Steven Chu said on Tuesday that he would push as the new energy secretary to help the nuclear energy and clean coal industries jump-start their contributions to battle the nation’s energy crisis. The Nobel Prize-winning physicist told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee during his confirmation hearing that he’d help streamline nuclear loan guarantees …
Textron solid state lasers Aviation Week reports on the status of military solid state lasers. Hellad [High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System] program small [size of a large refrigerator and about 1650 pounds] 150KW lasers are working to ground tests in 2011 and will include a demonstration of the system’s ability to shoot down …
-American Superconductor Corporation (NASDAQ: AMSC), a leading energy technologies company, and Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) announced today at the Surface Navy Association’s 21st National Symposium the successful completion of full-power testing of the world’s first 36.5 megawatt (49,000 horsepower) high temperature superconductor (HTS) ship propulsion motor at the U.S. Navy’s Integrated Power System Land-Based …
President-elect Barack Obama has put forth a goal to reduce carbon emissions in the U.S. by 80% by 2050, using $150 billion over 10 years to create a “clean-energy” future. Cambridge Energy Research Associates has estimated that the potential for world-wide investment in clean energy, of which nuclear generation is the focal point, will reach …
1. Super carbon nanotube batteries MIT Technology Review reports researchers at MIT have made pure, dense, thin films of carbon nanotubes that show promise as electrodes for higher-capacity batteries and supercapacitors. Dispensing with the additives previously used to hold such films together improved their electrical properties, including the ability to carry and store a large …
New Scientist has a 3 page online review of CO2 capture from the air technology. Capturing CO2 gas is not difficult. In fact, in the near future we are likely to be extracting quantities of the stuff from the flue gases of power plants and factories, and stashing it deep underground. In 2005 a special …
The Edge 2009 Annual question was asked and answered by 150 noted people. The question was: What will change everything ? What game-changing scientific ideas and developments do you expect to live to see? There are various interpretations of the question and the answers contained various interpretations. Variations on “change everything” and “game-changing”. 1. What …
Carnival of space week 86 is up at collectSpace This site provided an article on experimental validation and measurement of a repulsive casimir force and what control of the casimir force could enable. The OrbitalHub looks at Orbital Corp.’s (no relation) Taurus II medium-lift launch vehicle and the Cygnus spacecraft, which NASA recently contracted to …
The Navy is ordering another copy of WB 7 (Wiffle Ball Version 7 Unit) from EMC2 for modification and testing. This is the Bussard Inertial Electrostatic Confinement Fusion Device. H/T to Schwinn who commented on the last article indicating that the WB7 tests had positive results.
Pure Silicon has introduced the worlds first 2.5″ 1 Terabyte solid state drive at 2009 CES (consumer Electronics Show). The drive is higher density than magnetic hard drives of that size. The 1TB Nitro SSD is the most compact SSD per gigabyte: 15.40GB per cubic centimeter in a 2.5-inch form-factor — at least three times …
Business Week has numbers of oil supply, demand and price which if accurate would indicate a continuation of relatively moderate oil prices through 2010. Beyond 2010, this site has noted a large supply of $35-65 oil and oil substitutes. 1. Petrobanks THAI/Capri and other oilsand and heavy oil processes could make over a trillion barrels …