In search of implantable devices appropriate for medical treatment applications such as the cardiac defibrillator and the deep brain stimulator, researchers are requiring a power source that is rechargeable in vivo, flexible, and biocompatible. Learning from how an electric eel can generate its own electricity – 600 volts and 1 ampere of electric current – as a defense against its enemies, an energy source that is self-charging, biocompatible, and environment-friendly has been developed by a group of researchers from Switzerland and the United States. [ 487 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/electric-eel-inspires-new-…/

“If you have a new solar cell technology, you can see where your technology might be able to outcompete commercial silicon solar cells,” explains Tonio Buonassisi, Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Massachusetts’s Institute of Technology (MIT), pertaining to the significance of their newly developed open-source tool published in the journal Joule last December 13. “We’ve explored the convergence of two things, location and technology, to come up with a framework for predicting solar panel energy output,” Buonassisi describes of his team’s work. [ 378 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/mits-open-source-tool-pred…/

Being the most expensive part of electric vehicles, batteries are the key to the affordability of green vehicles, and the latter’s sales and technological trends. In the past few years, lithium-ion batteries were decreasing at a fast rate, averaging 12 percent per year, making the mass production of green vehicles cheaper. However, the South Korean automaker Hyundai Motor has recently expressed their projection that this decline in battery prices that helped the electric vehicle technology grow rapidly will eventually reach a plateau, probably starting the year 2020. [ 260 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/ev-battery-prices-stop-dec…/

It is a huge biomass compared to what humans run through in fish and meat per year, a mere 400 tons, or half the spider´s insects yearly ration. These unique organisms, otherwise consider pests themselves, would bear dire biological implications were they to disappear. Just think of nature´s work of replacing spiders with other predators, and humans trying to deal with an 800 million tons surplus of crawling insects including roaches, flies, and other invertebrates part of which would show up in homes uninvited. [ 329 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/spiders-consume-astonishin…/

Created in 2009 by an unknown person, the virtual money generated and traded electronically called bitcoin introduced to investors and businessmen a method that allows transactions which exclude banks and government. This meant that money transfers can be done very quickly without paying bank fees and taxes. Not only that, but bitcoin owners are also protected with anonymity as they are only represented with ID codes. [ 592 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/bitcoin-energy-consuming-2…/

To encourage usage of electric vehicles, Germany has launched just last year an incentive scheme worth about 1 billion euros, which is partly financed by the country’s car industry. With this subsidy scheme, those who purchase all-electric vehicles can avail a discount of 4,000 euros ($4,755), while those who select plug-in hybrid cars can have a discount of 3,000 euros ($3,566). [ 233 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/tesla-subsidies-slashed-ge…/

Toyota plans to go all out for its 100% sustainable new project to build the world’s first megawatt-scale carbonate fuel cell power generation plant, with a hydrogen fueling station. Dubbed The Tri-Gen, the facility is expected to begin services in 2020 and provide water, electricity, and hydrogen for Toyota from bio-waste, for their operations at the port of Long Beach, California. [ 259 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/toyota-tri-gen-20171211/

Upon acknowledging that at present, the improvement of solar cell’s efficiency has already reached its maximum with only gradient increases if any, the two physicists from the University of Warwick, Coventry took the works of Einstein and Tesla as inspiration and came up with a new design of solar panels – double-glazing. The proposed solar panel design of Dr. Gavin Bell and Dr. [ 289 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/double-glazed-solar-panels…/

The amount of solar energy that a solar cell can convert into electrical energy is presently limited by its bandgap, such that only the photons with higher energies can be converted, leaving photons with lower energies useless. This limit is also called the Shockley-Queisser limit and in order to address such hindrance in achieving optimum solar efficiency, photon upconversion was created. [ 286 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/solvents-increasing-solar-…/

A partnership is in the making to positively impact the automobile industry as a whole, and on the alternative fuel vehicle in particular. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA), Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. (abbreviated as FCA) is an Italian-American Corporation and currently the world’s Eighth largest automaker. The group was established in late 2014 by merging Fiat and Chrysler into a new holding company, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (with headquarters in London). [ 325 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/fiat-chrysler-hyundai-buil…/

In the beginning, biofuel or ethanol is made from food products such as corn, classified as first generation biofuel. To avoid competition with food supply and thus avoid food shortage, agricultural wastes called biomass are then used in ethanol production. This second generation biofuel has a limitation though in its conversion efficiency, in terms of energy, time, and raw materials consumed, and yield. [ 291 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/japan-develops-novel-solve…/

Small private businesses that aim to fight climate change and prevent more environmental destructions are flourishing rapidly in Asia. Globally, the current worth of these environment-friendly businesses has reached over $1 trillion, according to a report by the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corp (IFC). This suggests that there are a lot of opportunities in fighting climate change and most importantly, this means that there are a lot of entrepreneurs that are more than willing to splurge funds to invest for a greener and cleaner future. [ 336 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/eco-friendly-businesses-gr…/

Nitrogen oxides such as NOx is along with COx a major constituent of tailpipe emissions, and a study of European historical data suggests the proportion of NO2 in NOx emissions is smaller than previously thought. Stringent Legislation Legislation in Europe sets emission standards according to pollutant level inventories. These limits, in turn, have an impact on the industry in general and in transportation specifically, in the production management strategies and the engineering control devices to minimize emissions. [ 225 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/europe-no2-levels-lower-20…/

“I believe NIO will make a car that is not only good in terms of performance but also in software. But quantity will not be the driving force behind the electric vehicle industry, it’s the user experience. No matter the product hardware, nor the software, the user experience must be the focus.” This is the business concept of Izzy Zhu, the vice president of NIO, a three-year-old Chinese electric car manufacturer previously known as NextEv. [ 300 more words ]

https://www.greenoptimistic.com/chinese-ev-maker-nio-wants…/