Recent Trends in Nano material for Energy Application

Nano Material For Energy Application

Compiled by Shyam Shendur G

New Renewable energy and Advancement ◦ Osmotic power

CO2 Emission control Capturing the carbon dioxide (CO2) from the ambient air

like trees. Current Trends in Solar Cells

3D solar towers. Ink-Jet Printed DSSC solar

Outline

Osmotic power

Osmotic Power ◦Prototyped by Statraft in 2009.◦Commercialization by the year : 2020.

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Osmotic Power prototype

Image credits: http://www.waterworld.com/

Sea water and freshwater are put in two compartments divided by a semi permeable membrane.

This semi permeable membrane has the capacity to let water pass but not salt. It is a sort of filter.

Due to the chemical properties of salt, freshwater will move through the membrane to the compartment where the saltwater is located.

This diffusion is called osmosis and creates an upwards pressure in the saltwater compartment. This pressure can be used to turn turbines that power a generator.

Working of plant-overview

Membranes were far too expensive to make and far too difficult to produce

With biofouling and membrane performance cited as challenges to commercializing this technology

Challenge in Osmotic power

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Anti-Fouling:◦ Creation of nanoscale surface topologies similar

to the skin of sharks and dolphins which only offer poor anchor points

Suggested Improvement

CO2 Emission Control

Image Credits :Carbon Engineering

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What’s mechanism ?

Pictorial Representation

Image credits :Carbon Engineering

Fans pull air through the side of the machine, where it's combined with CO2-absorbent liquid that flows downward.

They meet in the contacter, a structure composed of tightly packed, corrugated PVC sheets. When air flows over the sheets (which are coated with the absorbent liquid), the CO2 gets converted to carbonate, a type of salt. The arrangement of the sheets ensures that as much of the carbon-dioxide contaminated air as possible makes contact with the liquid.

The salt-containing liquid is then processed to get back the CO2, using technology developed by the paper industry.

Carbon Engineering is developing a membrane-based version of this system that it says will consume less energy.

The CO2-absorbent liquid is fed back to the contacter, and a stream of pure, compressed CO2 is produced, which can then be discarded, or combined with hydrogen to make more fossil fuels .

Operating Principle

Carbon Engineering already has a prototype machine - shown below - that can absorb the emissions from about 14 or 15 vehicles, which it hopes to scale up in the future by replicating the machine up to 20,000 times.

They Claim that this Prototype can actually eliminate CO2 Emissions from 300,000 cars every year.

Pros

The cost of air capture is uncertain and hotly disputed.

Some have argued that the costs would be prohibitively high .

Important thing is that Commercialization Can Even Worsen the Impact in Negative Way◦ --By its Impact on Plant Livelihood .Think the

MNC(some not all) Extract too much from the environment actually there is actually need for generating CO2.But we need to be Optimistic .

Cons of CO2 Capture

3D SOLAR TOWER

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Image Credits:http://futurism.com

A decade back, this idea wouldn’t have been economically justified because the modules cost very high.

ADVANTAGE :◦ While the team believes its 3D solar cells could

offer big advantages in flat-rooftop installations or urban environments where space is limited

LIMITATION◦ Once a configuration that minimizes the shading

effects between towers has been developed

DSSC with Inkjet Printed Dyes

Image source: Wikimedia Commons

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Sensitivity to moisture and the fact that it contains lead, thereby becoming a source of toxicity if broken.

Researchers believes that Materials need to be optimized in order to make it more stable while some researchers are working on ways to substitute the lead content for something less harmful.

Challenges in Inkjet DSSC

Latest Science News – ScienceDaily (Source:American Institute of Physics)

MIT(Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Carbon Engineering Video Credits :YouTube. Disclaimer : Collecting the these type of

data is my Hobby ,its my purely personal view expressed in these slide.

Reference/Further Read