Solar Ship: A Hybrid Airship Concept

Hybrid technologies always give the benefit of both worlds. Various kinds of aircraft designs have their advantages and disadvantages. How about an aircraft that gives the benefit of a fixed wing aircraft and a helium airship, add to that the benefit of Zero carbon emission and Solar powered operation. A Canadian Company called Solar Ship Inc. has come with such an interesting concept.

What is Solar Airship?

The Solar Ship as its called is basically a hybrid airship. Just like any other airship it has an envelope to store helium which provides with Buoyancy/ lift to some extent, although the difference here is that unlike a normal Airship which completely relies for all its lift from the helium stored in something like a balloon on top, the solar ship on the other hand relies partly on the helium and partly on the aerodynamic lift created by the wings design. The airship is designed using  Advanced aerodynamics, synthetic textile laminates that give the aircraft the ability to store helium and at the same time have enough stiffness to provide a perfect aerodynamic (aero-foil) profile to act as wings.

Under normal conditions the solar airship would rely on the aerodynamic lift provided by the wing shape to give it more than half the lift required to get them off the ground. Additionally, the aircraft could also fly when filled with plain air. What this means is the aircraft will still be able to fly and land safely if there is any accidental damage that results in helium loss.

On top of the wings it has an array of highly efficient solar cells providing it with the ability to store electric energy  in batteries which can be used when required.

Gallium Nitride could make power electronics more efficient than silicon

Power electronics companies are absolutely in love with silicon. Silicon based power electronic components are pretty cheap to manufacture and also have a good life cycle, however they have a fair amount of problems too. They are bulky, run hot and a lot of energy is lost to keeping them cool thus making them less energy efficient. The world wants electronic to be smaller faster and more energy efficient.Well if you don't know what is power electronics in short these are devices that convert high voltages to lower voltages, convert AC supply to DC. Basically devices like battery chargers, power supply units in computer and inverters. Just look at the size of your laptop charger its like a brick.

Vibro-Wind: The new way for Wind Power

Despite so much wind energy around us the only way to harness this energy man has figured is by the use of wind turbine. With their advantages Wind turbines have a lot of disadvantages too, as a result they are not that popular. They are huge, require large space for mounting and ultimate they cost a lot. A lot of conservationist consider them as a danger for birds and sensitive natural habitats. So the only way to solve these problems is to find a new design approach and that's what Vibro-Wind is about.

Logitech’s Latest Innovation: Wireless Keyboard Powered by Solar Panel

Logitech the popular computer accessories manufacturer launched it's new light powered keyboard The 'Logitech Wireless Solar Keyboard K750'. The KeyBoard is quite innovative considering that light is very much available everywhere where people work on keyboards, this keyboard has an array of solar panels on the top part which harness the light energy falling on them to make it work.

Turbine light is the next step in street lighting

Street lighting is something which is important for drivers, but it is quite energy hungry as well. Its actually quit silly to use main stream energy  just for lighting the street/highways, so we had solar powered lights in place. Its proved to be quite successful, a lot of streets in the world do have solar lights but these lights fail to work when we have cloudy days and stuff like that. But technology is all about innovation and ideas; the US-based TAK Studio has come up with an ingenious concept of wind powered street lights,(that's old but wait) which will use the wind turbulence created from moving cars.

Sound cool isn't it!?

This is still a concept and is still under a lot of speculations as you might wonder and there are no solid details available yet. It will be featured at the Greener Gadget conference in New york City on the 25th of Feb. Probably a lot more details will be available then. If this gadget works well and is practically applicable it might just find a place on lots of highways across the world.

On a personal note; I'd say if we use a hybrid of solar and wind power it will probably be practically more applicable.

A lot more product which will be featured at Greener gadget conference, there is also a product by the name Go Mechanical charger made by an Indian a company by the name Elephant designs, its not as innovative but is a lot practical and is certainly pulling a lot of votes.  Visit  http://cea.mblast.com/ws/wfaward/rsp/vote2.asp to vote for your favorite.

Greener Plastic could come from mud.

Plastic is the most versatile material know to mankind. Its like embedded in our day to day life. In reality we cant imagine the world with out plastic. But as we know its a big problem to the environment. Its not degradable, Its made from crude oil which one day is going to vanish.

Scientist  all across the world are working on alternate ways to generate plastic having the same properties but greener in nature. One such Scientist is Dr Takuzo Aida from the University of Tokyo. He and his team mixed a a few grams of a clay into 100gms of water and added a little quantity of an organic molecular glue and sodium polyacrylate (thickening agent). This thickening agent tears apart the clay into thin sheets thus increasing the surface area and allowing the glue to hold better. This mixture formed is almost water but has a self holding capacity. But its not strong enough.

The strength in this material comes from the forces acting between the clay nanosheet and the glue. Its actually held together by Supra-molecular forces, which are hydrogen bonds. It also has a self healing property.

Mr Aida says that the strength of the material can be increased by increasing the quantities of clay, sodium polyacrylate and glue.

Lets hope it gives way to cleaner biodegradable plastic.

FloDesign high efficiency Wind Turbine

Alternative sources of energy is one of the hottest topic theses days. Wind energy is not being utilized to its full potential due to the lack of technology available in the field. The design of the wind turbine has been almost the same since historic times.

But a company by the name FloDesign based in Wilbraham, MA, USA. has come with a highly efficient wind turbine design. Traditional wind turbines are huge and require a lot of space and infrastructure for installation and transport. They have to be installed in remote areas away from people cause of safety concerns. They require huge and heavy gearboxes which require maintenance, Plus they are fragile and cannot bare high speed winds.They can only extract 50% of winds potential energy.

Lotus Omnivore Engine: 10% better fuel efficiency

Internal Combustion engines have been driving the world around for the last 100+ years. They are widely used because of their of their rugged construction and reliability to work in any condition, they still rule the world but, they are polluting and hence don’t seem to have a great future cause of the threat of global warming facing our planet. As a result a lot of companies are trying to refine the engine and develop new technologies.   Lotus Engineering has come up with a type of engine called the “Omnivore engine”. Lotus reviled the engine concept at the Geneva Motor show earlier this year. Now they seem to be running test trials and test show that the Engine achieves 10% better fuel economy compared to direct injection engines, with ultra low emissions. The engine takes advantage of electronic engine management technology; it can run on any liquid fuel hence the name Omnivore. 

The most interesting thing about this engine is that it has variable compression ratio(10:1to 40:1), it is achieved by a puck at the top of the cylinder which moves up and down thus affecting the volume/compression ratio of the engine. The Engine operates on a two stroke cycle and has homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI), As a result the engine does not require a spark plug just like a Diesel engine. Unlike 4 stroke where downsizing the engine increases its fuel efficiency here up sizing the engine improves fuel efficiency i.e. bigger the engine the better efficiency it has.
The prototype engine is a 500cc single cylinder mono-block engine. For practical application Lotus plans on developing a multi cylinder engines and is in talks with other companies. It is quite promising and as a result of it simple construction it will be cheaper to manufacture and thus we’ll have cheaper and more efficient greener cars in the future.

Lotus's True Hybrid Engine

What is a Hybrid engine??

Hybrid engine's are a special type of engines which have two sources of power.The most popular hybrid engines these days are gas electric. They combine the power of non polluting  electric motor with gas engine.The gas engine and brakes (regenerative braking) help keep the batteries charged.
Generally, in a full hybrid, the electric motor takes control of the car when its cruising, or when slowly accelerating. When more power is necessary , the gas engine comes in to give the acceleration expected.By giving the electric motor to take control hybrids are able to a get better fuel economy than their standard counterparts with only gas engines. But since a lot of the energy is conserved when the car is braking, hybrid cars  give better mileage in city driving. Which is just opposite case in gas cars.

Lotus's Hybrid Engine

Lotus has come up with a new engine which they will setup a in a hybrid vehicle. The  engine made its debut in a concept segment that was at the biggest motor show the Frankfurt Motor Show. The engine features include all aluminum 1.2L engine and has 3-cylinders, It will be used in the Range Extender unit.

The new series hybrids are being developed with special technology, it makes sense that one important part of the power train—the engine is been designed and engineered for the purpose, isnt’t it?

It’s a fact that most of the Hybrid cars make use of regular existing engines with adaptation and minor tweaks. As a result the efficiency is compromised. But lotus has considered this point and has made a special engine for its new Range extender unit. The engine weighs just around 56kg in mass which is really great thanks to its all aluminum body.

It has an optimized twin-valve port-fuel injection,combustion system that has high thermal efficiency, low fuel consumption, multi-fuel capability [methanol  or ethanol] and a 35KW peak output from a 1.2L ,low-cost architecture. This was said by Lotus Engineerings Technical Director Simon Wood  in an interview.


Technical specs of the Engine

General – 1.2 L, 2 valves,3-cylinder,SOHC

* Belt drive

* All aluminum

* Balance shaft

Bore and Stroke                       –   75.0 x 90.0(Millimeter)

Engines Compression ratio        –  10:1

Maximum power produced        –  35 KW (47 BHP) @ 3500 RPM

Maximum Speed of the Engine  – 3500 RPM 
Construction                           – Mono block with Exhaust Manifold Integrated

Fuel System                             – Lotus EMS,Port fuel injection system

Fuel                                        – methanol/ethanol

Weight                                    – 56 kg

The engine can runs either on alcohol-based fuels or gasoline. No word yet from Lotus on a possible production vehicle, Lotus also helped develop the Tesla Roadster's chassis and it builds on a contract basis in the past.