Electricity

Thermoelectric generators produce an electric current through a temperature gradient. Now, engineers have created a new device that absorbs heat from the Sun on one surface and emits it from another, allowing it to generate electricity day and night.

MIT has developed a device that generates electricity using a completely new mechanism. “Particles” made of carbon nanotubes are dunked in an organic solvent, which induces a current to potentially power small robots or drive chemical reactions.

California is set to be home to two new compressed-air energy storage facilities – each claiming the crown for world’s largest non-hydro energy storage system. Developed by Hydrostor, the facilities will have an output of 500 MW and capacity of 4 GWh.

Concrete is pretty useful, which is why it’s the most widely used construction material in the world. Now, engineers have made it even more useful, creating concrete that can conduct electricity and produce heat, by mixing in nanocarbon black.

There are energy sources all over the place, if you know where to look. Researchers at CUHK have now designed new modular nanogenerators that can harvest energy from various different types of motion, such as ocean waves or a person's body movements.

Lightning is a major trigger for wildfires, like the record-breaking blazes that devastated Australia and California this year. But what if we could redirect lightning to strike safely? Graphene particles trapped in a tractor beam could do just that.

Superconductors – materials in which electricity flows without any resistance whatsoever – could be extremely useful. For the first time ever, engineers have created a superconductor out of a state of matter called a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC).

South Australia's neighboring state of Victoria has upped the ante on grid-scale batteries with the announcement that it's partnering with Tesla to build a colossal 300-megawatt battery for grid stabilization and renewable energy storage.

Toyota and Honda recently started testing a fuel-cell bus designed as a mobile power source for disaster relief. Now Nissan has driven out an emergency response vehicle based on its Leaf electric car that will also provide emergency power.

A surprisingly simple new energy storage system is built on blocks that store thermal energy like melted chocolate chips in a muffin. The team says they’re efficient, scalable, safe, inexpensive, and can be used in existing coal-fired power plants.

When disaster strikes, the power often goes out, and it may be a good while before it's restored. Toyota and Honda start testing the Moving e system this month, a fuel cell bus designed to serve as a mobile power source for disaster relief.

A Scottish company called Gravitricity has now broken ground on a demonstrator facility for a creative new system that stores energy in the form of “gravity” by lifting and dropping huge weights.