Research into alternative sources of energy, such as solar and wind, are constantly growing and evolving. The science behind photovoltaics is improving constantly and wind turbines are producing more electrical energy than ever before. However, the question still stands of how we store and deliver this electrical energy to the grid. A few ECS members from Harvard University believe their new flow battery could answer that question.
Building off earlier research, the new and improve flow battery could offer a great solution for the reliability issue of energy sources such as wind and solar based on weather patterns. The batteries could store large amounts of electrical energy that can delivered to commercial and residential establishments even when the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining.
On the path to building better batteries, researchers have been choosing silicon as their material of choice to increase life-cycle and energy density. Silicon is favored among researchers because its anodes have the ability to store up to ten times the amount of lithium ions than conventional graphite electrodes. However, silicon is a rather rigid material, which makes it difficult for the battery to withstand volume changes during charge and discharge cycles.
This from Georgia Tech:
Using a combination of experimental and simulation techniques, researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and three other research organizations have reported surprisingly high damage tolerance in electrochemically-lithiated silicon materials. The work suggests that all-silicon anodes may be commercially viable if battery charge levels are kept high enough to maintain the material in its ductile state.
Cyanobacteria has been recognized by researchers as a promising platform for biofuel production since 2013. The bacteria—more commonly referred to as blue-green algae—has the ability to grow fast and fix carbon dioxide gas. Unlike many other forms of bacteria, they do not require fermentable sugars or arable land to grow.
While that all spells out promising potential for the transformation into biofuel, the productions methods have not been adequate to take this development to commercialization.
A ‘Green’ Revolution
Now, researchers from Michigan State University have found a way to streamline the molecular machinery that transforms cyanobacteria into biofuels. To do this, researchers fabricated a synthetic protein that can improve the bacteria’s ability to fix carbon dioxide gas as well as potentially improve plant photosynthesis.
“The multifunctional protein we’ve built can be compared to a Swiss Army knife,” says Raul Gonzalez-Esquer, a doctoral researcher at Michigan State University and one of the authors of the study. “From known, existing parts, we’ve built a new protein that does several essential functions.”
Even after the release of the highly anticipated iPhone 6s, Apple remains in the spotlight with the announcement of the company’s potential electric car.
Apple’s entrance into the electric car race puts them up against competitors such as Tesla and Google. The company aims to follow a Tesla path rather than Google—delivering cars directly to the consumers rather than selling the technology to established automobile manufactures. It is expected that the first iCar (presumed name) will hit the market by 2019.
Electric Car Race
These companies are not the only ones interested in green energy alternatives for automobiles. Car manufactures such as Toyota are also directing their attention to this topic. Aside from the release of the Toyota Prius PHV, the company has also allowed for royalty-free use of their fuel cell patents and has recently partnered with ECS to fund new projects in green energy technology.
Technology companies and automobile makers alike are transitioning away from gas-guzzling vehicles to environmentally friendly automobiles, utilizing hydrogen and electric power more frequently. This is in part due to consumer concern regarding climate change and danger of increased greenhouse gas emissions.
A working cell from Switzer’s research, with gas evolution. Image: Sam O’Keefe, Missouri S&T.
In order to satisfy growing energy demands, scientists are looking for ways to develop and deploy a broad range of alternative energy sources that can be both efficient and environmentally friendly. At Missouri University of Science and Technology, a team is working to make clean energy more accessible through the development of a cheap, simple way to split hydrogen and oxygen through a new electrodeposition method.
ECS member and head researcher in the project, Jay Switzer, believes that the new development will produce highly efficient solar cells. He and ECS student member James Hill predict the process will be able to effectively gather solar energy for use as fuel, further increasing the amount of hydrogen available for fuel usage.
“The work helps to solve the problem that solar energy is intermittent,” says Switzer. “Obviously, we cannot have the sun produce energy on one spot the entire day, but our process converts the energy into a form that is more easily stored.”
Electrodeposition for Hydrogen
This from Missouri University of Science and Technology:
Switzer and his team use silicon wafers to absorb solar energy. The silicon is submerged in water, with the front surface exposed to a solar energy simulator and the back surface covered in electrodes to conduct the energy. The silicon has cobalt nano-islands formed onto it using a process called electrodeposition.
Communities are facing pressing water and sanitation issues across the globe. Recently, ECS tackled this issue through a partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to establish the Science for Solving Society’s Problems Challenge. While ECS is working on a global level to encourage life-saving research in water and sanitation, researchers at Stanford University and working on innovative solutions to these issues in their own back yard.
Solving Sanitation
The water infrastructure that is currently in place in many semiarid and highly populated regions is reaching its limit. When taking recent droughts and population booms into consideration, many communities are beginning to fear water shortages. However, environmental engineer and Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment Senior Fellow, Richard Luthy, believes that answer to this problem has been right in front of us all along.
“These are billion-dollar problems,” said Luthy. “Meeting water needs in the future is going to depend a lot on how we reuse water and what we do with stormwater.”
Capture and Reuse Stormwater
Luthy is currently looking at ways to capture and treat stormwater to assist in alleviating current water supply issues in densely populated, semiarid environments. The environmental engineer is proposing a stormwater capture center that would be situated on 50-acres of currently unused space. Not only could the treatment plant help secure water infrastructure and the needs of the community, but it could also help the environment.
With stormwater comes runoff. This runoff is contaminated with harmful chemicals and often makes its way into oceans and streams. By recovering and cleaning a large portion of the stormwater, researchers believe that we will see a decrease in water pollution due to runoff.
Wind energy has been rising in the ranks when it comes to renewable energy sources. In the United States alone, wind energy produces enough electricity to power roughly 18 million homes—with about 48,000 utility-scale wind turbines operating nationally. While wind energy shows promising potential, there is still room for scientists to tweak this technology in order to yield higher efficiency levels.
The latest prototype of a new wind turbine system was developed with that goal in mind. The new system from researchers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) is set to yield 8.5 percent more electricity than current wind turbines.
Powering the Future
While wind turbines are a promising source of alternative energy, they tend to produce a decent amount of surplus energy that has not been able to be harvested and utilized. The newly developed turbine prototype examines that issue and can now store surplus energy for later use as electricity.
When comparing the new prototype and current generation wind turbines, the new turbines have the potential to yield up to an extra 16,400 kwh of electricity per month—coming in around 18 times the amount of energy a single United States household uses in a month.
An interdisciplinary team has set a new record for direct solar water splitting efficiency. Surpassing the 17 year old record of 12.4 percent, the new achieved efficiency level of 14 percent guarantees a promising future for solar hydrogen production.
While the potential for renewable energy is available across the globe, the ability to harvest and store this energy is not. One solution to achieving global renewable energy is through artificial photosynthesis.
How to Power the Future
Much like organic photosynthesis, artificial photosynthesis coverts sunlight into chemical energy. This highly-researched concept also has the ability to be carried into semiconductor technology.
Essentially, researchers can take the sun’s electrical power and split water into oxygen and hydrogen with high energy density levels. This type of development has the potential to replace current fossil fuels and create a type of energy that does not emit harmful carbon dioxide.
The concept has not been utilized on a commercial level due to the high cost. However, this new development could raise the efficiency levels to a high enough percentage to make the process economically viable.
This from the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres:
Lead author Matthias May … processed and surveyed about one hundred samples in his excellent doctoral dissertation to achieve this. The fundamental components are tandem solar cells of what are known as III-V semiconductors. Using a now patented photo-electrochemical process, May could modify certain surfaces of these semiconductor systems in such a way that they functioned better in water splitting.
One of the more common issues with solar cell efficiency is their inability to move with the sun as it crosses the sky. While large scale solar panels can be fitted with bulky motorized trackers, those with rooftop solar panels do not have that luxury. In an effort to solve this issues, researchers are drawing some inspiration from art in their mission toward higher solar efficiency.
Scientists are applying some of the shapes and designs from the ancient art of kirigami—the Japanese art of paper cutting—to develop a solar cell that can capture up to 36 percent more energy due to the design’s ability to grab more sun.
“The design takes what a large tracking solar panel does and condenses it into something that is essentially flat,” said Aaron Lamoureux, a doctoral student in materials science and engineering and first author on the paper.
In the United States alone, there are currently over 20,000 MW of operational solar capacity. Nearly 640,000 U.S. homes have opted to rely on solar power. However, if the home panels were able to follow the sun’s movement on a daily basis, we could see a dramatic increase in efficiency and usage.
Scientists working in the field of synthetic photosynthesis have recently developed an artificial “leaf” the can produce natural gas from carbon dioxide. This marks a major step toward producing renewable fuels.
Through a combination of semiconducting nanowires and bacteria, the researchers were able to design an artificial plant that can make natural gases using only sunlight—making the likelihood of a cleaner future more tangible.
From Organic to Synthetic
The roots of this development stem for the natural process of photosynthesis. Instead of the natural byproduct of organic photosynthesis (sugar), these scientists have produced methane.
“We’re good at generating electrons from light efficiently, but chemical synthesis always limited our systems in the past,” said Peidong Yang, head researcher in the study. “One purpose of this experiment was to show we could integrate bacterial catalysts with semiconductor technology. This lets us understand and optimize a truly synthetic photosynthesis system.”
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