Inventor of Photosynthesis-Based Solar Cells Wins Millennium Tech Prize
Professor Michael Gratzel The inventor of a low-cost solar cell that could be used to build electricity generating windows has been awarded this year's Millennium Technology Prize. He received the €800,000 prize at a ceremony in Helsinki. Explaining his inspiration, he said: "I was always intrigued by the way plants capture sunlight and turn it into fuels like sugar. Gratzel says "Natural photosynthesis was the inspiration, and our solar cell is the only one that mimics the natural photosynthetic process." Gratzel cells rely on nanotechnology to produce power from sunlight. "We are using nanocrystal films in which the particles are so small, they don't scatter light," said Professor Gratzel. "You can imagine using those cells as electricity producing windows. What's very exciting is that you collect light from all sides, so can capture electricity from the inside as well as the outside. You could think that the glass of all high-rises in New York would be electricity generating panels."
Wal-Mart Telling Suppliers to Go Green
The World's First Quintuple Play
Cisco wires 'city in a box' for fast-growing Asia
Cisco Systems is helping build a prototype in South Korea for what one developer describes as an instant "city in a box." Cisco, which has more than 4,400 employees and contractors in Research Triangle Park, is wiring every tech nook and cranny of the new city, making it one of the most technologically sophisticated urban centers on the planet. New Songdo City, a soon-to-be-completed metropolis about the size of downtown Boston that serves as a showroom model for what is expected to be the first of many assembly-line cities. In addition to state-of-the-art information technology, Songdo will emit just one-third of the greenhouse gases of a typical city of similar size. "Everything will be connected - buildings, cars, energy - everything," said Wim Elfrink, Cisco's Bangalore-based chief globalization officer. "This is the tipping point. When we start building cities with technology in the infrastructure, it's beyond my imagination what that will enable."
Coulomb Technologies to install 4,600 electric vehicle charging stations
LA Times - Coulomb Technologies plans to install 4,600 electric vehicle charging stations for free around the country. The installations are part of a $37-million project called ChargePoint America, funded partly by a $15-million stimulus grant administered by the Department of Energy through the Transportation Electrification Initiative. Once the stations are in place, Purdue University and Idaho National Labs will analyze data about vehicle use and charging patterns. The company, based in Campbell, Calif., will immediately start setting up public and private stations in Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Jose and San Francisco Bay Area. The stations will also go up in Austin, Texas; Detroit; New York; Orlando, Fla.; Redmond, Wash.; and Washington, D.C. Once installation launches in the coming weeks, more than 1,000 stations are scheduled to be put in by December, with the rest to be in place by September 2011.
AltEnergyMag Interview - Recycle CO2 into Fuel
From sources such as natural gas fields, refinery flare gas, landfill gas, municipal waste, algae and other biomass, there is an abundant supply of inexpensive feedstock available to produce large and sustainable quantities of liquid fuel to replace petroleum for global consumption, thereby eliminating our dependence on petroleum.
Case Study - How Spinwave Systems' Wireless Mesh Network is Helping Dartmouth College Monitor Energy
When Dartmouth, prompted by soaring fuel costs and concern about CO2 emissions, decided to install a network to collect more timely information on its heating/cooling system, it turned to Spinwave Systems. The college is deploying Spinwave sensors and other wireless networking hardware, linked together by Spinwave's wireless mesh network to give college facilities managers the ability to view energy system operations in near-real-time.
ZigBee Alliance & SunSpec Alliance Collaborate on Renewable Energy Management
Today ZigBee Alliance, a global ecosystem of companies creating wireless solutions for use in energy management, residential, commercial and consumer electronics applications announced an agreement to collaborate with SunSpec Alliance to define standards for renewable energy and microgrid management using ZigBee Smart Energy Version 2.0. The collaboration between the two Alliances will address the existing gap between the growing use of distributed generation via renewable energy resources and the Smart Grid, in order to take advantage of the energy management efficiencies of the Smart Grid.
Kyocera Solar's New Solar Plant Opens In San Diego
Initially, it will produce 30 megawatts of solar modules a year for the US market. But the plant's capacity is expected to expand as Japanese-owned Kyocera seeks to produce one gigawatt (1,000MW) of solar cells worldwide by March 2013. Kyocera's 210-watt and 235W modules are being produced at the San Diego facility, the company's most powerful and efficient solar power products. Tatsumi Maeda, vice president and general manager of Kyocera Corporation's Solar Energy Group, said: "High-quality, high-efficiency solar modules from Kyocera's San Diego plant fulfill the ‘Buy American' provisions enacted by the U.S. government, while meeting the rising demand for renewable energy that has accompanied the current administration's ‘Green New Deal' measures."
Smart House Developed Through ASHRAE Grant
From smart home controls to solar powered gas refrigeration, undergraduate HVAC&R students in their senior year are able to gain hands-on experience in their field thanks to the 2010-2011 ASHRAE Undergraduate Senior Project Grant. "Purdue University is designing and building a net zero energy home that will showcase a variety of new technologies for residential construction" Bill Hutzel, faculty advisor of the project, said. The ASHRAE grant will provide the crucial infrastructure for monitoring and controlling the mechanical, electrical, lighting and other systems in the smart house by developing the controls schematic; developing the sequence of operation; developing the control code; installing the controls and sensors; and commissioning the building systems. The smart house will become a multidisciplinary living laboratory for large numbers of university students interested in low energy residential construction.
Transforming waste plastic into an alternative fuel
Student researchers at Northeastern University have designed an apparatus to convert plastic waste into clean energy while minimizing the release of harmful emissions. Self-sustainability is the key to the double-tank combustor design. Plastic waste is first processed in an upper tank through pyrolysis, which converts solid plastic into gas. Next, the gas flows to a lower tank, where it is burned with oxidants to generate heat and steam. The heat sustains the combustor while the steam can be used to generate electric power.
OPEL SOLAR INC. CEO SAYS FUTURE REMAINS BRIGHT FOR SOLAR POWER
Despite an uneven economic recovery and the lingering effects of the global recession on virtually every industry around the world, Leon (Lee) M. Pierhal, Chief Executive Officer of OPEL Solar, Inc., a leading global supplier of high concentration photovoltaic ("HCPV") solar panels and other solar products, including utility scale ground-based tracker systems and unique light weight rooftop tracker systems, is reporting a sharp uptick in requests for quotes on industrial scale solar power systems in North America and abroad. In commenting on the dramatic growth in quoting on utility scale solar installations, Pierhal also noted an especially sharp and recent focus in the marketplace on solar power installations of at least 1 MW in size.
China to Subsidize Alternative Energy Cars
China is subsidizing alternative- energy cars in five cities to increase their attractiveness for buyers to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and improve air quality. The government will provide as much as 50,000 yuan ($7,320) for purchases of plug-in hybrid models, which run partly on gasoline, and as much as 60,000 yuan for cars powered only by batteries, a statement on the Ministry of Finance's website said today. China, which became the world's biggest car market last year, aims to increase the annual production capacity of alternative-energy vehicles to half a million units by 2011 as part of efforts to cut oil imports and rein in pollution.
State of the States: Fuel Cells in America
Fuel cells are here today, available for purchase and already taking off in early markets such as the telecommunications industry, materials handling equipment, and combined heat-and-power stationary systems.
EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge
EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge is a three-year collegiate student engineering competition that focuses on vehicle integration of advanced propulsion technologies. The competition challenges 16 universities across North America to reduce the environmental impact of vehicles by minimizing the vehicle's fuel consumption, petroleum use and emissions, while maintaining its utility, safety and performance.
Turning A Poisonous Weed Into The Next Viable Biofuel
The CCF Energy Credits Program facilitates the implementation of scalable and auditable energy efficiencies through education, baseline auditing and practicable product and service applications, all of which result in volume job creation at the shop floor and management levels now and in the future. For business and consumer customers, the benefits are also clear - reduced costs of energy be it water or electricity, with a no cost power efficiency program.
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