Energy & Green Tech news

Energy & Green Tech

Finland's plan to bury spent nuclear waste carries risk to future generations

With the push of a button, the elevator descends hundreds of meters in seconds into the dark depths of Onkalo.

Engineering

Safer sodium battery eliminates thermal runaway with a heat-triggered polymer barrier

Some batteries have been known to catch fire or explode at high temperatures or when under stress. This safety concern has pushed researchers to experiment with different ways to design safer batteries that can ideally still ...

Energy & Green Tech

Research examines economic patterns linked to local renewable energy restrictions in Indiana

A new policy brief from Ball State University's Center for Business and Economic Research (CBER) examines how county-level restrictions on utility-scale wind and solar development in Indiana are associated with employment, ...

Electronics & Semiconductors

Cheaper thermoelectrics? Silver selenide approaches performance level of commercial materials

Thermoelectric (TE) materials, which can directly convert heat into electricity and vice versa, are attracting significant attention as key energy technologies for applications such as electronic cooling and waste heat recovery. ...

Engineering

Solar-powered device disinfects drinking water in under an hour

For many people living in developed nations, towns and cities take care of ensuring that residents' water is clean and safe. Municipalities have advanced filters and UV light disinfection technologies at their disposal. Some ...

Energy & Green Tech

How electric cars could help tropical cities run on solar

In tropical cities, afternoon thunderstorms can plunge entire neighborhoods into brief moments of darkness. When civil engineer Markus Schläpfer moved to Singapore a decade ago, he recognized these thunderstorms as an emerging ...

Business

Researchers expose fossil fuel companies' communications facade

Fossil fuel companies say that they want to be on the front lines of renewable energy, with advertisements, social media, and even their own shareholder corporate reports espousing their commitment to green energy and combating ...

Energy & Green Tech

How electric vehicles could back up the power system

Electric vehicles (EVs) could do more for our environment than simply replace gasoline. Published in Joule, a new assessment of EV charging strategies suggests that EVs could serve as a vast network of mobile batteries, storing ...

Energy & Green Tech

Researchers measure traffic emissions, to the block, in real-time

In a study focused on New York City, MIT researchers have shown that existing sensors and mobile data can be used to generate a near real-time, high-resolution picture of auto emissions, which could be used to develop local ...

Energy & Green Tech

Photothermal fabric panels could cut heating energy up to 23%

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have unveiled a tool to combat climate change, fossil-fuel dependency, skyrocketing home-heating bills, and gentrification all at once—a simple fabric treated with a ...

Energy & Green Tech

Electric vehicles could strain Quebec's power grid

Electrification of vehicles is necessary to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but in Quebec the increasing weight of the battery-powered vehicles could cause electricity demand to rise well beyond projections.

Energy & Green Tech

Brain-inspired AI could cut energy use and boost performance

Artificial intelligence (AI) could soon become more energy-efficient and faster, thanks to a new approach developed at the University of Surrey that takes direct inspiration from biological neural networks of the human brain.

Business

Offshore wind projects feel brunt of Trump policy decisions

On his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive memorandum prohibiting new offshore wind leasing for all areas of the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf and directing his Cabinet to review previously approved ...