Astronomers didn’t expect to see a thin disk around the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy NGC 3147, some 130 million light-years away. They’re using Einstein’s theories of relativity to understand the velocities involved, and the intensity of black hole’s pull. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/black-hole-disk-shouldnt-exist-galaxy-ngc-3147…
Tag: grid
Wind Is Outpacing Coal As a Power Source In Texas For the First Time
A new report (XLSX) from the Electric Reliability Council of Texas says wind power has surpassed coal for the first time in the state. CNN reports: Wind has generated 22% of the state’s electrical needs this year. It just edged out coal, which provided 21% of the Lone Star State’s power, according to the Electrical Reliability Council of Texas, which manages…
Extreme U.S. Weather Brings Power Outages
“Ninety-four million people in parts of 23 states remain under excessive heat warnings and heat advisories on Sunday as one last day of scorching temperatures hits the Midwest and East Coast,” reports ABC News. “Sunday is the last day of oppressive heat, with many places in the Upper Midwest already feeling cooler Sunday morning after heat indices of 115 to 120…
Startup Aims To Tackle Grid Storage Problem With New Porous Silicon Battery
New submitter symgym writes: Recently out of stealth mode is a new battery technology that’s printed on silicon wafers (36 million “micro-batteries” machined into 12-inch silicon wafers). It can scale from small devices to large-scale grid storage and promises four times the energy density of lithium-ion batteries for half the price. There should also be no issues with fires caused by…
40 Years Later, Lessons From the Rise and Quick Decline of the First ‘Killer App’
It was the first killer app, the spark for Apple’s early success and a trigger for the broader PC boom that vaulted Microsoft to its central position in business computing. And within a few years, it was tech-industry roadkill. From a report: The story of VisiCalc, a humble spreadsheet program that set the tech world ablaze 40 years ago, has reverberated…
Giant Batteries and Cheap Solar Power Are Shoving Fossil Fuels Off the Grid
sciencehabit quotes a report from Science Magazine: This month, officials in Los Angeles, California, are expected to approve a deal that would make solar power cheaper than ever while also addressing its chief flaw: It works only when the sun shines. The deal calls for a huge solar farm backed up by one of the world’s largest batteries. It would provide…
Nissan Sees Leaf As Home Energy Source, Says Tesla Big Battery ‘Waste of Resources’
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Driven: Owning an electric car in Australia could become much more than just driving from A to B with a reduced carbon footprint, according to Nissan Australia which launched the new version of the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle in Melbourne on Wednesday. Nissan confirmed at the launch that the new Leaf, with a…
Safer Nuclear Reactors Are On the Way
Nuclear power plant manufacturers, such as Westinghouse and Framatome, are developing safer nuclear reactors that use so-called accident-tolerant fuels that are less likely to overheat — and if they do, will produce very little or no hydrogen. As Scientific American reports, commercial reactors use small pellets of uranium dioxide stacked inside long cylindrical rods made of zirconium alloy, which “allows the…
Senate Passes Cybersecurity Bill To Decrease Grid Digitization, Move Toward Manual Control
On June 27, the U.S. Senate passed a bipartisan cybersecurity bill that will study ways to replace automated systems with low-tech redundancies to protect the country’s electric grid from hackers. Called The Securing Energy Infrastructure Act (SEIA), the bill establishes a two-year pilot program identifying new security vulnerabilities and researching and testing solutions, including “analog and nondigital control systems.” The U.S…
Clean Electricity Overtaking Fossil Fuels In Britain
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: For the first time since the Industrial Revolution, Britain is obtaining more power from zero-carbon sources than fossil fuels. The milestone has been passed for the first five months of 2019. National Grid says clean energy has nudged ahead with 48% of generation, against 47% for coal and gas. The rest is…