Commercial silicon-based solar cells have made significant improvements in efficiency over the past decade, increasing from around 15% efficiency in 2015 to just shy of 25% in 2025.
Category: sustainability
ReElement Technologies uses Purdue tech in rare earth elements production critical to semiconductor manufacturing, other new-age technologies
Many essential products, from smartphones and magnets to electric vehicles, semiconductors and wind turbines, need rare earth metals to perform.
The rapidly growing demand for these critical products has led to increased need for domestic production of rare earth elements (REEs). However, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, the nation is still lagging globally behind countries such as China, with just over 14% of the world’s REE raw ore production and none of the world’s refining capacity. Purdue University is changing this harsh reality by using its patented rare earth technology in a partnership with Indiana-based ReElement Technologies in an effort to narrow the gap between the U.S. and the rest of the world in this critical industry.
Indy-area company builds on cutting-edge Purdue technology to help narrow the international gap in essential area.
Official Trailer
It’s the year 2073, and the worst fears of modern life have been realized. Surveillance drones fill the burnt orange skies and militarized police roam the wrecked streets, while survivors hide away underground, struggling to remember a free and hopeful existence. In this ingenious mixture of visionary science fiction and speculative nonfiction, Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Asif Kapadia (Amy) transports us to a future foreshadowed by the terrifying realities of our present moment. Two-time Academy Award® nominee Samantha Morton (In America, Sweet and Lowdown, Minority Report) plays a survivor besieged by nightmare visions of the past—a past that happens to be our present, visualized through contemporary footage interconnecting today’s global crises of authoritarianism, unchecked big tech, inequality, and global climate change. 2073 is an urgent, unshakable vision of a dystopic future that could very well be our own.
Scientists repurpose old solar panels to convert CO₂ exhaust into valuable chemicals
Centuries ago, alchemists worked furiously to convert the common metal lead to valuable gold. Today, chemists are repurposing discarded solar panels to create valuable organic compounds from carbon dioxide (CO2), a common greenhouse gas.
Significantly reducing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to mitigate the most devastating effects of climate change will require a large reduction in emissions as well as strategies designed to sequester emitted CO2 and other offending gases. While simply sequestering greenhouse gases would fulfill this goal, creating useful organic chemicals from waste CO2 is akin to generating valuable materials from trash.
A team of chemists from Yokohama National University, Electric Power Development Co., Ltd. and the Renewable Energy Research Center at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) recently decided to tackle two waste problems—excess CO2 emissions and decommissioned solar panels —in the pursuit of creating value-added organic chemicals. The team designed a study to determine if recycled components of discarded solar panels could be used to efficiently convert CO2 into useful, carbon-based compounds.
Three-layered material separates charges to boost green hydrogen production
The chemical reaction to produce hydrogen from water is several times more effective when using a combination of new materials in three layers, according to researchers at Linköping University in Sweden. Hydrogen produced from water is a promising renewable energy source—especially if the hydrogen is produced using sunlight.
Canadian refinery to reuse 100% of water with GE’s wastewater treatment technology
face_with_colon_three year 2024.
GE today announced that Federated Co-Operatives Limited’s Co-op Refinery Complex in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, is installing GE’s advanced water recycling technology for a wastewater improvement project that will enable the refinery to clean100 percent of its wastewater on-site. Once fully operationally, the Co-op Refinery Complex will be the only refinery in North America to recycle all of its wastewater for steam production, which is used for heating, hydrogen production, to power equipment and for cooling towers.
“Water is a precious resource and our wastewater improvement project allows us to be efficient and sustainable by recovering every drop of water. With GE’s technology, the Co-op Refinery Complex will clean and recycle all of its wastewater in a socially responsible and environmentally sound way to conserve water for Regina and the entire province of Saskatchewan,” said Gil Le Dressay, vice president, refinery operations, Federated Co-Operatives Limited.
Several years ago the refinery expanded its operations to produce 30,000 more barrels of oil per day (BPD) taking it from 100,000 BPD to a 130,000-BPD facility, which increased its water usage. The refinery’s current water source is a blend of well water and city water, and restrictions on water use mandated that the Co-op Refinery Complex had to find a new source of water. GE offered a solution combining ZeeWeed* membrane bioreactor (MBR) technology and a high-efficiency reverse osmosis (HERO• system to recycle and reuse 2 million gallons of wastewater a day. In addition to the water reuse solution, GE provides the refinery with wastewater specialty chemicals and monitoring solutions to provide system optimization.
THIS Problem Prevents a MERGER Between X.AI and Tesla Stock
Questions to inspire discussion.
🏢 Q: What are Elon Musk’s current ownership stakes in Tesla and XAI? A: Musk owns 55% of XAI and 12.9% of Tesla, with potential to increase his Tesla ownership to 20% through a compensation package.
💰 Q: How do the valuations of XAI and Tesla compare? A: XAI’s valuation is expected to reach $200 billion in the next round, while Tesla’s valuation is approximately $1 trillion.
Potential Conflicts and Risks.
⚖️ Q: What conflict of interest exists for Elon Musk in a potential merger? A: Musk’s significant ownership in both companies creates a conflict of interest in merger discussions, as he must balance his interests in XAI (55% ownership) and Tesla (12.9–20% ownership).
🔒 Q: What control risk does Elon Musk face with Tesla? A: Musk currently lacks the 25% voting control needed for major decisions in Tesla, presenting a non-trivial control risk that could be mitigated through Tesla’s investment in XAI. ## Key Insights.
This AI-powered lab runs itself—and discovers new materials 10x faster
A new leap in lab automation is shaking up how scientists discover materials. By switching from slow, traditional methods to real-time, dynamic chemical experiments, researchers have created a self-driving lab that collects 10 times more data, drastically accelerating progress. This new system not only saves time and resources but also paves the way for faster breakthroughs in clean energy, electronics, and sustainability—bringing us closer to a future where lab discoveries happen in days, not years.