The winners in hydropower and other large dam projects are those who gain electricity, domestic water supplies, sanitation, drought relief, sustainable irrigation, flood control, improved water transport, industrial and employment opportunities, food security, better roads, telecommunications, and other benefits. As well, other economic multipliers may arise and whole regions may flourish. This is an impressive list and is the very basis of modernization and liberation from the drudgery of traditional low technology rural life. Electricity, radio, and domestic water supplies completely transform the lives of those who gain these goods, and better health and education are the most obvious outcomes. (more…)
The water levels of most of the world’s rivers fluctuate with seasonal rains, melting snows, or droughts, and in the arid zones ...
Up to around 1980, hydropower research and development (R&D) efforts focused mainly on improving turbine efficiency, reducing c ...
The World Commission on Dams (WCD) was formed in 1998 by a joint initiative of the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the Worl ...
Hydropower, also known as hydroelectric power, is the use of water to produce power. Harnessing water to perform work has been ...
The first step in categorizing potential benefits and costs is determining the relevant scope of the analysis. We have concluded th ...
Several molecular systems have been constructed that mimic various aspects of photosynthesis. Two of these utilize molecular systems that are derived from natural photosynthesis but that incorporate chemically based modifications to produce artificial photosynthetic devices. These devices use artificial photosynthetic pigments to drive chemical reactions across lipid bilayers or use noble metal catalysts to change the function of the photosynthetic process to produce hydrogen and oxygen instead of sugars ethanol and oxygen. Neither of these systems are sufficiently robust to be operated for extended periods of time as energy unit conversion devices, but they have shown that it is possible to produce artificial photosynthetic assemblies that function well in a laboratory setting. (more…)
The basic processes that occur in such a system are well understood. The semiconductor electrode efficiently absorbs light, produci ...
Certain materials, generally metal oxides, can sustain the unassisted photo-electrolysis of water into H2 and O2. The energy co ...
A fuel cell is an electrochemical device that combines hydrogen with oxygen to generate electricity, heat and water to produce. ...
A fuel cell is an electrochemical device that directly converts a fuel to electricity by means of reactions on the surfaces of ...
The fuel cell can trace its roots back to the 1800s when a Welsh-born, Oxford-educated barrister, Sir William Robert Grove, realize ...
The energy efficiencies of various fuel production pathways from well to pump. The efficiencies shown are defined as the energy in a given fuel (available at pumps in vehicle refueling stations) divided by total energy inputs during all Well-to-Pump activities, including the energy content of the fuel. One way to interpret the Well-to-Pump efficiencies in the figure is as the difference between 100% and the energy efficiencies, which roughly represent energy losses during Well-to-Pump stages for making a given fuel available at the pump. As stated in Section 3, Well-to-Pump activities include biomass feedstock production; feedstock transportation and storage; fuel production; and fuel transportation, storage, and distribution. (more…)
The combination of well-to-pump results and the energy use and emissions associated with vehicle operation (also called the pum ...
It shows Well-to-Wheels Greenhouse Gas emissions of the 23 vehicle/fuel systems. For each system, the bottom bar represents CO2 ...
Because different studies have different system boundaries and parametric assumptions, the studies described in Section 7 resulted ...
There are different types of vehicle propulsion systems and the transportation fuels that have been studied for their potential ...
At present, in the United States and worldwide, motor vehicles are fueled almost exclusively by petroleum based gasoline (or re ...
High-speed maglev technology offers four main advantages: non-contact operation; low-mass vehicles (on a per seat basis, maglev vehicles weigh approximately one-third to three-quarters as much as high speed trains); high speed; and wayside system control and self-propelled vehicles (each car contains its own secondary part of a linear synchronous motors).
Non-contact operation means that vehicle traction does not depend on adhesion between contact surfaces, e.g., wheels and rails. (more…)
A propulsion alternative is to transfer power to the vehicle and then have a magnetic structure on the vehicle that can create ...
Electrodynamic Suspension (EDS) can be viewed as an array of magnets moving over a conducting sheet and being pushed upwards by ...
Designers in China have launched the first wind turbine levitating in the world of permanent magnetic levitation (Maglev) in the Wi ...
All electromagnetic suspension-based systems employ some type of feedback control mechanism to maintain stable levitation. (An inte ...
Electromagnetic Suspension (EMS) system in which an array of magnets is attracted upwards to a steel rail. It is possible to de ...
One study that does address the peak-oil scenario directly is a 2005 report conducted for the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) entitled “Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, and Risk Management” (Hirsch, et al., 2005). This study acknowledged the risk of the peaking of world oil production and investigated strategies to mitigate the impacts. Because NETL is the government’s primary fossil energy research lab, it is not surprising that the report concludes that the way to solve our looming liquid fossil fuel problem is . . . with more fossil fuels. (more…)
Nuclear fission and fusion Research and Development continues to account for nearly half of the total spending by IEA countries, al ...
Transportation is another sector that has increased its relative share of primary energy use. This sector has serious concerns ...
Options for dealing with the threats of climate change include both adaptation to inevitable changes and mitigation, or lessening, ...
ITMA Foundation, a group of researchers formed by Javier Belzunce, José Manuel Artimez, Ana Moran and Ruben Coto, has developed the ...
Do we have the resources? Rudolf Diesel developed the diesel engine which ran on biodiesel vegetable oil in the late 1800s. At the ...
As a reaction to these historical perspectives, the building industry has witnessed a certain rise in design responses to regional climatic conditions, as part of a powerful efficiency and energy conservation push since the 1970s. More recently, the zero green house gas emsission and office building has become a design concept as part of strategies to introduce urban renewable energy as an increasing contributor to managing urban energy supplies. (more…)
Hydrogen has many applications when it comes to fuel. It can be used both in internal combustion engines and hydrogen fuel cells. ...
The age of industrialization came into full force through the modern exploration and use of fossil fuels. As one of its most striki ...
The commercialization prospects for fuel cell vehicles depend not only on their performance and cost, but also on how well th ...
All of today’s hydrogen conversion products, demonstration models, and prototypes possess some deficiencies; they cannot yet pr ...
The Solar City approach originally emerged from a new generation of International Energy Agency (IEA) energy research and developme ...
The broad range of home solar energy systems are mostly known as Photovoltaic Systems (PV) or Thin Film Solar Technology. The system applies solar panels to create electricity for use in individual homes and cross-feeding in a electric grids with electricity to give supply to other city or municipality. Several countries around the world have realized the enormous potential of solar energy supply and place the necessary systems are able to make this a very successful energy alternative. (more…)
Photovoltaic solar energy once part of industrial phase are absolutely necessary to cut down its production costs for meaningfu ...
So you're finally tired of those exorbitant electricity bills, or, you're catching onto a "greener" way of life. Either way, solar ...
Nowadays, solar power have become more affordable. That makes it a viable alternative energy option for homeowners who would li ...
Today, photovoltaic cells only contribute a small proportion (approximately 0.04 percent) of total electricity in the United St ...
Japan has the largest Photovoltaic installed capacity in the world as a result of the sustained investments made by the country thr ...
The primary purpose of all forms of taxation, whether on energy or on non-energy items, is to raise money for the government to finance its expenditures. Taxes finance the majority of government expenditure (the rest being financed by borrowing, which will have to be repaid from future taxation) so that the general level of taxation is determined by the requirements for government spending. However, the same total revenue can be raised by many different combinations of taxes, so that the tax rates on individual items and groups of items can be adjusted to reflect other criteria. (more…)
Taxation of energy in the United States, the federal government does not impose an energy tax or a general sales tax that is br ...
Economists have overwhelmingly favored fuel taxes over fuel economy standards as a means to reduce fuel or gasoline consumption ...
A number of countries have vehicle tax incentives programs designed to reward purchasers and owners of alternative fuel-efficient v ...
Federal Excise Taxes placed on specific energy sources tend to reduce energy demand for these energy sources in both the short ...
We know of no studies that have examined vehicle taxation incentives programs elsewhere in the world, but it seems likely that ...
The most widespread and practical process for capture solar radiation as organic fuels is the growth of virgin biomass. Extremely large quantities of carbon are fixed each year in the form of terrestrial and aquatic biomass. (more…)
Another large source of renewable carbon supplies is waste biomass. It consists of a wide range of materials and includes munic ...
Another large source of renewable carbon supplies is waste biomass. It consists of a wide range of materials and includes munic ...
The future development of energy crops, to the level at which they would replace residues as the major bioenergy fuel source, will ...
The hydrogen can come from various sources including fossil fuels, wind, solar, biomass, nuclear, solar thermo-chemical reactio ...
The accumulation of carbon within a forest growth cycle can be considered in four stages. The initial establishment stage involves ...
In 2001, there were 14,000 small wind turbines for home/domestic use in the United States. The market potential for national and international market for small wind turbines is growing and have bright prospect. Small wind turbines as producing small energy are having the capacity up to 8% of the electricity needs of the United States in 2020. (more…)
Wind is a natural and inexhaustible source of energy, wind does not have to be imported or mined from deep down the earth. Wind ...
Renewable energy generators are devices that convert energy from its original form in the renewable energy source into electric ...
Would it not be great to be able to produce your own electricity supply at home? The idea of being independently powered up without ...
Designers in China have launched the first wind turbine levitating in the world of permanent magnetic levitation (Maglev) in the Wi ...
Germany is considered a world leader in wind energy deployment, with electricity production from wind having gone up more than eigh ...