Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog

Category: sustainability – Page 468

Solar meets 100 per cent of South Australia demand for first time

The combination of rooftop and utility scale solar met 100 per cent of demand in South Australia for the first time on Sunday, reaching a milestone that will surely be repeated many times over – and for longer periods – in the future.

The milestone was reached at 12.05pm grid time (Australian eastern standard time), with rooftop solar providing 992MW, or 76.3 per cent of state demand, and utility scale solar providing a further 315MW – meaning all three of the state’s big solar farms, Bungala 1m Bungala 2 and Tailem Bend were operating at full capacity.

World’s largest solar plant goes online in China

Huanghe Hydropower Development has connected a 2.2 GW solar plant to the grid in the desert in China’s remote Qinghai province. The project is backed by 202.8 MW/MWh of storage.

Chinese state-owned utility Huanghe Hydropower Development has finished building the world’s largest solar power project in a desert in the northwestern Chinese province of Qinghai.

Chinese inverter manufacturer Sungrow, which supplied the inverters, said that the 2.2 GW solar plant was built in five phases. It involved an investment of RMB15.04 billion ($2.2 billion) and includes 202.8 MW/MWh of storage capacity. The company announced the storage system as a solar+storage project in mid-May, but at the time it did not reveal that it was to be connected to a giant solar plant.

How recycled astronaut poop might sustain a mission to Mars

Circa 2018

In the 2015 movie “The Martian,” astronaut Mark Watney survives on Mars by growing potato plants in his own waste. The scenario is fictional, of course, but it underscores a real-world challenge for NASA: How can the space agency ensure an uninterrupted supply of safe, nutritious food for astronauts who are tens of millions of miles from the nearest supermarket?

The successful launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket marked a big step toward developing the technology needed to transport colonists to Mars, though the strategy for keeping them and deep-space astronauts fed remains a work in progress.

At Pennsylvania State University, researchers think they’ve hit upon a solution. They’ve devised a compact recycling system that uses astronaut poop and pee to fuel the growth of edible bacteria. As described in a paper published in November 2017 in Life Sciences in Space Research, the bioreactor breaks down human waste into salts and methane gas; the latter is used to fuel the growth of a protein-rich “microbial goo” that’s similar in consistency to Vegemite.

Study uncovers the role of exciton lifetimes in enabling highly efficient organic solar cells

Organic photovoltaics are a third-generation solar cell technology made of electron donor and electron acceptor materials instead of conventional semiconductor p-n junctions. The performance of this alternative solar cell technology has improved significantly over the past few years and it is now comparable to that of classical inorganic solar cells, both in terms of charge carrier yields (i.e., electrical current generation) and solar spectrum matching.

The only feature of organic photovoltaics that still lags behind traditional solar cells is its achievable voltage (VOC, which stands for open circuit voltage). As electrical power is the product of voltage and current, however, the poor VOC of organic solar cells currently prevents their successful commercialization.

Researchers at the Institute of Materials for Electronics and Energy Technology (i-MEET) in Germany and the National Hellenic Research Foundation (NHRF) in Greece have been investigating specific features of materials used to build organic photovoltaics that could enable greater efficiencies and achievable voltages. Their paper, published in Nature Energy, shows that materials with long exciton lifetimes could be particularly promising for the creation of efficient organic solar cells.

Tesla is looking to move to steer-by-wire with new motor and geartrain team in Austin

Tesla is looking into moving “current and future vehicle programs” to steer-by-wire with a new motor, geartrain, and chassis team in Austin, Texas.

Over the last few months, we have been reporting on how Tesla plans to establish new teams in Austin that are not directly related to the new Gigafactory under construction.

For example, we previously reported on Tesla building a new video game and user interface team in Austin.

This Flying Hypercar Is Powered By Tesla

Mankind has mastered the art of flight for well over a century, and the concept has become so normalized that we tend to take for granted this amazing accomplishment, but as advanced as modern airplanes are, we are still not much closer to developing a vehicle that can travel as well on land as it can in the air. The concept of a flying car has haunted engineers for decades, and companies such as Hyundai have dedicated some serious research and development to make this dream come true. But now an Italian upstart named Firenze has come up with a new and exciting concept that will be powered by the same electric motors that power the Tesla Model S.

Tesla ‘Monster’ Cybertruck concept makes traditional monster trucks look tame

In the world of extreme auto, there are no machines that are more intimidating than monster trucks. With their massive engines and giant tires, monster trucks are associated with pure automotive mayhem and insanity. And if there is anything that’s still largely missing from the monster truck scene, it is the presence of all-electric vehicles. A Tesla Cybertruck could probably change this status quo.

Automotive 3D concept specialist shubbak.3D recently shared his take on what a “Monster Edition” of the Tesla Cybertruck could look like. The artist did pretty well in his concept, adding classic monster truck flourishes to the already domineering Cybertruck. The beast of the machine is pictured with numerous modifications such as a body kit, high suspension, and giant wheels.

Tesla’s New Structural Battery Pack — It’s Not Cell-to-Pack, It’s Cell-to-Body

Tesla’s Battery Day was not just full of surprises. When you read between the slides, Tesla made a lot of product announcements, many of which are still awaiting their discovery. The one this article is about is Tesla’s new battery pack.

What most people didn’t realize is that Tesla is abandoning its famous battery skateboard design. For those who didn’t know, until now, Tesla’s vehicles were composed of the body and a flat battery “skateboard” on the bottom that, as Tesla would say, are married together in the factory. We even witnessed the ceremony in person. Originally, the skateboard design was developed because it provided a low center of gravity and strong safety benefits, as well as the ability to quickly swap battery packs instead of just Supercharging if Tesla went down that road.

Prototype gravity-based energy storage system begins construction

As renewable energy generation grows, so does the need for new storage methods that can be used at times when the Sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. A Scottish company called Gravitricity has now broken ground on a demonstrator facility for a creative new system that stores energy in the form of “gravity” by lifting and dropping huge weights.

If you coil a spring, you’re loading it with potential energy, which is released when you let it go. Gravitricity works on the same basic principle, except in this case the springs are 500- to 5,000-tonne weights. When held aloft by powerful cables and winches, these weights store large amounts of potential energy. When that energy is needed, they can be lowered down a mineshaft to spin the winch and feed electricity into the grid.

Gravitricity says that these units could have peak power outputs of between 1 and 20 MW, and function for up to 50 years with no loss of performance. Able to go from zero to full power in under a second, the system can quickly release its power payload in as little as 15 minutes or slow it down to last up to eight hours.