible to generate more power with smaller turbine blades, SheerWind says.
As to the sixfold output claim, as with many new technologies promising a performance breakthrough, it needs to be viewed with caution. SheerWind makes the claim based on its own comparative tests, the precise methodology of which is not entirely clear.
"We used the same turbine-generator (with a given load bank) and mounted it on a tower as is the case for traditional wind mills," SheerWind told Gizmag. "We measured wind speed and power output. Then we placed the same turbine-generator system (subjected to the same load), again we measured free stream wind speed, wind speed inside the INVELOX, and power. Then we used the power-speed relationship over 5 to 15 days (depending on the test), and calculated energy in kWh. Six hundred percent more energy was for one of the days. [...] The improvements in energy production ranged from 81 percent to 660 percent, with an average of about 314 percent more energy."
All else being equal, it would seem to be the latter category that is the most useful indicator.
Besides power performance and the fact it can operate at wind speeds as low as 1 mph, SheerWind says Invelox costs less than US$750 per kilowatt to install. It is also claimed that operating costs are significantly reduced compared to traditional turbine technology. Due to its reduced size, the system is supposedly safer for birds and other wildlife, concerns that also informed the designers of the Ewicon bladeless turbine. Finally, the system also makes it possible for multiple towers to network, that is, to get power from the same generator.
Utility-scale availability of Invelox is slated for 2014.
http://www.gizmag.com/
When we think of wind power, we generally think of huge wind turbines sitting high atop towers where they can take advantage of the higher wind speeds. But Maryland-based Solar Wind Energy, Inc. is looking to turn wind power on its head with the Solar Wind Downdraft Tower, which places turbines at the base of a tower and generates its own wind to turn them.Described by the company as the first hybrid solar-wind renewable energy technology in the renewable energy market, the tower at the center of the system generates a downdraft that drives the wind turbines positioned around its base. This is done by using a series of pumps to carry water to the top of a tower standing up to 2,250 ft (685 m) tall, where it is cast across the opening as a fine mist. The mist then evaporates and is absorbed by hot, dry air, thereby cooling the air and making it denser and heavier than the warmer air outside the tower.
This water-cooled air then falls through the hollow tower at speeds up to and in excess of 50 mph (80 km/h). When it reaches the bottom of the tower, the air is directed into wind tunnels that surround the base, turning wind turbines that are contained within the tunnels. Although the system requires large amounts of water, the bulk of the water emitted at the top of the tower is captured at the bottom and recirculated through the system, being pumped back up to the top with some of the power generated by the wind turbines.
In this way, the company claims the system can generate electricity 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, when located in a hot, dry area – although electricity generation would be reduced in winter. Depending on the tower's geographical location, electricity generation could also be supplemented through the use of vertical "wind vanes" that would capture the prevailing wind and channel it into the tower.
Solar Wind Energy says it has developed proprietary software capable of determining a tower's electricity generation capabilities based on the climate in geographic regions around the globe. Using the software, the company says it can predict the daily energy outputs of a tower based on its location and size.
Based on the most recent design specifications, the company says a tower designed for a site near San Luis, Arizona, would have a peak production capacity on an hourly basis of up to 1,250 MWh on sunny days. However, when taking into account the lower generation capabilities during the winter months, the average hourly output per day comes out to approximately 435 MWh.
The company points out that once built (using conventional materials, equipment and techniques), its towers are capable of operating throughout the year independent of wind speeds with virtually no carbon footprint, fuel consumption or waste generation.
Earlier this year, Solar Wind Energy gained the necessary local entitlements to pursue development of its first tower near San Luis, Arizona. The project got a leg up earlier this week when it announced a financing agreement with JDF Capital Inc., which will provide up to US$1,585,000 to the company. Solar Wind Energy says it is also exploring potential sites in Mexico, which along with the Middle East, Chile and India, would be an ideal location for the technology in terms of climate.
The video below explains how the Downdraft Tower works.
Source: Solar Wind Energy Inc.
http://www.csmonitor.com/
Recycling sunlight: a solar cell revolution?
Scientists have found a way to recycle sunlight and boost the amount of energy captured from the sun's rays.
The world of solar cells could be on the cusp of a revolution, as
researchers seek to boost efficiency by harnessing the power to recycle
light.
A new study, published Thursday in the journal Science, considers the properties of hybrid lead halide perovskites, a group of materials already making waves in solar cell technology, and demonstrates their ability to absorb energy from the sun, create electric charge, and then churn out some light energy of their own.
Moreover, the researchers demonstrated that such these cells can be produced cheaply, with easily synthesized materials, making the proposition much more commercially viable.
“We already knew that these materials were good at
absorbing light and producing charge-carriers,” says co-author Felix
Deschler of Cambridge University, UK, in a telephone interview with The
Christian Science Monitor. “But now we have demonstrated that they can
also recombine to produce photons again.”
Solar cells work by absorbing the light
energy – photons – from the sun, converting this energy into electrical
charge, and then conveying that charge to electrodes, which take the
energy out into the power-hungry world.
Hybrid lead halide perovskites were already known to do this task efficiently, but what Dr. Deschler and his team have demonstrated is an ability to do more: the perovskites are actually able to emit light themselves after creating charge – and then reabsorb that light energy.
The result is a solar cell that acts like a concentrator, able to produce more energy – to boost the voltage obtained from a given amount of light – than would a cell made of materials without this recycling ability.
“Why this is now a big thing is because the current record of photo cell efficiency rests at 20-21 percent, whereas the absolute limit is 33 percent,” says Deschler. “Our results suggest a route to achieve that limit.”
The efficiency of a solar cell refers to the percentage of energy, given a certain amount of light, it can harness for use.
According to a widely accepted 1961 paper by William Shockley and Hans Queisser, theoretical thermodynamics cap solar efficiency at 33 percent. It is simply impossible to do better, they argued.
Yet the beauty of this most recent work is not only the hope of climbing closer to that theoretical ceiling, but the materials used to do so.
“You wouldn’t expect photon recycling in our materials because their fabrication is so much simpler than others,” explains Deschler. “Our materials are very cheap to make, very versatile.”
The reason for surprise, even skepticism, is founded in the way these materials are made – via solution. This affords little control over the way in which the structure forms.
If you have impurities in a crystalline structure, you are left with a “defect site”, which makes the material “messier,” in terms of light absorption. Without such impurities, you have what is known as a “sharp absorption onset,” allowing efficient and clear absorption of the light.
“So, while they are very efficient,” says Deschler, “we’re still trying to understand why and how they’re better than other materials.”
The researchers expect considerable interest from solar cell producers looking for a cheaper, more efficient way to harness the power of the sun.
A new study, published Thursday in the journal Science, considers the properties of hybrid lead halide perovskites, a group of materials already making waves in solar cell technology, and demonstrates their ability to absorb energy from the sun, create electric charge, and then churn out some light energy of their own.
Moreover, the researchers demonstrated that such these cells can be produced cheaply, with easily synthesized materials, making the proposition much more commercially viable.
Recommended:
Top 5 nations that use renewable energy
Hybrid lead halide perovskites were already known to do this task efficiently, but what Dr. Deschler and his team have demonstrated is an ability to do more: the perovskites are actually able to emit light themselves after creating charge – and then reabsorb that light energy.
The result is a solar cell that acts like a concentrator, able to produce more energy – to boost the voltage obtained from a given amount of light – than would a cell made of materials without this recycling ability.
“Why this is now a big thing is because the current record of photo cell efficiency rests at 20-21 percent, whereas the absolute limit is 33 percent,” says Deschler. “Our results suggest a route to achieve that limit.”
The efficiency of a solar cell refers to the percentage of energy, given a certain amount of light, it can harness for use.
According to a widely accepted 1961 paper by William Shockley and Hans Queisser, theoretical thermodynamics cap solar efficiency at 33 percent. It is simply impossible to do better, they argued.
Yet the beauty of this most recent work is not only the hope of climbing closer to that theoretical ceiling, but the materials used to do so.
“You wouldn’t expect photon recycling in our materials because their fabrication is so much simpler than others,” explains Deschler. “Our materials are very cheap to make, very versatile.”
The reason for surprise, even skepticism, is founded in the way these materials are made – via solution. This affords little control over the way in which the structure forms.
If you have impurities in a crystalline structure, you are left with a “defect site”, which makes the material “messier,” in terms of light absorption. Without such impurities, you have what is known as a “sharp absorption onset,” allowing efficient and clear absorption of the light.
“So, while they are very efficient,” says Deschler, “we’re still trying to understand why and how they’re better than other materials.”
The researchers expect considerable interest from solar cell producers looking for a cheaper, more efficient way to harness the power of the sun.
http://www.computerworld.com/
New solar towers, cubes offer 20X more power, researchers say
Solar towers are ideal for lower light conditions
Researchers at MIT have discovered a method of optimizing solar energy collection by arranging photovoltaic (PV) panels on a tower or in a cube shape.
The new forms of solar energy collection offer anywhere from double to 20 times as much output compared with today's common flat-panels using the same area.
The technology would be most advantageous in northern climates -- further away from the equator -- where the less intensive solar exposure can be optimized.
MIT's research, the findings for which are based on both computer modeling and outdoor testing of real modules, were published in the journal Energy and Environmental Science.
"I think this concept could become an important part of the future of photovoltaics," Jeffrey Grossman, an associate professor of Power Engineering at MIT and lead author of the research paper, said in a statement.
The cost of the 3D solar towers or cubes exceeds that of ordinary flat panels. But the expense is partially balanced by a much higher energy output for a given footprint, as well as much more uniform power output over the course of a day and over the seasons when panels face less light and more cloud cover, the researchers stated.
Because solar cells have become less expensive than accompanying support structures, wiring and installation, the time is right to move forward with the innovation, the researchers said.
Solar power generation is leading the cost decline in solar systems. Solar photovoltaic (PV) module costs have fallen 75% since the end of 2009 and the cost of electricity from utility-scale solar PV has fallen 50% since 2010, according to a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).
In a separate report issued by Deutsche Bank last year, the cost to generate power through solar means was predicted to drop by 40% over the next three to four years. Deutsche Bank has also reported that the cost of rooftop solar power is expected to beat coal and oil-fired plant energy costs in just two years.
MIT's 3D solar structures' vertical surfaces can collect much more sunlight during mornings, evenings and winters, when the sun is closer to the horizon, according to co-author Marco Bernardi, a graduate student in MIT's Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE).
The 3D solar structure improvements simply make power output more predictable and uniform, which could make integration with the power grid easier than with conventional systems, the authors said.
"Even 10 years ago, this idea wouldn't have been economically justified because the modules cost so much," Grossman said. "The cost for silicon cells is a fraction of the total cost, a trend that will continue downward in the near future."
The new forms of solar energy collection offer anywhere from double to 20 times as much output compared with today's common flat-panels using the same area.
The technology would be most advantageous in northern climates -- further away from the equator -- where the less intensive solar exposure can be optimized.
MIT's research, the findings for which are based on both computer modeling and outdoor testing of real modules, were published in the journal Energy and Environmental Science.
"I think this concept could become an important part of the future of photovoltaics," Jeffrey Grossman, an associate professor of Power Engineering at MIT and lead author of the research paper, said in a statement.
The cost of the 3D solar towers or cubes exceeds that of ordinary flat panels. But the expense is partially balanced by a much higher energy output for a given footprint, as well as much more uniform power output over the course of a day and over the seasons when panels face less light and more cloud cover, the researchers stated.
Because solar cells have become less expensive than accompanying support structures, wiring and installation, the time is right to move forward with the innovation, the researchers said.
Solar power generation is leading the cost decline in solar systems. Solar photovoltaic (PV) module costs have fallen 75% since the end of 2009 and the cost of electricity from utility-scale solar PV has fallen 50% since 2010, according to a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).
In a separate report issued by Deutsche Bank last year, the cost to generate power through solar means was predicted to drop by 40% over the next three to four years. Deutsche Bank has also reported that the cost of rooftop solar power is expected to beat coal and oil-fired plant energy costs in just two years.
MIT's 3D solar structures' vertical surfaces can collect much more sunlight during mornings, evenings and winters, when the sun is closer to the horizon, according to co-author Marco Bernardi, a graduate student in MIT's Department of Materials Science and Engineering (DMSE).
The 3D solar structure improvements simply make power output more predictable and uniform, which could make integration with the power grid easier than with conventional systems, the authors said.
"Even 10 years ago, this idea wouldn't have been economically justified because the modules cost so much," Grossman said. "The cost for silicon cells is a fraction of the total cost, a trend that will continue downward in the near future."
Can Dean Kamen make the Stirling engine part of our energy future?
As New Hampshire contemplates its energy future, maybe we should include a bit of energy past that has never quite succeeded.
That’s the idea behind an intriguing
proposal from Dean Kamen’s research firm, DEKA. It wants to power a
state-owned building with a Stirling engine, a design that has shown
great promise for more than a century but hasn’t been truly
commercialized.
If the proposal is accepted by lawmakers
and if it works, it might save the state a little money on electricity,
might help DEKA turn one of Kamen’s dreams into a real business, and
would go a long way toward burnishing New Hampshire’s credentials as a
place where interesting technology comes to life.
So how likely is it? It’s hard to say,
but since this is Granite Geek, we’ll contemplate the tech stuff before
we get to the lawmaker stuff.
A Stirling engine (named after Robert
Stirling, a Scottish minister who developed one of the prototypes 200
years ago) has two major differences from my car engine.
One is that it uses an external heat
source to create energy and move parts around rather than an internal
heat source created by a spark plug igniting a mix of gasoline and air.
The other is that it is a closed-cycle engine; the internal fluids and
gases stay inside, unlike the exhaust that is released by my car.
In theory, these make the Stirling
engine more efficient, less polluting and more flexible than
internal-combustion engines, since it can use any external heat source.
In reality, issues of heat transfer through materials, sealing fluids
and other engineering problems have kept it from working efficiently on a
useful scale except in a few limited applications.
Enter Kamen, famous for the Segway but
more importantly an inventor of medical devices, a major force in the
rebirth of Manchester’s millyard tech scene and the creator of the FIRST
Robotics Competition. Kamen has long been fascinated with Stirling
engines, creating them in various sizes and configurations to power
various devices. But they haven’t really worked out – until now, maybe.
“We have done a lot of work at DEKA to
make (the Stirling engine) a more viable, a more practical technology,”
said Jim Scott, a DEKA representative.
DEKA has built refrigerator-sized
Stirling engines, powered by natural gas, that it says can generate 10
kilowatts of electricity and 40 kilowatts of heat. (I didn’t even know
you could measure heat in kilowatts; energy units sure are confusing.)
A couple of these units have been helping
power DEKA’s millyard building at 100 Commercial St. since late 2013 as
part of a test, and the company has several more operating in other
buildings hither and yon. It says they are living up to their promise,
and now DEKA would like to put one in a state building in Concord to
give the project a much higher profile.
A law (Senate Bill 489) has been proposed
to allow the project to go ahead, at no cost to the state. “It’s like
hooking up a generator and a water heater, that’s all,” Scott said.
Scott showed up at a legislative hearing
last Tuesday to answer questions on the proposal, but as it turns out,
there weren’t any questions for him. Lawmakers on the Science,
Technology and Energy Committee mostly talked about whether the issue
should be handled by the Legislature or handled through the Executive
Council, which is usually the body that accepts gifts to the state
government. They’ll discuss the issue again Thursday.
Sen. Jeb Bradley of Wolfeboro, the prime
sponsor, argued that the bill had the potential to give a boost to a
well-known state company, above and beyond its energy benefits. “We have
nothing to lose by doing this,” he said.
Committee member Herbert Vadney, a state
representative from Meredith who is a mechanical engineer, said his
familiarity with Stirling engines made him less than optimistic. “I see
no reason for the state to get involved in an R&D project at this
point – this is a gift to somebody,” he said.
David Murotake of Nashua, another
committee representative with tech background, was more
supportive. “It might build New Hampshire as a skill center for Sterling
engines,” he mused.
Meredith Hatfield, director of the Office
of Energy and Planning, said she was interested in the project as the
state ponders ways to deal with the fast-changing energy universe, where
utilities and power production is being reinvented on the fly.
“We need to be looking at different ways
of doing things,” she told the committee. A natural gas-fired
electricity-producing engine might not be as cutting edge as fuel cells
or solar panels, but adding small-scale power plants could give the
state more flexibility to cope with changes coming down the pike.
Plus, she noted, DEKA’s offer is a
full-scale pilot project for free. “We don’t have the budget to test it
out ourselves,” she said dryly.
(David Brooks can be reached at 369-3313, dbrooks@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @GraniteGeek.)