Energy Frontiers; A solar cell with 44.5% efficiency!

"George Washington University researchers have designed and constructed a prototype for a new solar cell that integrates multiple cells stacked into a single device capable of capturing nearly all of the energy in the solar spectrum.

The new design, which converts direct sunlight to electricity with 44.5 percent efficiency, has the potential to become the most efficient solar cell in the world."

Full article at GWToday, "Scientists Design Solar Cell That Captures Nearly All Solar Spectrum Energy".

Energy Frontiers; Flow batteries coming into their own!

With the world gradually moving towards renewables the downside of intermittent power is proving a real problem. No country can afford to have its industry and population at the whim of the sun and the wind. So it is not surprising that energy storage is receiving increasing scrutiny. Indeed the purported solution to SA's blackout dilemma is, in part at least, a 100 MW Tesla battery bank, the largest in the world. While the jury is out on how such a small addition of back-up power can avoid blackouts in SA, inevitably energy storage will become a must-have adjunct for any viable renewable energy installation. 

Storage can take many forms; pumped hydro (as per the proposed Snowy 2.0), compressed air, flywheels and of course chemical storage in the form of batteries . While the high energy density and ready availability of Lithium- ion batteries has given them the lead in battery storage solutions, many novel technologies are under development.

One such technology the 'Flow battery' has taken a giant step with Germany installing a pilot plant on a grand scale. In the article titled  "German energy company wants to build flow batteries in old natural gas caverns", Megan Geuss of Ars Tecnica explained;

"A German energy company (EWE GASSPEICHER GmbH) recently announced that it’s partnering with a university to build a massive flow battery in underground salt caverns that are currently used to store natural gas. The grid-tied battery, the company says, would be able to power Berlin for an hour."

I don't want to get too technical here, but if you are interested in the science an earlier article A recipe for an affordable, safe, and scalable flow battery by Shalini Saxena, again in Ars Tecnica, gives a good background.

"RFBs (Redox Flow batteries) are composed of organic materials that are able to transport electrons (redox-active). Almost all RFBs are composed of two pools of liquid electrolyte separated by a membrane, which allows some ions to cross between the two liquids. In these systems, electrons then flow from the negatively charged liquid (anolyte) through to the positive charged liquid (catholyte). These electrons can either charge the system or be extracted for use. Since the key components of the batteries are liquid, things can be scaled up simply by making the holding tanks larger."

Flow batteries have some compelling advantages over solid batteries; they are readily scale-able. Simply add more liquid electrolyte to increase the storage capacity. The second great advantage, again because the charge carrier is liquid, is that it can the 'charged liquid electrolyte' can be transferred to discharge somewhere else. The most obvious application is in electric vehicles. Re-fueling of a flow battery is similar to the process with petrol or natural gas. Simply drive into a c'charge station., replace your discharged electrolyte by newly charged electrolyte and you're off again in no time. This contrasts with the very real range limit of Li-ion battery storage where re-charge is currently very time consuming.

The energy world is undergoing widespread massive research, so it is not surprising that there is a constant stream of announcements of the latest 'breakthroughs'. While many of these will not make it to every day use, some will. And they have the power to transform our lives. Many of the most common products of today would have been impossible to predict just a decade ago. Think of the impact of the iPhone, first released just a decade ago in 2007.

We live in interesting times!

Does battery storage help the environment?

Battery storage is widely touted as the all encompassing solution to the intermittency of renewable energy sources such as solar or wind. Given the many variables that influence the greenhouse credentials of these devices does installing a battery make sense economically and/or environmentally?

"Does battery storage help or hurt the environment?" from web site SolarQuotes, provides an in depth analysis that is well worth reading.

The short answer is generally not today, at least for domestic use.

Why governments always waste money!

A recent Prager video explained why every single government project heralded far and wide as  touted 'nation building' ends up as a fiasco, with uncontrolled cost overruns and not meeting its objectives. The focus of the video is the US healthcare system, Obamacare and its antecedents. But it is equally true for government projects everywhere. In Australia think Collins Class submarines, pink bats, or the NBN.

The underlying cause is quite simply that government is always spending someone else's money, ie ours, so it really doesn't care about cost. Sure the headline cost matters as it an issue for the electorate when the project is first announced, but after this the actual costs barely cause a ruckus. In any case, spin, blame-shifting and plain old bull-dust will get you over the occasional headlines, at least most of the time. As to the quality of the outcomes, it rarely takes any emphasis as those making the decision, will not be in office by the time "it hits the fan". Government sponsored projects are so-called "third party' transactions where the government is not really paying for it, nor are they using the service, resulting in ocst overruns and poor quality outcomes.

Watch the video. It explains the issue perfectly. Simply replace the American Healthcare system by "NBN" and it will apply equally.

We should never let governments take on such projects. Governments role is to create a free market where competing suppliers will ensure the needs of consumers will be met at the lowest price. Imagine if that had been done for the NBN. We would not be faced with the current nightmare with cost overrun more than $50B,  and counting. Nor would consumers face the prospect of being forced to relinquish faster speeds from their current suppliers and to have to pay more for this privilege.

What a fiasco!

Can the LNP cracks be healed?

Malcolm , the usurper, has been trying to recast the party in his own image. In his recent article in Quadrant "The Liberals, Coming Apart at the Seams", Paul Collits argues "the party whose leadership Malcolm Turnbull schemed so assiduously to seize was once a big tent with seating for all, from old-school Tories to libertarians. Now, sacrificed on the altar of one man's egomaniacal ambition, there is nought but division, betrayal and disgust".

Today, unlike in the past when there was much common ground, 

"Liberals are actively hostile to the bedrock beliefs of conservatives. Now, liberals and conservatives are not merely not on the same page, they aren’t even in the same book. They might agree on a few things, but not many. And the things they disagree on, vehemently, are matters of core business to each, not things that can easily be parked."

Alas, if it is so, then the party may well split. It is a conclusion I have seen by many commentators. Perhaps the threat of a split is being amplified by conservatives to gain 'benefits' from the now wet-leaning party. But even unintentionally the fracture could lead to a split. For the sake of the country I hope not.

One of the strengths of Australia's political system over the past four decades was its ability to sustain two central parties that could each accommodate a range of views. Unlike the Italian-model of democracy the two party system gives choice to the electorate, but leaves the messy policy minutiae to the parties to work out. A split in the liberals would not only give a labor-greens alliance power for some time, it would make governing more difficult for everyone.