Oil alternative

The world is trying to find new forms of energy, freeing people from dependence on oil - fossil energy resources are running out and are causing harmful effects to the global climate.

Windmills fly

The higher the wind speed, the stronger. That is the basic idea to design the flying generator of Sky WindPower (California). A linkage group of four or eight aerial suspension (of course, outside the aircraft's flight path) can generate twice the amount of power of the ground-mounted intermittent pinwheel. A ' swarm ' covering 200 square miles can power 5 million people!

(Photo: TTO)

Car running alcohol

This year US car makers will market about 1 million alcohol cars and the number of alcohol storage stations will increase by 30%, up to 1,000 points.

But most of the alcohol produced in the United States today is made from corn in a highly oil-consuming process, so it is only considered a temporary fuel and people are studying the use of alcohol from fibers. cellulose of mollusc grass, shavings, wood and agricultural waste, like cores and corn stumps.

Currently the price of this alcohol is still high. Professor Eddy Rubin, director of the Research Institute of Joint Genome, said: The termite has a type of intestinal bacteria capable of turning cellulose into carbonite. We are establishing the chain of this DNA molecule to introduce another type of body, which can secrete a chemical molecule that turns garbage grass into alcohol.

Solar lights

In early 2007, 12 giant curved mirrors began appearing on a farm in the desert of northeastern Los Angeles. Each mirror with a diameter of 11m will collect sunlight and shine on a target, heating hydrogen gas to a temperature of 1,300 ^° F, leading to a Stirling engine generator.When the world's largest solar farm is completed, there will be 20,000 discs spanning over 1,800ha of the Mojave desert, generating enough energy for 278,000 roasters to use.

Stirling discs can turn about 30% of solar energy into electricity, the most efficient technique (the Mojave farm will generate more electricity than all existing solar farms across the US combined). ); while solar cells only convert 15% of solar energy into electricity.

This electro-optical technique allows us to charge mobile phones and iPods through a solar-powered backpack. Further, these tools can be recharged through clothes. We can also power cars and airplanes through surface coatings.

(Photo: TTO)

People are studying to get more energy per square centimeter and lower the cost of products. The University of Pennsylvania is creating ultra-small titanium tube photovoltaic cells. The University of New South Wales (Australia) is implanting tiny quantum dots in a silicone oxide matrix to turn sunlight into electricity.

By resizing the quantum dots, they hoped to expand the absorption spectrum of the photovoltaic cells, increasing the efficiency by up to 50%. And it is possible to coat these cell layers several microns thick, transparent to the roof, hips and even curtains.

NASA scientists have a bigger dream than collecting solar energy in space and sending it to the ground using microwaves. Huge solar panels in space will send microwave energy to giant antenna platforms on the ground, which will then be converted into electricity. This wave does not burn birds and planes when passing. This type of solar cell can collect 24 / 24g light. But the most difficult thing is to put them on orbit.

Hydrogen fuel

The potential is great, but the transition to economic exploitation, which is advertised noisily, is not easy. Pure hydrogen gas is not in natural form and today the cheapest way to produce is from . kerosene or natural gas!

But the hydrogen-powered engine has twice the efficiency of modern diesel engines using gasoline. Researchers are trying to transplant genetic genes into living organisms, so they can turn sunlight into hydrogen directly!

From water waves

The United States currently has about 2,100 billion watts / hour of ocean energy, of which 1/8 can be exploited to a degree . violating the minimum environment. This energy source is equivalent to the capacity of all hydroelectric dams now combined!

But Europe is the leading place. This summer, Portugal will complete a ocean wave mining power plant called Pelamis. The 120m-long steel pipes floating about 3 miles from the coast will provide electricity for about 15,000 houses.

(Photo: TTO)

The advantage of wave energy compared to wind is that there is no need to build high waves and waves are 10-40 times stronger than wind power. Professor Roger Bedard, of the Institute of Electrical Energy Research, said the system will become a reality sooner than the exploitation of wind power.

Techniques for making wave turbines are developing rapidly. At a depth of 2.5m below the East River in New York City, six wave energy turbines will begin to power this summer with 525,000kW / hour in the first year, which will then be raised to 26 million kW. / hour, supplying electricity to 8,000 households, the world's first water-wave power plant.

George Hagerman of the Virginia Institute of Technology calls it moon energy, much more stable than hydroelectricity, which is dependent on rain and snow melting speed. Wind power sometimes does not, but the wave energy is stable . for thousands of years!

From the ground

There are about 5,000MGW in hot water from abandoned oil fields in western Texas. This whole energy source is wasted.

Hawaii, Alaska and the states in the West have long used underground energy to heat buildings. But a new generation of power plants can generate electricity from a heat source of about 160 ^degrees Fahrenheit. Companies that extract electricity from hot springs in Texas, Arkansas, Georgia and West Virginia are expected to double the electricity generation capacity. underground in the next 4-5 years.

Development does not stop here. Scientists are creating artificial hot springs by pumping water into extremely hot rocks in the ground. Water is heated at the contact points, then back to the ground to make turbines.

(Photo: TTO)

And from garbage

We created biogas from prehistoric times when using firewood to heat the cave and bake the mammoth thighs. Today most biogas still comes from plants, but people have new techniques to generate electricity from garbage, plants and waste. People use a rare oxygen environment to turn agricultural waste into a mixture of hydrogen and CO to burn or replace natural gas in a turbine. This is a typical case.

The Audet family's Blue Spruce Farm in Vermont has 1,500 cows, producing enough fertilizer to generate 1.8 million kilowatt-hours per year. This cow's energy source helps thousands of families in the Vermont region use electricity without the need for government power lines. Audet's family put cow dung in a closed chamber so bacteria can break it down into gas, creating electrical energy. After this decomposition process, cow manure becomes an excellent fertilizer for agriculture.

Power from garbage can meet 17% of America's electricity demand.

DINH CONG THANH