Energy
Humankind's insatiable appetite for energy has put the planet in a very precarious position environmentally, but it also drives prosperity and improved living standards. New Atlas keeps you up to date with the latest breakthroughs in the energy sector, from the expanding field of renewable energy production to the exponential rise of battery technology and the slow march towards nuclear fusion.
Latest News
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Full-scale 5-MW floating "pyramid" wind turbine will be put to the test
December 04, 2022Floating wind turbines are crucial to the future of offshore wind, but they require radically different thinking. French company Eolink is building a full-scale pyramid-style floating wind turbine that reduces materials and weight by more than 30%. -
World's largest green ammonia projects could clean up half the market
November 30, 2022If all the major green ammonia projects on our shortlist are completed on schedule, their combined production total will be more than half of today's global ammonia industry by the mid-2030s – eliminating nearly 1% of global carbon dioxide emissions. -
Revolutionary photocatalyst is huge news for green hydrogen and ammonia
November 28, 2022A fundamental chemistry breakthrough promises to unlock ammonia as a clean fuel, and decarbonize the chemical industry in the process. Rice University researchers have created a small, LED-powered device that converts ammonia to hydrogen on the fly. -
Simpler, cheaper electrical generator can be made with store-bought tape
November 21, 2022Scientists working on cheap and easy-to-make electrical generators have landed upon a design that makes use of store-bought double-sided tape, and which they say can perform on par with more complex systems when it comes to producing electricity. -
MIT advance paves way for high-density batteries that handle stress
November 21, 2022Branch-like growths called dendrites continue to plague next-gen battery designs of many types, but new MIT-led research claims to have uncovered the root of the problem, and shown how it can be negated through the use of mechanical stress. -
Hybrid ultracap battery promises 72-second city EV charging
November 21, 2022A new electric energy storage solution from Morand could offer electric city car charging times that undercut gas fill-ups. Its eTechnology hybrid batteries also offer the possibility of much longer battery lifespan. -
World's first electric lithium mine: Birth of an American supply chain
November 16, 2022As the world rushes toward "the greatest disconnect between supply and demand in the history of commodities," Snow Lake Lithium CEO Philip Gross talks us through his company's plans to open the world's first all-electric lithium mine in Canada. -
All-perovskite tandem solar cell boasts high efficiency, record voltage
November 15, 2022A new solar cell packs a record voltage and (arguably) a record efficiency for its kind. The tandem solar cell uses two layers of perovskite that tap into different wavelengths of light, plus a special surface treatment reduces wasted energy. -
Fusion researchers spot strange, high-energy behavior in burning plasma
November 14, 2022Having achieved a self-heating “burning plasma” in the quest for producing clean, limitless energy using nuclear fusion, on closer inspection of that plasma researchers have discovered strange, unexplained behavior of ions within it. -
Swords to ploughshares: Hyme re-jigs old power plants for clean energy
November 14, 2022Denmark's Hyme Energy wants to save shut-down fossil-fuel heat and power plants by repurposing them as renewable energy storage and release facilities using technology borrowed from the advanced nuclear sector. Its first plant will be online by 2024. -
New charging approach could extend battery life by at least 20%
November 07, 2022The many cells that make up a lithium battery pack are not all equal; some will degrade and die faster than others. New research out of Stanford has found that the whole battery can live much longer if each cell gets an individual charging treatment. -
"Telescoping can" wave energy device beats test predictions by 20%
November 06, 2022Scotland's AWS Energy has reported results some 20% better than predicted for its Archimedes Waveswing, a prototype wave energy generator that's been undergoing ocean-based testing at the European Marine Energy Centre in Orkney for the last 6 months. -
Light-powered catalyst makes profitable hydrogen from stinky waste gas
November 01, 2022Hydrogen sulfide famously stinks like rotten eggs. It's also toxic, corrosive, flammable and produced in large amounts as an expensive by-product at petroleum refineries. Now, researchers have found an easy, profitable way to turn it into hydrogen. -
Caltech's space solar project prepares for its first orbital prototype
October 18, 2022Caltech's wildly ambitious space solar project, buoyed by a massive hundred-million-dollar donation, is preparing to launch its first prototypes into orbit. These cutting-edge ultralight structures will collect, convert and wirelessly send energy. -
New electrode wastes no space to offer EV batteries a 25% density boost
October 17, 2022Scientists tinkering with commonly used battery materials have come up with a way of tweaking their microstructures to improve energy density, pointing the way to electric vehicles that can travel farther on each charge.
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