Log'N'Rock: Log'N'Rock News

Three U.S. senators have introduced a bill to promote electric grid energy storage projects. The Storage Technology of Renewable and Green Energy Act of 2010 ("STORAGE 2010 Act") would provide tax credits worth as much as $1.5 billion for grid storage projects.

In addition to providing credits for utility scale projects, the bill also has provisions for businesses and homeowners who want to have on-site energy storage, whether or not they also have on-site renewable energy generation of their own. Grid scale projects could qualify for a 20% tax credit of up to $30 million, and individual projects could qualify for a 30% tax credit of up to $1 million.

Projects would be selected by the Energy Secretary based on their commercial viability and would look to those that "provide the greatest increase of reliability or economic benefit, that enable the greatest improvement in integration of renewable energy resources with the grid, or that enable the greatest increase in efficiency in grid operation."

Encouraging increased grid storage capacity is meant to help further the adoption of intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. Grid storage should also help in furthering a more reliable smart grid for national energy distribution.

image: CC 2.0 by -5m

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Scientists at MIT have created a breakthrough solution to one of the biggest problems facing solar cells by mimicking the world's best harvesters of solar energy:  plants.

Over time, sunlight breaks down the materials in solar cells, leading to a gradual degradation of devices aiming to harvest the energy in that light.  Plants don't have this problem because the chloroplasts in plant cells constantly breakdown and reassemble their light-capturing molecules -- essentially constantly creating brand new molecules.

The scientists have developed self-assembling solar cells that can be broken down and reassembled quickly by the subtraction or addition of a surfactant (similar to the dispersants used on the oil spill).  MIT News describe the system as being made up of:

When the surfactant is added, all of the components come apart.  When it's removed, the components spontaneously reassemble into a "rejuvenated" photocell.  After repeated tests where the cell is dis- and reassembled, there was no loss of efficiency.  The individual molecules have an efficiency of about 40 percent, around double current solar cells, but testing has been at low concentrations of these molecules, so the overall efficiency of the device was also low.

The scientists think that the individual molecules could theoretically hit 100 percent efficiency.  They are currently working to increase the concentration of the device and up the overall efficiency to something much greater.

via  MIT News

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The UK's Information Commissioner has reprimanded ISP TalkTalk over recent unpublicised trials of its anti-malware system.

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How SAP helped the City of Palo Alto reduce its carbon emissions
A few years ago, we had the local electric company do a home energy audit. Our 19th-century house was hard to heat, and as we suspected, the inspector found we didn’t have enough insulation. But our most cost-effective change turned out to be the purchase of a new refrigerator. You can’t manage what you don’t measure. Once you start looking at the right data, the results can lead you to solutions you hadn’t imagined.

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Tech stars join forces as Oracle's Larry Ellison brings in former HP boss Mark Hurd to replace Charles Phillips.

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Swimming robots could work in swarms to clean up oil spills
MIT researchers have used nanotechnology to develop a robot that can autonomously navigate across the surface of the ocean to clean up an oil spill.

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Sony has released a "minor" update for its PlayStation 3 that closes a loophole that allowed users to run pirated software.

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The developers behind the hotly anticipated Halo: Reach have taken another step aimed at cracking down on pirates.

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Part of collapsed computer games firm Realtime Worlds has been bought by an anonymous American company, administrators confirm.

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Customers of Orange and T-Mobile will soon be able to hop between the two mobile networks as the firms merge their networks.

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We are always intrigued by biomimetic technologies that find answers based in imitating naturally developed systems. Mechanical locomotion that imitates animal locomotion is particularly interesting. So we liked finding this video of a robotic snake being which is developed by a team at Carnegie Mellon University.

The motion of the snake-bot would allow it to maneuver through tighter spaces than either people or other mechanisms can easily move through. According to the researchers, "Snake robots can use their many internal degrees of freedom to thread through tightly packed volumes accessing locations that people and machinery otherwise cannot use." The flexibility and maneuverability of the snakebot allow it to move through a wide range of terrain types, and could be useful for a range of tasks from building maintenance to field research.

See the video after the jump...

Read more...

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ARM-based processor design useful for embedded devices
Apple's internally developed A4 chip could be implemented in new devices such as low power servers, TVs or even communications or entertainment boxes, if the company tries to expand the chip's footprint, analysts said.

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Google proposes settling a lawsuit over its Buzz social network, whilst regulators launch a review of the firm's US search practices.

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A mix of chemicals borrowed from plants with tiny tubes of carbon can spontaneously create tiny, self-repairing solar cells.

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Online marketplace Craigslist closes its US adult services listing following pressure from attorneys general and advocacy groups.

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