Pentagon going green, because it has to: officials

[RandomGuy]

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The US military's heavy dependence on fossil fuels is a dangerous vulnerability, officials said Wednesday as they made a fresh push to develop renewable energy solutions for the battlefield.

While an energy bill has stalled in Congress and statewide alternative energy initiatives have been put on ice in the midst of a bruising economic recession, senior military leaders are now warning that the armed forces' continued reliance on petroleum harms national security.

In the wake of a spate of deadly attacks on tankers carrying fuel to foreign troops in Afghanistan, Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, spoke of a "strategic imperative" for the US military to become more efficient and find new sources of energy.

The Department of Defense is burning through 300,000 barrels of oil a day, using more energy per soldier every year and its top import to Afghanistan is fossil fuels, the highest ranking US military officer said as he kicked off a Pentagon discussion on energy security.

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, has set a goal of having renewable energy account for 50 percent of power for the Navy and Marines by 2020.

"We're not going green just for green's sake. Energy reform and the new energy future aren't about politics or slogans," he said.

"It's about protecting the lives of our troops. It's about making our military better and more capable fighters. It's about making our country more secure and more independent. That's why we are doing this, that's why we have to change."

Officials speaking at Energy Awareness Month events launched by the federal government -- the nation's biggest energy consumer -- said getting access to more sources of renewable energy improved national security because too much oil consumed by the United States comes from volatile regions.

The cost of relying too heavily on fossil fuels, both in blood and treasure, is also a top concern for military planners.

A September 2009 Army study found that for every 24 convoys carrying fuel to bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, one soldier or civilian is killed.

Estimates vary on the cost of fuel.

While the US military sets a standard price for fuel at about three dollars, the Marine Corps once found the price of delivering that gallon to troops in the Afghan province of Helmand could reach up to 30 dollars. A 2001 Defense Science Board report said it could cost a whopping 400 dollars.

Earlier this month, attackers in Pakistan targeted fuel convoys headed for foreign military bases in Afghanistan, highlighting the vulnerability of the main land route for NATO supplies across the Torkham border through the Khyber Pass.

Scores of NATO vehicles were destroyed in gun and arson attacks as thousands of oil tankers and supply vehicles became stranded during an 11-day closure.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101013/pl_afp/puspoliticsmilitaryenergyenvironment

[DarrinS]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The New and Improved "Green" Navy


http://www.earthtechling.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/solar-powered-aequus.jpg

[MannyIsGod]

This is what happens when you paint yourself into the corner against obvious and necessary progress isn't it Darrin?

[RandomGuy]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The New and Improved "Green" Navy


http://www.earthtechling.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/solar-powered-aequus.jpg

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101027/ap_on_re_us/us_algae_fuels_us_navy

Military, gov't increase investment in algae fuels
By JASON DEAREN, Associated Press Jason Dearen, Associated Press – Wed Oct 27, 5:38 am ET
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. – The forest green algae bubbling in a stainless steel fermenting tank in a suburban warehouse may look like primordial pond scum, but it is a promising new source of domestically produced fuels being tested on the nation's jets and warships.

In a laboratory just a few steps away from the warehouse, white-coated scientists for a company called Solazyme are changing the genetic makeup of algae to construct a new generation of fuels.

These "bioengineered" algae are placed into tanks, where they get fat on sugar beets, switch grass or a host of other plants. The sun's energy, which is stored in the plants, is transformed by the hungry algae into oil, which can be refined into jet fuel, bio-diesel, cooking oil or even cosmetics.

While it may sound far-fetched, the U.S. Navy in September ordered more than 150,000 gallons of ship and jet fuel from Solazyme and the company received a $21.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy last year to build a new refinery in Riverside, Penn., to help push production to commercial levels.

"Most of the planet is producing some kind of plant matter, even in the oceans," said Jonathan Wolfson, the CEO and co-founder of Solazyme. "(Our) unique microbial conversion technology process allows algae to produce oil in standard industrial fermentation facilities quickly, efficiently and at commercial scale."

The U.S. military hopes to run 50 percent of its fleet on a mixture of renewable fuels and nuclear power by 2020. As part of this drive, the Department of Defense has been investing in companies like Solazyme to help jump-start the young industry.

The military as a whole uses more than 90 percent of the energy consumed by the federal government, officials said. The federal government uses about 2 percent of the energy consumed by the U.S.

The U.S. Navy has already tested Solazyme's algae fuels on part of its fleet, with promising results, and plans to have its entire non-nuclear fleet tested by the end of 2012.

Focusing on making fuels for the military was an easy choice for Solazyme — the biofuels market for passenger cars has taken a backseat to electric vehicles as the focus of the future consumer market.

However, billions of dollars of military aircraft and ships will not be replaced anytime soon, so finding a cleaner, domestically produced source of fuel compatible with the current generation of equipment is the best way to decrease reliance on foreign sources of oil.

"These alternative fuels provide some strategic advantages," said Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Navy for Energy Tom Hicks.

"We purchase fuels today from some parts of the world that are not very friendly to the U.S. Having sources to replace those unfriendly fuel barrels with domestically grown fuel barrels is (important)."

Fuels made from algae oil burn cleaner than fossil fuels and require no drilling to acquire, which means fewer greenhouse gas emissions from the beginning to the end of the fuel's life cycle. Wolfson said Solazyme's diesel fuels can reduces greenhouse gas emissions by more than 85 percent versus petroleum diesel, when you take into account the drilling, shipping and refining required in traditional fuel.

Currently, only about 1 percent of the fuels used by the Navy would be considered renewable by most standards. Sixteen percent of the Navy's energy and fuel needs are achieved through nuclear power, with the rest from traditional sources.

For the Navy to achieve its 50 percent goals alone, production of algae and other renewable fuels will have to increase exponentially. Hicks said the Navy will need 8 million barrels of renewable fuels in 2020 to achieve its goals.

The U.S. government's interest in algae fuels is nothing new. The first spike in attention to algae's potential for making oil spiked in the 1970s as a response to the energy crisis.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has been researching algae oils and fuels since the 1980s, but in the 1990s the effort was curtailed as petroleum prices dropped and algae fuels were considered too costly to compete.

However, this decade's rise in petroleum prices and an increased interest in moving the nation away from foreign sources of oil has brought algae back.

Initial efforts at converting algae to oil required large ponds, where algae were exposed to sunlight to create oil. By replacing sunlight with plants, which have already processed the sun's energy through photosynthesis, Solazyme does not need large ponds. The algae and plants put together in a vat and placed in a dark room will create oil faster and cheaper than ponds, Wolfson said.

Solazyme's use of plants to create its algae based fuels have raised some concerns from environmental groups. The sustainability of other biofuels like ethanol or bio-diesel encountered the same problem because each rely on a specific crop, such as corn or soy beans, which can take a lot of energy to grow.

"Solazyme still faces all of the same landscape challenges that traditional biofuels face," said Nathanael Greene, director of renewable energy policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"Today they are using sugar cane or beets, so they need the same plant matter that today's biofuels do."

CEO Wolfson said the company's research has shown that Solazyme's algae don't rely on a specific crop to make oil, which means a host of different plants can be used, providing a flexibility that other biofuel types do not.

"We've demonstrated that the process works, and you end up with exactly the same oil off of all of these different (plants)," Wolfson said.
-------------------------------------------------


I can see brigade level "bio-reactors".

The navy already makes use of nukes for larger ships, but could probably go hybrid solar/diesel for smaller ships to extend ranges.

You might not be able to fully displace the need to get fuel supplies into units, but you could reduce that need by a good margin.

[RandomGuy]

Monster power
Lithium-ion batteries start to take on the big stuff

ALMOST every portable device that uses electricity has benefited from the development of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. They hold more charge in a lighter package (lithium is the lightest metal) and they have boosted the performance of mobile phones, laptop computers, cameras and power tools, and made electric cars and even small electric aircraft practical. But there are some drawbacks. They need constant monitoring by external electronics to stop them charging and discharging too rapidly, for if they do the excess heat damages the battery and, in rare cases, can start a fire. Despite this, one company thinks lithium-ion batteries can now be made robust enough to power some really big, demanding kit—such as tugboats, dockside cranes and super-yachts.

Such marine applications are what got Corvus Energy, of Vancouver, interested in powerful lithium-ion batteries, but the firm is also looking into using them to run equipment like the chillers in delivery lorries and as backup for electrical generators. It has, for example, just won an order to provide a 2.2 megawatt-hour battery the size of a shipping container for use in tests to back up a Chinese coal-fired power station.

Corvus’s batteries are a lot meatier than the ones used in consumer products, but they are built in a similar way. The building blocks of lithium-ion batteries are individual cells. Each cell consists of two electrodes separated by an electrolyte, often a polymer gel. When the battery is being charged, lithium ions migrate from the positive electrode, which is made from a lithium-based material, through the electrolyte to the negative electrode, which is usually made of carbon. When the thing is discharged, the ions flow back and in the process cause a current to flow in an external circuit attached to the battery.

The positive electrodes are often made from lithium iron phosphate. Corvus, however, uses lithium nickel manganese cobalt (NMC) because it provides a greater energy density. The result, says Brent Perry, the company’s boss, is that the cells are 22% more powerful than ones that use iron phosphate. The cells are made for Corvus by Dow Kokam, a joint venture set up in 2009 by two American companies, Dow Chemical and Townsend Kokam, to produce advanced batteries.

Corvus assembles its cells into standard 6.2 kilowatt-hour modules, which can be fitted together to make batteries capable of storing several megawatt-hours of energy—more than 40 megawatt-hours is technically possible. (To compare, Nissan’s new electric car, the Leaf, comes with a 24 kilowatt-hour battery.) Each module is fitted with its own, personal electronic management system to optimise its charging and discharging rates. The result, says the company, is that a module can be charged from flat in as little as 30 minutes and is able to discharge its full 6.2 kilowatt-hours in just six minutes.

Making lithium-ion batteries capable of such feats is expensive. One of Corvus’s NMC modules costs about $9,300. A comparable lithium iron phosphate system would set you back around $7,500. But according to Mr Perry the higher price of NMC is more than compensated for by better performance, the ability to withstand harsh environments and an operating life at full capacity of around 20 years. And even when the batteries start to lose capacity, he suggests, they will have a usable afterlife as, for instance, buffers to store electricity produced by wind farms.

In many cases, using electric motors powered by batteries will be more efficient than running diesel engines in industrial equipment. In others, the two might act in concert. Tugboats, for example, are idle with their engines running for 60% of the time and operate at full power for only about 10% of the time. Adding a battery system to a harbour tug would allow it to be used as a hybrid, greatly reducing fuel and carbon-dioxide emissions. The tugboat could draw extra power from the battery when full-power surges were needed, and turn its diesel engines off altogether when it was idle, allowing the battery to power other equipment. It sounds like just the ticket for other demanding applications, like long-range high-performance electric cars.

http://www.economist.com/node/17352944

[RandomGuy]

High voltage
Transport: As electric cars make steady progress on land, battery- powered aircraft of various kinds are quietly taking to the air

Jun 10th 2010

RANDALL FISHMAN, a retired jeweller from New Jersey, is a keen pilot who has spent a lot of time hang-gliding over the Hudson river when he should have been working. Despite some 30 years’ experience as an aviator, he yearned to fly in a new and purer way. So in 2006 he converted a powered hang-glider, removing its small combustion engine and replacing it with a battery and an electric motor. He was not trying to be green. “I just did not like all the vibration and noise from a combustion engine,” he says. “With electric power it was like that dream you had as a kid—of soaring and flying silently.”

Mr Fishman is among a growing group of aviators in America, Europe and Asia who are flying under electric power. What began with hang-gliders and microlights has moved on to full-sized gliders and now two-seater aircraft. A dozen or so electric aircraft are expected to turn up at the Green Aviation Show, which will be held at Le Bourget, France, this month. And they will also be out in force at the Experimental Aircraft Association’s annual gathering at Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in July.


Fly high, fly silent


The idea of flying electric has lots going for it. An electric motor can deliver a huge amount of torque, or turning force, which is what gives electric cars such rapid acceleration, and is good for turning propellers, too. Electric motors do not need a gearbox, which reduces weight and mechanical complexity. This means less maintenance is required and there are fewer things to break—which is comforting in an aircraft. And if things do go wrong, there is no tank of fuel to rupture and explode.

The problem is that batteries tend to be heavy. What has changed the game are lithium-ion batteries, which are a lot lighter than other rechargeable batteries. Paul Robertson of the University of Cambridge’s engineering department, who has also converted hang-gliders to fly under electric power, calculates that the energy density of a lithium-ion battery is 0.15 kilowatt-hours per kilogram (kWh/kg). The equivalent figure for petrol is 12.5kWh/kg, and although only 30% of this energy is captured, the energy density is still 3.7kWh/kg, or 25 times as much as a battery. Even so, Dr Robertson says it is feasible to build electric aircraft—provided they have efficient wings to provide lots of lift.

In aerodynamic terms, lift is a function of weight, thrust and drag (air resistance). The aerofoil of a wing creates more lift than drag, but exactly how much depends on its design and the speed of the air passing over it. A light aircraft typically has a lift-to-drag ratio of around 10:1; for a hang-glider, the ratio is about 15:1. (This ratio also means that an unpowered hang-glider flying at a constant speed moves 15 metres forward for every one metre it descends.) Dr Robertson is working on a twin-engined electric microlight with a wingspan of 10 metres (33 feet) and a lift-to-drag ratio of 18:1. This means it requires an unusually small amount of thrust in order to stay airborne. He expects to be able to fly it for around 40 minutes, and longer with additional battery packs. Flying electric, says Dr Robertson, is a pleasantly quiet and low-cost way of taking to the air.

A modern sports glider, with long, slender wings, is the most aerodynamically efficient aircraft, with a lift-to-drag ratio of around 50:1. Lange Aviation, a glider manufacturer based in Zweibrücken, Germany, started developing a self-launching electric glider in 1996. Some gliders can launch themselves with a retractable propeller turned by a small combustion engine. The propeller is usually mounted on a mast behind the pilot and raised for take-off (or to gain more height or distance once airborne) and then lowered back inside the fuselage. The trouble is, says Axel Lange, the company’s founder, combustion engines are noisy, vibrate a lot and require plenty of maintenance.

Lange’s Antares 20E is a single-seat glider with a retractable propeller powered by a 40kW electric motor and 72 lithium-ion cells mounted in the leading edges of its wings. On a single charge it is capable of taking off and soaring to 3,000 metres, though the same amount of energy could also be used for multiple launches to a lower altitude, or for range-extension during a mostly unpowered flight. The Antares 20E is thought to be the first fully certified and commercially produced electric plane. So far 50 have been sold. Mr Lange is also supplying the power system to Schempp-Hirth, another German glider-maker, which is developing a two-seater version called the Arcus E.

Making sparks fly: Solar Impulse (top); Yuneec E430 (middle); Antares 20E (bottom); Antares DLR-H2 (on next page).Gliders are all very well, but the most exciting area of development is the construction of electric aircraft that are quite good at gliding but, like a small Cessna or Piper, can also be used for longer journeys. Mr Fishman, who went on to build a single-seat electric plane and then moved into the electric-aircraft business, is completing development of a two-seater called the ElectraFlyer-X. It will be able to fly for two hours and reach a top speed of 128kph (80mph). It can be recharged in around three hours from a built-in charger, has a 15-metre wingspan and a lift-to-drag ratio of around 30:1. The plan is to sell the ElectraFlyer-X in kit form for around $65,000; the batteries cost an extra $15,000. Regulations vary around the world, but in America and some other countries, home-built aircraft do not have to undergo the complex certification processes that commercial aircraft do, and can be flown as “experimental”.

Indeed, there are all kinds of rules in America and elsewhere for various forms of lightweight recreational aircraft. But very few were written with electric power in mind. That means it is slow and frustrating to obtain certification, says Tine Tomazic of Pipistral, a Slovenian maker of light aircraft, which has produced an electric version of its Taurus self-launching glider and has been granted permission to sell it in France. Mr Tomazic believes the lack of a universal certification process for electric aircraft is holding up a technology that is “mature and ready to go”.

Another company seeking certification is Yuneec. In January Tian Yu, the firm’s founder, became one of the first passengers to fly in his firm’s new two-seater E430 from the company’s airstrip, next to its factory and research centre near Shanghai. A sales office has been opened near London with plans to sell the aircraft for around $89,000, including batteries. Mr Yu was inspired by radio-controlled electric planes. He says the E430’s operating costs work out at just $5 an hour—about one tenth of those for a typical two-seater combustion-engine light aircraft. With a 13.8-metre wingspan and a 42kW electric motor, the E430 has a flying time of up to three hours.


Topping up the batteries

Some of the tricks being used by carmakers to make electric vehicles go farther on a single charge are being copied by aviators. Propellers can, for example, be used to “windmill” in a descending glide, thus working the motor as a generator and topping up the batteries. This is somewhat akin to capturing the kinetic energy of an electric car via regenerative braking—a feature found in the Toyota Prius. Similarly, hybrid aircraft could use a small combustion engine as a “range extender”, running at a constant speed and driving a generator to power the electric motor or top up the batteries. (The Chevy Volt, GM’s forthcoming electric car, uses this trick.) And thin-film solar panels can be applied to the wings to generate electricity—enough electricity, hopes Bertrand Piccard, a Swiss psychiatrist turned adventurer, to fly a solar-powered aircraft around the world.

Mr Piccard’s Solar Impulse has a wingspan of just over 63 metres, similar to that of a giant Airbus A340 airliner, but its carbon-fibre fuselage has only enough room for one pilot. The idea is that Solar Impulse will take off and fly under its own power using electricity from the 11,628 solar cells covering the upper surfaces of its wings and tailplane. With an average speed of 70kph, it will spend the day climbing as its lithium-polymer cells (which account for about a quarter of its 1,600kg weight) are recharged. It will then descend slowly under low power throughout the night to conserve energy. The idea is to circle the globe in five stages, each taking four or five days of continuous flight (which is about as much as a pilot could endure). A prototype flew in April and test flights will continue this year, culminating in a 36-hour flight. A second aircraft will then be built for the record attempt in 2012.

Another way to fly farther is to swap the batteries for hydrogen and use that in a fuel cell to produce electricity. Hydrogen is lighter than air, but compressing it, storing it in tanks and adding all the necessary equipment starts to tip the scales towards heavy again. Nevertheless, the German Aerospace Centre has converted an Antares 20E, the DLR-H2, to fly with a fuel cell. Boeing has also flown a Dimona motor glider with an electric motor powered by a fuel cell. And United Technologies, which makes Sikorsky helicopters, has flown a large model electric-helicopter powered by a hydrogen fuel cell.

The main reason for these projects is not to develop primary power sources for jet-turbine powered aircraft, but to build small, highly efficient fuel cells that could be used to make greener airliners. The fuel cells could be used as auxiliary power units to produce electricity when an aircraft is on the ground, for example, allowing its engines to be turned off. They could power electrically driven wheels, letting an aircraft taxi without using its main engines. Fuel cells are also being used to power unmanned surveillance drones. A small, fuel-cell powered electric helicopter might be possible, reckons David Parekh, director of United Technologies’ research centre. But for anything much bigger, the energy density of aviation fuel still looks to be unbeatable.

Perhaps that will always be the case. But it is worth remembering that just over a century ago, heavier-than-air flight seemed an impossible dream. The Wright brothers proved otherwise on December 17th 1903, making a series of short flights in a flimsy, single-propeller plane. It had a petrol engine producing 12 horsepower (8.9kW)—not much more than each of the four 6kW electric motors on Mr Piccard’s Solar Impulse. Wilbur Wright travelled just 260 metres on the longest flight that day; whereas Mr Piccard is off around the world, under electric power, using no fuel at all.

http://www.economist.com/node/16295620

[RandomGuy]

MIT develops new fast-charging battery technology ideal for automobiles

February With the world going mobile and billions of new devices requiring electrical storage, battery technology is almost certainly due for a renaissance in the near future and recent developments suggest MIT will play a role in the next significant battery technology. Less than a week ago, we reported on work being done by MIT's Laboratory for Electromagnetic and Electronic Systems (LEES) that could become the first technologically significant and economically viable alternative to conventional batteries in 200 years. Now a second new and highly promising battery technology is emerging from MIT - a new type of lithium battery that could become a cheaper alternative to the batteries that now power hybrid electric cars.

Until now, lithium batteries have not had the rapid charging capability or safety level needed for use in cars. Hybrid cars now run on nickel metal hydride batteries, which power an electric motor and can rapidly recharge while the car is decelerating or standing still.

But lithium nickel manganese oxide, described in a paper to be published in Science on Feb. 17, could revolutionize the hybrid car industry -- a sector that has "enormous growth potential," says Gerbrand Ceder, MIT professor of materials science and engineering, who led the project.

"The writing is on the wall. It's clearly happening," said Ceder, who said that a couple of companies are already interested in licensing the new lithium battery technology.

The new material is more stable (and thus safer) than lithium cobalt oxide batteries, which are used to power small electronic devices like cell phones, laptop computers, rechargeable personal digital assistants (PDAs) and such medical devices as pacemakers.

The small safety risk posed by lithium cobalt oxide is manageable in small devices but makes the material not viable for the larger batteries needed to run hybrid cars, Ceder said. Cobalt is also fairly expensive, he said.

The MIT team's new lithium battery contains manganese and nickel, which are cheaper than cobalt.

Scientists already knew that lithium nickel manganese oxide could store a lot of energy, but the material took too long to charge to be commercially useful. The MIT researchers set out to modify the material's structure to make it capable of charging and discharging more quickly.

Lithium nickel manganese oxide consists of layers of metal (nickel and manganese) separated from lithium layers by oxygen. The major problem with the compound was that the crystalline structure was too "disordered," meaning that the nickel and lithium were drawn to each other, interfering with the flow of lithium ions and slowing down the charging rate.

Lithium ions carry the battery's charge, so to maximize the speed at which the battery can charge and discharge, the researchers designed and synthesized a material with a very ordered crystalline structure, allowing lithium ions to freely flow between the metal layers.

A battery made from the new material can charge or discharge in about 10 minutes -- about 10 times faster than the unmodified lithium nickel manganese oxide. That brings it much closer to the timeframe needed for hybrid car batteries, Ceder said.

Before the material can be used commercially, the manufacturing process needs to be made less expensive, and a few other modifications will likely be necessary, Ceder said.

Other potential applications for the new lithium battery include power tools, electric bikes, and power backup for renewable energy sources.

The lead author on the research paper is Kisuk Kang, a graduate student in Ceder's lab. Ying Shirley Meng, a postdoctoral associate in materials science and engineering at MIT, and Julien Breger and Clare P. Grey of the State University of New York at Stony Brook are also authors on the paper.

The research was funded by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.


http://www.gizmag.com/go/5228/


Damn government research. Time to cut that shit out, so we can lower taxes.

[RandomGuy]

So let's sum up here.

Fast charging batteries, coupled with bio-reactors mean hybrid military vehicles, and an entire logistic train obviated. Little to no need to re-fuel units in the field, will start cutting the Pentagons 500,000 barrel a day habit.

The same technology can easily be applied to aircraft, especially drones. Long range bombers with cruise missles can be deployed using hybrid technology as well.

Same bio-reactor and solar hybrid for ships, and bam, you have finished building out a green military with some distinct advantages.

Military advances have driven civilian technology for centuries, and seem poised to continue doing that.