Michele Kearney's Nuclear Wire: Alternative energy

Showing posts with label Alternative energy. Show all posts

Monday, December 6, 2010

Non-Profit Group Establishes Florida Fusion Center

File image.

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=247854211242866212 Melbourne FL (SPX) Dec 06, 2010 As Brevard County, FL, home to NASA's Kennedy Space Center, prepares for the end of the space shuttle program, the Aerospace Research and Engineering Systems Institute, Inc. is fostering the growth of high-technology research on the Space Coast through the establishment of a state-of-the-art plasma science and fusion research laboratory. Located near Kennedy Space Center, the Spacecoast Plasma and High-Energy Electrostatics Laboratory (SphereLab) will provide the opportunity for researchers from academia and industry as well as university students in Florida to engage in cutting-edge plasma and fusion research while also attracting talent from around the United States.
The laboratory is intended to be a testbed for new technologies and potential commercial spinoffs from its research activities.
SphereLab is envisioned as a state-of-the-art yet cost-effective facility for the study of high-energy plasma and the challenges and problems of nuclear fusion and its potential use in terrestrial and aerospace power and propulsion applications.
"ARES Institute is currently involved in several projects, but SphereLab is really the cornerstone for our future activities," says Matthew Travis, Executive Director of the Aerospace Research and Engineering Systems Institute. "The concept has been in development for several years.
"We hope to attract and retain high-technology talent in the area after the shuttle program ends. More than that, we want to see Central Florida become known as the foremost location for fusion-related science and technology research in the same way that Silicon Valley is synonymous with computer technology."
Currently, work on the laboratory is focused on designing the first of its central instruments, a Hirsch-Meeks Inertial Electrostatic Confinement fusor (a type of fusion reactor) suitable for initial research activities, along with fundraising for the acquisition and construction of the laboratory facility itself.
Additionally, ARES Institute has identified several potential grant opportunities with the National Science Foundation and Air Force Research Laboratory that it intends to pursue.
Once the laboratory is operational, it will be available for university students and researchers to use to conduct their own experiments. An overriding goal is to draw scientists and researchers together at a facility with unique capabilities not found elsewhere in Florida.
Currently, the development timetable is targeting Spring of 2011 for occupation of temporary facilities and startup of the first fusor instrument. The laboratory will be fully outfitted by the end of 2011. Eventually, the laboratory will move into a permanent home, perhaps at KSC's Exploration Park.
For more information, please visit http://www.aresinstitute.org/spherelab. For more information about ARES Institute and its programs, visit our website at http://www.aresinstitute.org.
Research Specifics SphereLab will advance work in CO2 laser electrodynamics, advanced rocket propulsion, alternative energy, semiconductor vapor deposition, and other fields and heavily utilize presently dormant facilities and equipment. It will create proprietary "signature instruments" - a unique research apparatus sufficiently advanced and desirable in its capabilities as to attract top talent from across the country and around the world.
In giving a university or private sector partner a piece of equipment able to draw prestigious investigators to use it, this program will also attract graduate and doctoral students of the highest caliber to work with them.
The laboratory will place emphasis on investigations into the potential aerospace applications of IEC fusion. Along the way, it will help advance the goal of achieving Earth-based fusion power production and the holy grail of producing more power from the reaction than is required to sustain it.
Additionally, SphereLab will undertake difficult, high-risk/high-reward investigations in a variety of disciplines, the relative activity and prominence of each dependent upon the degree of external funding that can be developed in that program area. Targets for study include High Performance Aerospace Power and Propulsion; Controlled Nuclear Fusion and Alternative Energy; Pollution Control, Waste Remediation and Resource Recovery; Mineral Refining, Materials Science and Industrial Processing; Next Generation Radiofrequency Antenna Architectures; and Advanced Laser/Maser Systems Development.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

Scarcity Of New Energy Minerals Will Trigger Trade Wars

China supplies the world with a lot of those rare earth elements, like neodymium, and will have little or none to export if it moves ahead with its wind power plans.

http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/Scarcity_Of_New_Energy_Minerals_Will_Trigger_Trade_Wars_999.html Boulder CO (SPX) Nov 04, 2010 It's not hard to argue in favor of alternatives to fossil fuels these days, but one popular argument - domestic energy security - may be standing on very shaky legs. A lot of rare metals are needed to make photovoltaic panels, rare earth magnets for wind generators, fuel cells and high-capacity batteries for hybrid and electric vehicles. But most industrialized nations, including the United States, are almost entirely dependent on foreign sources for those metals. The only way this is going to change is if there is more domestic exploration and mining.
"There's a misunderstanding in the public about moving to alternative energy and moving from mining, which can't be done," said James Burnell of the Colorado Geological Survey.
There is a long list of scarce metals needed for alternative energy and transportation. Metals like gallium, indium, selenium, tellurium, and high purity silicon are needed to make photovoltaic panels.
To make batteries there's zinc, vanadium, lithium and rare earth elements as well as platinum group minerals for fuel cell-powered vehicles. One of the biggest players in the scarce metals game is China, and they are starting to play hard ball, says Burnell.
China is preparing to build 330 giga-watts worth of wind generators. That will require about 59,000 tons of neodymium to make high-strength magnets - more than that country's annual output of neodymium.
China supplies the world with a lot of those rare earth elements, like neodymium, and will have little or none to export if it moves ahead with its wind power plans.
"So the source for the West is problematical," said Burnell. Trade wars are on the horizon, he predicted. Yet policy makers and the public seem only superficially aware of the problem.
"It is obvious that Japan was upset by the practical pause of rare earth export by China in late September," said Yasushi Watanabe of the Institute for Geo-Resources and Environment in Tsukuba, Japan.
New sources of these critical metals are needed, said Watanabe, as well as new methods for extracting the rare elements from different kinds of rocks.
"Extraction methods of metals from new minerals and materials are not well established," said Watanabe. "We need to develop new (refining) and smelting methods for new type ores."
We also need to find those ores and start exploiting them, said Burnell. That means more mining. It's the only way we can stay competitive in the new energy future.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Study: Worst CO2 emissions are yet to come

image credit: kleineolive (Wikimedia Commons)

Future fossil fuel infrastructure set to be built between now and 2060 will have the strongest effect on climate change, according to a report in the journal Science.
The global demand for energy is quickly rising, while political agreements and regulations to curb the resultant rise in greenhouse gas emissions have so far failed.
A new study from scientists in the US and Canada has calculated that most of the ‘key’ impacts of climate change could be avoided if no further CO2 power plants were built and that the real risks come from fossil fuel-based energy infrastructure which has yet to be built.
While previous policies have largely focused on regulating greenhouse gas emissions, a tactic that has so far not produced their desired results, the new study stresses the need for alternative sources of energy and technological innovation.