This week we look into the future; a future full of offshore turbines leaning into the wind, solar panels in space, EV’s charging in 10 minutes and fusion reactors suppling our baseload…
I’m not sure that all of these future scenarios will actually transpire, but maybe we won’t need them if the more prosaic technologies like machine learning do their stuff.
UK NEWS
Zero energy bills homes partnership announced
Octopus Energy has joined forces with Bellway Homes to launch the initiative, “Zero Bills homes”.
These homes are designed to offer residents the opportunity to live without energy bills for a minimum of five years.
Zero Bills homes are fully equipped with air source heat pumps, home batteries and roof-mounted solar panels.
Octopus Energy’s tech platform, known as Kraken, will optimise the performance of these technologies, ensuring homeowners can enjoy substantial energy savings.
These homes are expected to save households around £1,800 annually on energy expenses compared to those on standard variable tariffs, based on current energy rates.
Bellway Homes is currently constructing three Zero Bills homes as part of its Victoria Gate development in Stafford, marking the start of its involvement in this project. (energylivenews)
AD meets Industry 4.0
Karan Tyagi of Bio Capital explains to Business Green how machine learning, AI and the internet-of-things, together known as “Industry 4.0”, will revolutionise food waste anaerobic digestion:
– Remote access & real-time data monitoring: Cloud-based solutions that integrate with various sensors and data collection devices installed at sites.
– Centralised data storage: Automated data collection negates the need for manual data entry.
– Automated data collection: Smart cameras at all sites that import real time readings to a cloud-based data acquisition systems.
– Data analytics and reporting: Real-time operational and management dashboards to identify patterns, trends, and data to optimise plant operations, improve efficiency, and identify potential maintenance requirements.
– Collaboration and communication: The integration of data and analytics enables collaboration among different stakeholders involved in the operation and management of plants.
We are also likely to see the introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) tools in AD plants in the not-so-distant future. ML tools can be used to optimise the AD process further by predicting the optimal conditions for maximum methane production and the performance of digestors. (businessgreen)
photo: Bio Capital
How surplus energy from data centres can heat UK homes
Earlier this month, the Green Heat Network Fund (GHNF) announced the winners of its latest funding round, which included a new project by Old Park Royal Development Corporation (OPDC).
The public regeneration body received £36 million of the allocated £65 million to support its project which aims to use surplus energy from data centres to heat over 10,000 homes alongside 250,000m2 of commercial space in the London Boroughs of Ealing, Brent and Hammersmith and Fulham.
In total, the scheme is expected to supply 95GWh of heat across five phases between 2026 and 2024, as well as create 22,000 jobs. (current-news)
EV OF THE WEEK
Polestar 5 Revealed
Tesla and BYD are fighting of global supremacy in EV’s, and are doing a great job of driving the motoring transition. Meanwhile, Polestar have probably achieved more than any other in terms of creating highly desirable electric cars, and the company is not hanging around.
The Polestar 2 is a very credible Model 3 competitor, and is even better in its new rear wheel drive format. The Polestar 3, a big SUV/Estate launched this year, and will be followed by the Polestar 4 early in 2024. The 4 is a smaller SUV/coupe which we covered a few months ago (HERE). It sets new standards for supply chain CO2 footprint and, in a break with tradition, has no rear window.
If this wasn’t a frenetic pace for an automotive company, the Polestar 5, a luxury saloon to compete against the Porsche Taycan and Model S will launch in 2025. I am sure it will be a gorgeous driving machine, and likely very expensive, but it is particularly interesting in the charging technology it will launch with, discussed below.
Photo: Polestar
Polestar extreme fast charging tech adds 100 miles in 5 minutes
Polestar has partnered with StoreDot, the originator of a new charging technology dubbed ‘extreme fast charging’ or XFC for short, with the aim of bringing to market a system that can add 100 miles of range to an electric car in just five minutes.
Crucially, the StoreDot technology does not rely on a battery technology revolution and can be integrated with existing battery designs and manufacturing processes to bring this claimed boost in charging speeds. The ‘pouch cell’ battery uses a conventional lithium-ion makeup with special silicone anodes to deliver the speeds. The company claims that their 100 miles in five minutes claim can be achieved with an existing 350kW charger and a car offering similar efficiency to that of the new Polestar 5. With faster chargers or more efficient cars, that amount of range could be added even faster. (autoexpress)
EUROPEAN STORIES
Energy flexibility could save €10bn annually by 2030
Through demand-side flexibility, the EU and UK can reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 40 million tonnes annually by 2030 and achieve cost savings of €10.5 billion.
A new report from Danfoss indicates that households can look forward to saving 7% on their electricity bills by 2030, and this savings percentage is expected to increase to 10% by 2050.
Analysts note that in the US, optimising efficiency, demand flexibility and electrification in buildings can result in up to $107 billion in annual power system cost savings and a 91% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from buildings by 2050.
The report estimates that by 2030, up to 53% of global energy input will be wasted as excess heat, which can be harnessed and reused, particularly through sector integration.
The report’s authors propose that on a global scale, it could be feasible to reclaim 1.228TWh of excess heat by 2050. (energylivenews)
Solar panel advances will see millions go off grid
More than 30 million homes in Europe could meet all their energy needs using rooftop solar panels alone, according to a new study.
Researchers from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany found that more than 50 per cent of Europe’s 41 million freestanding homes could have been self-sufficient in 2020 using just solar and batteries, with this figure expected to rise to 75 per cent by 2050.
Advances with solar technology mean that it will also make it economically viable for a portion of these freestanding single-family homes to abandon the electrical grid altogether in the coming decades.
Rather than abandoning the grid altogether, however, the researchers said it would make more sense at a macroeconomic scale for households to remain connected and feed excess energy back to other users during times of overproduction. (independent)
Extraordinary contra-rotating floating wind turbines to begin testing
We have covered the extraordinary World Wide Wind contra-rotating vertical axis (VAWT) offshore wind turbine before (HERE), so I am pleased to hear that it is about to commence testing in Norway. The 19-m, 30-kW, contra-rotating vertical-axis turbine is a prototype of a design that could scale to unprecedented size and power.
That’s what makes this turbine such a fascinating alternative. All the heavy generator business is kept at the bottom – indeed, under water and below the turbine’s floating pontoon. That adds enough weight at the bottom to keep the whole thing from toppling into the water, requiring only a set of mooring anchors.
The generator’s rotor and stator are then connected to a pair of vertical-axis turbines, each running three blades at 45 degrees from the main tower shaft. The lower turbine is set to rotate in one direction, and the upper one, mounted on a pole that runs up the middle of the lower one, is set to rotate in the other direction.
The blades are simple and fixed, and harvest useful torque from the wind most of the way around, much like sailboats can.
Using some interesting materials choices, WWW says it sees a clear path to scale these machines up to a monstrous 400 m tall, at which point a single tower could harvest an enormous 40MW – nearly twice what the world’s largest wind turbines can do – and more importantly, it could massively drop the Levelized Cost of Energy (LCoE) for offshore wind to less than US$50/MWh – that’s less than half the cost of what regular horizontal-axis towers are shooting for by 2027. (newatlas)
photo: Worldwide Wind
FOCUS ON: NUCLEAR NEWS
Nuclear is the marmite of the cleantech world. Politicians love it (not German ones), but many environmentalists hate it. Those of us in the middle just wonder whether it will answer the right questions at the right time and at the right price. Here are some recent developments:
World’s largest nuclear fusion reactor achieves first plasma
Japan has successfully activated its new fusion reactor, JT-60SA, which uses superconducting magnets to confine a hot plasma in a doughnut-shaped chamber. The reactor, the largest and most advanced in the world, aims to study the physics of fusion energy and support the international ITER(International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) project in France.
The first plasma was achieved on October 26, 2023, after more than 15 years of construction and testing. “This proves to the world that the machine fulfills its basic function,” said Sam Davis, a project manager at Fusion for Energy. This EU organization collaborates with Japan’s National Institutes for Quantum Science and Technology (QST) on JT-60SA and related programs.
The reactor is designed to heat the plasma to 200 million degrees Celsius and maintain it for about 100 seconds, much longer than previous large tokamaks. This will allow researchers to investigate how to control and optimize the plasma stability and performance, which are crucial for achieving fusion power.
JT-60SA will also help ITER, the giant international fusion reactor that is being built in France, to demonstrate that Fusion can produce more energy than it consumes. ITER will rely on technologies and operating know-how that JT-60SA will test and validate.
This is exciting news, but for context the project is 7 years behind schedule and its budgets have never been revealed. Commercial fusion still looks a very long way off. (interestingengineering)
photo: National Institutes for Quantum Science and Technology
UK and US forge fusion tech partnership
The UK and US have formed a partnership to develop fusion technology.
Fusion technology involves merging two forms of hydrogen and heating them to extreme temperatures, causing them to combine and release energy, which can then be harnessed to generate electricity.
The collaboration aims to address technical challenges, standardise regulations and build a skilled workforce.
This partnership builds on the UK’s Fusion Strategy and involves national laboratories, academia and industry representatives. (futurenetzero)
First planned small nuclear reactor in the US has been canceled
The US has approved a single design for a small, modular nuclear reactor developed by the company NuScale Power. The government’s Idaho National Lab was working to help construct the first NuScale installation, the Carbon Free Power Project. Under the plan, the national lab would maintain a few of the first reactors at the site, and a number of nearby utilities would purchase power from the remaining ones.
With the price of renewables dropping precipitously, however, the project’s economics have worsened. Some of the initial backers started pulling out of the project earlier in the decade, although the numbers continued to fluctuate in the ensuing years.
The final straw came on Wednesday, when NuScale and the primary utility partner, Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, announced that the Carbon Free Power Project did not have enough utility partners at a planned checkpoint and, given that uncertainty, would be shut down. In a statement, the pair accepted that “it appears unlikely that the project will have enough subscription to continue toward deployment.”
Nobody has advanced any project nearly as far as the Carbon Free Power Project, so it is now uncertain whether the company can build any commercial reactors before the decade ends. The same is true for nuclear power in general in the US. No large reactors are planned, and the last few projects of that sort were either canceled or ran horrifically over budget. And, while some other reactor designs are being considered for separate projects, none have cleared the hurdle of approval by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. (arstechnica)
photo: Idaho National Laboratory
RECLAMATION PROJECT OF THE WEEK
The 9,000 acre project reclaiming the Fens for nature
Looking north from Woodwalton Fen nature reserve, in Cambridgeshire, visitors get an uninterrupted view of Britain’s flattest landscape. An entire hemisphere of sky hangs over a network of carefully drained fields that stretch to the horizon without a hill or mound in sight. Potatoes and other root crops grow in profusion in the rich, peaty soil.
But change is coming to this quiet corner of fenland – thanks to one of the largest and most ambitious restoration schemes ever launched in Europe: the Great Fen project. Organised by Wildlife Trust conservationists, the project has already cost £10m and its price tag could reach £30m by the time it is completed, they say.
The money – which has included an £8m donation from the National Lottery Heritage Fund – is being used to buy large sections of farmland to create a 9,000-acre site around two nature reserves – one at Holme Fen and the other at Woodwalton Fen, the latter being one of the very first wildlife refuges created in the UK . The land will then be transformed by allowing water to return to previously drained fields, restoring it to its former damp glory.
Mosaics of pools, streams and water meadows will take over fields that recently brimmed with onions and carrots. Recreating these old habitats should then entice a host of animals and birds – from voles to kingfishers – into the Great Fen. Rare species that have already been recorded in the area include marsh harriers and scarce chaser dragonflies as well as plants such as cuckooflower, purple loosestrife and greater water parsnip. (guardian)
photo: Wikimedia Commons
GLOBAL STUFF
GM Targets ‘Clean Earth Magnets’ For Future Electric Vehicles
If the ultimate goal of electric vehicles is cleaner transportation in the future, there’s more at stake than just tailpipe emissions. You also have the minerals used to create EV batteries and electric motors, many of which are mined and refined in a less-than-green fashion – or are located in a country that’s not exactly friendly with the United States. Some of those challenges are exactly what General Motors hopes to overcome with a new partnership with a U.S. startup that seeks to make more “sustainable” magnets within electric motors.
GM today announced a deal with Minneapolis-based Niron Magnetics to develop and scale what the latter company claims is the world’s “first and only permanent magnet with automotive-grade power that is entirely free from critical materials.” Both companies say the technology represents a way to make a key component for electric motors that replace the rare-earth minerals used in most magnets currently. (insideevs)
TECHIE CORNER
Solar Panel farms in space can work
For the first time, scientists say they have proven that gigantic solar farms in space are possible – meaning a potentially boundless supply of clean energy.
A team, from University of Surrey and University of Swansea, followed a satellite in orbit for six years in order to observe how the panels generated power, weathered solar radiation and tolerated space’s harsh conditions.
The satellite was designed by the Surrey Space Centre along with a team of trainee engineers from the Algerian Space Agency.
The cells were made of thin-film cadmium telluride, which acts as a semiconducting material, laid on ultra-thin glass. The new solar technology allows for larger, lightweight panels which generate more power and are relatively low-cost.
The team gathered its evidence over 30,000 orbits, a research paper explained. Although the cells’ power output deteriorated over time, the researchers believe their findings prove that solar power satellites work and could be commercially viable. (independent)
photo: University of Surrey
