The Race of the Artificial Suns






The energy transformation of our times advances, in a discreet way but at a good pace. There are several races that seek to break with the current limits of technologies; they can become the dominant standard of the global energy sector in the future.

Recently, GE launched the Haliade-X, a 13 MW mega wind turbine that makes the 2.5 MW turbines in La Venta, Oaxaca pale. We can see the same with technological companies that seek to integrate perovskite into solar panels to make them more efficient; batteries with greater duration, cheaper and more compact, among many other events. But a technological race to which we should pay special attention is that of artificial suns.

But what is an artificial sun?

In reality it is an apparatus that uses high-temperature plasma superconducting technology and high magnetic fields to approach atomic fusion, similar to what happens inside a sun. To achieve this, the fusion fuel must be heated to temperatures of more than 200 million degrees Kelvin, where matter becomes plasma.

Before fusion occurs, the electric repulsion of the atomic nucleus allows the atoms to come physically close enough to fuse. Fusion, then, promises the use of this reaction to provide virtually unlimited, safe energy with zero greenhouse gas emissions.

Some countries that are in this race for the development of their own artificial suns are South Korea and China. In South Korea it is developed at the Korean Center for Advanced Tokamak Superconductivity Research of the Korean Fusion Institute, with support from Seoul National University and Columbia University of the United States. On November 24, 2020, this project maintained the continuous operation of plasma with an ionic temperature of more than 100 million degrees Celsius for 20 seconds. These 20 seconds represent a record not reached by other projects.

For its part, the China National Nuclear Corporation developed the HL-2M Tokamak that operates at temperatures of 150 million degrees Celsius and is located in the city of Chengdu, within the province of Sichuan. However, this is only the largest and most stable of the artificial suns that are developed in the country.

Another country that also advances in this race is France through the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor that is being built in Cadarache within the European country. The development will have an estimated cost of 24,000 million euros and it is expected to obtain its first plasma by 2025. It is estimated that the temperature of this project could be between 100 and 150 million degrees Celsius.

Unlike atomic fission nuclear plants, which we addressed in the past, and which face difficulties to continue advancing and keep their costs low, the development of artificial suns that use nuclear fusion has a more promising future that could become an important piece in the competition to achieve clean, cheap and reliable energy.

This could be fundamental to achieve objective seven of the Sustainable Development Goals, which refers to achieving total coverage of electricity in the world through modern, affordable, renewable and reliable sources. A synergy that, in combination with solar, wind, hydrogen and storage developments, could be the energy pillars of a future without greenhouse gas emissions.

This article was originally published by Business Insider México.
Date: January 12, 2021
Original Link: https://businessinsider.mx/carrera-sol-artificial-paul-alejandro-sanchez-opinion-energia-circular/ [offline]
Archived Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20211027225428/https://businessinsider.mx/carrera-sol-artificial-paul-alejandro-sanchez-opinion-energia-circular/ [Archived]

Wireless Electricity






Almost any road trip in Mexico, and perhaps in the world, is accompanied by large transmission lines. Those metal poles that carry electricity from power plants at high voltage to distribution substations —where the voltage is lowered— to take electricity to our homes through concrete or wooden poles, common in our neighborhoods, or, in some cases, through underground wiring.

The principle is simple, the electricity generated in large power plants travels long distances through cables, raising and lowering the electric voltage from the production center to the consumption center depending on the consumer. In your house everything comes from the domestic wiring that gives energy to lamps, blenders, televisions, videogame consoles, sound systems; hair dryer, razor, cellphone and others. Almost any device requires energy that flows through a cable.

Can you imagine that in this world of electric wiring there were wireless electricity? That by holding your cellphone in your hands near an energy source, it charged without cables; that just by holding a light bulb in your hands near the energy source it turned on or, that the television did not have cables to connect.

Well then, wireless electricity is real and can be produced by transferring electricity through the magnetic field.

Since the magnetic field is used, the flow that produces the primary energy must be of high density and high frequency, of which we will speak in another column. The success of developing this technology would imply the possibility of replacing cables as the main channels of energy flow.

Wireless electricity is not something new

This, however, is not new. It was part of the efforts that the scientist Nikola Tesla promoted in the decade of 1890, more than 130 years ago. For this he developed the so-called Tesla Coil, known in English as Tesla Coil, which is a transformer composed of a series of resonant electric circuits.

In the end, Tesla did not achieve a commercial advance of importance and lost JP Morgan’s financing. Since then, some efforts to continue the development of wireless electric energy transmission have been made, in more than 100 years, with very limited advances.

Clearly, the development of wireless transmission of electricity would have many advantages. Imagine that electric automobiles could recharge at every stop or without connecting them to a power outlet. Or being able to take electricity to remote places without having to build a wide infrastructure to attend a small demand. Or, even, to take renewable energy from remote places to important consumption centers.

However, many of the problems around transmitting and distributing electricity wirelessly are not solved and the advance is rather in a conceptual stage. The important thing, perhaps, is that as technology advances this is a field with great potential for application.

For now, wireless electricity technology has some applications inside homes on a smaller scale where disruptions are smaller and environments more controlled. At least, eventually, we could forget about cables to charge cellphones and laptops and perhaps also automobiles. Without a doubt, this would be a wonderful advance.

This article was originally published by Business Insider México.
Date: December 16, 2020
Original Link: https://businessinsider.mx/electricidad-inalambrica-opinion-energia-circular-paul-alejandro-sanchez/ [offline]
Archived Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20210517193607/https://businessinsider.mx/electricidad-inalambrica-opinion-energia-circular-paul-alejandro-sanchez/ [Archived]

The Hindenburg and Hydrogen






There was a time, before the Second World War, when air transport was dominated by zeppelins —which are basically self-propelled aerostats that remained in the air thanks to being filled with hydrogen, which, being lighter than oxygen, allowed aerostatic lift. Also known as dirigibles, zeppelins had as their basic principle a rigid structure that supported the walls of the balloon where the hydrogen was located.

Since the 1890s, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin began the development of the rigid dirigible that, finally, bore his name and was completed in 1900. The LZ-1, as the first zeppelin was called, measured 128 meters long.

The first airline in the world, DELAG, operated seven zeppelins in 1914. By then it had already transported almost 35,000 passengers on more than 1,500 commercial flights, accumulating more than 170,000 kilometers and more than 3,000 hours of travel. The First World War stopped the advance of commercial flights, since the German army took DELAG’s aircraft to use them in combat.

By the end of the war, the British developed their own zeppelins, with the R34 being the first to cross the Atlantic in July 1919. After several attempts, in 1931, DELAG —using the LZ-127 of the Zeppelin company— launched several national, regional and transatlantic routes; there was even a route between Germany and South America. At that time, zeppelins were far ahead of the capabilities of airplanes; by 1937, around 140 transatlantic trips and a complete trip around the world in an airship had been made.

However, in 1937 the future of zeppelins ended in tragedy with the Hindenburg disaster. On May 6, the German aircraft LZ-129 of the Hindenburg class caught fire in New Jersey, United States. Of the 97 people on board, among passengers and crew members, 35 died.

Although there are different theories regarding the cause of the tragedy, the dominant one indicates that a spark caused by static provoked a chain reaction that, due to the large amount of hydrogen inside the zeppelin, caused it to ignite and magnified the tragedy.

Hydrogen is highly flammable and is considered a high-power fuel that burns at high speed and with great force. It is normally used in industries that require high power, such as aerospace, particularly in rocket launches.

Despite the fact that incidents related to hydrogen, such as that of the Hindenburg, have had great relevance, in reality hydrogen as a fuel is potentially safer than petroleum derivatives such as gasoline and diesel. When these petroleum products spill and ignite, it is highly probable that the fire will last a considerable time. In contrast, in an accident related to hydrogen, it tends to disperse quickly, rising at a speed of 72 kilometers per hour into the atmosphere; in case of fire, the fire generated has less heat because of the absence of carbon, so it goes out quickly.

The lesson of the Hindenburg was not the colossal impact for the time derived from its fire, but rather that, in reality, it demonstrated that hydrogen, although more unstable, can be safer. In that sense, there remains an important area of opportunity before speaking of hydrogen service stations and hydrogen automobiles: increasing the safety associated with its storage and distribution, much of which has been learned thanks to the development of the conventional automobile industry.

This article was originally published by Business Insider México.
Date: December 9, 2020
Original Link: https://businessinsider.mx/hindenburg-accidentes-hidrogeno-combustible-opinion-energia-circular/ [offline]
Archived Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20240424101358/https://businessinsider.mx/hindenburg-accidentes-hidrogeno-combustible-opinion-energia-circular/ [Archived]