First citywide energy audit

An energy audit – an assessment of how well a home holds in its heat or cooling – typically takes hours for just one house. But MIT Professor Sanjay Sarma’s new method can conduct an energy audit of a building in only seconds. His team uses special heat-sensitive cameras mounted on a car.

(Image Credit: Long Phan)

Source: EarthSky

Energy-efficient programming

A University of Washington project sees a role for programmers to reduce the energy appetite of the ones and zeroes in the code itself. Researchers have created a system, called EnerJ, that reduces energy consumption in simulations by up to 50 percent, and has the potential to cut energy by as much as 90 percent.

Source: Code green: Energy-efficient programming to curb computers’ power use

Green GPS calculates most fuel-efficient route

A new software interface reduces energy consumption in transportation systems.

Green GPS, developed by computer scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, works like general GPS navigation, except that in addition to calculating the shortest and fastest routes, it also projects the most fuel-efficient route.

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Putting wireless power to work

Sandra Upson, in "IEEE Spectrum", June 2008
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/jun08/6254

This article discusses works-in-progress to allow smart sensors to harvest their energy from radio-frequency energy.

"The concept was once dismissed as unfeasible because of the rapid dissipation of electromagnetic waves as they travel from their source. But even microwatts, (...) can be enough to power some sensors (...)."

"Typically, wireless sensors are designed to observe environments in a more flexible way than wired ones can. (...)"

"(...) A sensor's power supply is the most confounding problem. Each option has its limitations: a battery alone has a short lifetime, and solar cells (...) can't soak up photons from inside an airplane's wing."

"The technology for harvesting wireless power is essentially based on (...) RFID. A transmitter can both recharge and query RFID-based sensors."

According to the article, a key development is a steady growth in tag communication distances (now up to 100 meters and increasing). One essential problem remains: a reliable source of RF energy is not always available. The solution might be hybrid power supplies, where a sensor can make good use of different tentative power sources, like temperature changes or mechanical movements.

A solar power revolution ahead?

Anne Trafton, in MIT News

MIT researchers have hit upon a simple, inexpensive, highly efficient process for storing solar energy. The following diagram explains the concept:


Read more about it on: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/oxygen-0731.html