Green // Current TV

California Nuclear Power Plant Shut Down Indefinitely Amid NRC Hunt to Find Cause of Problems

CNN... . . California nuclear plant shut indefinitely amid hunt to find cause... more

EthicalVegan
added this
1 month ago
|
10 comments

Tuaregs had completed a military push aimed at creating the state of Azawad and declared victory

BAMAKO – DESERT rebels have launched a revolutionary war in the Sahara. The... more

worrg
added this
1 month ago
|
0 comments

Yaffe: Harper majority drops green pretences with budget

VANCOUVER — Measures announced in last week's budget suggest the Harper... more

northernexpat
added this
1 month ago
|
38 comments

Federal Agency Prohibits Edison from Re-Starting San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant

Los Angeles Times Breaking news . Federal agency bars Edison from restarting... more

EthicalVegan
added this
2 months ago
|
5 comments

A Planetary Fairy Tale

Just keep smiling (and get a snorkel).

Progresshiv
added this
2 months ago
|
12 comments

Butterfly Wings' 'Art of Blackness' Could Boost Production of Green Fuels

Scientists long have known that butterfly wings contain tiny scales that serve as... more

11dim
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Gulf Dolphins Exposed To Oil Are Seriously Ill, Agency Says

Dolphins in Barataria Bay off Louisiana, which was hit hard by the BP oil spill in... more

JanforGore
added this
2 months ago
|
27 comments

Indiginous People of Australia Fighting for Right to Keep Lands

Southwest Australia has been ravaged by agriculture and mining. The Noongar people... more

nmsamanda
added this
2 months ago
|
13 comments

Graceful World Change: Meaningful, Fun and Empowering

Graceful World Change: Meaningful, Fun and Empowering I have heard that the next... more

gentjim
added this
2 months ago
|
4 comments

Hemp Can Save the World - Music Video

(NaturalNews) Here on NaturalNews, we often spend so much time talking about... more

rodstradamus
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Your Fratoscope: March 18, 2012

The psychic frat boy predicts your future.

TonyDiGerolamo
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Wish we would focus on the development of solar, as hard as we do the search for fossil fuels, before it's too late! No more drillin' and spillin' of Oil, Corporate can't beat solar's delivery logistics-angular perspective, planetary rotation is all you need. No more tankers, trucks, pumps, gas stations, tank farms, or wars of acquisition fought; disguised as liberation. Just pure sunlight, we are using oil to consume ourselves (...and all life, for that matter) right out of a perfectly good planet,

.
"A small Mississippi solar panel factory that, until this week, had been working in semi-secrecy, claims that its unique manufacturing process allows photovoltaic panels to be produced at almost half the cost of conventional methods. The key, according to Twin Creeks Technologies, is in the thinness of its monocrystalline wafers, dramatically reducing the material required.

Where conventional solar wafers can be sliced down to about 180 micrometers in thickness, Twin Creeks is able to produce laminas only 20 micrometers wide using what it calls its "Hyperion" manufacturing system.

This system employs a technique Twin Creeks calls Proton Induced Exfoliation. During this process, hydrogen ions are embedded into layers within standard silicon monocrystalline wafers without altering the wafer's inherent characteristics. The ions are embedded using a high-voltage, high-current ion accelerator which Twin Creeks CEO Siva Sivaram told Technology Review is "10 times more powerful" than any accelerator commercially available. The embedded depth is precisely controlled via the voltage of the accelerator beam.

When the ion layer is heated inside a furnace, a thin lamina of the host wafter is separated from the rest. The process can be repeated with the same wafer to extract up 10 usable layers. A metal-coating is applied to each layer to add strength.

Twin Creeks claims that only 10 percent of a standard wafer performs useful work. Though the company has not announced specific performance figures for panels created with its technology, it says that solar cells, LEDs and other devices made with its skinny laminae have "similar or better levels of performance" than those made using conventional wafers.

Though conventional solar wafer thickness has come down over the years, the 20-micrometer wafer available now is a disruptive breakthough. But rather than position itself as usurper, Twin Creeks seems to be pitching its manufacturing technology to established solar panel manufacturers rather than selling solar cells itself. The company claims that a factory equipped with its technology can manufacture solar cells for 40 cents per Watt. By comparison First Solar, which positions itself as the "premier provider of comprehensive PV solar systems", announced only last month that it had cut costs to 73 cents per Watt.

Research technologies (thin-wafers included) that threaten to multiply the efficiency of photovoltaic panels emerge with clockwork regularity, but generally such developments are far from proven at the commercial level. By contrast, Twin Creeks claims its Hyperion 3 systems are available for shipment immediately, and can individually produce 1.5 million skinny wafers—sufficient for over 6MW of solar cells—per year.

The exfoliation method is also applicable to germanium, silicon carbide, gallium nitride and other III-V compounds. Though Twin Creeks' initial focus is on solar cells, it claims its process is suitable in the manufacture of LEDs, power electronics equipment, image sensors and 3D packaging."Wish we would focus on the development of solar, as hard as we do the search for... more

thetrimsmith
added this
2 months ago
|
12 comments

Dr. Daniel Fine, NMCEP takes on the "opposition" to Shale Gas in North Carolina

Dr. Daniel Fine of the New Mexico Center for Energy Policy discusses North... more

manomet67
added this
3 months ago
|
0 comments

The National Academies Press on Climate Change

When you click on the link, go about halfway down the page and you will notice the... more

csmonut
added this
3 months ago
|
1 comment

OBAMA RELEASES CHUPACABRA INTO ARIZONA

PIMA COUNTY, AZ – The U.S. Department of Interior has released a Chupacabra into Arizona in an attempt to get the State to repeal their new immigration law.

After the U.S. Justice Department filed suit Tuesday against Arizona, Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar had the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service release the Chupacabra or “goat sucker” into Saguaro National Park in Pima County. Salazar, acting on orders from President Obama, said, “We are encouraging Arizonans to repeal their immigration law before it goes into affect on July 29th, or we will be forced to release more Chupacabras into Arizona towns, cities and Home Depot parking lots.”

Upon learning of the release of the creature into her state, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer was defiant, “Bring it on! We’ve dealt with aliens, monsters and mutants in Arizona for the last fifty years – especially since Don Imus moved into the state. Arizonans don’t scare easy. The feds can send in a Bigfoot Army if they want, we will take them on. And we will win!”

White House Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs, told Wolf Blitzer at CNN, that the U.S. government will use “any means necessary” to get the people of Arizona to comply with U.S. Immigration laws. When Major Garrett of Fox News pointed out that Arizona seems to be in full compliance with existing federal immigration laws, Gibbs shouted “Chupacabra! Chupacabra! Chupacabra!”

There is a good deal of mystery surrounding the Chupacabra. Some believe the Chupacabra (much like Immigration Reform) is a myth – something that never has or never will exist. Some witnesses believe the Chupacabra to be a small half-alien, half-dinosaur, others think he is a tailless vampire with quills running down its back and still others believe him to be a panther like creature with a long snake-like tongue.

State authorities advise Arizona residents to avoid making any contact with the Chupacabra. Federal authorities, on the other hand, advise Arizonans to approach and pet the Chupacabra.

In related news, Governor Jan Brewer found a horse’s head in her bed when she returned home on Tuesday night. Authorities have not determined who placed the head in the Governor’s mansion, though one eyewitness said he saw White House Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, riding a donkey nearby.PIMA COUNTY, AZ – The U.S. Department of Interior has released a Chupacabra... more