https://techxplore.com/rss-feed/energy-green-tech-news/ en-us The latest news on energy sciences and green technology, energy technology, energy renovation, alternative energy, and green energy. Solar energy is becoming one of the world's most important sources of electricity. In Lithuania, the number of solar power plants is also growing rapidly, and the energy they produce is playing an ever more significant role in the country's energy system. At the same time, however, one of the key challenges is becoming more pronounced: Solar power generation remains highly dependent on weather conditions. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-ai-clouds-solar-power-output.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 14 Jul 2026 11:20:01 EDT news703246063 Researchers from Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands) have developed a European energy system model that pits two technologies against each other—future unidirectional smart charging (V1G) and vehicle-to-grid charging (V2G)—to determine which mode is most economically advantageous for EU countries in a 2050 energy system. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-customized-ev-eu-energy.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 14 Jul 2026 10:20:06 EDT news703242137 As global demand for electricity storage grows alongside the rise of renewable energy and AI-driven data centers, researchers are racing to find battery technologies that can store large amounts of energy cheaply and safely over long periods. Soluble lead flow batteries are a strong candidate: They are inexpensive, easy to scale up and built from lead that can be recycled from the existing lead-acid battery supply chain. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-smarter-interfaces-longer-soluble-batteries.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 14 Jul 2026 08:40:10 EDT news703232958 Engineers have developed a new way to pull carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere using a process similar to charging and discharging a battery—an advance that could help address the planet's excess CO2 problem. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-battery-device-air-electricity-saltwater.html Energy & Green Tech Mon, 13 Jul 2026 15:40:08 EDT news703173572 Nuclear reactors are traditionally powered with dense fuel rods that can produce about 1 gigawatt of carbon-free electricity, enough to power about 100,000,000 lightbulbs. Newer power plant designs using molten salt for cooling instead of the water found in traditional reactors could offer better efficiency and stability, but they face a problem—the extreme chemical environment created by the molten salt can corrode the metal comprising the reactor. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-metals-atomic-corrosion-highways-nuclear.html Engineering Mon, 13 Jul 2026 15:20:05 EDT news703173377 Researchers in chemistry and materials science at Kiel University are working with partners to develop new water sources for the Mediterranean region. "Regions like these are facing rising temperatures and declining rainfall. Our goal is to develop an environmentally friendly technology that converts water molecules from the air into drinking water," says Professor Norbert Stock from CAU's Institute of Inorganic Chemistry. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-porous-material-liters-daily-dry.html Energy & Green Tech Mon, 13 Jul 2026 09:00:03 EDT news703149318 Tires are essential to modern transport, but their production and use raise environmental concerns. One important issue is zinc oxide, a common activator used in rubber vulcanization. Zinc oxide helps rubber form the crosslinked network that gives tires their strength, elasticity and durability. However, zinc can be released into the environment during manufacturing, recycling and tire wear, where it may affect aquatic ecosystems. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-fly-ash-greener-rubber.html Energy & Green Tech Mon, 13 Jul 2026 08:20:03 EDT news703149174 Hydrogen could serve as a clean alternative to fossil fuels because, when used as a fuel, it produces water vapor instead of carbon dioxide (CO2). This cleaner fuel has proved particularly promising for the creation of so-called fuel cells, energy storage devices that could power heavy-duty vehicles, airplanes, trains and energy-intensive manufacturing machinery. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-catalyst-enable-safer-electrolyzers-hydrogen.html Energy & Green Tech Sun, 12 Jul 2026 14:10:01 EDT news702897200 Batteries are part of everyday life, powering everything from phones and laptops to electric cars. Most rechargeable batteries use a liquid to help lithium ions move during charging and discharging. But this liquid can create safety issues and limit how far battery performance can improve. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-neutrons-track-lithium-solid-state.html Energy & Green Tech Sat, 11 Jul 2026 08:00:08 EDT news702822170 Organic semiconductors are paving the way for a new generation of lightweight, flexible electronics, including bendable displays, printable circuits, wearable sensors and devices that harvest energy from their surroundings. A key factor behind the performance of these technologies is doping—a process in which molecules are introduced into a semiconductor to control the number of charge carriers it can support. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-method-semiconductor-doping-flexible-electronics.html Electronics & Semiconductors Fri, 10 Jul 2026 10:10:01 EDT news702896423 Worldwide, discarded electronic toys, computers and smartphones are becoming an increasingly significant source of electronic waste. Electronic circuits are based on printed circuit boards (PCBs), which are typically made of glass fiber-reinforced fossil epoxy resin, making them difficult to recycle, let alone biodegrade. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-compostable-circuit-boards-citric-acid.html Electronics & Semiconductors Fri, 10 Jul 2026 08:00:09 EDT news702888613 Catalysts that convert waste carbon dioxide into valuable products like acetate are designed to run continuously on electricity for the conversion process. But electricity from renewable energy sources, such as solar or hydroelectric power, often runs intermittently, which can damage parts of the catalyst and reduce performance. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-current-standby-carbon-dioxide-catalysts.html Energy & Green Tech Thu, 09 Jul 2026 16:20:01 EDT news702832105 Perovskite semiconductors efficiently convert sunlight into electrical energy; they are also inexpensive and extremely lightweight. A team at HZB has developed a triple-junction solar cell comprising different perovskite semiconductors, with a novel bilayer of graphene oxide (GO) and a self-assembled monolayer (SAM) as the hole conductor. This bilayer significantly increases both efficiency and long-term stability. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-perovskite-triple-junction-solar-cells.html Electronics & Semiconductors Thu, 09 Jul 2026 11:00:04 EDT news702711383 Buildings are responsible for around 40% of CO2 emissions in the European Union. This means the building sector has a central role to play in achieving the EU's climate targets by 2050. An EU research project involving Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) has analyzed CO2 emissions from the European building stock over its entire life cycle and identified ways to reduce them. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-smaller-homes-europe-emissions.html Engineering Thu, 09 Jul 2026 08:00:10 EDT news702802169 Two sets of roles emerge when couples consider installing solar panels on their house, a new study shows: in sync, when partners with shared goals and defined tasks end up adopting solar, and oppositional, marked by discord and not making the solar investment. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-rooftop-solar-hinge-household-champion.html Business Thu, 09 Jul 2026 05:00:03 EDT news702711310 In the future, iron might be used as a chemical energy storage material, making large quantities of renewable energy available in the long term. Iron powder is combusted in a cyclic process that is carbon neutral and then reconverted to its original state using energy input. Scientists at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) were the first to conduct an extensive study to evaluate the potential of this technology for power generation. Their results show that iron, while not superseding hydrogen, may usefully complement it in a climate-neutral energy system. The findings have been published in Chem Circularity. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-rust-iron-term-storage-renewable.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 08 Jul 2026 11:10:01 EDT news702724666 An international team of researchers has developed a homogeneous catalytic process that converts methanol, carbon dioxide and hydrogen into ethanol using inexpensive and stable catalyst precursors. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-cheaper-catalyst-captured-carbon-dioxide.html Engineering Wed, 08 Jul 2026 09:40:03 EDT news702721807 Most contemporary portable electronics, including laptops, smartphones and smart watches, are powered by batteries that need to be recharged daily or every few days. Over the past decade, however, some engineers have been exploring the possibility of developing battery-free electronic devices that autonomously derive electricity from renewable sources, such as sunlight, indoor lighting or heat. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-powered-chip-harvests-energy-chemicals.html Electronics & Semiconductors Wed, 08 Jul 2026 08:20:02 EDT news702646871 Energy storage is becoming critical to grid resilience and electricity affordability because battery systems can help balance supply and demand and stabilize power. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-reveals-grid-battery-days.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 07 Jul 2026 15:20:03 EDT news702647043 The future hydrogen economy may hinge on iridium, a metal so rare that only about 8 tonnes are produced worldwide each year. To help stretch the limited supply, University of Delaware researchers have developed a recycling process that recovers precious metals and other materials from used hydrogen-energy devices without producing toxic waste. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-spray-jet-method-recycles-rare.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:40:01 EDT news702647004 Many experts refer to hydrogen as "the fuel of the future." It is expected to help decarbonize the global economy in two main ways: Burning it or feeding it into a fuel cell produces storable energy with no carbon emissions, just water. It can also be used in place of fossil fuels or as a chemical feedstock in hard-to-decarbonize industrial processes such as steel and cement production. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-hydrogen-fuel-future-cheap-ship.html Software Tue, 07 Jul 2026 13:20:07 EDT news702646984 A battery that "talks" does not use words—it communicates through data. Researchers at Kiel University have demonstrated how sensors inside a battery cell can transmit measurement data to the outside without the need for additional communication wires. Instead, the system uses the existing power connections as well as the electronics that already control the battery's charging and discharging process. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-talkative-batteries-battery-cells-temperature.html Energy & Green Tech Tue, 07 Jul 2026 07:40:06 EDT news702627739 A research team from City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) has recently overcome a technological bottleneck that has persisted for more than a decade. They successfully "turned waste into treasure" by recycling triplet excitons and converting them into effective charge carriers for electricity generation. Using this new approach, they achieved an efficiency of 20.5% in OPV cells. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-recycling-triplet-excitons-boost-photovoltaics.html Electronics & Semiconductors Mon, 06 Jul 2026 13:00:04 EDT news702554064 As the era of AI agents—systems that can reason and act autonomously—begins, the power consumption of data centers is emerging as a critical challenge. A KAIST research team has, for the first time, analyzed the computational cost and energy consumption of AI agents, finding that they can consume up to 136.5 times more energy per query than conventional generative AI. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-hidden-energy-ai-agents.html Energy & Green Tech Mon, 06 Jul 2026 10:40:03 EDT news702552128 Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries combine the abundance and affordability of sulfur with an energy storage capability far beyond that of current lithium-ion technologies. Practical deployment, however, has been slowed by a longstanding challenge known as polysulfide shuttling, whereby dissolved sulfur intermediates migrate within the battery, leading to active-material loss and premature performance decay. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-cof-graphene-hybrid-horizons-lithium.html Energy & Green Tech Fri, 03 Jul 2026 09:00:10 EDT news702287281 A Berlin-based team from HZB and Center for the Science of Materials Berlin (CSMB) at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin has set a new record for a tandem solar cell. Using a combination of a CIGS semiconductor layer and perovskite, along with several optimized intermediate layers, the team converted 25.5% of sunlight into electrical energy. The previous record for this combination of materials and this size cell had stood at 24.6%. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-tandem-solar-cell-efficiency-cigs.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 01 Jul 2026 16:00:07 EDT news702136900 The supply of lithium—the battery material that keeps digital devices humming, EVs racing and renewable energy on the grid—will not meet even half the expected demand by 2040. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-electrochemical-major-harvesting-vital-battery.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 01 Jul 2026 15:00:08 EDT news702136022 Researchers from North Carolina State University and Rice University have created a nontoxic, stretchable battery that operates by extracting moisture from the ambient environment—even in climates as dry as the desert. The batteries could be useful in Internet of Things (IoT) applications ranging from wearables to advanced surveillance monitors with built-in kill switches. The study is published in the journal Science Advances. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-06-moisture-driven-tech-power-green.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 01 Jul 2026 14:00:05 EDT news702053590 Electric vehicle batteries could last twice as long, preventing costly replacement, with a new approach to heating and cooling the batteries, according to a study led by University of Michigan Engineering. The system is designed to work with voltage and charging data that today's battery management systems already collect, rather than requiring new sensors inside the battery. It is best suited for lower-power Level 1 and Level 2 charging, which is common at homes, workplaces and public parking areas, and is expected to cover most EV charging demand. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-smarter-diagnostics-silicon-ev-batteries.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 01 Jul 2026 12:40:09 EDT news702127861 A new approach to battery recycling could turn today's electric vehicle waste into the building blocks of tomorrow's higher-performing batteries. Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed an environmentally friendly method to upcycle cathodes from used lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries into a more powerful battery material known as lithium manganese iron phosphate (LMFP), which can store more energy than LFP. https://techxplore.com/news/2026-07-spent-ev-batteries-life-higher.html Energy & Green Tech Wed, 01 Jul 2026 11:40:08 EDT news702122515