Candace

Talmadge

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August 4, 2008

Energy Breakthrough: Stick This Where the Sun Don’t Shine!

This is artificial photosynthesis from cheap, non-toxic, readily available components that works at room temperature at an affordable cost.

Yes! Finally! This breakthrough comes courtesy of the brainy types at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which announced the results in the July 31 issue of Science. The lead developer of this energy technology is Daniel Nocera, MIT’s Henry Dreyfus, professor of energy, with assistance from Matthew Kanan, a post-doctorate fellow in Nocera’s laboratory.

This development holds profound and positive implications for U.S. energy policy. First and foremost: No need for any more expensive, toxic-waste-producing nuclear plants. And far less need for any type of centralized electricity generation facilities, or for major, costly upgrades to the national power transmission grid.

Here’s how it all works. This new artificial process duplicates the natural photosynthesis that occurs within all green plants, splitting water and creating oxygen, while another catalyst results in hydrogen. The new catalyst consists of cobalt, phosphate and an electrode, placed in water. Electricity from any source, such as photovoltaic (solar) cells, wind turbines, waves, biomass or even off the existing grid, powers the artificial photosynthesis.

The separated oxygen and hydrogen can be combined later in a fuel cell to produce carbon-free electricity to power buildings or vehicles. A home or business that uses solar cells or a wind turbine for daytime power when the wind blows can now store excess energy and have power even at night or when the sun stops shining or the wind dies down.

Most current solar cells have efficiencies ranging from 12 percent to 18 percent. The efficiency rating measures the percentage of sunlight hitting the cell that is actually converted into electricity. The U.S. Department of Energy announced late in 2006 a breakthrough solar cell that is 40.7 percent efficient, and now that artificial photosynthesis makes it possible to store all the energy that a solar cell generates, it probably won’t be long before such cells can be manufactured in sufficient quantities to make them commercially affordable.

In an MIT news release, Nocera said that within a decade, homeowners should be able to power their homes through solar cells, use excess solar energy to produce hydrogen and oxygen to power the household (or business) fuel cell.  Electricity by wire from a central source may well be outmoded, he added.

Long-range planners for the electric utility industry or the oil majors may want to think about adjusting their business forecast models away from huge centralized capital investments in power plants or oil production/refining, and more toward hiring and training a crack workforce to service these new home- and business-based models of highly localized power generation. 

Let us hope this development will help diffuse the excessive fear-mongering of the “man-made greenhouse-gasses-are-dooming-earth!” chorus. 

Now we have a true technology focal point for a sustainable energy policy. What on Earth are we waiting for? The engraved invitation to a cleaner environment has arrived!

© 2008 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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