Highly conductive paper for energy-storage devices

Stanford scientists have developed featherweight, pliable batteries and supercapacitors in the form of everyday paper.

By coating a sheet of paper with ink made of carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires, the scientists were able to construct a highly conductive storage device that’s both low-cost and high-performance.

(The difference between a battery and a capacitor, you ask? both hold energy to be converted to electricity, but capacitors hold it for a shorter period of time. On the other hand, they can store and discharge energy much more rapidly.)

The batteries are so strong that you can crumple them and the performance does not degrade.Led by assistant professor of materials science and engineering Yi Cui, who previously created nano-size batteries using plastics, the researchers developed a solution that is more durable than conventional batteries.

Source: Smart Planet

Samsø

The Danish island of Samsø has become one of the first industrialized places on Earth to qualify as completely energy self-sufficient.

The tiny island — just 30 miles long and 15 miles wide — first began its push toward sustainability in 1997. In just over a decade, Samsø erected 21 electricity-producing wind turbines and a heating system fueled by wood chip- and straw-burning furnaces accompanied by several small solar panels.

Eleven of Samsø’s turbines are onshore and ten are offshore; all generate one megawatt each. The onshore turbines produce more electricity than the island consumes — enough to offset 690,000 gallons of oil — while the offshore turbines produce enough power to handle the island’s transportation energy budget.

Source: Smart Planet

Prosperity without Growth

‘The crisis doesn’t only make us free to imagine other models, another future, another world. It obliges us to do so.’ — President Nicolas Sarkozy, Paris, September 2009

Is more economic growth the solution? Will it deliver prosperity and well-being for a global population projected to reach nine billion?

In this explosive book, Tim Jackson – a top sustainability adviser to the UK government – makes a compelling case against continued economic growth in developed nations.

No one denies that development is essential for poorer nations. But in the advanced economies there is mounting evidence that ever-increasing consumption adds little to human happiness and may even impede it. More urgently, it is now clear that the ecosystems that sustain our economies are collapsing under the impacts of rising consumption. Unless we can radically lower the environmental impact of economic activity – and there is no evidence to suggest that we can – we will have to devise a path to prosperity that does not rely on continued growth.

Economic heresy? Or an opportunity to improve the sources of well-being, creativity and lasting prosperity that lie outside the realm of the market?

Tim Jackson provides a credible vision of how human society can flourish – within the ecological limits of a finite planet. Fulfilling this vision is simply the most urgent task of our times.

The growth debate

The book is a substantially revised and updated version of Jackson’s controversial study for the Sustainable Development Commission, an advisory body to the UK Government. Since the report was published in March 2009, President Sarkozy has asked world leaders to join a revolution in the measurement of economic progress, Sir Nicholas Stern has warned ‘at some point we would have to think about whether we want future growth’, and John Prescott has called the current economic growth model ‘immoral’.

Source: Earth Scan

Perhaps the most significant limit to future energy supplies is the “net energy” factor—the requirement that energy systems yield more energy than is invested in their construction and operation.

THIS REPORT IS INTENDED as a non-technical examination of a basic question: Can any combination of known energy sources successfully supply society’s energy needs at least up to the year 2100? In the end, we are left with the disturbing conclusion that all known energy sources are subject to strict limits of one kind or another. Conventional energy sources such as oil, gas, coal, and nuclear are either at or nearing the limits of their ability to grow in annual supply, and will dwindle as the decades proceed—but in any case they are unacceptably hazardous to the environment. And contrary to the hopes of many, there is no clear practical scenario by which we can replace the energy from today’s conventional sources with sufficient energy from alternative sources to sustain industrial society at its present scale of operations. To achieve such a transition would require (1) a vast financial investment beyond society’s practical abilities, (2) a very long time—too long in practical terms—for build-out, and (3) significant sacrifices in terms of energy quality and reliability.

Perhaps the most significant limit to future energy supplies is the “net energy” factor—the requirement that energy systems yield more energy than is invested in their construction and operation. There is a strong likelihood that future energy systems, both conventional and alternative, will have higher energy input costs than those that powered industrial societies during the last century.We will come back to this point repeatedly.

The report explores some of the presently proposed energy transition scenarios, showing why, up to this time, most are overly optimistic, as they do not address all of the relevant limiting factors to the expansion of alternative energy sources. Finally, it shows why energy conservation (using less energy, and also less resource materials) combined with humane, gradual population decline must become primary strategies for achieving sustainability.

Read the full report: Download the PDF (2.61 MB)

Source: Energy Bulletin

Desalination

Companies will increasingly have to be established in coastal areas owing to the desperate shortage of water in South Africa.

A new report by the international McKinsey consultancy says government needs to make an annual capital investment of $365m (about R2.8bn) in its national water infrastructure. If it does not do so, South Africa could experience a 30% shortage of water by 2030.

Johan van Rooyen, director of water resources planning at the Department of Water Affairs, says government is intensely aware of the situation and is working hard to avoid future water problems.

He points out that it is important for water to be used more economically. South Africans need to learn to employ it more effectively. Consumers in the metropolitan areas could, for instance, with little effort use up to 15% less.

The aim is to save more, but that is only a start. Some water borne toilet systems, for example, use up to 20 litres of water per flush. That’s 20 litres of water that needs to be re-purified. Toilets that use five litres work just as well, Van Rooyen points out.

Linda Page, spokesperson for the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, says the McKinsey report was compiled with the cooperation of various parties, including the department.

These include bodies from the private sector, such as SABMiller and Coca-Cola.

The McKinsey report indicates that, if South Africa experiences a water shortage, various industries – like the industrial, agricultural and mining sectors – will have to compete with each other for the available water sources.

This could considerably elevate water prices, Van Rooyen points out. He says it could result in industries’ increasingly having to settle at the coast.

Sea water would then be substantially cheaper to desalinate and use than fresh water.

Source: Fin24