There is a great deal of interest in developing cost-effective, energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly ways of producing hydrogen. If hydrogen-powered vehicles are to catch on, it is essential.
Los Angeles has a tremendous thirst for electric power and is always trying to find new sources. On December 1, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power began buying all the power generated by the brand-new 24 MW Tungsten Mountain geothermal power plant located in Churchill County in Nevada’s Great Basin region.
Bitcoin is a form of digital currency. Bitcoins aren’t printed, like dollars or euros. They are produced by people and businesses using computer software to perform the necessary complex calculations. A bitcoin is essentially a line of computer code that’s signed digitally when it goes from one owner to another. Bitcoin is the most prominent example of a growing category of money known as cryptocurrency.
Power plants have been the biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States for more than 40 years. But the ever-changing picture of electricity production has changed that situation. According to new data from the government’s Energy Information Administration, transportation has now taken over the top spot.
The Australian state of South Australia suffered crippling electricity outages in September 2016, which coincided with gale-force winds and flooding rains. The outages were triggered by storm damage to major transmission lines followed by wind farms disconnecting from the power grid.
It is well-known that the cost of both solar and wind energy has been dropping dramatically in recent years. That trend is largely responsible for the rapid growth of both power sources. A recent study has revealed just how remarkable the economic progress has been.
2018 is just around the corner. Popular resolutions for the New Year always seem to include things like improving health, traveling more, spending less money, and so on. But one resolution that isn’t as popular but could collectively have a major impact is committing to living a cleaner and greener life.
Germany has a reputation as one of the greenest countries on earth. They have comprehensive recycling programs, they treasure their forests, and in recent decades, they have been aggressively working to replace both nuclear and coal-fired power plants with renewable energy sources. They have been an early world leader in solar power. And their national Energiewende or “energy turn” initiative demonstrates a strong commitment to the environment.
Carbon dioxide and methane are the two greenhouse gases that are having the greatest impact on the global climate. There are basically three ways to prevent them from getting into the atmosphere: don’t emit them, trap them and store them away, or turn them into something useful.
Researchers at Columbia University have demonstrated a potential new energy harvesting technique based on the natural evaporation of water. Every day, vast amounts of water evaporate from the surfaces of lakes and rivers, a process powered by the heat energy of the sun. The amount of energy involved is enormous but generally speaking is not something we can tap into.
Firebricks, which are bricks designed to withstand high heat, have been around for more than 3000 years. The Hittites used them to line iron-smelting kilns. They are simply bricks made from clays that can withstand much higher temperatures than ordinary bricks.
The Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology or OIST has been working on ways to generate electricity from the ocean for five years. Their initial project, known as “Sea Horse” uses submerged turbines anchored to the sea floor that convert the kinetic energy of sustained natural currents into useful electricity, which is then delivered by cables to the land. The project has been successful and OIST is now planning the next phase.
Two turbines in the Pentland Firth in Scotland recently set a world record for monthly energy production from a tidal stream power station. In August, the MeyGen installation off the Caithness coast of Scotland produced 700 MWh of electricity, enough to power 2,000 homes.
In a study published in the journal Science, researchers from institutions in the United States, South Korea, and China described the development of “twistron” yarns, which are essentially pieces of yarn that produce electricity when they are twisted or stretched.
Solar panels are on more than a million rooftops in the United States, so they are getting to be a pretty common sight. We also see them along our highways powering lights and signs and emergency call boxes. As it gets cheaper and more common, solar technology is starting to show up in more unusual ways.
The earth’s energy imbalance is the difference between the amount of solar energy absorbed by the earth and the amount of energy the planet radiates back into space as heat. If the imbalance is positive, that is, if more energy is coming in than going out, then the earth will get warmer over time. If the imbalance is negative, then the planet will get cooler.
In a recent report to a United Nations ocean conference, scientists are warning that new rules are desperately needed to protect marine life in the open seas. That’s because more than 60% of the ocean has no conservation rules since it’s located outside national jurisdictions. The open ocean is at risk from climate change, over-fishing, deep sea mining, farm pollution, and plastics pollution.
Electric cars represent only a tiny fraction of the overall auto market. The numbers are growing, most certainly, but they are still quite small in most places. The recent start of production of the Tesla Model 3 has attracted quite a bit of attention to electric cars, but in many countries, there is much more to the story than just media buzz about a new car.
