National Renewable Energy Laboratory (DOD)
Best for batteries: Not too hot, not too cold
May 17, 2011 8:10 am | News | CommentsBefore Americans are able to flip the switch from gasoline to electricity, automakers need batteries for the next generation of electric vehicles that can deliver the range, performance, reliability, and safety drivers expect. NREL's Large-Volume Battery Calorimeter is a crucial tool to putting electric vehicles on the road.
Products from Government-sponsored Research
April 8, 2011 7:19 am | by Rita C. Peters | Articles | CommentsArgonne National Laboratory (Argonne, Ill.) has recently commercialized its lithium-rich composite cathode technology for lithium-ion batteries with licenses to GM, Envia, Toda Kogyo, LG Chem, and BASF.
Research Insights: National Renewable Energy Laboratory
April 8, 2011 6:39 am | Articles | CommentsNational Renewable Energy Laboratory comments on pressing topics.
Research Insights
April 8, 2011 6:08 am | by Rita C. Peters | Articles | CommentsGovernment lab executives comment on pressing topics.
Key plant traits yield more sugar for biofuels
March 29, 2011 5:24 am | News | CommentsNew clues about plant structure are helping researchers from the Department of Energy’s BioEnergy Science Center narrow down a large collection of poplar tree candidates and identify winners for future use in biofuel production.
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 8
December 10, 2010 8:44 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 8 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. What do you think the next great invention will be?
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 7
December 10, 2010 8:35 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 7 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. In your point of view, what are some of the greatest threats to R&D in the U.S. right now? Are these roadblocks experienced by your organization, and, if so, how are you dealing with them?
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 6
December 10, 2010 8:23 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 6 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. What specifics discoveries or breakthroughs has your organization made that embody the spirit of innovation? Please describe the support for these technologies your organization has had for sponsor or collaborators? Finally, please describe your funding situation.
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 5
December 10, 2010 8:04 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 5 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. Where do you see real innovations taking place, and what are the geographical locations or industries do you see benefiting from innovation?
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 4
December 10, 2010 7:54 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 4 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. Many R&D organizations are seeing a greater collaboration and partnership activity. Are you seeing this trend? If so, what are some of the forces behind it, and how is it affecting your organization?
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 3
December 10, 2010 7:36 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 3 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. Describe your organization’s staffing and recruiting challenges as you see them now.
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 2
December 10, 2010 7:06 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsPart 2 of R&D Magazine's 2010 executive roundtable. What one word would you use to describe the current state of industrial research?
New Economy, New Playbook: Part 1
December 10, 2010 6:48 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsToday’s economic and employment realities drive research organizations to develop new strategies.
Prefab solar collector achieves 25% efficiency
August 12, 2010 11:27 am | Award WinnersThe Amonix 7700 Solar Power Generator, developed by National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Amonix Inc. can supply 40% more energy than conventional fixed PV panels through the use of high-efficiency solar cells, concentrator Fresnel lenses, and smart controller and tracker technology.
Don’t let photons go to waste
August 11, 2010 7:14 am | Award WinnersNational Renewable Energy Laboratory scientists have invented the Black Silicon Nanocatalytic Wet-Chemical Etch, an antireflection etch process that turns silicon wafers black so they absorb 98% of solar radiation, boosting overall photovoltaic performance.
Govt. Labs See Bright Future, For Now
December 22, 2009 9:40 am | by Paul Livingstone | Articles | CommentsTo say that the outlook for government R&D laboratory executives is brighter for 2010 than 2009 would be a great understatement. At this time last year most laboratories were scrambling to adjust to a short-term financial upheaval brought about by an across-the-board freeze on budgets until March 2009.
Forget efficiency for now: solar chases $1 per watt
November 19, 2009 5:02 am | Blogs | CommentsConversion efficiency will always be intrinsic to the success of solar cells, but as one startup is showing us, low cost has its merits, too.
Inexpensive solar collector revamps cost structure
July 27, 2009 7:18 am | Award WinnersThe National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, Colo.) and SkyFuel Inc.'s (Arvada, Calif.) SkyTrough Parabolic Trough Solar Concentrating Collector was designed to overcome cost barriers of traditional solar cells by using a new reflector material: a weather-proof, low-cost, high-reflectance polymeric film instead of the traditional heavy, glass-based mirror.
Safety is buried in lithium battery
July 27, 2009 6:32 am | Award WinnersThe National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, Colo.) and Planar Energy Devices’ (Orlando, Fla.) PowerPlane UX combines a solid-state lithium battery with a buried-anode architecture—invented at the NREL—to form an intrinsically safe, rechargeable microbattery with an extremely long lifetime.
Better UV protection through time-lapse weathering
July 24, 2009 8:21 am | Award WinnersThe unique optical system design and innovative optical components of the UAWS deliver highly concentrated sunlight in the UV spectrum—the wavelength region that does by far the most damage to materials deployed outdoors.
Tough Times Ahead for Government Labs
November 30, 2008 7:00 pm | by Tim Studt | Articles | CommentsThe upcoming changes in government leadership will create temporary issues in the government’s network of research labs until new strategies are defined and funded.
Super solar cells
September 24, 2008 3:39 pm | Award WinnersThe IMM solar cell is a new class of multijunction solar cells that is the world-record holder for one-sun efficiency (40.8%). Two major innovations make this possible. The first is growing or depositing cell layers in an inverted sequence—from top to bottom—the reverse of the normal order. The second is using a transparent, compositionally graded transition layer to allow the growth of one subcell layer on another.
Practical PV printing
September 24, 2008 3:35 pm | Award WinnersOver the last three decades, researchers and others have envisioned a time when we might be able to do something as simple, fast, and inexpensive as constructing our houses and buildings with PV(photovoltaic)-coated materials to provide the electricity the buildings would need. That vision will soon be a reality with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (Golden, Colo.) and HelioVolt Corporation's (Austin, Texas) Hybrid CIGS (copper indium gallium deselenide), an innovative technology for the rapid production of high-quality, low-cost, thin-film CIGS solar cells using the inkjet printing or spraying of liquid precursor inks on substrates in air followed by a fast, energy-efficient printing process.
Hot to generate
August 31, 2007 8:00 pm | Award WinnersResearchers from Spectrolab, Inc. (Sylmar, Calif.) and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, Colo.) have collaborated to develop a High-Efficiency Metamorphic Multijunction Concentrator Solar Cell (HEMM) that is the first solar cell to surpass the 40% efficiency barrier. This new technology is a lattice-mismatched triple-junction device that can generate utility-scale electricity with ultra-high performance under high solar concentrations.
Optimizing silicon processing
August 31, 2005 8:00 pm | Award WinnersResearchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, Colo., in a joint effort with Sinton Consulting, Inc., Boulder, Colo., have developed the Sinton QSSPC Silicon Evaluation System, a system that quickly and accurately determines the quality of silicon starter material by measuring minority-carrier lifetimes, impurities, resistivity, and trapping.
