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Thursday, June 7, 2012
DTI Consulting Blog has Moved
This blog has moved to http://dtiStrategy.com/blog.
Please visit DTI Renewable Energy at our new site.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Japanese Wind Breakthrough Cheaper than Nuclear
An aerodynamic innovation in wind turbine design called the 'wind lens' could triple the output of a typical wind turbine, making it less costly than nuclear power.
Watch video below or read more here:
Monday, September 26, 2011
US Battery Firm Moves to China for $$$
“Battery maker Boston Power is shifting its operations to China to capitalize on the electric-vehicle market.
The Westborough, Mass.-based company today announced that it has raised $125 million from Chinese venture capital firm GSR Ventures as part of an expansion into China. In addition to the private equity, the company is receiving grants, low-interest loans, and other incentives from the Chinese government, which will lead to construction of a large-scale battery manufacturing plant.”
US Solar Firm Moves to China for $$$
“Battery maker Boston Power is shifting its operations to China to capitalize on the electric-vehicle market.
The Westborough, Mass.-based company today announced that it has raised $125 million from Chinese venture capital firm GSR Ventures as part of an expansion into China. In addition to the private equity, the company is receiving grants, low-interest loans, and other incentives from the Chinese government, which will lead to construction of a large-scale battery manufacturing plant.”
Radiometrics Expands Systems for Wind Energy & Utilities
Radiometrics Corporation in Boulder, Colorado is growing its business with successful deployments of its MP-3000A microwave radiometer system for wind energy and utility load forecasting applications. In addition, the company recently announced that an MP-3000A was recently deployed with the U.S. National Weather Service to provide crucial real-time weather data for aviation weather forecasting.
Read more here.
'Inexhaustible' Source of Hydrogen may be Unlocked by Salt Water
Monday, September 19, 2011
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- A grain of salt or two may be all that microbial electrolysis cells need to produce hydrogen from wastewater or organic byproducts, without adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere or using grid electricity, according to Penn State engineers.
"This system could produce hydrogen anyplace that there is wastewater near sea water," said Bruce E. Logan, Kappe Professor of Environmental Engineering. "It uses no grid electricity and is completely carbon neutral. It is an inexhaustible source of energy."
Microbial electrolysis cells that produce hydrogen are the basis of this recent work, but previously, to produce hydrogen, the fuel cells required some electrical input. Now, Logan, working with postdoctoral fellow Younggy Kim, is using the difference between river water and seawater to add the extra energy needed to produce hydrogen.
Their results, published in the Sept. 19 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, "show that pure hydrogen gas can efficiently be produced from virtually limitless supplies of seawater and river water and biodegradable organic matter."
Logan's cells were between 58 and 64 percent efficient and produced between 0.8 to 1.6 cubic meters of hydrogen for every cubic meter of liquid through the cell each day. The researchers estimated that only about 1 percent of the energy produced in the cell was needed to pump water through the system.
The key to these microbial electrolysis cells is reverse-electrodialysis or RED that extracts energy from the ionic differences between salt water and fresh water. A RED stack consists of alternating ion exchange membranes -- positive and negative -- with each RED contributing additively to the electrical output.
"People have proposed making electricity out of RED stacks," said Logan. "But you need so many membrane pairs and are trying to drive an unfavorable reaction."
For RED technology to hydrolyze water -- split it into hydrogen and oxygen -- requires 1.8 volts, which would in practice require about 25 pairs of membranes and increase pumping resistance. However, combining RED technology with exoelectrogenic bacteria -- bacteria that consume organic material and produce an electric current -- reduced the number of RED stacks to five membrane pairs.
Previous work with microbial electrolysis cells showed that they could, by themselves, produce about 0.3 volts of electricity, but not the 0.414 volts needed to generate hydrogen in these fuel cells. Adding less than 0.2 volts of outside electricity released the hydrogen. Now, by incorporating 11 membranes -- five membrane pairs that produce about 0.5 volts -- the cells produce hydrogen.
"The added voltage that we need is a lot less than the 1.8 volts necessary to hydrolyze water," said Logan. "Biodegradable liquids and cellulose waste are abundant and with no energy in and hydrogen out we can get rid of wastewater and by-products. This could be an inexhaustible source of energy."
Logan and Kim's research used platinum as a catalyst on the cathode, but subsequent experimentation showed that a non-precious metal catalyst, molybdenum sulfide, had 51 percent energy efficiency.
The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology supported this work.
Growth of Small Wind Turbine Market
U.S. small wind added 25.6 megawatts of new capacity in 2010, according to numbers just released at the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) Small and Community Windpower Conference, which is very impressive growth in a very challenging economy.
The industry estimated that there were 144,000 small wind systems in place in the U.S. at the end of 2010 generating 179 megawatts.
Read full article here.
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