Biofuels have been around as long as cars have.

A biofuel is a fuel that contains energy from geologically recent carbon fixation. These fuels are produced from living organisms.

Generating Electricity from Wing Waves.

Wind turbines, like windmills, are mounted on a tower to capture the most energy. At 100 feet (30 meters) or more aboveground, they can take advantage of the faster and less turbulent wind.

Producing electricity from solar energy.

Solar energy is a free, inexhaustible resource, yet harnessing it is a relatively new idea. The ability to use solar power for heat was the first discovery.

Turbines catch the wind's energy with their propeller-like blades.

A blade acts much like an airplane wing. When the wind blows, a pocket of low-pressure air forms on the downwind side of the blade.

Solar energy may have had great potential

Solar technology advanced to roughly its present design in 1908 when William J. Bailey of the Carnegie Steel Company invented a collector with an insulated box and copper coils.

We have been harnessing the wind's energy for hundreds of years.

For utility-scale sources of wind energy, a large number of wind turbines are usually built close together to form awind plant.

Biofuels are produced from living organisms.

In order to be considered a biofuel the fuel must contain over 80 percent renewable materials.

Geothermal energy is the heat from the Earth.

Resources of geothermal energy range from the shallow ground to hot water and hot rock found a few miles beneath the Earth's surface, and down even deeper to the extremely high temperatures of molten rock called magma.

Geothermal heat pumps can tap into this resource to heat and cool buildings.

A geothermal heat pump system consists of a heat pump, an air delivery system (ductwork), and a heat exchanger-a system of pipes buried in the shallow ground near the building.

In the future, civilization will be forced to research and develop alternative energy sources.

Possession of surplus energy is, of course, a requisite for any kind of civilization, for if man possesses merely the energy of his own muscles, he must expend all his strength - mental and physical - to obtain the bare necessities of life.

Showing posts with label rooftop solar system. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rooftop solar system. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Bloom Energy Coming To Delaware

7:41 PM  , ,   

Bloom Energy Coming To Delaware
A decade into the 21st century, Delaware is placing a big bet on clean, high tech energy. Bloom Energy, which makes sleek, highly efficient fuel cells, announced yesterday that it is setting up a manufacturing facility on the old Chrysler site in Newark. The company will eventually employ 900 workers, and its suppliers may add another 600 jobs on the site.

The fuel cells, called Bloom Energy Servers or Bloom Boxes, combine fuel such as methane with air to directly generate electricity. These fuel cells are already online providing power to customers such as Google, Adobe and CalTech.

I spoke to a session of Leadership Delaware yesterday on the economics of renewable energy. The fellows, who had been listening to speakers on energy all day, had not heard the news when I stood up around 4:30. Two minutes into my talk, I could make the point that clean energy is not a dream, but a reality, which will bring jobs and other economic benefits to Delaware.

This is what a clean energy future looks like. Delaware has no energy resources other than sunlight and wind, and thus has no economic interest in relying on coal power from out of state. Coal burned here or to our west produces pollutants like SOx, NOx and particulate matter that degrades our health.

I'm sitting on a panel on green energy as part of today's Governor's Entrepreneurial Business Conference in Wilmington. (It's a great panel that includes Dr. Michael T. Klein and Dan Rich of the University of Delaware and John Moore of Acorn Energy.) The discussion won't just be theoretical; we will be able to talk about real opportunities in the very near future. In the effort to replace 19th energy with 21st century technology, it make sense for Delaware to place its bet on clean energy.

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