Solar Power - Major Discovery by MIT Researchers

[Sassy]

'Major discovery' from MIT primed to unleash solar revolution
Scientists mimic essence of plants' energy storage system

Anne Trafton, News Office
July 31, 2008

In a revolutionary leap that could transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/oxygen-0731.html

[ScottA]

Better save this artical before it gets deleted. I doubt this will make the evening news.

[desdawg]

Storage of electricity in something other than a battery has to be high on the list of upcoming technological breakthroughs. Pouring it in a can just won't work. It just won't stay in there. Human ingenuity will overcome that problem sometime in the near future I am going to bet. For solar and wind power to be viable on a large scale storage will be a must for nights, cloudy and still days etc. It will have to be transfered to another storable medium of some sort and my guess would be it will be in liquid form. This seems like a good start.

[John_C]

Nothing in that article gets me excited.  Breaking water down into hydrogen and oxygen is a high school level science project.  The problem is that it takes substantially more energy to separate water into  hydrogen and oxygen atoms than is produced when they are recombined.  The cobalt and platinum catalysts may reduce the disparity but that wasn't mentioned in the article.  I think he is fishing for a 10 year extension of his 1 year research grant. If we never hear of it again I don't think gov't/big business will have had anything to do with it. When the grant money runs out there will still be a few "technical problems" that might be solved with 10 more years of research grant money.

This article http://www.naturalnews.com/023753.html  describes "New Lithium Nanowire Technology Boosts Lithium Ion Battery Capacity by 1000 Percent"

The article describes the methodology by which they achieve the gains and it may well come to market. If they can be produced at a competitive price they will make electric cars, hybrid cars,  solar, wind and mini-hydro power far more practical.  IMO this one bears watching 

[desdawg]

Good to hear that it is being addressed. Compact, light weight storage is going to be a big part of the answer IMO. There are some great minds in this world who no doubt will come up with some solutions.