British scientists say they've achieved a breakthrough, figuring out how to extract hydrogen from water with an unheard-of 60% efficiency using solar energy. The secret sauce is nanotechnology, in the form of nanoclusters of indium phosphide encrusted on a gold electrode. Using this, they can turn sunlight into that hotshot hydrogen fuel, clean-burning and as energetic as a swift kick in the ass.

Gold Coast company Tidal Energy has developed a turbine that can produce potentially limitless clean electricity from water currents.The design includes a submerged water-current turbine similar to a jet engine. It draws water through a hydrofoil system to turn an impellor that converts the kinetic energy of the water into mechanical energy that can power an electrical generator. It resembles a wind generator under water.The technology could add to existing power sources, not replace them at this stage.

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A new treatment system for organic residues has been launched by CST Wastewater Solutions, promising to convert almost any organic residue or energy crop into biogas, valuable electricity or heat. CST Wastewater Solutions has partnered with Global Water Engineering (GWE) to supply the RAPTOR system, which stands for Rapid Treatment of Organic Residues.

A RAPTOR plant is a total solution, starting with logistics for handling the energy crop and ending with the production of biogas, green electricity or steam. In the RAPTOR process, the pre-treated and blended substrate slurry is transferred into a mixed digester that uses energy efficient and low maintenance mechanical mixing. The digester tank comes in sizes up to 12,000 m3. Optional extras include a foam breaker fan, a scum buster system and a bottom grit trap.

The digester tank is fully insulated, heated by recycling the digester content through a special heat exchanger.

The plant can handle:
• Food waste, such as market surplus, kitchen waste, off specification fruit and vegetables, and excess crops
• Agro-industry residues, like starch and sugar pulps, vegetable or potato waste.
• Industrial residues, such as brewery waste (spent grain), fruit processing waste, and paper mill sludge.
• Energy crops, for example corn (silage), various grasses, algae.

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Ken Upton, a retired entrepreneur in Spain, has come up with a new method of extracting the energy from the oscillating motion, which is being seriously considered by a major company.An enhanced method of extracting power from fluid flow streams has the potential to produce a great deal of carbon free energy.It relies on having wing shaped hydrofoils that repeatedly go into stall and then recover, which results in massive oscillating forces.

In order to enhance the oscillating foil idea, Upton has added a Kenape turbine in front of the oscillating foil. A Kenape turbine is an invention of Ken Upton's that essentially consists of a series of tethered kites that are forced to circle. For use in water, the flexible blades of the Kenape rotor are made bat wing shaped. As well as allowing the extraction of some energy from the flow from the rotation, the wakes of the bat wing elements generate considerable amounts of turbulence to enhance the oscillations of the wing.

In addition to this, Upton's foil shape is a delta wing, with a guiding canard wing at the front, so as to adjust the angle of attack and guide the foil into an attitude that generates maximum flutter.Upton's prototype is only a working model, with the Kenape elements made out of old XRay film, which he says combine the required elements of strength and flexibility.It may have potential of its own as a low cost turbine.

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POET Biorefining in Bingham Lake, Minnesota, has developed a way to be more efficient in the ways they produce ethanol. After two years of research, they started working on a process that we're now calling zero liquid discharge. And they've implemented this new process in January of this year. Bingham Lake is the first plant in the POET system to start up the patent pending "zero liquid discharge" system. The goal is to reduce water usage from 3.2 gallons of water per gallon of ethanol, to 2.6 gallons of water, a 23 percent decrease.

They've gathered all of the different locations throughout the plant that previously discharge water to the treatment system. They've recollected and filtered several streams. So now they are internally using all their effluent.Even though operating costs will increase,the water bills have already started to drop in Bingham Lake.

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Schoell, a Florida inventor, envisions a day when his external combustion engine replaces most of today's gasoline- and diesel-powered internal combustion engines. The U.S. Army and U.S. Navy think it may be an efficient way to generate electricity.

The Cyclone engine works by pumping fuel and air into a round combustion chamber, where it swirls cyclonelike and burns at about 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Combustion gas passes into a heat exchanger, where it heats deion-ized water to 1,200 degrees under 3,200 pounds of pressure.The water turns into steam, but under pressure the steam remains in a fluid state and is referred to as a "supercritical fluid,".

The steam passes through a valve and into a cylinder, where it expands with almost explosive force to drive a piston. When the piston is pushed to the far end of the cylinder, the steam exits through an exhaust port.From there, the steam enters another heat exchanger, where heat is recovered and cycled back to the combustion chamber. Now cooler, the steam exits the heat exchanger and enters an air-cooled condenser, where it is turned back into water and is pumped back to the first heat exchanger to go through the cycle again.

Schoell has run his engines on gasoline and diesel fuel, but also on fuel made from orange peels, palm oil and chicken fat.cyclonelike swirl of fuel and air in the combustion chamber enables complete combustion so there is little except carbon dioxide as exhaust.In February, Cyclone Power Technologies announced the completion of tests with Raytheon of a Cyclone engine designed for the Navy to use in unmanned underwater vehicles and torpedoes.

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John Bays says his invention could save him tens of thousands of dollars. Bays has built a "tidal Venturi hydro-electric paddle wheel". He tested the paddle wheel out on the Intracoastal Waterway and sure enough....it worked. Bays floated the paddle wheel down to this waterfront residence, where he says he'll eventually connect the paddle wheel operation to his house and generate energy.

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Jack Robertson, a Portland retiree, reckoning a viable formula to produce hydrogen energy and green fertilizer by combining water, wind and air.He calls it a hydrogen hub.

A hydrogen hub would be a power plant that uses water and air to produce a form of ammonia, then burns the ammonia to yield hydrogen energy.Robertson says his invention would trim the need for gas- and coal-fired power plants that contribute to global warming. He envisions a new sustainable industry springing up at abandoned aluminum plants or the former Trojan nuclear plant in Rainier, Ore.

A genetically modified (GM) rice that can give 50 percent more harvest while requiring less fertilizer and water is seen as a long term solution to low yield in resource-scarce, poverty-stricken farms threatened by climate change.

The GM rice will have more efficient carbon dioxide capture with its enhanced capacity for photosynthesis, the process of using solar energy to capture carbon dioxide and converting it into growth-inducing carbohydrate in plants.Dr. John Sheehy, International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) project leader for the GM rice, said that using C4 photosynthesis, rice plant’s capacity to convert solar energy in producing a richer grain can be enhanced particularly in tropical climates.

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At the Aspen Environment Forum today, MIT professor Dan Nocera gave a revolutionary picture of the new energy economy with an assertion that our homes will be our power plants and our fuel stations, powered by sunlight and water. And it’s not science fiction.

Nocera said that MIT will announce its patent next week of a cheap, efficient, manufacturable electrolyzer made from cobalt and potassium phosphate. This technology, powered by a 6 meter by 5 meter photovoltaic array on the roof, is capable of powering an entire house’s power needs plus a fuel cell good for 500 km of travel, with just 5 liters of water.

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A local inventor says he has figured out how to boost a car’s fuel efficiency by using water; experts say laws of physics are against him.Inventor Rob Juliano stands in front of a customer’s engine that’s been outfitted with an electrolysis-based hydrogen gas pump he’s developed. The system uses power from the car battery to break down water into its gaseous components, which are then pumped into the engine with the goal of improving fuel efficiency.

Hydrogen is being pursued as a fuel by car manufacturers.Honda earlier this year debuted its FCX Clarity, a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle powered by an electric motor. BMW has developed a car that can use either gasoline or hydrogen to power a traditional motor.Juliano, however, is peddling something a bit different. Through his company — UnitedH2O.com — builds and installs electrolytic hydrogen generators. They are small, footlong canisters that use electricity from a car battery to break water into its gaseous components, hydrogen and oxygen.

The gases are then funneled into the engine, where — due to the combustive nature of hydrogen — it is used to help drive an engine’s pistons. The process means less gasoline is injected into the piston cylinders, hence the car can travel farther on less gas, thereby increasing the car’s fuel efficiency. In other words, Juliano says cars with his system get more miles per gallon.Lincoln City resident Linda Young, who paid roughly $1,100 to have Juliano install the system, says her gas mileage has increased nearly 65 percent.

But Hydrogen can be used as a fuel, but to create it onboard a vehicle with electricity from a battery, which is charged by an alternator, which is turned by an engine, which is powered by gas, constitutes a perpetual motion machine, says Robert Paasch, the Boeing professor of mechanical design at Oregon State University’s School of Mechanical, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering.According to the first law of thermodynamics, which states energy can neither be created nor destroyed, the car as a perpetual motion machine is an impossibility, Paasch said. It takes more energy to create hydrogen from water than you get in return when burning the hydrogen in the engine, he said.

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