Material & Energy

Fast-Charging Sodium-Ion Battery uses Tree-Based Anodes

Lignode is a carbon substance that Stora Enso and Altris are teaming to use to replace anode graphiteStora Enso"One month after Natron Energy launched mass production of its pioneering sodium-ion batteries, Swedish company Altris, in collaboration with Stora Enso, discovered a way to enhance the sustainability of lithium-free batteries by adapting carbon from tree...

Promising New Desalination Method Operates without Electricity

Shuqi Xu (left) and Professor Juan Felipe Torres with their first prototype of thermodiffusive desalination. Credit: ANU College of Engineering, Computing & CyberneticsResearchers at The Australian National University have introduced a novel desalination method that mitigates many of the adverse effects associated with traditional techniques and cuts energy consumption by approximately 80%.Freshwater scarcity...

Pennsylvania Could Provide 40% of US Lithium Needs from an Unexpected Source

Runoff from fracking operations is not usually considered a good thing, but a new finding reveals it could be a source of a very valuable metalDALL-EAs electric vehicles and other battery technologies continue to rise, researchers anticipate a surge in the demand for lithium in the coming years. A new study identifies an unusual...

The Most Efficient Hydrogen System in the World Scales up for Mass Production

Hysata guarantees the world's most affordable hydrogen with a groundbreaking device that splits water into H2 and O2 at 95% efficiency, which is about 20% more efficient than the top conventional electrolyzers. The company has secured US$111 million to expand production.Hydrogen production typically wastes 20-30% of renewable energy, contributing to high costs. Australian company...

New Method Cuts Costs by 30% in Converting CO2 to High-Value Chemicals

NUS researchers, led by Assistant Professor Lum Yanwei, have developed a groundbreaking technique to address rising CO2 emissions and their impact on climate change. Their method greatly improves the conversion of waste CO2 into valuable chemicals and fuels, directly from treated industrial flue gas. This innovation turns CO2 into key raw materials like ethylene...

Sea-Bed Air Batteries Offer Affordable, Long-Term Energy Storage

BaroMar says its undersea compressed energy storage system creates an air battery cheaper than any other for long-duration storageBaroMarIsraeli firm BaroMar is gearing up to trial an inventive approach to grid-level energy storage, aiming to provide the most cost-effective solution for stabilizing renewable grids over extended periods. Their innovative system harnesses the power of...

Sodium Batteries Sans Lithium Move from Lab to US Manufacturing

Blue has become Natron Energy's signature color owing to the patented Prussian Blue electrons it uses for the fast, frequent transfer of sodium ions that underpin its claims of 10 times lithium-ion's cycling speeds and a 50,000-cycle lifespan Natron EnergyIn 2023, sodium-ion battery innovator Natron Energy was gearing up for large-scale production of its custom-designed...

E-waste Recycling Yields Significant Profits

Using a food industry byproduct, researchers have extracted 22-karat gold from old motherboardsDepositphotosResearchers have discovered a novel technique for reclaiming high-purity gold from discarded electronics, generating a return of US$50 for every dollar invested. Surprisingly, they found the crucial gold-filtering material in an unexpected source: cheese production.Gold has been revered by societies for thousands...

Using Magnetism to Induce Movement in Water Droplets

Credit: ACS Nano (2024). DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.3c11197A collaborative effort between material scientists from Sun Yat-sen University and Dalian University of Technology in China has demonstrated the ability to manipulate the movement of a single water droplet by incorporating a magnetic particle inside it and controlling an electromagnet's activation. This research was published in the journal ACS Nano.The...

Soil-Powered Fuel Cell Harnesses Earth’s Energy

A microbial fuel cell buried in soil and generating powerBill Yen/Northwestern UniversityA groundbreaking innovation from Northwestern University showcases a compact device capable of producing electricity by harnessing the power generated as microbes decompose soil, as long as there is carbon present.This device, about the size of a paperback book, operates on microbial fuel...