Yet another day, yet another company (Dairy Queen, this time) realizes their computer security was breached, exposing customers’ names and credit card information. The brilliance of Apple Pay? None of that data would have been transmitted from the phone to the business in the first place. There would be no data to actually steal. Say bye-bye to traditional credit card terminals. Read about Dairy Queen’s data breach here.
Solar panel with integral battery
Is it a solar panel with integrated battery, or a battery with an integrated solar panel? No matter which way you look at it, this new technology being developed at Ohio State is pretty cool. This solar panel has a layer inside that acts as an energy storage medium. No separate charge controllers like an external battery would require. It’s just a solar panel that can continue to supply power once the sun goes down. Since it’s still in the research stage there’s no word on capacity and those details, but it’s a really neat idea that I hope takes off. Read more at ExtremeTech.
Old Energy vs Solar
The fight has begun. Solar and ‘old energy’ are increasingly butting heads, as the old business model breaks in the face of new distributed solar generation. Old energy is fighting back with the help of governments reducing incentives for distributed solar installations and even increasing fees for grid-tied systems. It seems to be slowing down solar adaption in areas, but I think this is just a temporary blip…once energy storage drops in price, people will have a viable solution for going entirely off-grid, and then Old Energy will be faced with the same infrastructure costs, yet with fewer customers to spread that cost over. The inevitable collapse of Old Energy will be fascinating to observe…I can’t wait! Read more at Business Insider.
Hypetex – Colored Carbon Fiber
Hypetex is a bew colored carbon fiber available in bright, brilliant colors. I’m not quite sure how they’ve managed to make black carbon into these colors, but am assuming that the carbon fiber strands are coated in color before being woven into traditional carbon fiber mats for production in any product.
Naturally, you can expect to see Hypetex appear in automotive applications where carbon fiber is already prized for its combination of light weight and stiffness. Cars are often left unpainted to show off the carbon fiber weave, or the weave contains other materials such as titanium threads to enhance its beauty (such as Pagani or the Koenigsegg Trevita). Chairs and other home furnishings are another possibility. The most interesting application I foresee though is personal electronics. Imagine the rear shell of your iPad being constructed from this material. Beautiful, rigid, lightweight…I think it’s only a matter of time before Apple moves away from aluminum and towards carbon fiber for their products…and this colored carbon fiber will only hasten that transition.
Solar City to Make Battery Backup Standard
Cool news…using batteries from the gigafactory Tesla is building outside of Reno, Solar City will be including battery backup systems in 100% of the rooftop solar systems they install within 5-10 years. This is significant partly because it helps illustrate the rapidly decreasing costs of both solar panels and battery backup systems, but also because it is likely to have a major impact on our current energy production and distribution systems…the old grid will become obsolete eventually, but the transition won’t be easy for the larger energy companies. Read more at climaterocks.com.