Lifeboat Foundation

In just a few years, we could see an electric car on the market that doesn’t need a charging station to ‘fuel up.’

The biggest apparent stumbling blocks for electric vehicles (EVs) seems to be their range — the distance that can be driven between charging — and the time it takes for an EV battery to be charged. When competing against gas cars, which can be filled up in just a few minutes, and can cover a range of several hundred miles per tank, the idea of having a limited range and a longer ‘fueling’ time with an EV isn’t one that most of us are comfortable with. And when considering the easy availability of fuel from the vast number of gas stations (as opposed to the EV charging stations that are few and far between in most areas), switching from gas to electric mobility is a bit of a stretch for many people (not even taking into account the higher cost for EVs).

However, as costs go down, and as EV ranges increase (along with the growing numbers of dedicated EV charging stations), electric transport options will start to become more and more desirable (especially in times of rising gas prices), but will still most likely need to be tethered to charging points, unless the next generation of electric cars follows in the footsteps of one Chinese company.

Continue reading “Hanergy’s solar-powered electric cars can charge themselves while driving” »

It would be interesting to see how this could be used in solar panels that can adjust themselves to capture the best/ high quality sun rays;

Written by AZoM

A team of researchers from Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) and Humboldt University in Berlin showcased a thin layer of plastic material in the Nature Communications journal, which has the capacity to move spontaneously under the influence of daylight. The researchers feel that this flexible plastic is appropriate as a self-cleaning surface, for example it can be used in solar cells.

Continue reading “Innovative Plastic Material has Ability to Move Spontaneously in Visible Light” »

I’ve seen people try and shoot this down, but it’s on its way.

Missouri will line a swath of the iconic highway with special energy-generating photovoltaic pavers.

Continue reading “A Section of Route 66 Will Become America’s First Public Solar Road” »

Scientists from the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have discovered a possible secret to dramatically boosting the efficiency of perovskite solar cells hidden in the nanoscale peaks and valleys of the crystalline material.

Solar cells made from compounds that have the crystal structure of the mineral perovskite have captured scientists’ imaginations. They’re inexpensive and easy to fabricate, like organic solar cells. Even more intriguing, the efficiency at which perovskite solar cells convert photons to electricity has increased more rapidly than any other material to date, starting at three percent in 2009 — when researchers first began exploring the material’s photovoltaic capabilities — to 22 percent today. This is in the ballpark of the efficiency of silicon solar cells.

Now, as reported online July 4, 2016 in the journal Nature Energy, a team of scientists from the Molecular Foundry and the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis, both at Berkeley Lab, found a surprising characteristic of a perovskite solar cell that could be exploited for even higher efficiencies, possibly up to 31 percent.

Q-Dot demand in Healthcare is predicted to be high.

http://embedded-computing.com/news/rising-quantum-dots-market/#

Quantum Dots Market is driven by increasing demand for energy efficient displays and lighting solutions, North America accounted for largest quantum dots market share, use of quantum dots in solar cells and VLSI design is expected to open new possibilities for quantum dots market.

Quantum dots are semiconducting nanoparticles that range from 1nm to 10nm diameter in size and demonstrate quantum mechanical properties. The peculiarity of quantum dots is that they have ability to unite their semiconductor properties with those of nanomaterials. In addition, tunable nanocrystal size and superior optical properties have made quantum dots attractive semiconducting material for variety of applications in the field of healthcare, optoelectronics, solar energy, and security among others.

Scientists are making the big push to send electricity to Earthlings from the final frontier.

Anna Bitong is a Los Angeles-based journalist who has reported for The Acorn Newspapers and City News Service.

Deep inside the electronic devices that proliferate in our world, from cell phones to solar cells, layer upon layer of almost unimaginably small transistors and delicate circuitry shuttle all-important electrons back and forth.

It is now possible to cram 6 million or more transistors into a single layer of these chips. Designers include layers of glassy materials between the electronics to insulate and protect these delicate components against the continual push and pull of heating and cooling that often causes them to fail.

A paper published today in the journal Nature Materials reshapes our understanding of the materials in those important protective layers. In the study, Stanford’s Reinhold Dauskardt, a professor of materials science and engineering, and doctoral candidate Joseph Burg reveal that those glassy materials respond very differently to compression than they do to the tension of bending and stretching. The findings overturn conventional understanding and could have a lasting impact on the structure and reliability of the myriad devices that people depend upon every day.

Continue reading “Research may lead to more durable electronic devices such as cellphones” »

(credit: WEF)

The World Economic Forum’s annual list of this year’s breakthrough technologies, published today, includes “socially aware” openAI, grid-scale energy storage, perovskite solar cells, and other technologies with the potential to “transform industries, improve lives, and safeguard the planet.” The WEF’s specific interest is to “close gaps in investment and regulation.”

“Horizon scanning for emerging technologies is crucial to staying abreast of developments that can radically transform our world, enabling timely expert analysis in preparation for these disruptors. The global community needs to come together and agree on common principles if our society is to reap the benefits and hedge the risks of these technologies,” said Bernard Meyerson, PhD, Chief Innovation Officer of IBM and Chair of the WEF’s Meta-Council on Emerging Technologies.

The list also provides an opportunity to debate human, societal, economic or environmental risks and concerns that the technologies may pose — prior to widespread adoption.

The flights take such a long time because Solar Impulse 2, as the name suggests, is completely powered by sunlight. The plane’s massive 72-metre wings (broader than a 747!) are covered in some 269.5 square metres of photovoltaic cells. During the day, the cells power four 14kW (17.4hp) electric motors and top-up four 41kWh lithium-ion batteries. During the evening, the motors are driven by the batteries. Max cruise speed when the sun is up is 49 knots (90km/h), and a rather languid 33 knots (60km/h) at night.

The solar cells don’t quite refill the batteries during the day, which means the plane can’t fly forever just yet. Max flight duration is somewhere around five to six days.

For power-saving reasons, the Solar Impulse 2 cockpit can only carry a single human, and is both unheated and unpressurised. The pilots do sleep while they’re up in the air, but usually just for 20 minutes at a time (the telemetry data for one flight showed 10 catnaps of 20 minutes over a 24-hour period). Now multiply those conditions by a continuous flight time of three or four days and you have some idea of the rigours that Piccard and Borschberg must go through.

Continue reading “Solar Impulse 2 completes world’s first solar-powered Atlantic flight” »