Category Archives: Energy Storage

August 18, 2008 — Gasification for the production of biofuel’s is getting a new look from researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory and Iowa State University. By combining gasification with high-tech nanoscale porous catalysts, they hope to create ethanol from a wide range of biomass, including distiller’s grain left over from ethanol production, corn stover from the field, grass, wood pulp, animal waste, and garbage.
The advantage of gasification compared to fermentation technologies is that it can be used in a variety of applications, including process heat, electric power generation, and synthesis of commodity chemicals and fuels.

“There was some interest in converting syngas into ethanol during the first oil crisis back in the 70s,” said Ames Lab chemist and chemical and biological science program director Victor Lin. “The problem was that catalysis technology at that time didn’t allow selectivity in the byproducts. They could produce ethanol, but you’d also get methane, aldehydes and a number of other undesirable products.”

A catalyst is a material that facilitates and speeds up a chemical reaction without chemically changing the catalyst itself. In studying the chemical reactions in syngas conversion, Lin found that the carbon monoxide molecules that yielded ethanol could be “activated” in the presence of a catalyst with a unique structural feature. “If we can increase this ‘activated’ CO adsorption on the surface of the catalyst, it improves the opportunity for the formation of ethanol molecules,” Lin said. “And if we can increase the amount of surface area for the catalyst, we can increase the amount of ethanol produced.”

Lin’s group looked at using a metal alloy as the catalyst. To increase the surface area, they used nano-scale catalyst particles dispersed widely within the structure of mesoporous nanospheres, tiny sponge-like balls with thousands of channels running through them. The total surface area of these dispersed catalyst nanoparticles is roughly 100 times greater than the surface area you’d get with the same quantity of catalyst material in larger, macro-scale particles.
It is also important to control the chemical makeup of the syngas. Researchers at ISU’s Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies , or CSET, have spent several years developing fluidized bed gasifiers to provide reliable operation and high-quality syngas for applications ranging from replacing natural gas in grain ethanol plants to providing hydrogen for fuel cells.

“Gasification to ethanol has received increasing attention as an attractive approach to reaching the Federal Renewable Fuel Standard of 36 billion gallons of biofuel,” said Robert Brown, CSET director.
“The great thing about using syngas to produce ethanol is that it expands the kinds of materials that can be converted into fuels,” Lin said. “You can use the waste product from the distilling process or any number of other sources of biomass, such as switchgrass or wood pulp. Basically any carbon-based material can be converted into syngas. And once we have syngas, we can turn that into ethanol.” The research is funded by the DOE’s Offices of Basic Energy Sciences and Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

Ames Laboratory is a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science laboratory operated for the DOE by Iowa State University. The Lab conducts research into various areas of national concern, including the synthesis and study of new materials, energy resources, high-speed computer design, and environmental cleanup and restoration .

July 22, 2008 — Marking a major milestone with the first commercial use of its breakthrough ultracapacitor nanotechnology, Enable IPC Corp. , an intellectual property commercialization company, has partnered with the Madrid, Spain-based IMDE Energy Institute to jointly develop ultracapacitors based on Enable IPC’s patent-pending energy technology. The initial project for this venture will be to incorporate Enable IPC’s ultracapacitor into the S 2VE clean energy innovation program.

Enable IPC’s ultracapacitor technology combines nanoparticles with common carbon sheets for a low cost, easy-to-implement technology that improves the performance of ultracapacitors so they can function as clean energy storage devices. The enhanced ultracapacitors are simpler, cheaper and longer lasting than some conventional batteries, but perform just as well in many applications.

Under the new partnership, IMDE Energy will work directly with Spanish company Green Power and a national lab in Spain known as CEDEX, while Enable IPC will provide enhanced ultracapacitor electrodes to the organization for integration into a new power conditioning unit.

“Our partnership with IMDE Energy marks a major validation of Enable IPC’s ultracapacitor technology by a renowned international organization,” said David Walker, CEO, Enable IPC. “Partnering with IMDE Energy solidifies our standing as a leading company with cutting-edge energy technologies. We are excited by this unique opportunity to help develop clean energy devices that could be a part of the solution to the world’s energy problems, and hope it marks the first of many collaborations with IMDE Energy.”

The IMDE Energy Institute develops energy-related research and development (R&D) with an emphasis on renewable energy and clean energy technologies to achieve outstanding scientific and technological contributions that create a sustainable energy system. Together with the S 2VE, a strategic national research and development program in Spain focusing on electricity storage for applications in renewable energy integration, transport sectors and households, the organizations seek innovative, state-of-the-art technologies to address energy issues locally in Spain, as well as worldwide. In effect since 2006, partnering with Enable IPC marks one of the first steps in S 2VE’s expansion to include ultracapacitors.

“After conducting an exhaustive search of ultracapacitor technologies, we chose Enable IPC due to the numerous improvements that their process produced over today’s current market-ready ultracapacitors,” said Manuel Romero, deputy director, IMDE Energy Institute. “The Government of Spain is extremely committed to developing environmentally friendly sources of energy, and this partnership is an excellent example of how technology can be used to protect the environment, while also assisting the economy.”

July 9, 2008 — Arrowhead Research Corporation has formed Agonn Systems Corporation to explore, develop and commercialize nanotechnology-based energy storage devices for electric vehicles and other large format applications. Agonn has initiated a strategy to acquire energy storage technologies based on nanoscale engineering from research institutions and expects to begin prototyping ultracapacitors based on carbon nanotubes and other advanced materials this year. The formation of Agonn Systems is part of a strategy at Arrowhead to leverage nanotechnology for clean energy applications.
“We implemented a similar roll up of intellectual property, device design, and manufacturing capability to build our majority-owned subsidiary Unidym into a leader in the application of carbon nanotubes for electronics,” says Arrowhead CEO Chris Anzalone. “We intend to replicate this strategy in the field of nanotech-based energy storage devices.”
Arrowhead has established for Agonn a team of scientific advisors pioneering nanotechnology-based energy storage, including:

  • Alan Gotcher, Ph.D., former CEO, Altair Nanotechnologies Inc, and former Chief Technology Officer and Senior Vice President, Manufacturing at Avery Dennison.
  • Joel Schindall, Ph.D., the Bernard Gordon Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Associate Director of the Laboratory for Electromagnetic and Electronic Systems (LEES) at MIT
  • Jud Ready, Ph.D., Senior Research Engineer and Adjunct Professor, Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI)
  • Satish Kumar, Ph.D., Professor of Textile and Fiber Engineering at Georgia Tech
  • Prashant N. Kumta, Ph.D., Edward R. Weidlein Chair Professor at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering

July 1, 2008 — Nextreme Thermal Solutions, a manufacturer of microscale thermal and power management products for the electronics industry, has been awarded a grant from the North Carolina Green Business Fund to enhance the efficiency of thin-film thermoelectrics used to convert waste heat into electricity.

The North Carolina Green Business Fund, directed by the North Carolina Board of Science and Technology, awards grants to North Carolina organizations in support of competitively assessed projects focused on attracting and leveraging private sector investments, and entrepreneurial growth in environmentally conscious clean technology, renewable energy products and businesses.

Efficiency of power conversion is becoming increasingly important across all market segments, including IT, automotive, and industrial manufacturing. As energy costs continue to skyrocket, the efficiency of power delivery systems is becoming a critical attribute to the overall product value. One way to improve electrical efficiency is to extract waste heat from the system and convert a larger portion of that heat into usable energy. This value proposition means that highly efficient thermoelectric components have the potential to play a central role in electronic systems in the future.

Nextreme’s thin-film embedded thermoelectric generator (eTEG) generates electricity via the Seebeck effect, where electricity is produced from a temperature differential applied across the device.
The company states that the Nextreme advantage is a very thin, nano-engineered material that delivers a Seebeck coefficient 150 percent greater than conventional thermoelectric material.

Nextreme’s materials can be engineered at a nano-scale, providing improvement options not available in traditional thermoelectric manufacturing processes. The grant from the North Carolina Green Business Fund will be used to optimize the Nextreme thin-film growth process with the goal of doubling the power output of a single device from 250mW to 500mW.

The ability of Nextreme’s thin-film thermoelectric materials to convert waste heat to electrical energy in such a thin, nano-scale form factor positions it uniquely to address market opportunities that standard bulk thermoelectric devices and other energy harvesting or reclamation systems cannot address.
“We are already demonstrating our devices in a number of specialty applications where heat is available and power is required,” says Nextreme CEO Jesko von Windheim. “Increasing Nextreme’s power conversion efficiency will open up a whole new scale of market opportunities.”

Nextreme is currently working with customers in the powering of remote sensors that can monitor equipment and human activities without the use of batteries by using energy sources available and harvesting the waste heat to power the sensors. Other applications include thermal batteries that can be used to power implantable medical devices and capturing waste heat from exhaust manifolds to improve fuel efficiency in automobiles.

Nextreme’s thin-film thermoelectric products are manufactured in volume with the Thermal Copper Pillar Bump process, an established electronic packaging approach that scales well into large arrays. The Thermal Copper Pillar Bump process integrates thin-film thermoelectric material into the solder bumped interconnects that provide mechanical and electrical connections for today’s high performance/high density integrated circuits. Unlike conventional solder bumps, thermal bumps function as solid-state heat pumps on a microscale. The stack-up of a thermal bump, including the thin-film material, solder and electrical traces, is only 100¼m (microns) high and has a diameter of 238¼m. The thermal bumping process can be implemented at the package-, die- or wafer-level, and is used today to fabricate Nextreme’s discrete modules.

June 25, 2008 — Mool Gupta, a professor in the U.Va. School of Engineering and Applied Science’s Charles L. Brown Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Harry Dorn, a professor in Virginia Tech’s Department of Chemistry, have teamed up to offer a long distance cross-university team teaching course.

Addressing the need for more accessible introductory curricula into the study of nanoscale carbon materials.

The 142 miles between Virginia Tech and University of Virginia were not a deterrent as the two began a distance-teaching course that involved 23 students in nine different locations in Virginia, Maryland and New York.

Connected through real-time interactive video conferencing, students were able to listen to lectures and interact as a class, despite their separate locations.
Dorn brought his intimate knowledge of fullerenes, the molecular building blocks of nanocarbon materials, to the table and Gupta brought expertise in the creation of carbon nanotubes and devices for technology such as photovoltaic energy cells.

“There are a few books for nanocarbon materials, but not effective introductory books,” Gupta says. “Here was an opportunity for team-teaching – for breaking new ground in introducing these concepts.”
“This course provides students with access to knowledge about the field that would otherwise not be available,” adds James Groves, assistant dean for research and outreach at U.Va.’s Engineering School. “Without distance learning technology, it would not be possible to connect professors Gupta and Dorn to each other and to a distributed group of students. Through this course and the related distance learning initiative, we are making experts in nanotechnology available to many students around the Commonwealth who would otherwise not have such access.”
Thanks to a $600,000 Virginia Partnership for Nanotechnology Education and Workforce Development Grant from the National Science Foundation’s Partnerships for Innovation Program, an ongoing $150,000 per year award from the Virginia General Assembly, and the coordinating support of the Commonwealth Graduate Engineering Program, the class was offered to university students across Virginia, as well as to non-traditional students working in government and the private sector. In addition to students from University of Virginia and Virginia Tech, students attended the class from distance learning facilities at the College of William and Mary, Virginia Commonwealth University, the National Institute of Aerospace in Hampton, Va., the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, Va.. and General Electric in Schenectady, N.Y.
At the end of a semester, complete with class presentations on the latest research in the field and demonstrations via video conference, students from each location traveled in person to Virginia Tech to synthesize nanocarbon materials in the lab. The next day, they transported the materials to the University of Virginia to build and test a functioning photovoltaic energy device.
Rama Rajan, who recently graduated with a master’s degree in electrical engineering from Virginia Tech, believes the novel subject matter and its interdisciplinary nature made for a rewarding student experience.
“It was a very interesting experience for me as I had no idea about the nanocarbon field before I took this course,” she says. “The extent of research, advancement and the potential applications totally amazed me. I really liked the interdisciplinary efforts that were popping up everywhere. It is wonderful to see people working together toward a common goal.”
Maria Rodriguez, who is pursuing her master’s degree in electrical and computer engineering at U.Va. as part of the Commonwealth Graduate Engineering Program, took the distance learning course from the U.Va. Northern Virginia Continuing Education Center in Falls Church. Despite the travel time and distance, she was glad to make the trip to both Virginia Tech and U.Va. to apply her knowledge in the lab.
“Certainly and without a doubt, the laboratory sessions at Virginia Tech and U.Va. were the most rewarding part of the class.” Rodriguez says. “This gave us the opportunity to have a hands-on experience and make the connection between the theory and concepts and the real device and chemical synthesis.”
While the athletic rivalry between U.Va. and Virginia Tech remains healthy, this class has shown that academia is fertile ground for a meeting of the minds. Team-teaching and distance-learning are not only benefiting students at both of these universities, but also a diverse group of students from throughout the Commonwealth and beyond.
“It’s vital that we collaborate in the Commonwealth,” Gupta says. “We are competing academically with institutions throughout the U.S. and around the world. Coming together for research and education will help us to be more competitive, win research grants and move research forward to make a positive impact on our society.”

June 9, 2008 — Advanced nanomaterials company Angstron Materials LLC has acquired a new 22,000 square foot manufacturing facility where it will provide small to large batch processing and production capacity for its carbon-based nano-graphene platelets (NGPs), and continue its research and development efforts. Angstron’s NGPs can be blended with other nanomaterials to achieve higher loadings required for various forms of composite lamina as well as nanocomposites for load-bearing and functional applications.

Based in Dayton, Ohio, the new facility will increase Angstron’s ability to offer customers a turnkey solution from application development and pilot quantities for test articles to scale-up for required production volumes. The company claims that NGPs can be used as an alternative to carbon nanotubes and are suited to aerospace, automotive, energy, marine, electronics, construction, medical and telecommunications applications.
Angston announced availability of large quantities of its single atomic layer thick NGPs in April, 2008.

“The new location gives Angstron the capability to produce tons of pristine NGP material annually,” said Dr. Bor Z. Jang, CEO of Angstron Materials, LLC. “The larger facility will allow Angstron to more effectively meet customer requirements.”

Angstron’s engineered NPGs are available in several forms including raw materials and solutions. These solutions can achieve an exceptionally high loading and maintain uniform dispersion without degrading viscosity.
The company promises to reduce production cost barriers with its nano-graphene solutions, and claims that NGPs are similar to nanotubes but offer improved performance properties including very high Young’s modulus, strength and surface area, superior thermal and electrical conductivity, lower density and less weight. As a result, Angstron says it is able to work with companies to develop products for batteries, fuel cells, supercapacitors, light weight structural components as well as electromagnetic interference (EMI), radio frequency interference (RFI), electrostatic discharge (ESD), lightning strike and composite applications.

May 20, 2008 — Polypore International, Inc. today announced that through its wholly owned subsidiary, Celgard, LLC, the company has closed on the previously announced acquisition of 100 percent of the outstanding capital stock of Yurie-Wide Corp., a South Korean company, for approximately $23 million in cash, including acquisition-related costs.

About Polypore International, Inc.
Polypore International, Inc. is a global high-technology filtration company specializing in microporous membranes. Polypore’s flat sheet and hollow fiber membranes are used in specialized applications that require the removal or separation of various materials from liquids, primarily in the ultrafiltration and microfiltration markets. Based in Charlotte, NC, Polypore International, Inc. is a market leader with manufacturing facilities or sales offices in ten countries serving six continents.

Visit www.polypore.net

About Celgard, LLC
Celgard, LLC — part of Polypore’s Energy Storage business segment — is a global leader in the development and production of specialty microporous membranes, including separators used in rechargeable lithium-ion batteries for personal electronic devices such as notebook computers, mobile telephones, digital cameras, and other high performance applications such as power tools, hybrid-electric vehicles (HEVs) and fuel cells. A key component in lithium-ion batteries, the separator is an ultra-thin microporous plastic membrane that separates the battery’s positive and negative electrodes and facilitates ion flow.

Visit www.celgard.com

May 7, 2008 — Yole Développement, the French market research firm known for its annual “Top 30” ranking of MEMS producers has introduced a MEMS “toolkit” consisting of two databases. The toolkit is designed to serve the market-quantification needs of MEMS developers, investors, and industry suppliers; it consists of Yole’s World MEMS Market database 2008 (WM2) and the latest edition of its World MEMS Firms database (WMF) provides unprecedented insight into the MEMS sector.

WM2 presents detailed MEMS product forecasts for different types of devices (ink jet heads, pressure sensors, microphones, accelerometers, gyroscopes, MOEMS, micro displays, micro bolometers, microfluidics, RF MEMS, micro tips, micro fuel cells, new emerging MEMS devices). For each MEMS device covered forecasts are detailed by application (consumer, automotive, medical, life science, telecom, industrial, aeronautics and defense). Three updates per year are included in this new Yole product.

Companion database WMF describes more than 450 MEMS players worldwide including all business models (e.g., R&D, fab, fabless, foundry, integrated fab). WMF database features organization contact details and their top executives (job title, phone, and email) as well as technology information such as clean room size, production capacity, wafer size, processes, materials, and type of manufactured products.

Yole is offering a special bundle price of 3,590 Euros — a 20% discount off list — until May 8, 2008. For more information or to order, contact David Jourdan, +33 472 83 01 95.

April 22, 2008 — Angstron Materials LLC says it is the first advanced materials company to offer large quantities of single atomic layer thick nano-graphene platelets (NGPs). The carbon-based NGPs aim to be cost-effective, high-quality alternatives to nanotubes.

Angstron claims that NGPs outperform all other nanomaterials on the market: They demonstrate the highest thermal conductivity known today — five times that of copper — a capability that provides faster thermal dissipation; plus electrical conductivity similar to copper with a density four times lower — for lighter weight components. And, says Angstron, NGPs are 50 times stronger than steel with a surface area twice that of carbon nanotubes.

Angstron offers oxide-free, pristine NGP products in thicknesses ranging from 0.34 to 100 nanometers and widths of 0.5-20 microns. Exceptionally high length-to-thickness aspect ratios of up to 10,000 are available. In addition, the company can modify the chemistry of the nano-platelet surface to fine-tune electrical, thermal, mechanical, optical, magnetic, chemical and other key performance properties while maintaining precision control of platelet dimensions and other physical parameters.

Angstron’s engineered NPGs are available in several forms including raw materials and solutions. These solutions promise an exceptionally high loading and uniform dispersion without degrading viscosity. The NGPs can be blended with other nanomaterials to achieve higher loadings required for various forms of composite lamina as well as nanocomposites for load-bearing and functional applications.

Angstron can also tailor nanomaterial products to customers’ manufacturing processes, enhanced materials or device needs. The advanced materials specialist offers customers a total turnkey solution from application development and pilot quantities for test articles to scale-up for required production volumes. Angstron is currently working with companies to develop products for batteries, fuel cells, supercapacitors, light weight structural components as well as electromagnetic interference (EMI), radio magnetic indicator (RMI), electrostatic discharge (ESD), lightning strike and composite applications.

by Katherine Derbyshire, Contributing Editor, Solid State Technology

April 17, 2008 – The vast majority of photovoltaic (PV) installations capture photons emitted by the sun, but many other sources of electromagnetic radiation exist. Since combustion of any kind emits photons in the infrared portion of the spectrum, the waste heat produced by diesel generators, internal combustion engines, and industrial processes offers a potential source of radiation for PV cells with the appropriate bandgap.

Though some systems generate electricity as a byproduct of combustion, they generally do so by mechanical means. Industrial waste heat powers steam turbines. In engines, some of the energy from the drive train may be used to drive an alternator, in which the rotation of a magnet generates electricity for use by the vehicle.

In both these cases, the conversion from thermal to mechanical to electrical energy increases system complexity and introduces mechanical and other losses. Such systems are also difficult to miniaturize for portable applications. While microturbines can generate a high power density, they require precise, high speed, moving parts, notes W. M. Yang of the U. of Singapore. Creating and assembling millimeter-scale microturbines is quite challenging. 1. Moreover, such mechanical systems make noise and are subject to friction and wear.

Military applications in particular would benefit from a lightweight, near-silent source of electricity. For example, unmanned reconnaissance vehicles use significant amounts of electricity to operate cameras and sensors and transmit information back to the human controller. Batteries are heavy, while their limited charge constrains the vehicle’s range. Internal combustion engines are noisy and also add substantial weight.

Conventional diesel generators also convert thermal energy to electricity by way of a mechanical system. At the same time, generators are often used in parallel with heat sources for cooking and climate control. A system that could generate electricity as a byproduct of heating might offer substantial weight savings.

Applications like these are driving interest in thermophotovoltaic (TPV) devices. TPV devices place photovoltaic cells in close proximity to a combustion heat source (usually 1000-1600K, or 1340°-2420°F). They have no moving parts, substantially reducing weight and complexity compared to conventional generators. Because of their simplicity, TPV generators can be very small. Yang’s group, for instance, demonstrated a 0.92W unit with a micro-combustor diameter of 3.0mm. In fact, such small units can deliver more output power/unit volume than larger units because of their high surface-to-volume ratio.

The most significant difference between TPV and conventional solar PV cells is the use of low-bandgap materials to exploit low energy, long wavelength IR photons. Yang’s group used GaSb cells, which have a bandgap of about 0.8eV and absorb wavelengths up to 1.8μm. While silicon cells are much less expensive, K. Qiu of Canada’s CANMET Energy Technology Centre explained that most thermal radiation falls short of their bandgap (silicon Eg = 1.12 eV) and cannot be used. Qiu’s group used a selective Yb2O3 radiator to shift the spectrum of their natural gas burner to the desired range 2.

Control of excess heat is extremely important for successful TPV cells. They encounter far higher temperatures and energy densities than solar PV cells, yet can only absorb and convert a small fraction of that energy. To protect themselves from destructive heat loads, most designs reflect excess heat back to the combustion chamber, where it serves to preheat the air-gas mixture and increase the combustion efficiency.

As J. van der Heide and coworkers at IMEC explained, TPV cells generate a higher current density than conventional solar cells; it’s important to minimize the resistance of the front contact structure. For the back surface, a highly reflective contact is desirable. Without some form of optical confinement, many long wavelength photons would simply pass through the thin film cells without being absorbed. The IMEC group, working with germanium TPV cells (Eg = 0.66 eV), used an amorphous silicon/SiO2/aluminum stack to form this reflector, realizing the contact structures by laser firing. For the front surface, they diffused palladium from a thin coating through the silicon passivation to form the contact, with a thick silver layer on top to reduce series resistance. 3

In many applications, TPV cells will compete with batteries or fuel cells, not with conventional generators or with solar PV. Energy density (power per unit weight or volume) will be as important as cost or net efficiency. Yet parameters like contact resistance, optical confinement, and cell efficiency contribute to energy density as well. TPV and solar PV designs are likely to learn from each other, enriching the range of photovoltaic applications in the process. — K.D.

References:

[1] W. M. Yang, et. al., “Experimental study of micro-thermophotovoltaic systems with different combustor configurations,” Energy Conv. And Mgmt., vol 48, pp. 1238-1244 (2007).
[2] K. Qiu and A.C.S. Hayden, “Development of a silicon concentrator solar cell based TPV power system,” Energy Conv. And Mgmt., vol. 47, pp 365-376 (2006).
[3] J. van der Heide, et. al., “Optimisation and characterisation of contact structures for germanium thermophotovoltaic cells,” presented at 22nd EU PVSEC, 3-7 September, 2007, Milan.