Costs of building large-scale solar installations in India fell by 27 per cent in 2018
Around the globe, prices are falling and India is now producing the world’s cheapest solar power, according to an IRENA survey.
Technology & innovation
Germany tests its first ‘electric highway’ for trucks
Germany is testing a eHighway system with a hybrid truck receiving power from cables to keep it from using its combustion engine.
Scientists claim to have created an environmentally friendly alternative to Styrofoam
Scientists at Washington State University say they have developed an experimental foam made primarily from nanocrystals of cellulose – the most abundant plant material on earth.
Scientists invent 100% recyclable plastic
Scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have created a recyclable plastic that can be disassembled into its constituent parts and reassembled without loss of performance or quality.
Inexpensive ‘first-of-its-kind’ device can generate electricity from snowfall
UCLA researchers have developed a first-of-its-kind device that can generate electricity from falling snow. The inexpensive device scientists is small, thin, and flexible like a sheet of plastic.
Global cost of batteries drops 35% in 2018, paving the way for faster transition to low-carbon energy
The benchmark levelized cost of electricity, or LCOE, for lithium-ion batteries has fallen 35% to $187 per megawatt-hour since the first half of 2018.
Swiss startup Innolith claims 1000 Wh/kg battery technology breakthrough
1000 Wh/kg batteries would theoretically allow an electric car to travel 600 miles or more on a single charge.
Finnish innovation boosts EV battery recycling rate to over 80%
Present recycling solutions for EV batteries are not able to recover these scarce metals. To combat this, Fortum has a unique recovery process, involving chemical precipitation methodology that allows these minerals to be recovered and delivered to battery manufacturers to be reused in producing new batteries.
Lake Region Electric Cooperative in Minnesota launches first-of-its-kind solar-wind hybrid renewable energy plant
In GE’s integrated renewable energy system, electricity from the solar panels is funneled through the wind turbine converter. The overall capacity of the system will increase by 3% to 4%, while boosting annual production by up to 10%.
In ‘world first’, blind people in Scotland have vision restored thanks to stem cells
Thanks to the pioneering tissue transplant, eight patients with a common condition that destroys vision have had the affected area repaired –and two were able to read again after having severe macular degeneration.