MIT has a transportation plan from now until 2035 For the near term (up to 15 years), we should increase our efforts to improve light-duty vehicle engines and transmissions, but all improvements must go toward increasing fuel efficiency rather than making cars bigger and faster. Also critical is reducing vehicle weight and size. For the …
Which solutions do you care about most ? Reducing CO2 from energy and transportation sources Storing CO2 in cement or sequestering in the ground or ocean Prevention of nuclear weapon usage Reducing damage from nuclear and other weapons Curing diseases (cancer, heart disease, Alzheimers, etc) Effective anti-aging treatments Poverty reduction Starvation prevention Peak oil solutions …
The Transition “Personal Air Vehicle” is expected to be released in late 2009 and has just shown its operational prototype. The estimated purchase price is $148,000. Owners will drive the car from their garage to an airport where they will then be able to fly within a range of 100 to 500 miles (800 km). …
Electric planes do not have to be private (although things will start out that way.)Electric planes (with jumpjet type takeoff and landing) could form a virtual callable personal pod transportation (which have been proposed for cities) but without building the rails. One of the Personal pod transportation proposals is shown here. Current electric planes hold …
This technology news roundup has imminent testing of the Vasimr plasma rocket in space, twelve dollar personal computers, ten dollar dime sized microscopes and a plant that is 250% better than corn for biofuels and twice as productive as switchgrass. (the plant has not been modified yet and genetic modifications could vastly increase yields.) Nasa …
Ultra-strong, high-temperature, high-performance permanent magnet compounds, such as Samarium Cobalt, are the mainstay materials for several industries that rely on high-performance motor and power generation applications, including the Department of Defense (DOD) and the automotive industry. Until now, producing Samarium Cobalt has been a difficult and expensive multi-step process. Northeastern University researchers have broken new …
China has declared a new target of 5% of electricity by 2020 will be from nuclear power. This will be 70GW. About 500TWh. The target from 2007 was 60GW and the target before that was 40GW. 16% of power by 2030 (about 1400 TWh, 200+GW) A projected total generation of 8472 TWh and an installed …
This is a small prediction on a trivial topic. Dark Knight will earn more than the non-inflation adjusted total of Titanic. This Mondays numbers were 45% over the Dead Man’s chest numbers, which could be an indication of longer legs than Dead Man’s chest. An extra $4 million this week if the pattern holds throughout …
New nuclear plants constructed in the USA can provide electricity at about 5-9 cents/kwh Because of the large capital costs for nuclear power, and the relatively long construction period before revenue is returned, servicing the capital costs of a nuclear power plant is the most important factor determining the economic competitiveness of nuclear energy. The …
Randomly oriented nanowires, on the growth substrate at left, are having a “bad hair day.” But after contact printing, the nanowires on the receiver substrate are highly aligned. Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California at Berkeley have created the world’s first all-integrated sensor circuit based …
EEStor has manufactured materials that have met all certification milestones for crystallization, chemical purity, and particle-size consistency. The results suggest that the materials can be made at a high-enough grade to meet the company’s performance goals. The company also said a key component of the material can withstand the extreme voltages needed for high energy …