The “darkest ever” substance known to science has been made in a US laboratory.The material was created from carbon nanotubes – sheets of carbon just one atom thick rolled up into cylinders.
Researchers say it is the closest thing yet to the ideal black material, which absorbs light perfectly at all angles and over all wavelengths.
The discovery is expected to have applications in the fields of electronics and solar energy.
“It really kills the view to have mile after mile of wind turbines,” said Howard Hayden, a retired physicist and renewable energy skeptic who distributes The Energy Advocate, a monthly newsletter.At least 260,000 turbines, each 300 feet tall, would be required to meet the United States’ electricity needs.
“To me, the number is pretty small,” said Cristina Archer of Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, Calif., who sees a wind turbine as less pollution and less imported oil.
She and a colleague previously showed that the world’s wind energy potential is 35 times the global energy demand. They have now shown that wind energy can provide the stable power supply that its critics have said it cannot.
“It is the nature of the wind to gust and lull,” Archer told LiveScience, and this can cause fluctuations in the electricity that is generated.
However, a large network of interconnected wind farms could stabilize the supply.
General Motors Corp. is planning on making biofuel with garbage at a cost of less than a dollar a gallon, the company’s chief has said.
The US automaker has entered into a partnership with Illinois-based Coskata Inc. which has developed a way to make ethanol from practically any renewable source, including old tires and plant waste.The process is a significant improvement over corn-base ethanol because it uses far less water and energy and does not divert food into fuel.
“We are very excited about what this breakthrough will mean to the viability of biofuels and, more importantly, to our ability to reduce dependence on petroleum,” said Rick Wagoner, GM’s chief executive officer, on Sunday
Tags: biofuel, electricity, nanotubes, solar power, solar sunday, wind power
