research

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has launched the “Genesis Mission,” a national effort to build an integrated artificial intelligence (AI) platform across its 17 national laboratories. According to The White House, the initiative will “accelerate scientific discovery, strengthen national security, secure energy dominance, enhance workforce productivity, and multiply the return on taxpayer investment into […]

California-based Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and hydrogen technology group Verne have demonstrated a novel pathway for creating high-density hydrogen through a research program funded by the federal government’s ARPA-E group. The companies announced their results on March 18. The demonstration validated that it is possible to efficiently reach cryo-compressed hydrogen conditions with liquid hydrogen-like […]

A UK- based global research group said continued growth in wind and solar power increased power generation from renewable energy to nearly a third of worldwide electricity output last year. Ember, a think tank headquartered in London, in its “Global Electricity Review 2024” released May 8 wrote that the numbers show a goal to triple […]

Enhancements will enable research into the physics of advanced fusion reactors and accelerate the drive to commercial fusion energy. The DIII-D National Fusion Facility has completed a series of important enhancements, providing researchers with several first-of-a-kind tools for controlling and understanding the function of fusion plasmas. These upgrades will further strengthen DIII-D’s standing as one […]

Fossil-fueled power plants are billion-pound investments that businesses (as well as whole nations themselves) around the world can’t afford to simply discard. Yet, the combinations of old plant, new fuels, and new operating conditions lead to corrosion, faults, downtime, and inefficiencies for plant operators and manufacturers. But these kinds of bridging technologies—between the “black” and […]

Power industry professionals searching for valuable data and insights on U.S. power plants will find a wealth of information in the POWER Plant ID (Intelligence Database) research tool. Data available includes plant locations, capacities, generation types, ownership breakdown, production history, emissions data, and more.   HOUSTON/AUSTIN, Texas (July 18, 2023) — POWER, the leading power […]

ATHENS, Ohio (March 2, 2023) – The Department of Energy (DOE) announced it has funded six research and development projects that will repurpose domestic coal resources for high-value graphitic products and carbon-metal composites that can be employed in clean energy technologies. Ohio University’s Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment was awarded two of the […]

January 13, 2023 – The Fire Protection Research Foundation (FPRF), the research affiliate of the National Fire Protection Association® (NFPA®), has received grant funding for four projects, including two funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency Assistance to Firefighters Grants (FEMA AFG) and two funded by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). In […]

Countries’ timelines to becoming energy secure and reaching net-zero targets have shortened. Major contributing factors include COVID-19’s impact on supply chains and the war in Ukraine. Alongside this are external influences such as COP27, or the landmark U.S. Climate Bill, which will direct almost $370 billion toward rapidly scaling renewable energy production and reducing emissions. Already, intergovernmental […]

Innovative concept leverages decades of expertise in fusion research and development San Diego, Oct. 20, 2022 – Today, General Atomics (GA) announced a new concept for a fusion pilot plant (FPP) to deliver clean, safe, and economically viable fusion energy. GA’s FPP concept utilizes a steady-state, compact advanced tokamak design approach, where the fusion plasma […]

Findings from research led by a team that included a former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) chairperson and experts from Stanford University suggests small modular reactors (SMRs) will generate more radioactive waste than conventional gigawatt-scale nuclear units. The results were released in a research article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences […]

Small modular reactors (SMRs) are widely considered the best technology to increase the use of nuclear power worldwide, with advocates touting their zero-emission production of electricity, smaller land footprint, and scalability. SMRs also offer a cost savings over construction of new utility-scale nuclear reactors. Powering a college campus with nuclear energy has increasingly been a […]

The costs for wind and solar power generating systems have decreased dramatically over the past decade. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the global weighted-average levelized

For the world to avoid a climate catastrophe, carbon capture is likely a necessity, not an option. To meet the Paris Agreement’s objectives—keep warming below 2C and preferably near 1.5C—net zero carbon emissions must be achieved circa 2050, and some carbon dioxide will have to be extracted from the atmosphere. Deployment of carbon capture, utilization, […]

Nearly 10-acre site in Gillette, Wyo., to accelerate production of new coal-based products, reduce U.S. reliance on foreign imports for rare earth elements GILLETTE, Wyo., June 7, 2021 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ — The Wyoming Innovation Center (WyIC), a 5,500-square-foot coal commercialization facility, has broken ground in Gillette, Wyo., owner Energy Capital Economic Development (ECED) announced today. The 9.5-acre […]

Scientists at the DIII-D National Fusion Facility have released a new design for a compact fusion reactor that can generate electricity and help define the technology necessary for commercial fusion power. General Atomics, which operates the DIII-D facility in San Diego, California, for the U.S. Department of Energy, says the approach is based on the […]

The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to lead three advanced energy storage projects. The projects will study innovative, non-battery-based bulk energy storage solutions integrated with fossil assets. “Investing in research and development to improve energy storage is critical at this moment in time,” Neva Espinoza, vice […]

GE researchers developing an artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML)- enabled inverse design framework that allows performance metrics to create more optimized designs for industrial gas turbine (IGT) aerodynamic components   Project aims to achieve a 30-50% reduction in design cycle times, or from 1 year to a few months Partnered with University of […]

When I see estimates of premature deaths attributable to coal-fired power plants, I usually take the data with a grain of salt. It’s not that I don’t trust researchers to do their best to calculate the

A recent study found that electric vehicle (EV) batteries used as a utility virtual power plant (VPP) could shift the entire residential peak load to nighttime hours with only 10% EV market saturation. The research was conducted by Jackson Associates, an Orlando, Florida-based firm that does energy forecasting, data development, and energy-related analysis. The study […]

In line with global emissions targets, energy markets are moving ever more quickly to take up renewables. Such a move is obviously important to ensure carbon reduction targets can be met. This does however create an issue—one that’s not been given the attention it deserves—of the impact this has on the conventional power plants that […]

Japan’s government this June adopted a new energy white paper that suggests the country must rely on a larger share of nuclear and renewables to slash its carbon emissions and meet its target of a 26%

First ground has been broken on a 10-MW pilot of a novel supercritical carbon dioxide (sCO2) technology, a $119 million project that will refine the sCO2 power cycle and demonstrate component performance and scalability.  Construction of the Supercritical Transformational Electric Power (STEP) pilot plant at the 15-acre facility at Southwest Research Institute’s (SwRI’s) San Antonio, […]

Wood and National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) have won a three-year contract from the UK government’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to carry out a key research project on fuels for the nuclear reactors of the future. Effective immediately, the two organisations will deliver the research and development necessary to provide a world-leading reactor […]

The Department of Energy (DOE) is offering approximately $28 million in cost-shared funding for research and development of advanced energy systems.  According to three separate funding opportunity announcements (FOAs), the department is looking for research into advanced combustion systems, advanced turbines, and gasification. “Advanced energy conversion systems are designed to enable efficient, low-cost, and near-zero […]

Academics at the University of Sheffield—a public research university in the UK—have begun two new carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects, searching for cheaper methods of capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) from fossil-fueled power plants. The work is being funded by the European Commission’s (EC’s) Horizon 2020 Low Carbon Energy program. Solvents Could Be Game-Changing The […]

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have combined two proven technologies to create a new hybrid system that could produce electricity, using coal as a fuel source, at nearly double the efficiency of conventional coal-fired power plants. The concept—proposed by MIT doctoral student Katherine Ong and Ronald C. Crane (1972) Professor Ahmed Ghoniem—combines […]

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) announced on August 17 that it will dole out a total of almost $17 million to research new CO2 storage technologies through DOE’s Carbon Storage Program and to research coal conversion and utilization through NETL’s University Coal Research Program. Nine projects will receive funding […]

Gov. Matthew Mead is taking an active role in developing an integrated test center to be constructed at a coal-fired power plant in Wyoming to research commercial uses for carbon. As the top coal-producing state in the U.S.—producing more than three times the amount of coal as second-place West Virginia in the first half of […]

Eighteen carbon capture projects across the U.S. have been chosen to receive $84 million in federal funding to help improve the efficiency and drive down costs of carbon capture processes for new and existing coal power plants. The Department of Energy (DOE), which announced selection of the projects today, said funded research will focus on […]