Innovative News

1September2010

Extracting energy from winds at altitude

Posted by Cecilia under: Energy.

The Macani Power Inc. company in Alameda, CA is developing Airborne Wind Turbines (AWT) to extract energy from powerful, consistent winds at altitude. Makani AWTs will produce energy at an unsubsidized real cost competitive with coal-fired power plants, the current benchmark of the lowest cost source of power.The Macani wing and a conventional wind turbine operate on the same aerodynamic principles.

The Macani wing is transformed into a kite by tethering it to the ground. The aerodynamics remain the same but the wing can harness the energy in the wind by pulling against the tether. The onboard avionics computer navigates the wing in a circular path that mimics the tip of a wind turbine blade.

The advantage of the Macani wing lies in the effectivity. The tip of a wind turbine is the most effective part. In some cases the last 25% of the blade is responsible for 75% of the energy generated. The Macani wing captures all of the benefit of the blade tip using a fraction of the material. At a wingspan comparable in length to one wind turbine blade, the Macani wing can move higher in the sky and access 10x as much energy.

Energy is extracted from the Macani wing with small rotors driving high-speed generators. The electricity is transmitted to the ground via conductors in the tether. There it is converted to grid-quality power and connected to the grid.

On the website of Macani Power you can see the Macani wing in motion with all technical details. It is an interesting and innovative new idea around wind energy.

20August2010

Backpack water filter system

Posted by Cecilia under: Economy; Environment; Home.

Researchers of the University of Kassel, (website unfortunately only in German) Germany presented recently a very innovative water filter system of the size of a backpack. This water filter system is based on nano technology meaning that the membranes filtering the water are of nano size keeping out bacteries and other harmful particles.

In areas like Pakistan where the floods leave the people without drinkable water in villages which aren’t reachable this kind of water filter system can help. It can be used permanently filtering about 1,200 liters (317 gallons) per day. It weighs only 20 kilograms (44 pounds).

A very interesting new invention which hopefully can soon be available on the market.

19August2010

Ultrahigh-Power Energy Storage

Posted by Cecilia under: Energy.

Researchers from the U.S. and France report the development of a mirco-supercapacitor with remarkable properties.

Supercapacitors bridge the gap between batteries, which offer high energy densities but are slow, and “conventional” electrolytic capacitors, which are fast but have low energy densities.

The newly developed devices offer four times higher energy than batteries and three times faster than conventional supercapacitors which are used in backup power supplies, wind power generators and other machinery. These new devices are called “micro-supercapacitors” because they are only a few micrometers (0.000001 meters) thick.

This new device might be the goal on the research for a more capable battery for alternative energy devices.

17August2010

Seoul will install 100 new EV charging stations

Posted by Cecilia under: Economy; Environment; Transportation.

In an effort to promote the use of eco-friendly vehicles, the city government of the South Korean capital Seoul is working to secure enough parking spaces to accommodate minimum two electric vehicles and at least one charging station at each of Seoul 25 district (”gu”) offices.  In recognition that lack of EV charging facilities is the biggest challenge in promoting the eco-friendly vehicle, the city government signed a joint agreement with three large Seoul-based retailers for the installation of over 100 EV charging stations until the end of 2010.

Within this year, E-Mart is planning to install EV recharging facilities at six stores around Seoul and expand the service to 25 stores in the city in a near future.  E-Mart and others allow their clients to recharge their electric vehicles for free.

28July2010

Eco-friendly method for reducing mosquitoes

Posted by Cecilia under: Environment.

Researchers of the University of Haifa in collaboration with researchers of other universities have chemically identified, for the first time, compounds released by mosquitoes’ natural aquatic predators that function as warning signals for egg laying mosquitoes.

Introducing these natural chemicals into mosquito breeding sites will cause the mosquitoes to sense risk of predation to their progeny and avoid laying their eggs there.  Applying such synthetic compounds to mosquito breeding sites would not only result in much fewer mosquitoes in the immediate area but probably reduce mosquito populations overall. Also, mosquitoes, by concentrating their eggs in considerably fewer breeding sites perceived as predation-risk free, would increase competition among the mosquito larvae resulting in fewer and weaker emerging adults.

These results can be a breakthrough in providing a natural, environmentally friendly and inexpensive option to the other known strategies.  Prof. Leon Blaustein of the University of Haifa explains: “While we see this as a potentially large breakthrough in developing another weapon against mosquitoes, the work, is not over. We hope this breakthrough will spur further research to chemically determine other effective predator-released chemicals, particularly ones that are long lasting and then tested for their efficacy.”

27July2010

Electric vehicle with wireless energy transfer

Posted by Cecilia under: Transportation.

This new electric vehicle was built by 14 students of the University of Karlsruhe, Germany. The highlight is the fact that it doesn’t need batteries or accumulators, but pulls its energy needs from electric conducting paths in the vehicle’s base. At the vehicle’s underside are suitable electric scanner covering the energy from these conducting paths by electric induction and passing it on to the electric hub engine of the vehicle.

This idea isn’t entirely new but this system made the vehicles too heavy to be energy efficient and fast enough. The students would like to show with their project work that through the most modern materials and the optimization of the used technology such electric vehicles can move fast and energy-efficiently.

An electric vehicle as city car which doesn’t need batteries - wouldn’t this be a great car of the future? See more on their website which is unfortunately only in German.

26July2010

“Milking the fog”

Posted by Cecilia under: Economy; Environment; Home.

Fog is nothing special - at first sight. After careful consideration the white-grey smoke appears to be interesting for scientific research as well as in view of a possible use of the water contained in fog.

About 140 scientists from Europe, America, Africa, Asia and Australia deal with questions all around this subject from the 25th to the 30th of July in Münster, Germany  - during the fifth international conference about Fog Fog collection and Dew. The conference is held this year for the first time in Europe.

Collecting fog for drinking water happens already in areas with very little rain, but with considerably passing-through clouds being a useful water resource.

“The ‘milking’ of such clouds with big nets is very successful and is increasingly used in semiariden semitropical areas of South America, Africa and Asia “, explains Otto Klemm from the Westphalian Wilhelm’s university (WWU) Münster.

So-called shading nets are used. Under favorable conditions more than five liters (1.3 gallons) of water  per square meter (10.7 square feet) of net surface can be collected per day as annual average.

With 40 one-square-meter nets a considerable amount of water can be won, enough to supply people and small agricultural unities with water.

8July2010

Success for Solar Impulse plane

Posted by Cecilia under: Energy; Transportation.

The Solar Impulse completed the longest and highest flight of a solar powered plane on July 7-8, 2010.

The plane, which has flown for 26 continuous hours and at up to a height of more than 8,000 metres, has the wingspan of a Airbus (61 metres) but just a fraction of the weight at 1,600kg. Some 12,000 solar cells and high-performance batteries store energy that allow the delicate plane to fly through the night.

Congratulations to Swiss pilot Bertrand Piccard and his team!

5April2010

Wind Turbines Social Network

Posted by Cecilia under: Energy.

Wind Turbines - www.windturbines.net is the first social network for the wind turbine community where the public and professionals can come together to get advice, share ideas and network for career advancement.

3November2009

Innovative News on Hiatus

Posted by Cecilia under: Uncategorized.

After 18 months and nearly 600 posts we’ve decided to take a break from daily posting on Innovative News.  It’s been our pleasure to bring you the latest news about green technology from around the world.

We have decided to focus our attention toward other writing projects that we’ve neglected for many months.

From time to time we’ll update you with innovations that we find too important to not pass along and we’ll notify our followers on Twitter.

Thanks to our loyal readers for your support and comments.