Energy
Transitioning to a world powered by renewable energy is key to tackling climate change. Here you can find the latest good news related to our clean energy transition, covering wind, solar, green hydrogen, hydropower, and more.
The winds created by trains in London could soon help power the city
As the energy needs of urban areas continue to increase, innovators are looking for new ways to generate energy in unexpected places. One woman in London has created a startup that seeks to harness wind energy from the draft winds created by the Crossrail trains in the city’s underground. The Read More...
Natural gas can’t compete with the powerful mix of solar and batteries
The powerful combination of solar and batteries are nudging natural gas out of the power market. Not only because solar energy is becoming cheaper than burning gas, but also because government is supporting the use of battery systems. In California, for example, regulators have called on PG&E Read More...
Australia's solar power boom could almost double capacity in a year, analysts say
A record-breaking month of rooftop installations and a flood of large-scale solar farms could almost double Australia’s solar power capacity in a single year, industry analysts Read More...
Old coal mines may just be crucial for storing energy in the future
A UK-based startup has come up with a crazy idea for storing mass amounts of energy, but it might just work. The company plans to suspend a 3,000-tonne cylindrical weight in disused mine shafts from 150m to 1,5000m deep. The weight is attached to a series of winches that can lift it, and when Read More...
Madagascar has a hi-tech waterless toilet that charges your phone
Traditional flush toilets aren’t an option in many parts of the world, but neither is leaving people with unsafe and unhygenic choices. Now, one company is piloting a new loo that’s waterless, off-grid and able to charge your Read More...
Wind energy leader ventures into solar and batteries
Vestas is the world’s biggest manufacturer of wind turbines. It is now offering solar power and storage (batteries) as well as it seeks to sell hybrid renewable plants to generate electricity around the Read More...
Life beyond oil: Saudi Arabia is spending billions on renewable energy
There are not so many examples of “empires” successfully transitioning to new eras with new technologies. The companies that ran the shipping lines around the world, were not the same as the one pioneering the new airline industry. Oil made—and still makes—Saudi Arabia very wealthy. But the Read More...
We can now harvest electricity from Earth's heat using quantum tunneling
Researchers have come up with a way we could harvest energy from Earth by turning excess infrared radiation and waste heat into electricity we can use. The concept involves the strange physics of quantum tunnelling, and key to the idea is a specially designed antenna that can detect waste or Read More...
Why farmers should swap tobacco plants for solar panels
Tobacco has been a key cash crop since America was first discovered, but a new analysis says that the tobacco farmers of today could make even more money harvesting sunlight. Researchers looked at tobacco farms and calculated the point at which farmers could make more money farming energy given the Read More...
How lithium-ion electric car batteries could still power your home once they've run out of zap
Less than five per cent of lithium-ion batteries sold in Australia are currently recovered and recycled. The rest end up in landfill. That's prompting the question — what will happen when the volume of battery waste grows as more electric vehicles (EVs) start driving on our Read More...