Robins AFB GA (AFPN) Jan 02, 2007 - Air Force Materiel Command officials here are tied to a project that could provide warfighters at remote bases with a cleaner, quieter way to power runway lights and other electrically powered devices. Air Force Advanced Power Technology Office, or APTO, officials here held a December demonstration of a hydrogen fuel cell for providing power at remote locations.
Potsdam NY (SPX) Dec 27, 2006 - Susan Powers, associate dean for Research and Graduate Studies at Clarkson's Coulter School of Engineering, was paying special attention today when Governor Pataki announced that $24 million was being awarded to two companies for the development and construction of the state's first cellulosic ethanol plants.
Paris (AFP) Dec 20, 2006 - A German scientist believes he has resolved a three-decade mystery about why Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, has such a weak magnetic field. One of the four rocky planets in the inner Solar System, Mercury is believed to generate its magnetism in the same way as Earth -- by a dynamo, caused by the rotation of molten iron at its core.
Edwards AFB CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2006 - A B-52 Stratofortress took off today on a flight-test mission using a blend of synthetic fuel and JP-8 in all eight engines. This is the first time a Buff has flown using a synfuel-blend as the only fuel on board. In September, the Air Force successfully flew a B-52 with two-engines using the synfuel-blend. The B-52 test flights at Edwards AFB are the initial steps in the Air Force process to test and certify a synthetic blend of fuel for its aviation fleet, said Michael Wynne, Secretary of the Air Force.
Moscow, Russia (RIA Novosti) Dec 18, 2006 - Easy come, easy go - this is perhaps the best description of what is happening to oil and gas giant Shell on the Russian island of Sakhalin. The Russian environmental authorities are accusing the Anglo-Dutch company of violating their regulations. Foreign observers believe this is just an excuse to push Shell out of the key position in the Sakhalin oil project.
Bilkent, Turkey (SPX) Dec 15, 2006 - Ethylene, a ho-hum material that is the building block of the most common plastic, might have an exciting future in storing hydrogen, the hoped-for transportation fuel of the future. New research reported by scientists from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and Turkey's Bilkent University makes the surprising prediction that ethylene, a well-known inexpensive molecule, can be an important basis in developing frameworks for efficient and safe hydrogen-storage media.
Richland WA (SPX) Dec 15, 2006 - The Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has brokered a cooperative partnership between a U.S. firm, a Russian Institute and its scientists for commercialization of a miniature hydrogen gas sensor with improved reliability and response time. Such a device will provide added safety, detection capability and efficiency to a variety of applications industry-wide.
Seoul (AFP) Dec 15, 2006 - South Korea has opened the world's largest garbage-fuelled power plant and expects to reduce its imports of heavy oil by 500,000 barrels a year as a result, officials said Wednesday. The 50-megawatt plant, designed to provide power to more than 180,000 households, began operating on Tuesday. It sits on a mammoth garbage dump in the city of Incheon west of Seoul, the ministry said in a statement.
Upton NY (SPX) Dec 15, 2006 - Researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory and Cornell have made a surprising discovery about the behavior of high-temperature superconductors that could be a further step toward understanding how these valuable materials work. Previous experiments have shown that in high-temperature superconductors known as cuprates, electrons bind together in pairs.
Delft, Holland (SPX) Dec 07, 2006 - Delft University of Technology PhD candidate Maaike Kroon has developed a sustainable and inexpensive production method for the chemical industry. This method combines reactions and separation processes, does not produce chemical waste and uses much less energy. After just two years of PhD research, she will receive her doctorate degree based on this research subject on December 11. Maaike Kroon (25) is regarded as an exceptionally talented young researcher.
London (AFP) Dec 06, 2006 - Britain's finance minister Gordon Brown unveiled a series of measures aimed at tackling global warming and raised his forecast for British economic growth in a key budget speech delivered on Wednesday. Brown, seen as favourite to replace Tony Blair as prime minister next year, doubled air passenger duty and ended a freeze on fuel tax for motorists in his tenth pre-budget report -- a curtain-raiser to Britain's official 2007/08 budget due in March.
Providence RI (SPX) Dec 06, 2006 - In his 2006 State of the Union address, President Bush acknowledged the potential for switchgrass as a source of ethanol to reduce the nation's reliance on foreign oil. Unlike corn, which is currently used for ethanol production, switchgrass can be grown on marginal soils, is useful as wildlife habitat, and requires little use of fertilizers, insecticides or irrigation.
Los Alamos (UPI) Dec. 4, 2006 - U.S. government scientists say they've built a device that can manipulate terahertz radiation, perhaps leading to new imaging and communications devices. The terahertz, or THz, range of the frequency spectrum lies between infrared and microwave wavelengths. Devices generating and detecting THz radiation are in development but techniques to control the waves are lagging.
West Lafayette IN (SPX) Dec 06, 2006 - But biological engineer Chang Lu has done just that with a new and cheaper method to electrically fuse cells - a vital technology for studying stem cells, creating clones and finding disease antibodies. The only current method for electrofusion requires a very expensive and specialized electrical pulse generator, said Lu, a professor of agricultural and biological engineering at Purdue University. My device uses constant DC voltage and would enable researchers to fuse one pair of cells at a time.
Los Angeles (AFP) Dec 5, 2006 - A hydrogen fuel cell will light California's Christmas tree, governor of the pro-environment US state Arnold Schwarzenegger announced Tuesday, giving the low-emissions technology a boost. For the first time in California's history, a small hydrogen fuel-cell system will power the energy-efficient Christmas tree throughout the holiday season, said a statement from his office.
Yerevan (AFP) Dec 03, 2006 - Cut off from world energy markets, the mountainous state of Armenia is making a virtue of adversity and may be leading the world in using cleaner car fuel, officials say. While the European Union is looking at 2020 before 10 percent of vehicles there will use alternative fuel, in Armenia up to 30 percent of cars already run on clean compressed gas, officials here say.
