tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8618467891929877342024-03-13T07:28:55.324+08:00Ways to Tackle Malaysia Energy CrisisKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.comBlogger25125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-19221611763414631812018-11-07T17:25:00.000+08:002018-11-07T17:27:39.056+08:00water filtering reduce electricity<h1 style="margin-top: 22px; margin-bottom: 14px; line-height: 1.2;"><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Filtering liquids with liquids saves electricity</span></font></h1><h5 class="data" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 14px;"><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">November 7, 2018<br>Harvard University </span></font></h5><p></p><figure itemprop="image" itemscope="" itemtype="https://schema.org/ImageObject" id="i767480" style="padding: 0px; margin-left: -10px; margin-right: -10px; max-width: 550px;"><amp-img role="button" tabindex="0" src="https://3c1703fe8d.site.internapcdn.net/newman/csz/news/800/2018/2-water.jpg" layout="responsive" width="1280" height="849" alt="" class="i-amphtml-element i-amphtml-layout-responsive i-amphtml-layout-size-defined i-amphtml-layout" style="display: block; position: relative; overflow: hidden !important;"><i-amphtml-sizer style="display: block !important; padding-top: 274.59375px;"></i-amphtml-sizer><img decoding="async" alt="" src="https://3c1703fe8d.site.internapcdn.net/newman/csz/news/800/2018/2-water.jpg" class="i-amphtml-fill-content i-amphtml-replaced-content" style="display: block; height: 0px; max-height: 100%; max-width: 100%; min-height: 100%; min-width: 100%; width: 0px; margin: auto; position: absolute; top: 0px; left: 0px; bottom: 0px; right: 0px; padding: 0px !important; border-style: none !important;"></amp-img><figcaption itemprop="description" class="desc" style="margin: 5px 10px 0px;"><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Credit: CC0 Public Domain</span></font></figcaption></figure><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Filtering and treating water, both for human consumption and to clean industrial and municipal wastewater, accounts for about 13% of all electricity consumed in the US every year and releases about 290 million metric tons of CO<sub>2</sub> into the atmosphere annually—roughly equivalent to the combined weight of every human on Earth.</span></font></p><div><div class="clearfix" style="clear: both;"><amp-ad width="336" height="280" type="adsense" data-ad-client="ca-pub-0536483524803400" data-ad-slot="8730621137" layout="responsive" class="i-amphtml-element i-amphtml-layout-responsive i-amphtml-layout-size-defined i-amphtml-layout" data-amp-slot-index="0" style="display: block; 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margin: auto; display: block; height: 0px; max-height: 100%; max-width: 100%; min-height: 100%; min-width: 100%; width: 0px; transform: translate(-50%, -50%); top: 0px; left: 0px; position: absolute; bottom: 0px; right: 0px; padding: 0px !important;"></iframe></amp-ad></div><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">One of the most common methods of processing <a href="https://phys.org/tags/water/" rel="tag" class="textTag" style="text-decoration: none;">water</a>is passing it through a <a href="https://phys.org/tags/membrane/" rel="tag" class="textTag" style="text-decoration: none;">membrane</a> with <a href="https://phys.org/tags/pores/" rel="tag" class="textTag" style="text-decoration: none;">pores</a> that are sized to filter out particles that are larger than water molecules. However, these membranes are susceptible to "fouling," or clogging by the very materials they are designed to filter out, necessitating more electricity to force the water through a partially clogged membrane and frequent membrane replacement, both of which increase water treatment costs.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">New research from the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and collaborators at Northeastern University and the University of Waterloo demonstrates that the Wyss' liquid-gated membranes (LGMs) filter nanoclay particles out of water with twofold higher efficiency, nearly threefold longer time-to-foul, and a reduction in the pressure required for filtration over conventional membranes, offering a solution that could reduce the cost and electricity consumption of high-impact industrial processes such as oil and gas drilling. The study is reported in <i>APL Materials</i>.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"This is the first study to demonstrate that LGMs can achieve sustained filtration in settings similar to those found in heavy industry, and it provides insight into how LGMs resist different types of fouling, which could lead to their use in a variety of water processing settings," said first author Jack Alvarenga, a Research Scientist at the Wyss Institute.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">LGMs mimic nature's use of liquid-filled pores to control the movement of liquids, gases and particles through biological filters using the lowest possible amount of energy, much like the small stomata openings in plants' leaves allow gases to pass through. Each LGM is coated with a liquid that acts as a reversible gate, filling and sealing its pores in the "closed" state. When pressure is applied to the membrane, the liquid inside the pores is pulled to the sides, creating open, liquid-lined pores that can be tuned to allow the passage of specific liquids or gases, and resist fouling due to the liquid layer's slippery surface. The use of fluid-lined pores also enables the separation of a target compound from a mixture of different substances, which is common in industrial liquid processing</span></font></p><div class="clearfix" style="clear: both;"><amp-ad width="336" height="280" type="adsense" data-ad-client="ca-pub-0536483524803400" data-ad-slot="8730621137" layout="responsive" class="i-amphtml-element i-amphtml-layout-responsive i-amphtml-layout-size-defined i-amphtml-layout" data-amp-slot-index="1" style="display: block; position: relative; overflow: hidden !important; direction: ltr;"><div placeholder="" class="amp-hidden" style="z-index: 1; visibility: hidden; position: absolute !important; top: 0px !important; left: 0px !important; right: 0px !important; bottom: 0px !important;"><div class="i-amphtml-ad-default-holder" data-ad-holder-text="Ad" style="position: absolute; left: 0px; right: 0px; top: 0px; bottom: 0px; display: flex; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center; -webkit-box-pack: center; justify-content: center;"></div></div><iframe src="https://d-7079009722759096150.ampproject.net/1811051833450/frame.html" name="{"host":"d-7079009722759096150.ampproject.net","type":"adsense","count":2,"attributes":{"adClient":"ca-pub-0536483524803400","adSlot":"8730621137","ampSlotIndex":"1","width":336,"height":280,"_context":{"ampcontextVersion":"1811051833450","ampcontextFilepath":"https://3p.ampproject.net/1811051833450/ampcontext-v0.js","sourceUrl":"https://phys.org/news/2018-11-filtering-liquids-electricity.amp?__twitter_impression=true","referrer":"https://t.co/EPP034KTWy?amp=1","canonicalUrl":"https://phys.org/news/2018-11-filtering-liquids-electricity.html","pageViewId":"7965","location":{"href":"https://phys.org/news/2018-11-filtering-liquids-electricity.amp?__twitter_impression=true"},"startTime":1541582340978,"tagName":"AMP-AD","mode":{"localDev":false,"development":false,"minified":true,"lite":false,"test":false,"version":"1811051833450","rtvVersion":"011811051833450"},"canary":false,"hidden":false,"initialLayoutRect":{"left":10,"top":2160,"width":394,"height":328},"initialIntersection":{"time":7623,"rootBounds":{"left":0,"top":0,"width":414,"height":671,"bottom":671,"right":414,"x":0,"y":0},"boundingClientRect":{"left":10,"top":1998,"width":394,"height":328,"bottom":2326,"right":404,"x":10,"y":1998},"intersectionRect":{"left":0,"top":0,"width":0,"height":0,"bottom":0,"right":0,"x":0,"y":0},"intersectionRatio":0},"domFingerprint":"3591080125","experimentToggles":{"canary":false,"expAdsenseA4A":false,"a4aProfilingRate":false,"ad-type-custom":true,"amp-access-iframe":true,"amp-apester-media":true,"amp-ima-video":true,"amp-playbuzz":true,"chunked-amp":true,"amp-auto-ads":true,"amp-auto-ads-adsense-holdout":false,"amp-auto-ads-adsense-responsive":false,"version-locking":true,"as-use-attr-for-format":false,"a4aFastFetchDoubleclickLaunched":false,"a4aFastFetchAdSenseLaunched":false,"pump-early-frame":true,"amp-live-list-sorting":true,"amp-sidebar toolbar":true,"amp-consent":true,"amp-story-hold-to-pause":false,"amp-story-v1":true,"expAdsenseUnconditionedCanonical":false,"expAdsenseCanonical":false,"faster-bind-scan":true,"font-display-swap":true,"amp-date-picker":true,"linker-meta-opt-in":true,"url-replacement-v2":true,"user-error-reporting":true,"no-initial-intersection":true,"no-sync-xhr-in-ads":true,"doubleclickSraExp":false,"doubleclickSraReportExcludedBlock":false,"inabox-rov":true,"ampdoc-closest":false,"linker-form":true,"scroll-height-bounce":false,"scroll-height-minheight":false,"hidden-mutation-observer":false},"sentinel":"0-7756669322474853397","clientId":"GA1.2.25588118.1538482889","container":null,"initialConsentState":null,"consentSharedData":null},"type":"adsense"}}" width="336" height="280" scrolling="no" allow="sync-xhr 'none';" data-amp-3p-sentinel="0-7756669322474853397" class="i-amphtml-fill-content" style="border-style: none; margin: auto; display: block; height: 0px; max-height: 100%; max-width: 100%; min-height: 100%; min-width: 100%; width: 0px; transform: translate(-50%, -50%); top: 0px; left: 0px; position: absolute; bottom: 0px; right: 0px; padding: 0px !important;"></iframe></amp-ad></div><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The research team decided to test their LGMs on a suspension of bentonite clay in water, as such "nanoclay" solutions mimic the wastewater produced by drilling activities in the oil and gas industry. They infused 25-mm discs of a standard filter membrane with perfluoropolyether, a type of liquid lubricant that has been used in the aerospace industry for over 30 years, to convert them into LGMs. They then placed the membranes under pressure to draw water through the pores but leave the nanoclay particles behind, and compared the performance of untreated membranes to LGMs.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The untreated membranes displayed signs of nanoclay fouling much more quickly than the LGMs, and the LGMs were able to filter water three times longer than the standard membranes before requiring a "backwash" procedure to remove particles that had accumulated on the membrane. Less frequent backwashing could translate to a reduction in the use of cleaning chemicals and energy required to pump backwash water, and improve the filtration rate in industrial water treatment settings.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">While the LGMs did eventually experience fouling, they displayed a 60% reduction in the amount of nanoclay that accumulated within their structure during filtration, which is known as "irreversible fouling" because it is not removed by backwashing. This advantage gives LGMs a longer lifespan and makes more of the filtrate recoverable for alternate uses. Additionally, the LGMs required 16% less pressure to initiate the filtration process, reflecting further energy savings.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"LGMs have the potential for use in industries as diverse as food and beverage processing, biopharmaceutical manufacturing, textiles, paper, pulp, chemical, and petrochemical, and could offer improvements in energy use and efficiency across a wide swath of industrial applications," said corresponding author Joanna Aizenberg, Ph.D., who is a Founding Core Faculty member of the Wyss Institute and the Amy Smith Berylson Professor of Material Sciences at Harvard's John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS).</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The team's next steps for the research include larger-scale pilot studies with industry partners, longer-term operation of the LGMs, and filtering even more complex mixtures of substances. These studies will provide insight into the commercial viability of LGMs for different applications, and how long they would last in a number of use cases.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"The concept of using a liquid to help filter other liquids, while perhaps not obvious to us, is prevalent in nature. It's wonderful to see how leveraging nature's innovation in this manner can potentially lead to huge energy savings," said Wyss Founding Director Donald Ingber, M.D., Ph.D., who is also the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical School and the Vascular Biology Program at Boston Children's Hospital, as well as Professor of Bioengineering at SEAS.</span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></font></p><p><font color="#000000" face="sans-serif" size="3"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></font></p></div>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-59099397530484802132012-01-01T20:30:00.001+08:002012-01-01T20:30:17.821+08:00Sun-free photovoltaics<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
Sun-free photovoltaics: Materials engineered to give off
precisely tuned wavelengths of light when heated are key to new high-efficiency
generating system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A new photovoltaic energy-conversion system developed at MIT
can be powered solely by heat, generating electricity with no sunlight at all.
While the principle involved is not new, a novel way of engineering the surface
of a material to convert heat into precisely tuned wavelengths of light —
selected to match the wavelengths that photovoltaic cells can best convert to
electricity — makes the new system much more efficient than previous versions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The key to this fine-tuned light emission, described in the
journal Physical Review A, lies in a material with billions of nanoscale pits
etched on its surface. When the material absorbs heat — whether from the sun, a
hydrocarbon fuel, a decaying radioisotope or any other source — the pitted
surface radiates energy primarily at these carefully chosen wavelengths.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Based on that technology, MIT researchers have made a
button-sized power generator fueled by butane that can run three times longer
than a lithium-ion battery of the same weight; the device can then be recharged
instantly, just by snapping in a tiny cartridge of fresh fuel. Another device,
powered by a radioisotope that steadily produces heat from radioactive decay, could
generate electricity for 30 years without refueling or servicing — an ideal
source of electricity for spacecraft headed on long missions away from the sun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 92
percent of all the energy we use involves converting heat into mechanical
energy, and then often into electricity — such as using fuel to boil water to
turn a turbine, which is attached to a generator. But today's mechanical
systems have relatively low efficiency, and can't be scaled down to the small
sizes needed for devices such as sensors, smartphones or medical monitors.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
"Being able to convert heat from various sources into
electricity without moving parts would bring huge benefits," says Ivan
Celanovic ScD '06, research engineer in MIT's Institute for Soldier
Nanotechnologies (ISN), "especially if we could do it efficiently,
relatively inexpensively and on a small scale."</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It has long been known that photovoltaic (PV) cells needn't
always run on sunlight. Half a century ago, researchers developed thermophotovoltaics
(TPV), which couple a PV cell with any source of heat: A burning hydrocarbon,
for example, heats up a material called the thermal emitter, which radiates
heat and light onto the PV diode, generating electricity. The thermal emitter's
radiation includes far more infrared wavelengths than occur in the solar
spectrum, and "low band-gap" PV materials invented less than a decade
ago can absorb more of that infrared radiation than standard silicon PVs can.
But much of the heat is still wasted, so efficiencies remain relatively low.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
An ideal match</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The solution, Celanovic says, is to design a thermal emitter
that radiates only the wavelengths that the PV diode can absorb and convert
into electricity, while suppressing other wavelengths. "But how do we find
a material that has this magical property of emitting only at the wavelengths
that we want?" asks Marin Soljačić, professor of physics and ISN
researcher. The answer: Make a photonic crystal by taking a sample of material
and create some nanoscale features on its surface — say, a regularly repeating
pattern of holes or ridges — so light propagates through the sample in a
dramatically different way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
"By choosing how we design the nanostructure, we can
create materials that have novel optical properties," Soljačić says.
"This gives us the ability to control and manipulate the behavior of
light."</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The team — which also includes Peter Bermel, research
scientist in the Research Laboratory for Electronics (RLE); Peter Fisher,
professor of physics; and Michael Ghebrebrhan, a postdoc in RLE — used a slab
of tungsten, engineering billions of tiny pits on its surface. When the slab
heats up, it generates bright light with an altered emission spectrum because
each pit acts as a resonator, capable of giving off radiation at only certain
wavelengths.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This powerful approach — co-developed by John D. Joannopoulos,
the Francis Wright Davis Professor of Physics and ISN director, and others —
has been widely used to improve lasers, light-emitting diodes and even optical
fibers. The MIT team, supported in part by a seed grant from the MIT Energy
Initiative, is now working with collaborators at MIT and elsewhere to use it to
create several novel electricity-generating devices.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mike Waits, an electronics engineer at the Army Research
Laboratory in Adelphi, Md., who was not involved in this work, says this
approach to producing miniature power supplies could lead to lighter portable
electronics, which is "critical for the soldier to lighten his load. It
not only reduces his burden, but also reduces the logistics chain" to
deliver those devices to the field. "There are a lot of lives at
stake," he says, "so if you can make the power sources more efficient,
it could be a great benefit."</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The button-like device that uses hydrocarbon fuels such as
butane or propane as its heat source — known as a micro-TPV power generator — has
at its heart a "micro-reactor" designed by Klavs Jensen, the Warren
K. Lewis Professor of Chemical Engineering, and fabricated in the Microsystems
Technology Laboratories. While the device achieves a fuel-to-electricity
conversion efficiency three times greater than that of a lithium-ion battery of
the same size and weight, Celanovic is confident that with further work his
team can triple the current energy density. "At that point, our TPV
generator could power your smartphone for a whole week without being
recharged," he says.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Celanovic and Soljačić stress that building practical
systems requires integrating many technologies and fields of expertise.
"It's a really multidisciplinary effort," Celanovic says. "And
it's a neat example of how fundamental research in materials can result in new
performance that enables a whole spectrum of applications for efficient energy
conversion."</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Science news source: </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Massachusetts Institute of Technology</div>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-86224542800389321712011-09-01T19:11:00.001+08:002011-09-01T19:11:46.116+08:00Down to the wire: Inexpensive technique for making high quality nanowire solar cells developed<br />
Solar or photovoltaic cells represent one of the best possible technologies for providing an absolutely clean and virtually inexhaustible source of energy to power our civilization. However, for this dream to be realized, solar cells need to be made from inexpensive elements using low-cost, less energy-intensive processing chemistry, and they need to efficiently and cost-competitively convert sunlight into electricity. A team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has now demonstrated two out of three of these requirements with a promising start on the third.<br />
<br />
Peidong Yang, a chemist with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division, led the development of a solution-based technique for fabricating core/shell nanowire solar cells using the semiconductors cadmium sulfide for the core and copper sulfide for the shell. These inexpensive and easy-to-make nanowire solar cells boasted open-circuit voltage and fill factor values superior to conventional planar solar cells. Together, the open-circuit voltage and fill factor determine the maximum energy that a solar cell can produce. In addition, the new nanowires also demonstrated an energy conversion efficiency of 5.4-percent, which is comparable to planar solar cells.<br />
<br />
"This is the first time a solution based cation-exchange chemistry technique has been used for the production of high quality single-crystalline cadmium sulfide/copper sulfide core/shell nanowires," Yang says. "Our achievement, together with the increased light absorption we have previously demonstrated in nanowire arrays through light trapping, indicates that core/shell nanowires are truly promising for future solar cell technology."<br />
Yang, who holds a joint appointment with the University of California (UC) Berkeley, is the corresponding author of a paper reporting this research that appears in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. The paper is titled "Solution-processed core–shell nanowires for efficient photovoltaic cells." Co-authoring this paper with Yang were Jinyao Tang, Ziyang Huo, Sarah Brittman and Hanwei Gao.<br />
<br />
Typical solar cells today are made from ultra-pure single crystal silicon wafers that require about 100 micrometers in thickness of this very expensive material to absorb enough solar light. Furthermore, the high-level of crystal purification required makes the fabrication of even the simplest silicon-based planar solar cell a complex, energy-intensive and costly process. <br />
<br />
A highly promising alternative would be semiconductor nanowires – one-dimensional strips of materials whose width measures only one-thousandth that of a human hair but whose length may stretch up to the millimeter scale. Solar cells made from nanowires offer a number of advantages over conventional planar solar cells, including better charge separation and collection capabilities, plus they can be made from Earth abundant materials rather than highly processed silicon. To date, however, the lower efficiencies of nanowire-based solar cells have outweighed their benefits.<br />
<br />
"Nanowire solar cells in the past have demonstrated fill factors and open-circuit voltages far inferior to those of their planar counterparts," Yang says. "Possible reasons for this poor performance include surface recombination and poor control over the quality of the p–n junctions when high-temperature doping processes are used."<br />
<br />
At the heart of all solar cells are two separate layers of material, one with an abundance of electrons that function as a negative pole, and one with an abundance of electron holes (positively-charged energy spaces) that function as a positive pole. When photons from the sun are absorbed, their energy is used to create electron-hole pairs, which are then separated at the p-n junction – the interface between the two layers - and collected as electricity.<br />
<br />
About a year ago, working with silicon, Yang and members of his research group developed a relatively inexpensive way to replace the planar p-n junctions of conventional solar cells with a radial p-n junction, in which a layer of n-type silicon formed a shell around a p-type silicon nanowire core. This geometry effectively turned each individual nanowire into a photovoltaic cell and greatly improved the light-trapping capabilities of silicon-based photovoltaic thin films.<br />
<br />
Now they have applied this strategy to the fabrication of core/shell nanowires using cadmium sulfide and copper sulfide, but this time using solution chemistry. These core/shell nanowires were prepared using a solution-based cation (negative ion) exchange reaction that was originally developed by chemist Paul Alivisatos and his research group to make quantum dots and nanorods. Alivisatos is now the director of Berkeley Lab, and UC Berkeley's Larry and Diane Bock Professor of Nanotechnology.<br />
<br />
"The initial cadmium sulfide nanowires were synthesized by physical vapor transport using a vapor–liquid–solid (VLS) mechanism rather than wet chemistry, which gave us better quality material and greater physical length, but certainly they can also be made using solution process" Yang says. "The as-grown single-crystalline cadmium sulfide nanowires have diameters of between 100 and 400 nanometers and lengths up to 50 millimeters."<br />
The cadmium sulfide nanowires were then dipped into a solution of copper chloride at a temperature of 50 degrees Celsius and kept there for 5 to 10 seconds. The cation exchange reaction converted the surface layer of the cadmium sulfide into a copper sulfide shell.<br />
<br />
"The solution-based cation exchange reaction provides us with an easy, low-cost method to prepare high-quality hetero-epitaxial nanomaterials," Yang says. "Furthermore, it circumvents the difficulties of high-temperature doping and deposition for typical vapor phase production methods, which suggests much lower fabrication costs and better reproducibility. All we really need are beakers and flasks for this solution-based process. There's none of the high fabrication costs associated with gas-phase epitaxial chemical vapor deposition and molecular beam epitaxy, the techniques most used today to fabricate semiconductor nanowires."<br />
<br />
Yang and his colleagues believe they can improve the energy conversion efficiency of their solar cell nanowires by increasing the amount of copper sulfide shell material. For their technology to be commercially viable, they need to reach an energy conversion efficiency of at least ten-percent.<br />
<br />
Provided by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory [August 31, 2011]<br />
Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-31879215447847090812011-09-01T18:55:00.000+08:002011-09-01T18:55:55.680+08:00Manufacturing method paves way for commercially viable quantum dot-based LEDs<br />
University of Florida researchers may help resolve the public debate over future light source of choice: Edison's incandescent bulb or the more energy efficient compact fluorescent lamp. It could be neither.<br />
<br />
Instead, future lighting needs may be supplied by a new breed of light emitting diode, or LED, that conjures light from the invisible world of quantum dots. According to an article in the current online issue of the journal Nature Photonics, moving a QD LED from the lab to market is a step closer to reality thanks to a new manufacturing process pioneered by two research teams in UF's department of materials science and engineering.<br />
<br />
"Our work paves the way to manufacture efficient and stable quantum dot-based LEDs with really low cost, which is very important if we want to see wide-spread commercial use of these LEDs in large-area, full-color flat-panel displays or as solid-state lighting sources to replace the existing incandescent and fluorescent lights," said Jiangeng Xue, the research leader and an associate professor of material science and engineering "Manufacturing costs will be significantly reduced for these solution-processed devices, compared to the conventional way of making semiconductor LED devices."<br />
<br />
A significant part of the research carried out by Xue's team focused on improving existing organic LEDs. These semiconductors are multilayered structures made up of paper thin organic materials, such as polymer plastics, used to light up display systems in computer monitors, television screens, as well as smaller devices such as MP3 players, mobile phones, watches, and other handheld electronic devices. OLEDs are also becoming more popular with manufacturers because they use less power and generate crisper, brighter images than those produced by conventional LCDs (liquid crystal displays). Ultra-thin OLED panels are also used as replacements for traditional light bulbs and may be the next big thing in 3-D imaging.<br />
<br />
Complementing Xue's team is another headed by Paul Holloway, distinguished professor of materials science and engineering at UF, which delved into quantum dots, or QDs. These nano-particles are tiny crystals just a few nanometers (billionths of a meter) wide, comprised of a combination of sulfur, zinc, selenium and cadmium atoms. When excited by electricity, QDs emit an array of colored light. The individual colors vary depending on the size of the dots. Tuning, or "adjusting," the colors is achieved by controlling the size of the QDs during the synthetic process. <br />
<br />
By integrating the work of both teams, researchers created a high-performance hybrid LED, comprised of both organic and QD-based layers. Until recently, however, engineers at UF and elsewhere have been vexed by a manufacturing problem that hindered commercial development. An industrial process known as vacuum deposition is the common way to put the necessary organic molecules in place to carry electricity into the QDs. However, a different manufacturing process called spin-coating, is used to create a very thin layer of QDs. Having to use two separate processes slows down production and drives up manufacturing costs.<br />
<br />
According to the Nature Photonics article, UF researchers overcame this obstacle with a patented device structure that allows for depositing all the particles and molecules needed onto the LED entirely with spin-coating. Such a device structure also yields significantly improved device efficiency and lifetime compared to previously reported QD-based LED devices.<br />
<br />
Spin-coating may not be the final manufacturing solution, however.<br />
"In terms of actual product manufacturing, there are many other high through-put, continuous "roll-to-roll" printing or coating processes that we could use to fabricate large area displays or lighting devices," Xue said. "That will remain as a future research and development topic for the university and a start-up company, NanoPhotonica, that has licensed the technology and is in the midst of a technology development program to capitalize on the manufacturing breakthrough."<br />
<br />
Provided by University of Florida [August 31, 2011]<br />
Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-65249861658342490642011-04-27T07:53:00.001+08:002011-04-27T07:53:43.834+08:00millimeter-scale energy harvester<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal;mso-outline-level:1"><b><span style="font-size:15.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black;mso-font-kerning:18.0pt">Most powerful millimeter-scale energy harvester generates electricity from vibrations<o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/archive/26-04-2011/"><span style="color:#0E3266">April 26, 2011</span></a></span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:6.0pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:3.75pt; margin-left:0in;line-height:13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:dimgray">A new energy harvester developed by University of Michigan researchers can harness energy from vibrations and convert it to electricity with five to ten times greater efficiency and power than other devices in its class. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"In a tiny amount of space, we've been able to make a device that generates more power for a given input than anything else out there on the market," said Khalil Najafi, one of the system's developers and chair of</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> Electrical and Computer Engineering</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">This new vibration energy harvester is specifically designed to turn the cyclic motions of factory machines into energy to power</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/wireless+sensor+networks/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;color:#0E3266">wireless sensor networks</span></a>. These sensor networks monitor machines' performance and let operators know about any malfunctions.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The sensors that do this today get their power from a plug or a battery. They're considered "wireless" because they can transmit information without wires. Being tethered to a power source drastically increases their installation and maintenance costs, said Erkan Aktakka, one of the system's developers and a doctoral student in</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Electrical and Computer Engineering.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Long-lasting power is the greatest hurdle to large-scale use of pervasive information-gathering sensor networks, the researchers say.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"If one were to look at the ongoing life-cycle expenses of operating a wireless sensor, up to 80 percent of the total cost consists solely of installing and maintaining power wires and continuously monitoring, testing and replacing finite-life batteries," Aktakka said. "Scavenging the energy already present in the environment is an effective solution."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The researchers have built a complete system that integrates a high-quality energy-harvesting piezoelectric material with the circuitry that makes the power accessible. (Piezoelectric materials allow a charge to build up in them in response to</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/mechanical+strain/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">mechanical strain</span></a>, which in this case would be induced by the machines' vibrations.)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"There are lots of energy sources surrounding us. Lightning has a lot of electricity and power, but it's not useful," Najafi said. "To be able to use the energy you harvest you have to store it in a capacitor or battery. We've developed an integrated system with an ultracapacitor that does not need to start out charged."</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><br /> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The active part of the harvester that enables the energy conversion occupies just 27 cubic millimeters. The packaged system, which includes the power management circuitry, is in the size of a penny. The system has a large bandwidth of 14 Hertz and operates at a vibration frequency of 155 Hertz, similar to the vibration you'd feel if you put your hand on top of a running microwave oven.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"Most of the previous vibration harvesters operated either at very high frequencies or with very narrow bandwidths, and this limited their practical</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> applications</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black">outside of a laboratory environment," Aktakka said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The new harvester can generate more than 200 microwatts of power when it is exposed to 1.5g vibration amplitude. (1g is the gravitational acceleration that all objects experience by Earth's gravity.) The harvested energy is processed by an integrated circuitry to charge an ultracapacitor to 1.85 volts.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">In theory, these devices could be left in place for 10 or 20 years without regular maintenance. "They have a limitless shelf time, since they do not require a pre-charged battery or an external</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/power+source/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">power source</span></a>," Aktakka said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">A novel silicon micromachining technique allows the engineers to fabricate the harvesters in bulk with a high-quality</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/piezoelectric+material/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;color:#0E3266">piezoelectric material</span></a>, unlike other competing devices.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The market for power sources for wireless sensor networks in industrial settings is expected to reach $450 million by 2015, Aktakka said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">These new devices could have</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black">applications</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black">in medicine and the auto industry too. They could possibly be used to power medical implants in people or heat sensors on vehicle motors, Najafi said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The researchers will present this work next at the 16th International Conference on Solid-State Sensors, Actuators, and Microsystems (TRANSDUCERS 2011) in Beijing in June.</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"><br /> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 13.5pt"><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Provided by University of Michigan</span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-6837597973525732312011-03-24T20:19:00.000+08:002011-03-24T20:20:05.862+08:00light to predict molecular crystal structures<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13px; "><table><tbody><tr><td font="" face="verdana"><h2 style="padding-top: 0px; display: inline-block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Syracuse University chemist develops technique to use light to predict molecular crystal structures</h2></td></tr><tr><td><i>March 23rd, 2011</i></td></tr><tr><td>A Syracuse University chemist has developed a way to use very low frequency light waves to study the weak forces (London dispersion forces) that hold molecules together in a crystal. This fundamental research could be applied to solve critical problems in drug research, manufacturing and quality control.<p>The research by Timothy Korter, associate professor of chemistry in SU's College of Arts and Sciences, was the cover article of the March 14 issue of Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics. The journal, published by the Royal Society of Chemistry, is one of the most prestigious in the field. A National Science Foundation Early Career Development (CAREER) Award funds Korter's research.</p><p>"When developing a drug, it is important that we uncover all of the possible ways the molecules can pack together to form a crystal," Korter says. "Changes in the crystal structure can change the way the drug is absorbed and accessed by the body."</p><p>One industry example is that of a drug distributed in the form of a gel capsule that crystallized into a solid when left on the shelf for an extended period of time, Korter explains. The medication inside the capsule changed to a form that could not dissolve in the human body, rendering it useless. The drug was removed from shelves. This example shows that it is not always possible for drug companies to identify all the variations of a drug's crystal structure through traditional experimentation, which is time consuming and expensive.</p><p>"The question is," Korter says, "can we leverage a better understanding of London and other weak intermolecular forces to predict these changes in crystal structure?"</p><p>Korter's lab is one of only a handful of university-based research labs in the world exploring the potential of THz radiation for chemical and pharmaceutical applications. THz light waves exist in the region between infrared radiation and microwaves and offer the unique advantages of being non-harmful to people and able to safely pass through many kinds of materials. THz can also be used to identify the chemical signatures of a wide range of substances. Korter has used THz to identify the chemical of signatures of molecules ranging from improvised explosives and drug components to the building blocks of DNA.</p><p>Korter's new research combines THz experiments with new computational models that accurately account for the effects of the London dispersion forces to predict crystal structures of various substances. London forces are one of several types of intermolecular forces that cause molecules to stick together and form solids. Environmental changes (temperature, humidity, light) impact the forces in ways that can cause the crystal structure to change. Korter's research team compares the computer models with the THz experiments and uses the results to refine and improve the theoretical models.</p><p>"We have demonstrated how to use THz to directly visualize these chemical interactions," Korter says. "The ultimate goal is to use these THz signatures to develop theoretical models that take into account the role of these weak forces to predict the crystal structures of pharmaceuticals before they are identified through experimentation."</p><p>Source: <a href="http://www.syr.edu/" target="new" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); text-decoration: none; ">Syracuse University</a></p></td></tr></tbody></table></span>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-21963964076976931922011-03-05T10:13:00.000+08:002011-03-05T10:19:00.821+08:00INVISIBILITY<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal;mso-outline-level:1"></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 15pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Invisibility cloaks may be just around the corner<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/archive/04-03-2011/">March 4, 2011</a> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">In 1897, H.G. Wells created a fictional scientist who became invisible by changing his refractive index to that of air, so that his body could not absorb or reflect light. More recently, Harry Potter disappeared from sight after wrapping himself in a cloak spun from the pelts of magical herbivores.</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Countless other fictional characters in books and films throughout history have discovered or devised ways to become invisible, a theme that long has been a staple of science fiction and a source of endless fascination for humans. Who among us has never imagined the possibilities? But, of course, it's not for real.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Or is it?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">While no one yet has the power to put on a garment and disappear, Elena Semouchkina, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Michigan Technological University, has found ways to use</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/magnetic+resonance/">magnetic resonance</a></span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">to capture rays of</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/visible+light/">visible light</a></span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">and route them around objects, rendering those objects invisible to the human eye. Her work is based on the transformation optics approaches, developed and applied to the solution of invisibility problems by British scientists John B. Pendry and Ulf Leonhardt in 2006.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">"Imagine that you look at the object, which is placed in front of a</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/light+source/">light source</a>," she explains.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">"The object would be invisible for your eye if the light rays are sent around the object to avoid scattering, and are accelerated along these curved paths to reach your eye undistinguishable from direct straight beams exiting the source, when the object is absent."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">At its simplest, the beams of light flow around the object and then meet again on the other side so that someone looking directly at the object would not be able to see it--but only what's on the other side.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">"You would see the light source directly through the object," said Semouchkina. "This effect could be achieved if we surround the object by a shell with a specific distribution of such material parameters as</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/permittivity/">permittivity</a></span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">and permeability."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">She and her collaborators at the Pennsylvania State University, where she is also an adjunct professor, designed a nonmetallic "invisibility cloak" that uses concentric arrays of identical glass resonators made of chalcogenide glass, a type of dielectric material--that is, one that does not conduct electricity.</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><br /> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">In computer simulations, the cloak made objects hit by infrared waves--approximately one micron, or one-millionth of a meter long--disappear from view.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">The potential practical applications of the work could be dramatic, for example, in the military, such as "making objects invisible to radar," she said, as well as in intelligence operations "to conceal people or objects."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Furthermore, "shielding objects from electromagnetic irradiation is also very important," she said, adding, "for sure, the gaming industry could use it in new types of toys."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Multi-resonator structures comprising Semouchkina's invisibility cloak belong to "metamaterials"--artificial materials with properties that do not exist in nature--since they can refract light by unusual ways. In particular, the "spokes" of tiny glass resonators accelerate light waves around the object making it invisible.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Until recently, there were no materials available with the relative permeability values between zero and one, which are necessary for the invisibility cloak to bend and accelerate light beams, she said. However, metamaterials, which were predicted more than 40 years ago by the Russian scientist Victor Veselago, and first implemented in 2000 by Pendry from Imperial College, London, in collaboration with David R. Smith from Duke University, now make it possible, she said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Metamaterials use lattices of resonators, instead of atoms or molecules of natural materials, and provide for a broad range of relative permittivity and permeability including zero and negative values in the vicinity of the resonance frequency, she said. Metamaterials were listed as one of the top three physics discoveries of the decade by the American Physical Society.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">"Metamaterials were initially made of metallic split ring resonators and wire arrays that limited both their isotropy (uniformity in all directions) and frequency range," Semouchkina said. "Depending on the size of split ring resonators, they could operate basically at microwaves and millimeter (mm) waves."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">In 2004, her research group proposed replacing metal resonators with dielectric resonators. "Although it seemed strange to control magnetic properties of a metamateral by using dielectrics, we have shown that arrays of dielectric resonators can provide for negative refraction and other unique properties of metamaterials," she said. "Low loss dielectric resonators promise to extend applications of metamaterials to the optical range, and we have demonstrated this opportunity by designing an infrared cloak."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Semouchkina and colleagues recently reported on their research in the journal<i>Applied Physics Letters</i>, published by the American Institute of Physics. Her co-authors were Douglas Werner and Carlo Pantano of Penn State and George Semouchkin, who teaches at Michigan Tech and has an adjunct position with Penn State.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">The National Science Foundation (NSF) is funding her research on dielectric metamaterials and the team's applications with a $318,520 award, but she plans to apply for an additional grant to conduct specific studies into invisibility cloak structures.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Semouchkina, who received her master's degree in electrical engineering and her doctorate in physics and mathematics from Tomsk State University in her native Russia, has lived in the United States for 13 years, and has been a U.S. citizen since 2005. She also earned her second doctorate in materials in 2001 from Penn State.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">She and her team now are testing an all-dielectric</span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/invisibility+cloak/">invisibility cloak</a></span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; "> </span><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">rescaled to work at microwave frequencies, performing experiments in Michigan Tech's anechoic chamber, a cave-like compartment in an electrical energy resources center lab, lined with highly absorbent charcoal-gray foam cones.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">There, "horn" antennas transmit and receive microwaves with wavelengths up to several centimeters, that is, more than 10,000 times longer than in the infrared range. They are cloaking metal cylinders two to three inches in diameter and three to four inches high with a shell comprised of mm-sized ceramic resonators, she said.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">"We want to move experiments to higher frequencies and smaller wavelengths," she said, adding: "The most exciting applications will be at the frequencies of visible light."<br /> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 20px; "><span style="font-size: 11.5pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; ">Provided by National Science Foundation<b style="color: black; "><o:p></o:p></b></span></p><p></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-52901554884635755002011-03-01T09:54:00.000+08:002011-03-01T09:55:32.679+08:00ENERGY SECURITY<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves/> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:donotpromoteqf/> <w:lidthemeother>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:lidthemeasian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:lidthemecomplexscript>AR-SA</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:splitpgbreakandparamark/> <w:dontvertaligncellwithsp/> <w:dontbreakconstrainedforcedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> <w:word11kerningpairs/> 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priority="21" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Intense Emphasis"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="31" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Subtle Reference"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="32" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Intense Reference"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="33" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Book Title"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="37" name="Bibliography"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="39" qformat="true" name="TOC Heading"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center">WHAT IS THE STATUS OF MALAYSIA ENERGY SECURITY? </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The energy industry's face challenges and need solutions for protecting critical assets including oil and gas infrastructure, transmission grids, power plants, storage, pipelines, and all aspects of strategic industry assets. Of special concern is the new Cyber-terrorism and protecting Control Systems.<br />Recent terrorist activities like the China hacker attack on global oil and gas companies - as reported by security company McAfee, have raised several critical questions:<br />- How can the Malaysia defend itself against future attacks on critical infrastructure such as energy systems?<br />- Are energy supplies vulnerable to attack, and if so ? how and where?<br />- How can energy generating and storage facilities be made safer?<br />- How can we protect transportation systems and transmission lines?<br />- How are government and industry leaders working together to develop contingency plans to protect the public?<br />- What policies would enhance Malaysia energy security?<br />- What are the roles of industry and government?<br />Energy security is a complex, multi-faceted issue. In its most fundamental sense, energy security is assured when a nation can deliver energy economically, reliably, in an environmentally sound and safe manner, and in quantities sufficient to support its economic and defense needs. To do this requires policies that support expansion of all elements of the energy supply and delivery infrastructure, with sufficient storage and generating reserves, diversity, and redundancy to meet the demands of economic growth.<br />The threats facing the nation's critical energy infrastructure continue to evolve and present new challenges. The intricate nature of the nation's electrical grid is becoming readily apparent with rolling blackouts and the potential for further disruptions. The interdependencies of the oil, natural gas, and electric infrastructures are increasingly complex and not easily understood. The impact of a major terrorist attack directed against this fragile and interdependent infrastructure could have drastic consequences.<br />Conflict over resources stretches far back in human history, and energy infrastructures have long been subject to planned attacks. For instance, the New World Liberation Front bombed assets of the Pacific Gas & Electric Company over 10 times in 1975 alone. Members of the Ku Klux Klan and San Joaquin Militia were convicted of conspiring or trying to attack energy infrastructure. Organized paramilitaries have had significant impacts in some countries. For example, the Farabundo-Marti National Liberation Front interrupted service in up to 90% of El Salvador at a time and created manuals for attacking power systems.<br />So what is the current state of the industry, and is there is a serious effort <span style=""> </span>to provide insights on all aspects of infrastructure and asset protection and recovery being done?</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Adapted from </span><span style="font-size: 9pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">EnergyBusinessReports</span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-33929549909089827212011-02-22T20:19:00.000+08:002011-02-22T20:20:14.507+08:00conducting plastic<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal;mso-outline-level:2"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">New plastics can conduct electricity<o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:0in;margin-right:3.75pt;margin-bottom: 7.5pt;margin-left:0in;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:7.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#8C8C8C"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:0in;margin-right:3.75pt;margin-bottom: 7.5pt;margin-left:0in;line-height:normal"><span style="font-size:7.5pt; mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#8C8C8C">February 22, 2011 </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Plastics usually conduct electricity so poorly that they are used to insulate electric cables but, by placing a thin film of metal onto a plastic sheet and mixing it into the polymer surface with an</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/ion+beam/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">ion beam</span></a>, Australian researchers have shown that the method can be used to make cheap, strong, flexible and conductive plastic films.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">The research has been published in the journal</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><i><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">ChemPhysChem</span></i><i><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span></i><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black">by a team led by Professor Paul Meredith and Associate Professor Ben Powell, both at the University of Queensland, and Associate Professor Adam Micolich of the UNSW School of Physics. This latest discovery reports experiments by former UQ Ph.D. student, Dr Andrew Stephenson.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Ion beam techniques are widely used in the microelectronics industry to tailor the</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/conductivity/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">conductivity</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black">of</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/semiconductors/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">semiconductors</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black">such as silicon, but attempts to adapt this process to plastic films have been made since the 1980s with only limited success – until now.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"What the team has been able to do here is use an ion beam to tune the properties of a plastic film so that it conducts electricity like the metals used in the electrical wires themselves, and even to act as a superconductor and pass electric current without resistance if cooled to low enough temperature," says Professor Meredith.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">To demonstrate a potential application of this new material, the team produced electrical resistance thermometers that meet industrial standards. Tested against an industry standard platinum resistance thermometer, it had comparable or even superior accuracy.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"This material is so interesting because we can take all the desirable aspects of polymers - such as mechanical flexibility, robustness and low cost - and into the mix add good electrical conductivity, something not normally associated with plastics," says Professor Micolich. "It opens new avenues to making plastic electronics."<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Andrew Stephenson says the most exciting part about the discovery is how precisely the film’s ability to conduct or resist the flow of electrical current can be tuned. It opens up a very broad potential for useful applications.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">"In fact, we can vary the electrical resistivity over 10 orders of magnitude – put simply, that means we have ten billion options to adjust the recipe when we're making the plastic film. In theory, we can make</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/plastics/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;color:#0E3266">plastics</span></a></span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black">that conduct no electricity at all or as well as metals do – and everything in between,” Dr Stephenson says.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">These new materials can be easily produced with equipment commonly used in the</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"><a href="http://www.physorg.com/tags/microelectronics/"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;color:#0E3266">microelectronics</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black">industry and are vastly more tolerant of exposure to oxygen compared to standard semiconducting polymers.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Combined, these advantages may give ion beam processed polymer films a bright future in the on-going development of soft materials for plastic electronics applications – a fusion between current and next generation technology, the researchers say.<br /> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black">Provided by University of New South Wales</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:black"> </span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:black"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-63487449639832264222011-02-20T13:10:00.000+08:002011-02-20T13:11:10.537+08:00Energy and Economy<p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610"><b>What is a monetary unit, in reality and how does it relate to energy?</b><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Here is the kind of analysis (greatly simplified) that might help us understand this better and lead us to an answer. Consider the production of an electronic gadget — a widget in economies. Let's just see where the cost elements come from. This hypothetical is highly simplified, but it isn't too far off the mark. It's the concept that counts.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Cost of production (consumer electronic widget):<o:p></o:p></span></p> <pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="color:#403610">Cost of production (consumer electronic widget):<br />Materials $ 500.00<br />Labor $5,000.00<br />Overhead (allocated) $ 100.00<br />Energy $ 50.00<br />Transportation $ 10.00<br />-------------------------------------<br />Total Costs $5,660.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Energy as percent of total: .88%<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">If energy is such a small percentage of total costs, why worry about a mere 200% increase in the cost of oil over the last decade? Hell, energy is still cheap, right? Some economists say so.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">But there is a problem. Let's start with Materials costs. We might think that we are paying for just physical material, right? Matter. But the reality is quite a bit more complicated.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Mining/Smelting/Forming Operations (proportioned):<o:p></o:p></span></p> <pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="color:#403610">Labor<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>200.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Equipment depreciation<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>1.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Overhead<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>2.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Energy (to run equipment)<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>50.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">-------------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Total cost of mining<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>253.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Profit<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>30.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">-------------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Price<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>283.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Energy as percent of cost: 20%<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">And suppose we add up the average costs of parts manufacturing.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="color:#403610">Materials<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>283.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Labor<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>100.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Overhead<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>10.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Energy<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>55.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Machinery depreciation<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>5.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">-------------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Total costs<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>453.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Profit<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>47.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">-------------------------------------<o:p></o:p></span></pre><pre style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left:0in"><span style="color:#403610">Price<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>$<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>500.00<o:p></o:p></span></pre> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Energy as percent of cost 12%<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Total energy costs rolled up $155.00<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">This is still only 2.4% of the total costs. Right? Well, what about labor? This one requires a much greater depth of analysis than I can fit in here, but just think about some basics. Consider the food eaten (energy) by the average worker. Consider the transportation costs to get the average worker to work (energy). Consider the cost of keeping the house warm in winter, cool in summer (energy). Now, it goes even deeper. For example, consider the work that was done in making the house (amortized over the life of the house, but nevertheless an energy input). Consider the work done to make the car. Consider the farm work needed to grow the food. And then consider that every one of the workers in this lower level have exactly the same energy needs as the workers at each of the above activities.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">In other words, if you look carefully enough at all of the factors that go into making it possible for a worker (farm, blue collar, white collar, or no-collar) to work you will soon see that the above product is sitting atop a massive energy pyramid. We could perform the same analysis for equipment used in manufacturing, mining, and transportation of the goods. We get the same picture. Fundamentally, all of the work that goes into producing that one product is based on energy in one form or another. In the end, one can argue that nearly 100% of the cost of making the widget is energy.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Now, what is the effect of doubling the basic cost of energy? In the end everything is affected. It takes time for the cost increases to ripple through the economy. They are felt differently by different industries at different times. It isn't a single smooth curve. But it is inexorable. Over time, the costs will percolate upward driving everything from bottom to top up in dollar measures.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">What causes the cost of energy to go up? And why does this impact the purchasing power of a monetary unit, say the dollar? The first one is ultimately very simple to answer. You have to use energy to get energy. The same analysis as above applied to, say, an off-shore oil drilling rig, or to the cost of exploration, or the cost of mining coal, will produce the same picture. The more machinery and labor that it takes to get the raw fuel, the more it takes to refine or process the fuel, the more equipment and anti-pollution measures you take to clean up the emissions and the environment (due to the release of toxic stuff in the fuel when burned), the more energy it takes to get the stuff in the first place. As the sources of oil are depleted and it takes more effort to get the same volume of fuels the energy it takes to get energy goes up as well.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">In the end we have less<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><em><span style="font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"">net energy</span></em><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>available for consumption as we labor on to make our widgets. The very same argument, by the way, holds for service industry work. And it is net energy that counts.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">In an era in which the finding and extracting of easy to reach fuels was the norm, the net energy actually increased from year to year. As it did it could support a growing amount of work. The economy could expand and more people could enjoy more stuff, like widgets. Energy was cheap. For a while, it even grew cheaper in terms of the amount of energy it took to return a given unit of new energy. In monetary terms, and this helps to answer the second question above, we watched as dollars could buy more goods and services over the long-run. The period after WWII saw the most incredible expansion of the extraction of easy to get oil and natural gas (and coal too). Right up until sometime in the nineties we enjoyed the creation of unheard of wealth (well if you call SUV's wealth — I call them pseudo-wealth). And then things started to change. Overall energy production started to decelerate. That is, while still growing, its marginal rate of growth declined. This was an ominous sign. It portended something really different from what we had gotten used to.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">In fact, I would argue that the debt crises we are experiencing is really due to a mismatch between expected growth in wealth production and actual growth due to energy limits. By attempting to pump more oil from very expensive (in energy terms) wells and expecting there will be even more in the future, we have borrowed, literally, against that future just at a time when everything is changing.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Eventually, if not already, the peak of energy production will arrive (see a summary of oil production<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3726"><span style="color:#A97700">here</span></a>. That is, the gain in net energy will go to zero and, sometime thereafter, decline. We will be living in a world in which the value of our monetary units will go down. Inflation will increase at increasing rates until widgets' dollar price will be unreachable. This is inescapable save for some miraculous technology that can create energy out of... I'll save that question for another posting. Meanwhile we have bought a lot of stuff (expended energy in the past) with the expectation that there would be more energy in the future, not less. The energy deficit that we are realizing and the monetary deficit that we now face are linked.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Here is a not-so-simple-to-implement solution to our lack of understanding economics. Let a dollar equal a fixed number of energy units, say British Thermal Units (BTUs). Instead of a gold standard — remember you can't eat gold — we adopt an energy standard. More technically correct, we adopt a<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><em><span style="font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"">free</span></em><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>energy standard. Free energy is what physicists call the energy available to do useful work. Not all energy qualifies. Think of the heat radiating from your home; it isn't able to do any work, but it is a lot of energy. A free energy standard says that there can be no more monetary units in circulation than there are units of stored and readily available units of free energy. This standard would already take into account the energy needed to obtain the stored energy. One of the beauties of this proposal is that the measure of amount of energy is fairly unambiguous. There is a standard unit of measure that is well defined. I remember that I started to think about this after reading something in Paul Samuelson's classic Introductory Economics (back in the 70's!) in which he noted that money is a lousy measuring tool, much like trying to measure a physical distance using a rubber yardstick. I guess this is one reason some folks prefer the gold standard. What Samuelson meant was that while it might be lousy in a physical sense, it was good enough for government work, literally. But what Samuelson and most other economists didn't know or understand is that there was a force pulling at both ends of that rubber yardstick that kept building a measurement error into every measurement act. Now we are going to see what happens when that force is removed — the yardstick will return to its earlier length.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">A free energy standard would have unbelievable consequences for the way an economy works and how we understand that working. It would literally turn it into a system akin to the natural ecosystem where energy is the obvious currency. Spending would take on a whole new meaning. Borrowing would too. Most of all the price of everything we buy/sell would reflect the true value of things. Moreover, we could know the future value of owning things by virtue of knowing how much energy they could consume in the future. It would be an easier decision to make regarding the purchase of that widget if we knew that it's operation consumed so many BTUs per time unit. We see a basic start on this trend in looking at automobile mileage figures or refrigerator efficiency ratings. In that same vein we would have a good idea of how much it would cost to replace the item. In an age of diminishing energy we would be able to put a truer time value (discount rate) on things, knowing that they will cost more in monetary terms.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">Right now everything is distorted in the economy. Economists can't really tell you what to expect because we are now operating in a different energy regime than when they developed their so-called economic laws. Things just don't work as they're supposed to under those laws. There is no small amount of head scratching going on in Washington and academia right now.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="margin-top:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;margin-left: 0in"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610">It is possible that the current crisis is just a temporary phenomenon. This kind of situation has happened before and has had similar effects in terms of the economy not working as advertised (remember stagflation during Jimmy Carter's administration). Historically we've survived and things seemed to return to normal. Maybe that will happen again. But the only way it can happen is if someone, some genius, somewhere invents the most stupendous energy production source ever imagined. Because that is what it is going to take to get us out of hot (forgive the pun) water now and return us to what we have thought of as normalcy in the future. Don't hold your breath, but if you are a believer, maybe pray.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Source: <span class="apple-style-span"><b><span style="font-size:8.5pt;line-height:115%;font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif"; color:#403610"><a href="http://questioneverything.typepad.com/question_everything/biophysical-economics/"><span style="color:#D3990E">Biophysical Economics</span></a>,</span></b></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><b><span style="font-size:8.5pt;line-height:115%; font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";color:#403610"> </span></b></span><span class="apple-style-span"><b><span style="font-size:8.5pt;line-height:115%; font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";color:#403610"><a href="http://questioneverything.typepad.com/question_everything/political-economy/"><span style="color:#A97700">Political Economy</span></a></span></b></span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-75060611718625529092011-02-20T12:38:00.003+08:002011-02-20T12:47:28.339+08:00FEED IN TARIFF FOR REFeed in Tariffs to be proposed in Malaysia<br />Reports produced in 2010 state that Malaysia is going to be proposing Feed in Tariffs for Solar, Biomass, Biogas and Hydro. This will be debated in the Parliament during the second quarter of 2011. There is a growing interest for renewable technology in Malaysia and the target is to achieve 11% by 2020. The proposed tariff structure is shown in the table below:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh87PDI0mGhVXFi-0Zur6O9MR61t9uDhaP9ahAGIMASCuX7CIEJmX_ZshAtVSSgkGATV1Rftm7TtX53vDeVAfKwxIT31h7am2DKMm45FxT_TK58wLSwFhZjJ97zYx6rJbup2LS1dBtR0Z4/s1600/re+tariff.JPG"><img style="float:centre; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 278px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh87PDI0mGhVXFi-0Zur6O9MR61t9uDhaP9ahAGIMASCuX7CIEJmX_ZshAtVSSgkGATV1Rftm7TtX53vDeVAfKwxIT31h7am2DKMm45FxT_TK58wLSwFhZjJ97zYx6rJbup2LS1dBtR0Z4/s320/re+tariff.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5575627747800546786" /></a>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-53688365303805986822011-02-19T16:28:00.001+08:002011-02-19T16:28:58.565+08:00ELEMENTARY LESSON FROM US<span style="font-weight:bold;">An elementary energy problem</span> - February 18, 2011<br /><br />The United States needs to “take control of its energy future” and prevent future resource crunches of ‘energy critical elements’. So says a new report from the American Physical Society and the Materials Research Society, which echoes many of the same concerns and solutions as the US Department of Energy’s December 2010 report on the same topic (see Nature News blog post). Action seems to be happening off the back of these reports, the report’s authors told the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting in DC today: US senator Mark Udall (Colorado) has introduced a bill on the same subject – the critical minerals and materials promotion act of 2011.<br />The reports and the bill focus on elements that are used in everything from efficient lighting to electric cars and wind turbines. Many of these elements are rarer than gold, and some are almost exclusively mined in China. In the face of skyrocketing demand, researchers, businessmen and politicians are seeking to find cheaper, more stable supplies, or invent alternative materials that use less of the critical elements. If they fail, future shortages of critical elements could hamstring the production of game-changing clean-energy technologies.<br />The new report differs from the DOE’s effort in that it takes a broader view of critical elements. “We are concerned to a relatively high degree about a good chunk of the periodic table,” said report co-author Tom Graedel of Yale University. “Maybe about a third.” By contrast the DOE report focused on six elements they identified as particularly critical.<br />The authors call for more information to be gathered (the US Geological Survey doesn’t even have statistics about the mining of individual critical elements, they note), and for a federal push on research into substitutes and recycling. They conclude that building up stockpiles of critical elements is probably not a good idea, since it wouldn’t spur innovative research.<br />Source: nature.comKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-86109414265579420772011-02-18T20:13:00.000+08:002011-02-18T20:15:01.585+08:00ANTI LASER<span style="font-weight:bold;">Scientists build world's first anti-laser</span><br /><br />February 17th, 2011<br /><br />More than 50 years after the invention of the laser, scientists at Yale University have built the world's first anti-laser, in which incoming beams of light interfere with one another in such a way as to perfectly cancel each other out. The discovery could pave the way for a number of novel technologies with applications in everything from optical computing to radiology.<br /><br />In the anti-laser, incoming light waves are trapped in a cavity where they bounce back and forth until they are eventually absorbed. Their energy is dissipated as heat. <br />Credit: Yidong Chong/Yale University<br />Conventional lasers, which were first invented in 1960, use a so-called "gain medium," usually a semiconductor like gallium arsenide, to produce a focused beam of coherent light-light waves with the same frequency and amplitude that are in step with one another.<br /><br />Last summer, Yale physicist A. Douglas Stone and his team published a study explaining the theory behind an anti-laser, demonstrating that such a device could be built using silicon, the most common semiconductor material. But it wasn't until now, after joining forces with the experimental group of his colleague Hui Cao, that the team actually built a functioning anti-laser, which they call a coherent perfect absorber (CPA).<br /><br />The team, whose results appear in the Feb. 18 issue of the journal Science, focused two laser beams with a specific frequency into a cavity containing a silicon wafer that acted as a "loss medium." The wafer aligned the light waves in such a way that they became perfectly trapped, bouncing back and forth indefinitely until they were eventually absorbed and transformed into heat.<br /><br />Stone believes that CPAs could one day be used as optical switches, detectors and other components in the next generation of computers, called optical computers, which will be powered by light in addition to electrons. Another application might be in radiology, where Stone said the principle of the CPA could be employed to target electromagnetic radiation to a small region within normally opaque human tissue, either for therapeutic or imaging purposes.<br /><br />Theoretically, the CPA should be able to absorb 99.999 percent of the incoming light. Due to experimental limitations, the team's current CPA absorbs 99.4 percent. "But the CPA we built is just a proof of concept," Stone said. "I'm confident we will start to approach the theoretical limit as we build more sophisticated CPAs." Similarly, the team's first CPA is about one centimeter across at the moment, but Stone said that computer simulations have shown how to build one as small as six microns (about one-twentieth the width of an average human hair).<br /><br />The team that built the CPA, led by Cao and another Yale physicist, Wenjie Wan, demonstrated the effect for near-infrared radiation, which is slightly "redder" than the eye can see and which is the frequency of light that the device naturally absorbs when ordinary silicon is used. But the team expects that, with some tinkering of the cavity and loss medium in future versions, the CPA will be able to absorb visible light as well as the specific infrared frequencies used in fiber optic communications.<br /><br />It was while explaining the complex physics behind lasers to a visiting professor that Stone first came up with the idea of an anti-laser. When Stone suggested his colleague think about a laser working in reverse in order to help him understand how a conventional laser works, Stone began contemplating whether it was possible to actually build a laser that would work backwards, absorbing light at specific frequencies rather than emitting it.<br /><br />"It went from being a useful thought experiment to having me wondering whether you could really do that," Stone said. "After some research, we found that several physicists had hinted at the concept in books and scientific papers, but no one had ever developed the idea."<br /><br />Source: Yale University <br />Credit: EurekalertKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-91277391043531085332011-02-18T20:06:00.000+08:002011-02-18T20:07:19.373+08:00environmental friendly battery<span style="font-weight:bold;">Technology breakthrough fuels laptops and phones, recharges scientist's 60-year career</span><br />February 17, 2011<br />How does a scientist fuel his enthusiasm for chemistry after 60 years? By discovering a new energy source, of course.<br /> <br />This week, SiGNa Chemistry Inc. unveiled its new hydrogen cartridges, which provide energy to fuel cells designed to recharge cell phones, laptops and GPS units. The green power source is geared toward outdoor enthusiasts as well as residents of the Third World, where electricity in homes is considered a luxury.<br />"SiGNa has created an inherently-safe solution to produce electric power, resulting in an eco-friendly and cost-effective portable solution," said Michael Lefenfeld, SiGNa's CEO.<br />The spark for this groundbreaking technology came from James Dye's Michigan State University laboratory. Dye, University Distinguished Professor of Chemistry Emeritus, and his work with alkali metals led to a green process to harness the power of sodium silicide, which is the source for SiGNa's new product.<br />"In our lab, we were able to produce alkali metal silicides, which basically are made from sodium and silicon, which in turn, are produced from salt and sand," Dye said. "By adding water to sodium silicide, we're able to produce hydrogen, which creates energy for fuel cells. The byproduct, sodium silicate, is also green. It's the same stuff found in toothpaste."<br />SiGNa was able to build on Dye's research and develop a power platform that produces low-pressure hydrogen gas on demand, convert it to electricity via a low-cost fuel cell and emit simple water vapor.<br />Dye, the co-founder of SiGNa and director of its scientific council, said that making the jump to research the company's products was a small one.<br />"I've been working with alkali metals for 50 years," he said. "My research was closely related to what SiGNa was looking for. So when they came to me with their idea, it was a relatively easy adaptation to make."<br />Dye came to MSU in 1953 — two years before MSU was a university. Based on the products that can be linked to Dye's research just in the last year, it's clear that he is reaping the rewards of his six decades of scientific sowing.<br />Using a similar process, Dye was able to assist the creation of a fuel source to power electric bicycles. The fuel cell, developed by SiGNa's partners, ranges in size from 1 watt to 3 kilowatts and is capable of pushing a bicycle up to 25 mph for approximately 100 miles.<br />While the mainstream attention of his work is rewarding, it's the untamed excitement of daily discovery and being able to share it with his students that fuel Dye's desire to maintain a full-time research schedule.<br />"Instilling that excitement about chemistry in my undergraduate students and giving them a jump on their graduate research is my reward," Dye said. "Everyone who has come through the lab and gone on to graduate school has had glowing reviews on how this experience helped their career."<br /><br />Provided by Michigan State UniversityKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-12730662224546791282011-02-16T19:10:00.001+08:002011-02-16T19:27:15.831+08:00thermoelectric<span style="font-weight:bold;">New material provides 25 percent greater thermoelectric conversion efficiency</span><br /><br />February 15, 2011<br /><br />Automobiles, military vehicles, even large-scale power generating facilities may someday operate far more efficiently thanks to a new alloy developed at the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory. A team of researchers at the Lab that is jointly funded by the DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Materials Sciences and Engineering and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, achieved a 25 percent improvement in the ability of a key material to convert heat into electrical energy.<br /> <br />"What happened here has not happened anywhere else," said Evgenii Levin, associate scientist at Ames Laboratory and co-principal investigator on the effort, speaking of the significant boost in efficiency documented by the research. Along with Levin, the Ames Lab-based team included: Bruce Cook, scientist and co-principal investigator; Joel Harringa, assistant scientist II; Sergey Bud'ko, scientist; and Klaus Schmidt-Rohr, faculty scientist. Also taking part in the research was Rama Venkatasubramanian, who is director of the Center for Solid State Energetics at RTI International, located in North Carolina.<br />So-called thermoelectric materials that convert heat into electricity have been known since the early 1800s. One well-established group of thermoelectric materials is composed of tellurium, antimony, germanium and silver, and thus is known by the acronym "TAGS." Thermoelectricity is based on the movement of charge carriers from their heated side to their cooler side, just as electrons travel along a wire.<br />The process, known as the Seebeck effect, was discovered in 1821 by Thomas Johann Seebeck, a physicist who lived in what is now Estonia. A related phenomenon observed in all thermoelectric materials is known as the Peltier effect, named after French physicist Jean-Charles Peltier, who discovered it in 1834. The Peltier effect can be utilized for solid-state heating or cooling with no moving parts.<br />In the nearly two centuries since the discovery of the Seebeck and Peltier effects, practical applications have been limited due to the low efficiency with which the materials performed either conversion. Significant work to improve that efficiency took place during the 1950s, when thermoelectric conversion was viewed as an ideal power source for deep-space probes, explained team member Cook. "Thermoelectric conversion was successfully used to power the Voyager, Pioneer, Galileo, Cassini, and Viking spacecrafts," he said.<br />Despite its use by NASA, the low efficiency of thermoelectric conversion still kept it from being harnessed for more down-to-earth applications – even as research around the world continued in earnest. "Occasionally, you would hear about a large increase in efficiency," Levin explained. But the claims did not hold up to closer scrutiny. <br /><br />All that changed in 2010, when the Ames Laboratory researchers found that adding just one percent of the rare-earth elements cerium or ytterbium to a TAGS material was sufficient to boost its performance.<br />The results of the group's work appeared in the article, "Analysis of Ce- and Yb-Doped TAGS-85 Materials with Enhanced Thermoelectric Figure of Merit," published online in November 2010 in the journal Advanced Functional Materials.<br />The team has yet to understand exactly why such a small compositional change in the material is able to profoundly affect its properties. However, they theorize that doping the TAGS material with either of the two rare-earth elements could affect several possible mechanisms that influence thermoelectric properties.<br />Team member Schmidt-Rohr studied the materials using Ames Laboratory's solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy instruments. This enabled the researchers to verify that the one percent doping of cerium or ytterbium affected the structure of the thermoelectric material. In order to understand effect of magnetism of rare earths, team member Bud'ko studied magnetic properties of the materials. "Rare-earth elements modified the lattice," said Levin, referring to the crystal structure of the thermoelectric materials.<br />The group plans to test the material in order to better understand why the pronounced change took place and, hopefully, to boost its performance further.<br />The durable and relatively easy-to-produce material has innumerable applications, including recycling waste heat from industrial refineries or using auto exhaust heat to help recharge the battery in an electric car. "It's a very amazing area," Levin said, particularly since many years of prior research into TAGS materials enables researchers to understand their nature. Better understanding of the thermoelectric and their improvement can immediately result in applications at larger scale than now.<br />Additionally, the Ames Laboratory results – dependent as they were on doping TAGS with small amounts of cerium or ytterbium – provide yet more evidence of rare-earth elements' strategic importance. Cerium or ytterbium are members of a group of 15 lanthanides, deemed essential to just about every new technology from consumer electronics and cell phones to hybrid car batteries and generator motors in wind turbines. The Ames Laboratory has been a leader in rare-earth research going back to the closing days of World War II. Fears of shortages of rare-earth elements have caused these little-known materials to be a much-talked-about subject in the news lately.<br /><br />More information: E.M. Levin, B.A. Cook, J.L. Harringa, S. L. Bud'ko, R. Venkatasubramanian, K. Schmidt-Rohr, "Analysis of Ce- and Yb-Doped TAGS-85 Materials with Enhanced Thermoelectric Figure of Merit," Advanced Functional Materials, 2010, in press. DOI:10.1002/adfm.201001307<br /><br />Provided by Ames Laboratory (news : web)Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-11313319786821935152008-12-09T11:05:00.000+08:002008-12-09T11:09:17.617+08:00Where are Energy Venture Capitalists Investing?Venture Capital in the Energy Industry <br />Venture capital (VC) is an important financial tool for innovative start-ups in many industries. In recent years, increasing amounts of venture capital have been invested in new energy technologies via newly emerging, dedicated industry VC funds. Although government financing continues to provide the lion's share of investment dollars in new and emerging energy technologies, industry experts are starting to see more and more investment activity from private sources. Venture capitalists have invested in everything from distributed generation to online energy exchanges, and many utilities are joining them to cultivate corporate earnings growth. <br /><br />Venture investing in energy-based technologies and projects began about seven years ago. Unlike government financing, which focuses on developing technologies for eventual application, venture dollars are invested for purposes of financial return. Venture capital is not R&D funding; it is really business expansion capital. <br /><br />Since the 1960s, venture capitalists have invested in young, rapidly growing companies through purchase of equity securities to help develop new products and services. Venture capitalists often take high risks in anticipation of high rewards. <br /><br />As deregulation and energy industry restructuring have opened up prospects for high-growth technology companies in the utility industry, private partnerships and closely-held corporations funded by other corporations, pension funds, endowment funds, foundations, and other investors have begun to take notice and establish funds focused exclusively on technology companies servicing the utility industry. Today, a small number of such firms devote themselves solely to energy investments. <br /><br />Utility companies, as well, see the opportunities and recognize the imperatives. Facing competition, tighter margins, and lower revenues in their traditional businesses, they realize that they must find new ways to raise income and must look to new technologies to become more efficient. Many conventional utility companies have set up venture arms to finance high-growth companies such as Internet exchanges for oil, gas, and power; utility bill presentment and consolidation; and other business-to-business e-commerce services. In addition to the Internet, many dollars are being poured into companies that develop alternative energy sources, particularly fuel cells and other types of distributed generation. <br /><br />Compared to investment in the Internet, venture capital investment in energy technologies is modest. However, in the past five years, a noticeable surge in venture funding has occurred. <br />www.EnergyBusinessReports.comKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-72456452901889606132008-10-09T11:33:00.000+08:002008-10-09T11:34:37.446+08:00LED chips set new R&D recordsLED chips set new R&D records<br />Over the summer, both Philips Lumileds and Osram Opto Semiconductors unveiled some pretty impressive lab results for power LEDs.<br />R&D results from power LEDs demonstrated by Osram<br /><br />Two of the leading power LED chipmakers have announced “record breaking” research results for their LEDs, with values as high as 155 lm and 140 lm/W for white LEDs made using 1 mm2 chips and driven at 350 mA.<br /><br />We’ve said this in the past in LEDs Magazine, but it bears repeating; these are results from superstar devices in the research lab, not from commercially available products. Our advice is this: be careful not to draw the wrong conclusions from these numbers, but recognize they are important. More than the values themselves, the results indicate the continued progress being made by LED manufacturers.<br /><br />Innovation is also happening in the labs of other companies that haven’t made recent announcements. And, perhaps most importantly, many of the technology enhancements that have resulted in these higher numbers will eventually move across to the next generation of production devices. Direct comparison of the numbers quoted below is not advised; wait until you can purchase production quantities of the devices and then see how they perform in your luminaire.<br /><br />Source: LEDs MagazineKamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-30068298624282840412008-06-27T10:04:00.000+08:002008-06-27T10:07:19.782+08:00Philips claims first with office building entirely lit using LEDs<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td colspan="2" class="item"><b><br /></b></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" class="item">26 Jun 2008</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" class="item"><b><i>Philips Lighting France will light an office building in Paris using LED fixtures to achieve both functional and decorative lighting. </i></b></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" class="item"><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="3"><tbody><tr><td align="center"><a href="http://www.ledsmagazine.com/news/5/6/34/ParisOffice1" title=""> <img src="http://img.ledsmagazine.com/objects/news/thumb/5/6/34/ParisOffice1.jpg" alt="" title="" border="0" /></a></td></tr></tbody></table> Philips has used LED fixtures to light an entire office building in Paris. The office, owned by Generali and located at 100 Champs-Elysées Avenue, Paris, "marks a milestone in lighting history" according to Philips. The company claims that, for the first time, functional office lighting powered entirely by LEDs goes hand in hand with scenic and atmospheric effects that are also based on LEDs. <p> The project came together with architect Anthony Béchu who had been commissioned by Generali to design "an innovative window in the world of LEDs". </p><p> LED lighting improves people’s well-being and gives designers more flexibility in the layout of open spaces and ceiling design. It removes the restrictions on lighting orientation that is often dictated by the use of fluorescents tubular lamps. Because of the extreme long lifetime of LEDs, the maintenance costs are kept to a minimum. </p><p> </p><table align="left" border="0" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="3"><tbody><tr><td align="center"><a href="http://www.ledsmagazine.com/news/5/6/34/ParisOffice2" title=""> <img src="http://img.ledsmagazine.com/objects/news/thumb/5/6/34/ParisOffice2.jpg" alt="" title="" border="0" /></a></td></tr></tbody></table> Throughout the office spaces, the functional office lighting is realized through 422 luminaires integrated in a false ceiling with 600 x 600 grids. Each luminaire is powered by 16 or 12 high power (2.6 W) LEDs, depending on their location in the office space. This provides an average of 300 lux everywhere and 500 lux on the working planes. Philips has given special care to the development of optics. <p>In addition, recessed SpotLed 3 K2 luminaires, each with 3 Luxeon high-power LEDs, are applied in the corridors. The solution complies with lighting norms and standards on energy consumption, illumination levels and visual comfort [* see footnote]. </p><p>To create the desired ambiance, Generali chose a scenario of LED-based color-changing light effects. The glass façade of the top two floors is lit, communicating the image of the building towards the outside world like a beacon in the night. </p><p> </p><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="3"><tbody><tr><td align="center"><a href="http://www.ledsmagazine.com/news/5/6/34/ParisOffice3" title=""> <img src="http://img.ledsmagazine.com/objects/news/thumb/5/6/34/ParisOffice3.jpg" alt="" title="" border="0" /></a></td></tr></tbody></table>Thierry Braunecker-Becker, General Manager, Philips Lighting France, said "We have been leading the world by unlocking the potential of LED for scene setting, creating atmospheres and lighting up landmark projects with dynamic colorful LED solutions." <p>"We recently announced a broad range of applications for general lighting, and today is the day that the LED enters into general lighting for offices. This marks a moment of truth and is proof that LEDs are making inroads into the heart of the lighting industry. This is exciting and it will accelerate the growth of solid-state lighting." </p><p>Philips expects the world market for LED luminaires to grow rapidly by more than 30% per year driven by the entrance of LEDs in general lighting, from about EUR 700 million last year to EUR 1.5 billion in 2010. </p><p> <b>* Footnote</b> </p><p> Energy consumption regulations: Réglementation Thermique 2005 - the reference value for lighting is 12 W/m<sup>2</sup> </p><p>Lighting standards for offices in terms of illuminance levels and visual comfort: European Lighting Standard for indoor work places (EN 12464-1)</p><br /><p>Source: LED Magazine<br /></p></td></tr></tbody></table>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-69063714425992980132008-06-26T09:57:00.000+08:002008-12-09T15:01:26.906+08:00CO2 CAPTURE, SEQUESTRATION, AND STORAGE<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMN1Y3PRFMNZcAAeN8LKR1AaRF3YtSgPeUEZLrBgJLni8uklZ_awe87OGGL7VLbU_ieFSyV_lAaShBHSoYXPlueBeXQ7KXELGNTIzV05HxSX3ummyExLOPotamBu2cIong93-lpwEPdm0/s1600-h/energy-4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMN1Y3PRFMNZcAAeN8LKR1AaRF3YtSgPeUEZLrBgJLni8uklZ_awe87OGGL7VLbU_ieFSyV_lAaShBHSoYXPlueBeXQ7KXELGNTIzV05HxSX3ummyExLOPotamBu2cIong93-lpwEPdm0/s320/energy-4.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5216003815250026466" border="0" /></a><br /><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >Over the last century, human activity had a profound impact on the environment. Fossil fuel consumption, deforestation, and other unsustainable land use practices have resulted in a dramatic increase of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into the atmosphere. Most scientists believe the increase of CO2 emissions has created the human-induced climate warming conditions that are currently affecting the globe. If this trend continues, climate change will be the inevitable result. The long-term effects of global temperature change are largely unknown; however, adverse effects can already be seen in certain parts of the world in the form of droughts, increased severity of storms, and flooding, particularly in the poorer regions of the globe.<br /><br />The natural production and absorption of carbon dioxide (CO2) is achieved through the earth�s biosphere and oceans. However, mankind has altered the natural carbon cycle by burning coal, oil, natural gas, and wood and each of these activities has increased in scale and distribution. Carbon dioxide was the first greenhouse gas demonstrated to be increasing in atmospheric concentration<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" ><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" > Atmospheric levels of CO2 have risen well over 30% from pre-industrial levels of 280 parts per million (ppm) to present levels of 375 ppm. Evidence suggests this observed rise in atmospheric CO2 levels is due primarily to expanding use of fossil fuels for energy. Predictions of global energy use in the next century suggest a continued increase in carbon emissions and rising concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere unless major changes are made in the way we produce and use energy - in particular, how we manage carbon. One way to manage carbon is to use energy more efficiently to reduce our need for a major energy and carbon source - fossil fuel combustion. Another way is to increase our use of low-carbon and carbon-free fuels and technologies (nuclear power and renewable sources such as solar energy, wind power, and biomass fuels). The most recent alternative for managing carbon is carbon sequestration.<br /><br />Carbon sequestration refers to the provision of long-term storage of carbon in the terrestrial biosphere, underground, or oceans, to reduce the buildup of carbon dioxide (the principal greenhouse gas) concentration in the atmosphere. This is accomplished by maintaining or enhancing natural processes, or the development of new techniques to dispose of carbon.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >SOURCE: </span><span style="font-family:PrimaSans BT,Verdana,sans-serif;font-size:180%;"><span><span style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" align="left"><i><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span style="color:#000080;">Energy Business Reports</span></span></i></span></span></span><span style="font-family:PrimaSans BT,Verdana,sans-serif;"><span><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span></span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-75100565270348889082008-06-25T10:06:00.000+08:002008-12-09T15:01:27.020+08:00BIOMASS TO BIOFUELS POTENTIAL<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbSuY1upHOdIXNStvSpRWgXuoVRyMQv4hdTB05g1H0BLxI3fS1h18AvyBxWCUxwwuCa9oVpop2s_1RJNi9i9uk7Ae6xqwGL4buvtK6FKHmaUONM6GXXzFT8M-WXmx4-xY7iy5asOppgQU/s1600-h/doecellulosic.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbSuY1upHOdIXNStvSpRWgXuoVRyMQv4hdTB05g1H0BLxI3fS1h18AvyBxWCUxwwuCa9oVpop2s_1RJNi9i9uk7Ae6xqwGL4buvtK6FKHmaUONM6GXXzFT8M-WXmx4-xY7iy5asOppgQU/s320/doecellulosic.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5215635185344354306" border="0" /></a><br /><p><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" ><br /></span></p><p><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >Biomass is a renewable energy resource derived from waste. It comes from both human and natural activities and uses by-products from the timber industry, agricultural crops, raw material from forests, household wastes, and wood. Like wind, solar and other forms of renewable energy, biomass produces fewer emissions than its fossil fuel counterparts. After fossil fuels, biomass is the most widely used fuel in the world.<br /><br />A principal advantage of biomass is its low greenhouse gas emission characteristic. Biomass does not spew carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as it absorbs an equal amount of carbon in growing as it releases when consumed as a fuel. Biomass contains less sulfur than coal, and consequently produces less SO2. It can be used to generate electricity utilizing the same equipment that is used to combust fossil fuels, and its use cuts down on the need for landfills, has a positive impact on watershed quality, retards the risk of wildfires by thinning forests, and generates jobs in the local economy.<br /><br />Biofuels are renewable fuels that are predominantly produced from domestically produced biomass feed stocks or as a by product from the industrial processing of agricultural or food products, or from the recovery and reprocessing of products such as cooking and vegetable oil. Biofuel contains no petroleum, but it can be blended at any level with petroleum fuel to create a biofuel blend. It can be used in conventional healing equipment or diesel engine with no major modification. Biofuel is simple to use, biodegradable, non-toxic and essentially free of sulfur and aromatics. Ethanol and biodiesel are the most widely recognized biofuel sources for transport sector.<br /><br />Feedstocks used to produce biofuels include corn (the predominant feedstock in the <st1:country-region st="on">U.S.</st1:country-region>), sugarcane or sugar beets (common in <st1:place st="on">Europe</st1:place>), various grains, rapeseed or oil seed, soybeans, as well as other bio-sources found throughout the world. Biofuels exhibit a wide range of physical, chemical, and agricultural/process engineering properties. Moisture content is probably the most important determinant of energy value. Despite the wide range of possible sources, biomass feedstocks are remarkably uniform in many of their fuel properties, compared with coal or petroleum.<br /><br />Biomass can be converted into various types of fuels and used in numerous applications. Two types of ethanol are produced in the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region>: fermentation ethanol and synthetic ethanol. In addition, biodiesel, bio-oil, and biofuel from synthetic gas are produced commercially.<br /><br />Grains and oilseeds are the primary feedstocks used to produce the ethanol, biodiesel, and bioproducts consumed today. Food and feed processing residues and tertiary post-consumer residues are also used to generate a modest amount of electricity. These agriculture-derived biomass resources account for nearly 25% of the current biomass consumption.<br /><br />Liquid biofuels made from biomass are attracting increasing interest worldwide. Industrial countries see biofuels as a way of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the transport sector and diversifying energy sources. Developing countries see biofuels as a way to stimulate rural development, create jobs, and save foreign exchange. Both groups view biofuels as a means of increasing energy security. These concerns, taken together and highlighted by recent surges in the world oil price, have prompted a wide range of countries to consider biofuels programs. <st1:country-region st="on">Canada</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region st="on">Colombia</st1:country-region>, the European Union (EU), <st1:country-region st="on">India</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region st="on">Thailand</st1:country-region>, and the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region> have adopted new targets, some mandatory, for increasing the contribution of biofuels to their transport fuel supplies. In <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Brazil</st1:place></st1:country-region>, after a period of a decline in ethanol consumption, flex-fuel vehicles - capable of running on varying percentages of ethanol - are revitalizing the ethanol market.<br /><br />It is becoming increasingly clear that reliance on oil as the principal source of fuel is unsustainable over the long-term. A shift towards any alternative fuel is going to require a governmental commitment to emerging technologies. In addition, integrating alternative fuels into the mass market will have broad impacts on existing policies.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial;">SOURCE: </span><span style="font-family: PrimaSans BT,Verdana,sans-serif; font-size: 180%;"><span><span style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" align="left"><i><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 128);">Energy Business Reports</span></span></i></span></span></span><br /><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" > </span><span style="font-family:Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-48038044477021365272008-06-24T11:05:00.000+08:002008-12-09T15:01:27.324+08:00Is Cellulose Ethanol a Viable Energy Alternative?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIVfob823niQJEYArnGOsfScmKICskglRSEVJeUvZ4WMJXg49fi0czRGGltr0EMjeu0k3YzCKkNR67EU0h_EJLwvfB2fuZovwmC8_CnQMo-HhuI3Nx_BwqpsCB969iz5uIeit87Obdr88/s1600-h/energy+cellulose.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIVfob823niQJEYArnGOsfScmKICskglRSEVJeUvZ4WMJXg49fi0czRGGltr0EMjeu0k3YzCKkNR67EU0h_EJLwvfB2fuZovwmC8_CnQMo-HhuI3Nx_BwqpsCB969iz5uIeit87Obdr88/s320/energy+cellulose.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5215282847981088354" border="0" /></a><br />The last few decades have seen rapid growth in the consumption of the fossil fuels such as oil, gas, and coal. Production, on the other hand, has not increased to match the rise in consumption, primarily due to limited availability of these resources. The situation has been exacerbated by political instability in the <st1:place st="on">Middle East</st1:place> and the catastrophic hurricanes of 2005, which led to sharp rises in the prices of these resources, and, in some cases, acute scarcity. Industrialized nations that are dependent on other countries for oil have been severely impacted and as a result, the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">U.S.</st1:place></st1:country-region> government, along with state governments and the energy industry, has ramped up its support for alternative energy sources.<br /><p><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" ><br />Given its environmental and economic benefits, together with the vast availability of feedstock, ethanol has taken on prominence as one of the most favored alternatives to fossil fuel.<br /><br />An in-depth analysis of the prospects for the use of cellulose ethanol as a fuel includes a comprehensive analysis of how cellulose ethanol is produced, its cost-effectiveness, the growth drivers promoting the use of ethanol over other fuels, the barriers to market, and much more. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >Focus on the steps government is taking to promote ethanol use, including tax incentives, funding for research and development, funding for technology, and other measures. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >The basics of ethanol production; how ethanol differs from other fuels, and the benefits to consumers from using ethanol.<br /><br />A complete source analysis of this promising young industry and the market potential of ethanol as an alternative fuel source.<br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">SOURCE: </span><span style="font-family: PrimaSans BT,Verdana,sans-serif; font-size: 180%;"><span><span style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" align="left"><i><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 128);">Energy Business Reports</span></span></i></span></span></span><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" > <!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--> <!--[endif]--></span>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-28008859776622674482008-06-24T11:03:00.000+08:002008-06-27T12:03:37.165+08:00UNDERSTANDING ENERGY HEDGE FUNDS<p><span style=";font-family:Arial;font-size:10;" >Hedge funds are private investment funds charging a performance fee and typically open to only a limited range of qualified investors. In the <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">United States</st1:place></st1:country-region>, hedge funds are open to accredited investors only. Because of this restriction, they are usually exempt from any direct regulation by regulatory bodies. Hedge funds are credited to Alfred Winslow Jones for their invention in 1949.<br /><br />Speculative energy trading has a strong future, but it will not be the traditional utilities and energy merchants that will create and maturate that market. While much of the energy industry has returned to the relative safety of trading around assets and marketing activities, energy markets have become characterized across all energy commodities by increasing prices and price volatilities. Oil markets are booming and were not at all impacted by the Enron collapse.<br /><br />Energy trading will now be dominated by more sophisticated and well-capitalized financial players such as hedge funds and investment banks, as well as by multinational energy companies with a global footprint, while electric utilities are more marginalized to niche markets. Evidence of the fund?s influence on oil markets has been the 55% growth in open interest on Nymex crude, heating oil and gasoline contracts over last year and the more violent and volatile intraday trading moving during recent months. These market drivers are bringing greater financialization and maturation to the energy complex.<br /><br />According to research, it can be established that there are over two hundred known hedge funds active in the energy sector with many more information. To put this in some context, there are more than 8,100 hedge funds globally managing over $1 trillion in assets today. Energy is still a relatively small but rapidly growing component of their universe. There are many factors responsible for this change in hedge fund strategy. For one thing, traditional equity returns this year have been flat so that many funds are not making the kinds of returns expected for this type of investment.</span></p><br /><span style="font-family: Arial;">SOURCE: </span><span style="font-family: PrimaSans BT,Verdana,sans-serif; font-size: 180%;"><span><span style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;" align="left"><i><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 128);">Energy Business Reports</span></span></i></span></span></span>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-16656808945690736692008-06-16T12:13:00.000+08:002008-12-09T15:01:27.643+08:00DRIVE SMART<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSTUKLK4mPumeOFaj4LR7esyr9vTjKq_HzOHw-wlqiEdHYe1_qMpAqwkmMUYyE2M2wGHZ9vZ0iqbZUAVbfuSjB8C1Hoy_59lk1bnIiD0wFVmeS-nmELlVPvPrUrpzs38n4HfSjHZW2l18/s1600-h/maintainne.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSTUKLK4mPumeOFaj4LR7esyr9vTjKq_HzOHw-wlqiEdHYe1_qMpAqwkmMUYyE2M2wGHZ9vZ0iqbZUAVbfuSjB8C1Hoy_59lk1bnIiD0wFVmeS-nmELlVPvPrUrpzs38n4HfSjHZW2l18/s320/maintainne.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5212329783014088434" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjG8dBl7HizZ2R0G6oq5H_h5DpI48WSbymoIZawJOR0WFm6w086BQZ2U2PInjOXqFRJy-ctkkwqvNzTBj2rBecfwll0U4OnisZmVynlnuyLc9bkZyXjZvT81QGFe-1G961HH62ZWjiFok/s1600-h/driver+saving.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjG8dBl7HizZ2R0G6oq5H_h5DpI48WSbymoIZawJOR0WFm6w086BQZ2U2PInjOXqFRJy-ctkkwqvNzTBj2rBecfwll0U4OnisZmVynlnuyLc9bkZyXjZvT81QGFe-1G961HH62ZWjiFok/s320/driver+saving.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5212329780635270978" border="0" /></a><br /><img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/KAMARU%7E1/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot.jpg" alt="" /><img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/KAMARU%7E1/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-1.jpg" alt="" />Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-39400074671759302942008-06-13T12:22:00.000+08:002008-06-13T12:23:18.379+08:00<h1>Why Oil Prices Are So High?</h1> <p><span style="font-size: 24pt; font-family: Verdana; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">H</span><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">ow to explain the oil price? Why is it so high? Are we running out? Are supplies disrupted, or is the high price a reflection of oil company greed or OPEC greed. Are Chavez and the Saudis conspiring against us?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi recently stated, “There is no justification for the current rise in prices.” What the minister means is that there are no shortages or supply disruptions. He means no real reasons as distinct from speculative or psychological reasons.</span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">The run up in oil price coincides with a period of heightened US and Israeli military aggression in the <st1:place st="on">Middle East</st1:place>. However, the biggest jump has been in the last 18 months.</span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">When Bush invaded <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Iraq</st1:place></st1:country-region> in 2003, the average price of oil that year was about $27 per barrel, or about $31 in inflation adjusted 2007 dollars. The price rose another $10 in 2004 to an average annual price of $42 (in 2007 dollars), another $12 in 2005, $7 in 2006, and $4 in 2007 to $65. But in the last few months the price has more than doubled to about $135. It is difficult to explain a $70 jump in price in terms other than speculation. </span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">Oil prices have been high in the past. Until 2008, the record monthly oil price was $104 in December 1979 (measured in December 2007 dollars). As recently as 1998 the real price of oil was lower than in 1946 when the nominal price of oil was $1.63 per barrel. During the Bush regime, the price of oil in 2007 dollars has risen from $27 to approximately $135. </span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">Possibly, the rise in the oil price was held down, prior to the recent jump, by expectations that Democrats would eventually end the conflict and restrain <st1:country-region st="on">Israel</st1:country-region> in the interest of <st1:place st="on">Middle East</st1:place> peace and justice for the Palestinians. </span></p> <p><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Verdana;">Now that Obama has pledged allegiance to AIPAC and adopted Bush’s position toward <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Iran</st1:place></st1:country-region>, the high oil price could be a forecast that US/Israeli policy is likely to result in substantial supply disruptions.</span></p>Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-861846789192987734.post-35881872133391611062008-06-06T14:55:00.000+08:002008-06-06T15:03:15.236+08:00Solution for high oil priceAre you having problem with electric bill??????<br />Do not worry solar energy is here!!!!!!!!<br />If you need help, just give us a comment here!!!!!!<br />You will not regret..........Kamarulazizi Ibrahimhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12463469016143466879noreply@blogger.com0