Adam Keiper, Managing Editor of The New Atlantis, points to the abstract of a presentation given at the 2004 Foresight Institute Conference on Advanced Nanotechnology on nanotechnology and energy efficiency.
The basic idea (from Keiper's blog) is this:
Too much of our fuel is wasted, and lost as heat. From this observation is derived the following principle: "The more spectacular a technology, the cruder it probably is. A truly mature technology will be as exciting as watching the grass grow." Thus, any technology that flames or spews smoke or shoots sparks or makes a lot of light is inefficient.
According to the abstract, applications of nanotechnology in the energy arena include:
Greatly increased energy efficiency:
- Non-thermal energy use. Burning a fuel wastes most of its energy. However, utilizing chemical energy without thermalizing it, as in fuel cells, requires molecular structuring.
- Focused processing. Highly specific catalysts that would generate only the desired product require nanostructuring.
- Distributed fabrication. Supplanting the massive importation of raw materials into conventional factories, and their re-export as finished products, by nanoscale fabrication from local materials will make the enormous present transportation infrastructure obsolete,.
Information-intensive energy extraction
- Diffuse sources. Cheap large-scale fabrication of nanostructured materials will lead to: direct use of solar power, via photovoltaics or artificial photosynthesis; thermoelectric materials to exploit small thermal gradients; piezoelectric materials to convert mechanical stress directly into electric potential. Distributed fabrication will make energy collection from diffuse sources practical, such as low-head hydropower, tidal currents and surf, "at wellhead" geothermal power.
- Efficient energy management applications include materials for passive energy management, such as "smart windows"; efficient energy conversion devices such as "white LEDs"; electrosynthesis for fuel manufacture and electricity storage; better electricity storage devices such as intercalation batteries and high-performance "ultracapacitors."
Superstrength materials.
- As materials having strengths approaching the limits set by chemical bonds become available, they will make transportation considerably more efficient through savings in vehicle mass.
The abstract also states that nanotechnology will have an application for molecular separation.
Element separation, whether for pollution control or resource extraction, is not intrinsically energy-intensive. The enormous energy costs of present-day pyrometallurgy largely result from the application of heat to force phase changes. Biosystems achieve their efficiencies by using direct molecular separation via specialized molecular machinery
Given the fact that one of the big obstacles standing in the way of hydrogen is creating the hydrogen fuel in the first place - i.e., separating it from oxygen in water - I wonder if nanotechnology might be part of where the answer lies for making it a mainstream and economically feasible possibility.
--
Recent Comments