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| New Sunlight Reactor Produces Fuel |  |
| eldavojohn writes "A new reactor developed by CalTech shows promise for producing renewable fuel from sunlight. The reactor hinges on a metal oxide named Ceria that has very interesting properties at very high temperatures. It exhales oxygen at very high temperatures and inhales oxygen at very low temperatures. From the article, `Specifically, the inhaled oxygen is stripped off of carbon dioxide (CO2) and/or water (H2O) gas molecules that are pumped into the reactor, producing carbon monoxide (CO) and/or hydrogen gas (H2). H2 can be used to fuel hydrogen fuel cells; CO, combined with H2, can be used to create synthetic gas, or "syngas," which is the precursor to liquid hydrocarbon fuels. Adding other catalysts to the gas mixture, meanwhile, produces methane. And once the ceria is oxygenated to full capacity, it can be heated back up again, and the cycle can begin anew.` The only other piece of the puzzle is a large sunlight concentrator to raise the temperature to the necessary 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The team is working on modifying and refining the reactor to require a lower temperature to achieve the two-step thermochemical cycle. Another issue is the heat loss which the team claims could be reduced to improve efficiency to 15% or higher. Since CO2 is an input, the possibility exists for coal and power plants to collect CO2 emissions to be used in this process which would effectively allow us to "use the carbon twice." Another idea listed is that a "zero CO2 emissions" is developed along these lines: `H2O and CO2 would be converted to methane, would fuel electricity-producing power plants that generate more CO2 and H2O, to keep the process going.` The team`s work was published last month in Science." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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| New Magnets Could Solve Our Rare-Earth Problems | |
| Researchers are working on composites that would make strong magnets that need less of the hard-to-get ingredients.
Stronger, lighter magnets could enter the market in the next few years, making more efficient car engines and wind turbines possible. Researchers need the new materials because today`s best magnets use rare-earth metals, whose supply is becoming unreliable even as demand grows.
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| Legislators urged to do more to back renewable energy | |
| Virginia needs to do more to aid the renewable-energy industry, speakers said today at the General Assembly Building . |
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| New Reactor to Make Fuel from Sunlight | |
| The metal is cerium oxide -- or ceria -- and it is the centerpiece of a promising new technology developed by Haile and her colleagues that concentrates solar energy and uses it to efficiently convert carbon dioxide and water into fuels. |
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| Tallahassee Tour Stop announced in the 2011 Florida Renewable Energy Tour | |
| The Florida Alliance for Renewable Energy (FARE) is excited to announce the next confirmed tour stop in the 2011 Florida Renewable Energy Tour with the evening Town Hall event at the Leon County Courthouse in downtown Tallahassee, and will be held on Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011. The tour will consist of visits to various renewable energy and energy efficiency installations in the area leading up to a Town Hall event including local and state legislators and industry experts, featuring discussions about advancing renewable energy and energy efficiency in Florida. |
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| Solar Installation at Perdue to be One of East Coast`s Largest | |
| More than 11,000 solar panels will be installed at two Perdue facilities this summer, resulting in one of the largest commercially-owned solar power systems in the eastern United States. |
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| Firm to create 300 turbine jobs | |
| Up to 300 jobs could be created in Glasgow and Dundee by Spanish wind turbine manufacturer, Gamesa. |
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| Cincinnati Zoo To Power Park With Solar Panels | |
| The Cincinnati Zoo has begun installing a solar power array that it hopes will provide about a fifth of the park`s energy needs by April. |
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| City building heated by the Earth | |
| A new shopping, leisure and office complex in London is being heated and cooled by large-scale renewable energy technology installed under the site. |
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| Are SRECs the Future of U.S. Solar Policy? | |
| Feed-in Tariffs (FITs) have been a major buzz phrase in solar policy circles in recent years. While dozens of countries and provinces have implemented FITs outside the U.S., they have yet to make major headway in America. Instead, a number of states have crafted markets based around the trading of Solar Renewable Energy Credits, known as SRECs. |
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| Bloom Energy`s Fuel Cell Breakthrough | |
| The Silicon Valley green startup is selling power by the watt, with no up-front cost |
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| A Talk with Denise Bode | |
| Washington`s top wind energy lobbyists talks about support for renewables in Congress, oil, coal, and China |
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| [Report] A Magnetically Focused Molecular Beam of Ortho-Water | |
| Magnetic fields can separate two isomers of water that differ in the relative spin states of their two hydrogen atoms.Authors: T. Kravchuk, M. Reznikov, P. Tichonov, N. Avidor, Y. Meir, A. Bekkerman, G. Alexandrowicz |
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