Energy

Cool Blue Manganese Compound Has 40 Percent Heat Reflectivity

A new durable, environmentally-benign (we all hope) blue pigment has also been found to have unusual characteristics in reflecting heat- it's much better at it than most blue pigments in use.  The compound just received patent approval and was discove ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 3 2012 - 3:00pm

Generating Solar Power...Underwater

It sounds like a child’s question: can you generate solar power underwater? The answer, according to Phillip Jenkins and his team at the US Naval Research Laboratory, is yes. The researchers recently demonstrated a method for harvesting solar power underwa ...

Article - Ysabel Yates - Jun 14 2012 - 11:48am

Transparent Solar Film Uses Tinted Windows To Generate Electricity

Heliatek GmbH, a technology company in the field of organic photovoltaics, has announced that its transparent solar films could be used to be integrated between the glass sheets of double glazed windows. These windows would look like tinted glass as the u ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 17 2012 - 12:44pm

Anti-Shale Gas Activists "Study It To Death" Strategy Threatens Natural Gas Development

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s rumored retreat on fracking shows just how powerful an anti-science, fear-based campaign can be. If reports are correct, Cuomo will restrict fracking to a few counties in which gas shale is far below the water table, and a ...

Article - Jon Entine - Jun 15 2012 - 10:41am

French Company Gets $25 Million From U.S. Department Of Energy For Solar Plant

Soitec, part of Euronext Paris, has announced that the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is giving them a SUNPATH award in the amount of $25 million to support its new North American solar manufacturing facility in San Diego, California. SUNPATH, which stand ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 18 2012 - 2:47pm

Photosynthetic Algae- Green Factories For Alternative Fuels

Scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have shown that ramping up the overall metabolism of algae by feeding in more carbon increases oil production as the organisms continue to grow- and that may point to new ways to turn photosynthetic green algae ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 19 2012 - 8:30am

Ocean Energy Development Could Get Less Dangerous

Tapping ocean energy sources like tides and offshore wind sound fine to people who understand nothing about science (the Anything But Oil contingent) but in reality it requires pile driving, the practice of pounding long, hollow steel pipes called piles in ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 21 2012 - 3:00am

Energy Density: Why Gasoline Is Here To Stay

Like people who approach geopolitics with the attitude of "If people would just talk to each other, we would all along", there are a lot of naïve assumptions about just dumping gasoline. We know it causes emissions, and emissions are bad, we know ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Aug 3 2012 - 5:20am

New Loo Changes Poo Into Power

A new toilet system can turn human waste into electricity and fertilizers and even reduce the amount of water needed for flushing by up to 90 percent The inventors in Singapore call it the No-Mix Vacuum Toilet and it has two chambers that separate the liqu ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 26 2012 - 11:11am

Abound Solar Saves Taxpayers $330 Million By Declaring Bankruptcy

Sometimes declaring bankruptcy is a good thing. In the case of  Abound Solar Inc., a U.S. solar manufacturer that had American taxpayers on the hook for $400 million, the good thing is they closed the doors after only losing us $70 million in Department of ...

Blog Post - Hank Campbell - Jun 29 2012 - 12:26am