energy

France is installing turbines under the sea to exploit the renewable energy source that never ceases: the tides

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In the heart of the sea, where the powerful tidal currents move to the rhythm of lunar gravity, an energy revolution is being created that promises to transform the future of Europe. France has a continuous energy with a large -scale installation. The project. French company Normandie Hydroliennes has created The NH1 initiative to generate energy from sea currents. The installation will consist of four seniomotor submarine wind turbines that will be located in the Raz Blanchard, a sea step known for its currents. The great support. EU 2023 Innovation Fund He has subsidized to the project with 31.3 million euros. In this way, Europe expects to integrate tidal energy into the energy mix in France and Europe, adding a constant and predictable source to avoid Intermittent energy problems. The largest in Europe. Thus it will be thanks to the AR3000 turbines, which are considered The most powerful in the world in the mareomotor energy sector. Each turbine will have a 3MW power and a 24 -meter rotor diameter and, its advanced control system will constantly adjust the speed and angle of the blades to optimize the production of electricity. It should be added that the marine structure of these turbines allows them to be installed in just 20 minutes. Stable energy. An interesting small fact is that this type of renewable energy offers a stable and continuous supply, thanks to Natural forces as the lunar gravity that generates the tides and moves the oceans continuously. Energy sending. The energy generated by the turbines will be transported to the ground through a single export cable, which facilitates the connection of multiple turbines to transmit the electricity generated efficiently. This type of very demanded cables in Europe It has made effective The network connection between England and Denmark, among other projects. However, too It has been target of objectives In geopolitical conflicts. The occasional setback. Like any type of large -scale system, problems may appear. The company has indicated that the design of the project minimizes the environmental impact and reduces costs, but problems may arise due to the extreme marine conditions of the sea pass. As for the marine impact, problems may arise of local fauna and flora. Forecasts. From the French company have indicated which will provide 34 GWh per year to the France electricity network from 2028. In addition, they have estimated that this energy source has a potential of up to 100GW by 2050, supplying the electrical needs of 94 million homes throughout the continent. Image | Wiseed Xataka | Oceanic energy is the new promise of renewables. And Japan is already testing a gigantic turbine

Sweden has managed to be 100% recyclable and turn its waste into energy. Spain follows it closely

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More than 190 million tons annuls of urban waste are generated in Europe, according to The European Waste Association. This amount of garbage has increased greenhouse gas emissions, contributing to climate change. However, to deal with recycling is not enough, but some countries have found a way to generate energy. 100% recycled. One of those countries and precursor has been Sweden, which They have found In the incineration of waste an energy source, providing heating and electricity to 250,000 homes. Energy source. The data, provided by the Swedish state company VattenfallThey have indicated that only 1% of the trash ends in landfills; The rest becomes energy through the use of biomethane. Thanks to this energy source they can generate heating, electricity and even can be used as fuel for cars. In addition, the Swedish nation is importing the waste from other European countries to produce more energy. The process. Waste management in Sweden It is done In plants Waste-to-Energy (WTE). Once there they are divided into three categories. The first is the organic garbage that is transformed into biogas, compost and fertilizers. Then the plastics that end up recycling. Finally, all non -recyclable waste is incinerated at temperatures up to 850 ° C to generate electricity and heating. And in Spain? A recent report, which has had access Infobaesaid that the Spanish nation will not meet the waste management objectives established by 2025. In it they have stressed that the waste sector is responsible for 5% of greenhouse gas emissions. But are they taking action? The central government has proposed to implement A packaging system, in which citizens will receive a refund for recycling containers. For its part, the Valencian Community will reuse The waste and mud that left the Dana, and is studying the possibility of incinerating them to generate electricity. But there was not an ace under the sleeve … Spain has A great potential To develop the biomethane industry, a renewable gas similar to natural gas that can be stored and injected into the current network. However, as indicated Cecilia Carballo for Fifodiesthe country is behind other European countries in terms of facilities. However, there is a glimpse of hope if appropriate support is given, Spain could take advantage of its ability to produce up to 160 twh per year, which would cover 50% of the national natural gas demand. For this, a robust regulatory framework and policies that foster their development are necessary. Image | Flickr and Norbert Nagel Xataka | A strange source of energy is putting the unity of Europe in energy matters: manure

SMR reactors are the great promise of nuclear energy. The United States pilot project has failed

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Fission energy based on small modular reactors (SMR) is the great promise to complement renewables in the energy transition. But the failure of the first pilot project in the United States has highlighted the economic challenges that could stop its development. The advantages of SMR. With nuclear fusion energy in diapers, the promise of a safer, cheap and efficient fission nuclear excites political leaders and technological equally. SMRs have clear benefits regarding conventional fission reactors: they are Compact unitsdesigned to be manufactured in series; Therefore, in theory, they can be transported and assembled rapidly, adapting to different locations to integrate into the electricity grid together with intermittent sources, such as solar panels and wind turbines. The Nuscale case. With their compact size and modular design, SMRs should considerably reduce the cost and construction times of large nuclear reactors. However, reality proved to be more complicated For the first pilot project in the United States. The Nuscale project, developed by the Nuscale Power company for small Utah communities, was canceled at the end of 2023, when it was supposed to be inaugurated, due to its crazy cost overruns. It had been projected in 2015 with 12 reactors capable of generating 600 MW of power for 3,000 million dollars. By 2023, The planned capacity of the plant had been reduced to 462 MW and the estimated project costs had climbed up to 9.3 billion dollars. He became unfeasible. A scale problem. Despite their modular nature and the aspiration to produce them in series, SMRs are an emerging technology that does not have the advantages of the scale economy, as renewables do. A German report He revealed that SMRs remain the most expensive option against renewable technologies, whose costs continue to decrease This already happened with conventional nuclear energy. A 2014 study He revealed that 180 nuclear projects analyzed, 175 had exceeded their initial budget with an average overrun of 117%. The SMR can be expected, at least initially, also raise the cost per megavatio compared to other more settled options. Many interested. Despite these financial challenges,The industry sees potential in SMR. Giants like Google, Microsoft and Amazon They have announced agreements to acquire energy from future projects of modular reactors of companies such as Kairos Power and X-Energy. These investments, driven by the energy consumption of artificial intelligence, could provide the financial impulse that the industry needs to solve long -term economic problems, with the expectation that costs decrease as more projects are built. Image | Nuscale Power In Xataka | Europe does not want to lose the SMR nuclear reactors train. This is your formula to deploy them in 2030

Cosmologists are increasingly clear where the most energy particles in the universe come from

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Cosmic radiation bathes our solar system, and therefore also our planet, from the moment in which it was formed from A gigantic cloud of gas and dust does more than 4.5 billion years. During most of our history we have not been aware of its existence, so to find the first scientist who told us about the presence of a form of radiation that had to proceed from the outer space we must go back to 1912. The Austrian physicist Victor Franz HESS was the first to identify the origin of a form of radiation whose intensity increases with altitude and its abundance varies with latitude. To carry out his experiments he used probe balloons inside whose measurement devices expressly designed to measure the radiation present in the atmosphere. His valuable scientific findings were rewarded with several awards, among which is the Nobel Prize in Physics, which he shared with the American physicist Carl David Anderson in 1936. Many other scientists continued HESS’s research, and thanks to all of them we know today a little better A radiation form that transports to our planet very valuable information about the universe to which we belong. Kilonovas seem to be responsible for the most energy radiation Cosmic radiation is constituted by high -energy ionized atomic nuclei that move through space at a speed very close to that of light (which is approximately 300,000 km/s). That they are ionized indicates that they have acquired electric charge because they have been stripped of their electrons, but these atomic nuclei are made of the same matter that constitutes us and everything that surrounds us, a quality that reveals to some extent their origin. One of the most important characteristics of cosmic radiation is its essentially perfect isotropy. This parameter reflects that the rays arrive from all directions with the same frequency, which indicates that they must coexist simultaneously numerous sources capable of generating them. And this invites us to ask ourselves one more question: where cosmic radiation comes from. A good part of the cosmic rays we receive comes from outside our solar system. Of other stars An important part of the radiation that permeates the atmosphere of our planet comes from the sun, which, as we all know, is the closest star. However, it is not at all the only source of external radiation that reaches the earth. A good part of the cosmic rays we receive comes from outside our solar system. Of other stars. And travel through space with enormous energy until impacting with the atoms present in the upper layers of the atmosphere of our planet. What astrophysics did not know with certainty until very recently was the nature of the source that originates the most energy particles that we can find in the universe. But researchers from the University of New York have published a scientific study in Physical Review Letters in which they argue that this form of radiation proceeds with a high probability of kilonovaswhich are nothing other than the clash and fusion of two neutron stars to give rise to the formation of a black hole. “After six decades of effort it is likely that we have identified the origin of the mysterious most energy particles in the universe. This discovery provides a new tool to understand the most aggressive events of the universe: the fusion of two neutron stars to form a black hole, the process responsible for the creation of many precious and exotic elements, such as, for example, gold, platinum, uranium, iodine or xenon. Gennys R. Farrar points outPhysics professor and one of the people who sign the study. When they are close enough, gravity takes control and the two neutron stars are condemned to collide Neutron stars are not always lonely. Sometimes one of them is part of a binary system next to a “living” star, and if the appropriate conditions are given, the latter can also become a neutron star. In this scenario the binary system ends up being constituted by Two neutron stars that turn around the other. As time goes by, angular momentum is being lost, which causes their orbits to narrow and approach more and more. And when they are close enough, gravity takes control and the two neutron stars are condemned to collide. The main contribution made by Farrar and their research partners is their defense of the existence of a very close relationship between the energy of the most intense cosmic rays and their electric charge. Their conclusions have to be experimentally endorsed, but they represent a breath of fresh air in a field in which it is not easy to elaborate new knowledge. Image | Generated by Xataka with Dall-e More information | Physical Review Letters In Xataka | The great challenge of cosmology: what happened to the universe in its first moments to expand so fast

Scotland has a plan to overcome one of the great challenges of renewable energy: a storage megaplant

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Thanks to strong winds, Scotland has become an ideal place to install wind turbines. The data speak for themselves With an exponential increase In these almost 15 years. However, as a bagpipe, energy also goes like that air, so they have designed what will be the largest storage megabatism in Europe. And there is even more. European megabattery. The British company, Zenobē, has announced That the energy storage plant (Bess) has begun to operate in Blackhillock, Scotland. In addition, it is the first in the world that provides complete services of active and reactive energy. With a capacity of 300MW/600MWh at the moment it is placed as the largest in Europe. However, in the Scottish territory a struggle has opened to see who leads it. It is not there. In its ambition, Scotland will house the three energy storage systems in largest batteries in Europe After an investment of £ 800 million by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP). The projects are Coalburn 2 in South Lanarkshire and Devilla in FIFE, which will be added to Coalburn 1. Currently, the latter is under construction and with an operating date planned for October. Each battery will have a capacity of 500 megawatts, allowing total storage of 3 GW/h to supply 4.5 million homes. Coalburn 2 is expected to enter into operation between 2027 and 2028. The current largest on the continent. The Blackhillock plant has been launched in two phases: 200 MW of initial capacity began operating in March 2025, and phase 2 of 100 MW will be completed in 2026. This installation seeks to improve the reliability of the electrical system, taking advantage of wind energy and storing excess electricity in batteries for use at high demand. The first in the world. As a little above, the central in operation provides complete services of active and reactive energy. In other words, since the United Kingdom He said goodbye to his gas plants They have had to find another way to generate these services. This BlackHillock Bess plant provides them and you will ask what it is. On the one hand, active energy is what is used directly for electricity consumption, while reactive energy helps keep the network tension and guarantee its stability. In summary, it helps to balance the network, especially in times of fluctuations in the supply and demand of electricity. For this reason, they have also found their light bill will benefit. They already noticed that, independent of coal, They had to pay a high pricebut with the new storage system, they expect this to generate a positive impact. Let’s not forget this controversy. More than a year ago, It was discovered that several wind turbines were working with diesel generators for days. This happened because network infrastructure is not always ready to handle fluctuations in renewable energy generation and distribution. For this reason, having a storage system helps prevent this situation from being repeated. The challenge for Europe. The intermission of renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind, remains one of the biggest challenges globally. The phenomenon of “Dunkelflaute” Because of this situation and an aged network It positions the storage system in one of the first objectives of the European agenda. In addition, in these types of situations we must look for a solution that allows the integration of stable and accessible renewable generation. There are some European countries that have already begun to invest in energy storage such as the case of Finland or Spain. In the latter, it has been used by a more unique system as They are the reservoirs. Forecasts Scotland, with its renewable wind excess and its limited network infrastructure, has become a strategic point for energy storage. By 2030, it is estimated that 60% of the United Kingdom’s energy will be generated by the wind, with 31% from Scotland. However, these projects have generated some opposition in local communities, concerned about safety, noise pollution and landscape industrialization. Despite this, the Scottish government highlights the importance of these systems to reach zero net, according to collect the Financial Times. Image | Zenobē Xataka | A United Kingdom project has found the easiest way to maintain offshore wind farms: AI and submarine robots

Extremadura has decided to explore an energy “treasure” under his feet: rare earth deposits

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In recent days, we have heard a lot about “rare earths.” This last obsession of the US president, Donald Trump, has infected everyone and We have followed closely your insatiable search by different parts of the world as Greenland either Ukraine. However, this desire for the dominance of this element is due, among things, that China is the giant that It dominates it. However, to the surprise of many, Extremadura handles the hypothesis that houses a potential of four deposits of rare earths. Short. The Board of Extremadura granted a license In August 2024 to explore an area of ​​49,500 hectares, which will cover 20 municipalities of the Cáceres de los Ibores and scratch field. For its part, indications of the presence of rare earths have also been confirmed in the Badajoz area. An opening for Europe. This new finding marks a new path to Europe, since it needs its own reservations to reduce its dependence on third countries. Francisco Fernández, delegate of the College of Geologists of Extremadura (ICOG), He explained: “The geological characteristics of Extremadura are favorable to house rare earth deposits”, although it is still in a preliminary phase. However, it has not ruled out the possibility that in deposits already exploited from metals I can host these elements. In addition, more than five years ago there were previous work where there had been search for mining resources in the area. The work, entitled “Mining Resources of Extremadura, Rocks and Industrial Minerals”was commissioned by the Ministry for the Ecological Transition, and placed the deposits in the Pacenses localities of Bartrota and Burguillos del Cerro, and in a cacereña, Alía. Spain has potential. The deposits are not reduced only to Extremadura. Spain has a wide variety of elements to extract and different areas for it. In particular, rare earths can find them in Galicia, Gran Canaria, Almería, Ciudad Realamong other places. The fan that has been opened is very wide, but these deposits have in common not only the element, but their extraction seems to be complex. However, another thing that does not remain and we can affirm that we have is ingenuity. In Spain, the formula has been found to stop depending on other countries to obtain rare earths, and It is by recycling. From a recycling plant, valuable elements are recovered through a process of merger at high temperatures. Other critical minerals. Ester Boixereu, an expert in Mineral and Vocal Resources of ICOG, in an interview for Radio 5, has detailed That rare earths are a critical mineral, but that the list of critical minerals in turn is a “very long list of elements.” In addition, he added that rare earth minerals have a peculiarity, and are not difficult names, but do not form their own minerals. In other words, it is difficult to find a high concentration of these elements, since they are all together in a series of minerals. On the other hand, Extremadura has a lot to offer, as it has great potential for minerals and is also in plans to carry out a Great Lithium Mine. However, making a more general photograph, Spain He is highlighting In the EU as a power in other productions such as copper, wolframium, graphite, vanadium and cobalt, among others. A long road. Despite the potential, rare earth mining is not immediate or simple. Despite the advance in extraction technologies to significantly reduce the environmental impact, there are still concerns about past cases such as that of Aznalcóllar. For this reason, Spanish legislation requires rigorous environmental controls before authorizing any mining exploitation to ensure care of the environment. Image | Pexels Xataka | Europe has been trapped between two powers: US and Russia already discuss the controversial Nord Stream 2 on their own

China has discovered a source of energy so massive that potentially lasts 60,000 years. The bad news: is Torio

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China sits on a virtually unlimited energy reserve. Only the Bayan Obo mine, in the Interior Mongolia region, could contain about 1 million tons of Torio, sufficient to meet the country’s energy needs for 60,000 years. In interior Mongolia. While the world, with China at the head, looks for alternatives to fossil fuels to complement the intermittent supply of renewables, the answer could be resting under our feet. More specifically, under the ground of Interior Mongolia, the Autonomous Region of China that limits the north with Mongolia. According to South China Morning Posta newly declassified 2020 study has revealed that Bayan Obo’s site could contain enough Torio to supply all the energy needs of China for millennia. Virtually unlimited. Only five years of mining waste in the largest field of rare earths in Interior Mongolia contain both Torio and the demand for US homes for the next thousand years, according to the study of China Geological Review magazine that CMP quotes. If it is exploited to the fullest, Bayan Obo’s mining complex could produce 1 million tons of thorium. We would be talking about enough production to supply China for 60,000 years, the article suggests. Context. The thorium is a radioactive element that is estimated between three and four times more abundant than uranium in the earth’s crust. Until recently, the official figures placed the Chinese reserves around 100,000-300,000 tons, in themselves of the largest in the world. With a potential of 1 million tons, Bayan Obo would go from being the largest rare land mine on a virtually unlimited Torio source. Some geologists described the finding as a change of play that would give China the worldwide control of the production of the material. Not so fast. In most cases, the thorium is obtained as a byproduct in rare earth processing (specifically, monacite) or uranium mining and phosphates. China is already the main producer of rare earths, and therefore manages large amounts of minerals containing Torio. Why don’t you exploit it commercially on a large scale? Because the thorium is a radioactive residue of delicate management. Its extraction, either by acid or alkaline digestion of Monacita, or as a recovery of mining tails, complicates waste management with the use of alkaline acids or metals that generate toxic and radioactive wastewater. Perspectives These challenges are not insurmountable, but require a regulatory framework and an important investment for the thorium to be competitive in front of Uranium in the Obtaining safe nuclear energy. And especially in front of renewable sources, which have been cheaper thanks to the exponential growth of the Chinese supply chain. However, the thorium can end up being key to reducing fossil fuel dependence (after all, renewables need batteries to offer continuous supply), and China already has Torio reactor testslike the TMSR-LF1 of 2 MW and its future scaled 10 MW version that could be ready in 2030. If the results are positive, China could end up making the jump to the first 100 MW Torio nuclear power plants. Image | Google In Xataka | The reactors of molten salts and Torio are the nuclear response to solve our energy future (and silence criticism) In Xataka | The moment of the thorium: what if we do not have to wait for the merger to have much more safer nuclear energy?

Germany gets serious with nuclear fusion. His energy model shouts that this ‘Stellarator’ reactor works

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The experimental reactors of nuclear fusion of type Stellarator They represent a very solid alternative to Tokamakas ITER either JET. And they are not precisely the result of a recent investigation. In fact, both designs were designed During the 50s of the last century. He Stellarator It was designed by the American physicist Lyman Spitzer and exercised as the foundations on which the Plasma Physics Laboratory of Princeton University (USA) was built. The design TokamakHowever, it was devised by Soviet physicists igor Yevguénievich Tamm and Andréi DMítrievich Sájarov from the ideas proposed a few years before by his colleague Oleg Lavrentiev. Both reactors were conceived with the purpose of confine Stellarator He received great support from the scientific community in the West due to its enormous potential. However, when Soviet and American scientists published their results and compared them, they realized that Tokamak design performance It was one or two orders of magnitude better than that of Stellarator. From that moment on, this last design was largely marginalized. The most obvious difference between one and the other lies in its geometry, but it is enough to investigate both to realize that the reactors Stellarator They still have a lot to say. Proxima Fusion has put a date to its demonstration fusion plant Type reactors Tokamak They have a toroid form (or donut), and Stellarator They have a more complex geometry that resembles them to a twisted donut on itself. However, the fundamental difference between these two designs is that the reactors Tokamak They require that the magnetic fields that confine plasma be generated by coils and induced by plasma itself, while in the reactors Stellarator Everything is done with coils. There is no current within the plasma. This means, in short, that the latter are more complex and difficult to build. In February 2023, the Wendelstein 7-X reactor managed In Europe we have a type fusion reactor Stellarator extraordinarily promising: el Wendelstein 7-X. It is installed in one of the buildings that the Max Planck Institute has for Plasma Physics in Greifswald (Germany), and its construction concluded in 2015. The first tests carried out in this fusion reactor between 2015 and 2018 came out as planned, so in November of this last year An important moment arrived in his itinerary: It was necessary to modify it to install a water cooling system that was able to evacuate more effectively the residual thermal energy of the vacuum chamber walls, as well as a system that allowed the plasma to reach a higher temperature. The works that required these modifications concluded successfully in August 2022. And in February 2023 the Wendelstein 7-X reactor reached an important milestone: it managed to confine and stabilize the plasma for 8 uninterrupted minutes in which it delivered a total energy of 1.3 gigajultos. During the last two years everything learned in the development and the first tests carried out in this machine has been used by the German emerging company Proxima Fusion. In fact, its founders come from the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics. His work is being financed by Germany, the European Union, and also by several private entities of venture capital. And it’s going very well. In fact, fusion physicists and engineers have published a scientific article in Fusion Engineering and Design which has already been reviewed by pairs and in which they detail the design of Stellaris, its reactor prototype Stellarator commercial. Your next step requires Build a demonstration power plant From its design that should be ready in 2031. Yes, in just six years. I hope you get it. If Alpha, which is what this test power plant will be called, the commercial fusion energy will be a reality before the next decade is completed. This is the authentic purpose of next fusion. Image | Proxima Fusion More information | Fusion Engineering and Design In Xataka | In France, an alternative to Iter in Nuclear Fusion is being cooking: a commercial ‘Stellarator’ reactor

Immediate energy and instant load

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If there is something that surrounds us and what we cannot escape, that is plastic. Better or worseplastic is used for everything and we have abused so much that even Our semen is full of plastic. However, not all are the same and there is a very special one that was discovered in the 80s: the Poli (3.4-ethylendioxytiophen), or pedot, for abbreviation. We are talking about a special plastic because, although with limitations, it is a conductor of electricity. However, UCLA researchers have found The way to create a pedest supercadrator, and is something with potential to change energy storage and transmission of it. Pedot. Plastic is common in elements that need an electricity insulator. A simple example is that of loaders or plugs, whose coverage is a polymer. However, in the 80s a combination was discovered that allowed to create a conductor polymer of electricity. And he did it in normal environments, so the air and humidity did not take its toll. That is why it is used in many types of devices, such as OLED panelstactile screens, electrocromic elements, sensors, flexible conductive films or flexible solar panelseven experiments such as 2.0 brick with energy storage or a Electrical cultivation floor. Almost for everything. Pedot’s problem is that it transmits electricity well, but it is not good by storing it because it does not have the necessary surface to store large amounts of energy. Therefore, the bricks we talked about before gave to illuminate a LED (which requires an extremely low amount of electricity), not for much more. But of course, if the plastic was already revolutionized with the pedot, one could go one step further, right? Superpedot. That is what a chemical team from the University of California was asked, who sought to control the growth of the nanofibers of this polymer so that, in addition to conducting electricity, it can be stored. In something that UCLA chemists have baptized as “steam stage”, pedot’s nanofibers expand vertically. To get a more visual idea, it is as if it were a mantle of grass, which allows the surface of the material to be increased and, therefore, providing the polymer with better properties to store energy. And this growth has been achieved by adding a liquid formed by graphene oxide nanoparticles and ferric chloride on a graphite sheet. Once it is exposed to steam, that vertical polymer is formed. Plastic battery. By increasing the surface of the pedot, “we increase its ability enough to build a supercainer,” Comment Haher El-Kady, principal researcher of this project. It’s an achievement, it is clear, but … for what? Well, the idea is to create more efficient storage systems to address the problem of storage of renewable energy plants. It is something that, for example, is disrupting giant plans like China. Applications. And the great point in favor of this superpedot is that it can release energy accumulating electric charge on its surface. It is what allows you to load and download extremely fast, which makes it an ideal system for applications that require quickly released and storing it again, again, faster than a conventional battery. An example can be the flash of a camera, but also something much more practical for the energy transition of the automotive segment: regenerative braking systems in electric vehicles. A conventional battery stores and releases energy by slow chemical reactions, but this pedotal supercadrator can use that regenerative braking, for continuing with that example, to store a greater load of energy that, then, feed the wheels. Promising. The team states that its conductivity is 100 times greater than that of other commercial products based on Pedot, but also has a four -time surface, which facilitates that use as a supercainer. They also comment that it is very durable, supporting more than 70,000 load cycles, which makes them more interesting than traditional materials with greater wear in that constant load and discharge process. From the UCLA, they are convinced that “the use of pedot with graphene in supercaursors can help society meet their energy needs,” but we must continue investigating to check their properties in field work. And, yes, these supercaders are not a replacement of batteries, but a complement to applications that require a high loading and discharge speed. The battery remains the best commercial way to store that energy and the field of electric cars It is one in which superconductors can give a lot of play. One of the most interesting examples of use is the one that MIT engineers detailed a few years ago: convert roads into supercaders. Images | UCLA In Xataka | A “Super Cardpisator” to forget to load lamps forever: the idea of ​​Indian researchers

Madrid only produces 4.8% of the energy it consumes, but has found a place to solve it: the subsoil

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In 1980, a group of geologists set out to investigate the depths of Madrid and I did not speak of the Movebut discover if under its soil there was oil. The black gold fever had reached the Castilian plateau. However, what seemed like a dream of energy self -sufficiency ended up opening the door to unexpected energy. Today, that story continues to be written, but with a turn that nobody anticipated. The search. One of the first and most serious drilling attempts was the one made by Shell in 1980 in the well known as “El Pradillo-1” where no hydrocarbons were found. At that time the Spanish capital dreamed of becoming an oil city attentive to the prevalence of fossil fuel above other alternatives at that time not yet sufficiently exploited. More than 3,500 meters deep, engineers did not find oil but very valuable data about the subsoil temperature, which gave rise to the exploration of geothermal energy. Thus, They found a geothermal aquifer with temperatures between 70ºC and 90ºC at depths that range between 1,500 and 2,150 meters. Over the years, More perforations were performed In nearby areas, such as three songs, San Sebastián de los Reyes and Geomadrid-1, where multicapa aquifers found with temperatures to produce geothermal energy. Although exploitation has not yet been developed on a large scale, investigations continue, and this renewable resource is expected to be used in the future as an alternative energy source in Madrid. Among the pros of this discovery, intrinsic characteristics of this type of clean energy that are based on the use of heat stored in groundwater stand out to generate electricity and for homes. But why isn’t it exploited? Despite the discovery of a significant geothermal potential in the Madrid subsoil, the exploitation of this energy source has not yet developed on a large scale Due to several factors Among those that include, in the first place, the high cost of initial investigations and perforations, the infrastructure necessary to take advantage of the heat of the subsoil efficiently, such as the construction of geothermal plants and water reinjection systems. Energy comes from other communities. Madrid only produces 4.8% of the energy it consumes. This fact only represents the urgency that the Autonomous Community should have to resolve the scarce of alternatives to meet its domestic demand. At present, the ranquin between the communities that more depends on the energy of other areas. If the Madrid region will diversify its energy mix through the use of geothermal energy, not only would it increase its self -sufficiency, but also contribute to a more balanced energy model between the different autonomous communities with economic redundancies throughout the country. In addition, it would lead to rethinking The installation of data centersamong other alternatives, and would reduce Energy generation concentration In certain areas of the country, the pressure on energy transport and distribution infrastructures, which would benefit the entire national energy system by reducing the carbon footprint. The forecasts. With the progress of drilling technologies and improvements in thermal use systems, such as geothermal heat pumps, Madrid could already be able to begin to take advantage of their geothermal resources more efficiently. This is what the Basque Country has done with Geothermal rings at the university. Another possible alternative is to take an example to Iceland, which has turned geothermal energy at the base of its energy model, representing 66% of the total primary energy consumption of the country. Image | Unspash and Unspash Xataka | Huelva has been the forgotten industrial pole of Spain for decades. We are realizing the consequences

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