Round-the-world balloooning pioneer Bertrand Piccard unveiled his solar-powered aircraft in Switzerland on Friday, ready for another trend-setting circumnavigation of the globe powered solely by the sun.

The wasp-shaped prototype of Solar Impulse, with the wingspan of a jumbo jet, was rolled out before some 800 guests at an airfield near Zurich after six years of development.

Ten years after Piccard and Briton Brian Jones achieved the first non-stop flight around the globe in the Orbiter balloon, the Solar Impulse team are aiming to demonstrate that reliance on renewable energy is not a pipedream.

“If an aircraft is able to fly day and night without fuel, propelled solely by solar energy, let no one come and claim that it is impossible to do the same thing for motor vehicles, heating and air conditioning systems and computers,” Piccard said.

Although computer simulations have been tried out, the prototype HB-SIA will make its maiden test flight by the end of this year.

Its mission is to test the feasibility of a complete flight sequence through two days and one night, propelled only by solar energy, and pave the say for a second aircraft’s bid to fly around the world in five stages in 2012.

The Swiss adventurer — who is again joined by Jones — said the idea emerged after that 19 day hot air balloon trip, when Orbiter was partly kept aloft by fuel canisters even if the wind ensured its progress eastwards.

“That historic success could have turned sour because of the lack of fuel,” Piccard said at the Dubendorf airfield.

“That’s why we took the decision to to attempt a trip around the world without relying on fossil fuels,” he explained.

The seemingly flimsy carbon fibre concentrate of new technology has a 63.4 metre wingspan but weighs little more than a medium sized car.

Some 12,000 solar cells spread over its slender wings are meant to keep it aloft, fuelling four tiny ten horsepower electric motors and 400 kilogrammes of batteries that are, unusually, meant to keep it going overnight.

Wedged in the narrow cockpit, the lone pilot will also be helped to fly Solar Impulse by some novel control technology.

“Those are the wings of hope. They are immense, as is the challenge we have to meet in climate protection,” said Swiss Transport, Energy and Environment Minister Moritz Leunberger.

(Agencies)

source : SINA

This marked the first time that concentrating solar power (CSP) stations can provide environmentally-friendly power 24 hours a day, according to AORA’s CEO, Haim Fried.

AORA’s “Power Flower” station, named due to its unique yellow tulip design, consists of a field of 30 tracking mirrors (heliostats) situated on half an acre of land.

Each of the station’s 30 heliostats tracks the sun and reflects its rays towards the top of a 30 meter-high tower housing a special solar receiver along with a 100 kilowatt gas turbine.

The patented receiver uses the solar energy to heat air to a temperature of 1,000 degrees Celsius and directs this energy into the turbine, which converts the thermal energy into electric power that will be fed directly into the national grid.

Besides solar energy, the power station can also run on other alternative fuel, including bio-gas, bio-diesel and natural gas. So the station can produce electricity when sunlight is insufficient, such as at night or when it is cloudy.

source : SINA

Forget sending probe to Mars, the planet may come crashing right here to Earth if gravitational interactions substantially agitate its now-stable orbit.

Boffins Jacques Laskar and Mickael Gastineau of the Paris Observatory say results of a new computer model show a roughly one percent chance within the next five billion years that such a planetary apocalypse will happen.

The researchers simulated the most current data available on the interactions of solar system’s eight planets (with the edition of Pluto and Earth’s moon) over the course of five billion years — a point in which the sun is expected to swell into a red giant and swallow the inner planets.

Mercury is a particular nuisance to the stability of the solar system because its orbit is a slightly elongated ellipse, leaving it more vulnerable to being swayed by gravity of the large outer planets like Jupiter.

Out of 2,501 scenarios sequentially nudging Mercury’s orbit by only 0.38 millimeters, 25 lead to a large enough increase in the planet’s orbital eccentricity to allow collisions with Venus or the sun.

In one simulation, Mercury smashes into Venus about 1.76 billion years from now. In three others, Mercury falls into the sun.

In yet another, Mercury’s gravitational tug yanks Mars within 800 kilometers of Earth 3.34 billion years from now, causing the red planet to rip apart and shower Earth with debris.

Astronomers believe the solar system is about 4.6 billion years old.

(Agencies)

The only problem with this scenario is that all these seeming benefits come with a heavy price. In ecological terms, these cars that have taken us places are taking us nowhere. In fact, they seem to be a big part of the problem. Air pollution, noise pollution, carbon dioxide emissions, global warming, fossil fuel consumption at an alarming rate, mountains of metal and plastic scraps and waste products, even the paving of perfectly good earth to make roads and parking lots; these can all be attributed in part or in full to our very own cars. The solution? Walking, bicycles, mass-transportation, car pooling, and solar powered cars.

For some time now we have been using solar energy to power our calculators and toys, and in a larger scale our homes and factories, as well as our communication and navigation systems. Add to this list the solar powered cars. Solar energy is plentiful in our world. The third planet from the sun is indeed fortunate in its distance from the yellow dwarf star. Aside from life-giving light and heat, the sun can now be harnessed to provide us with electricity and power. This can be done with the aid of solar cells. The same principle that is used for solar electric systems for the homes and factories are used here. Solar cells are placed in solar panels that are in turn placed in the roof of specially made cars. These solar panels capture light energy from the sun and then convert them into electricity. The electricity is then coursed through the car’s battery. Silicon cells act like semiconductors in a photovoltaic system in the solar powered car.

Number of concerned scientists, inventors, and engineers are busy working on solutions to the earth’s major problems. One of the things that have been worked on is the search for alternative sources of energy. The wind, sun, and water have been harnesses, as well as biomass. These sustainable energy sources have been used to power factories, homes, and solar powered cars.

Some of these solar powered cars are already being used, wheeling silently and efficiently down our streets. They run on batteries powered by the sun’s energy, not on gasoline taken from the earth’s dwindling supply of fossil fuels. Solar powered cars run silent and smooth without noise pollution and without air pollution. The next step for this technological and ecological breakthrough is to figure out a way to produce them cheaply and efficiently. Affordable solar powered cars are sure to make a positive impact on the betterment of our world for future generations. Now that is magical.