USC Scientists Create New Battery That’s Cheap, Clean, Rechargeable… and Organic

Image: USC professor Sri Narayan's research focuses on the fundamental and applied aspects of electrochemical energy conversion and storage to reduce the carbon footprint of energy use and by providing energy alternatives to fossil fuel, Wednesday, June 10, 2014 in Los Angeles. (USC Photo / Gus Ruelas)

Scientists at USC have developed a water-based organic battery that is long lasting, built from cheap, eco-friendly components.

The new battery – which uses no metals or toxic materials – is intended for use in power plants, where it can make the energy grid more resilient and efficient by creating a large-scale means to store energy for use as needed.

“The batteries last for about 5,000 recharge cycles, giving them an estimated 15-year lifespan,” said Sri Narayan, professor of chemistry at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and corresponding author of a paper describing the new batteries that was published online by the Journal of the Electrochemical Society on June 20. “Lithium ion batteries degrade after around 1,000 cycles, and cost 10 times more to manufacture.”

Narayan collaborated with Surya Prakash, Prakash, professor of chemistry and director of the USC Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute, as well as USC’s Bo Yang, Lena Hoober-Burkhardt, and Fang Wang.

“Such organic flow batteries will be game-changers for grid electrical energy storage in terms of simplicity, cost, reliability and sustainability,” said Prakash.

The batteries could pave the way for renewable energy sources to make up a greater share of the nation’s energy generation. Solar panels can only generate power when the sun’s shining, and wind turbines can only generate power when the wind blows. That inherent unreliability makes it difficult for power companies to rely on them to meet customer demand.

With batteries to store surplus energy and then dole it out as needed, that sporadic unreliability could cease to be such an issue.

“‘Mega-scale’ energy storage is a critical problem in the future of the renewable energy, requiring inexpensive and eco-friendly solutions,” Narayan said.

The new battery is based on a redox flow design – similar in design to a fuel cell, with two tanks of electroactive materials dissolved in water. The solutions are pumped into a cell containing a membrane between the two fluids with electrodes on either side, releasing energy.

The design has the advantage of decoupling power from energy. The tanks of electroactive materials can be made as large as needed – increasing total amount of energy the system can store – or the central cell can be tweaked to release that energy faster or slower, altering the amount of power (energy released over time) that the system can generate.

The team’s breakthrough centered around the electroactive materials. While previous battery designs have used metals or toxic chemicals, Narayan and Prakash wanted to find an organic compound that could be dissolved in water. Such a system would create a minimal impact on the environment, and would likely be cheap, they figured.

Through a combination of molecule design and trial-and-error, they found that certain naturally occurring quinones – oxidized organic compounds – fit the bill. Quinones are found in plants, fungi, bacteria, and some animals, and are involved in photosynthesis and cellular respiration.

“These are the types of molecules that nature uses for energy transfer,” Narayan said.

Currently, the quinones needed for the batteries are manufactured from naturally occurring hydrocarbons. In the future, the potential exists to derive them from carbon dioxide, Narayan said.

The team has filed several patents in regards to design of the battery, and next plans to build a larger scale version.

This research was funded by 

• the ARPA-E Open-FOA program (DE-AR0000337), 
• the University of Southern California, and 
• the Loker Hydrocarbon Research Institute.

ORIGINAL: USC

Contact: Robert Perkins at (213) 740-9226 or perkinsr@usc.edu

June 25, 2014

Dutch Polydome Could Be Used to Provide the Majority of NYC’s Food

Multidisciplinary design firm Except recently unveiled its Polydome concept for meeting the world’s skyrocketing agricultural demands. Using advanced greenhouse technology, meticulously planned crop groupings and absolutely no synthetic pesticides or fertilizers, the system can produce an abundant 10-15 lbs per square foot of vegetables, fish, and even honey. If grown atop rooftops, this bounty of food could even provide the majority of New York City’s food supply.

Unlike conventional monoculture greenhouses that produce only one crop, Polydome is a polyculture system with over 50 different crops growing at once interspersed among livestock and insects. This diversified system connects waste, water and energy flows enabling food production to be fully zero-waste.

Although the Polydome system uses recent advances in greenhouse technology such as integrated solar photovoltaics, Except’s greatest success was in designing optimal “crop clusters.” These are groups of plants, such as the Three Sisters, that use space, light and nutrients together in a way that maximizes productivity. The clusters are interchangeable, like Lego blocks, with many possible combinations that can be chosen to meet local food demand.

Depending on the plants and clusters chosen, Polydome systems can be entirely zero-waste. Inedible plant waste is reused as mulch, compost, and fish feed, while animal waste is used as natural fertilizer. Furthermore, mushroom cultivation, chickens and composing provide the high levels of carbon dioxide that plants thrive on, rather than generators or fossil fuel combustion.

To further maximize productivity, the system also uses stacked hydroponic crops. High profit crops such as strawberries and lettuces are suspended above soil crops, quickly growing in a hydroponic solution. This solution is loaded with nutrients from the wastewater of the Polydome’s fish aquaculture system.

Except suggests that their advanced greenhouse design could be coupled with restaurants, supermarkets and other food vendors. But as BrightFarms has demonstrated, a greenhouse like this could be planted atop any building, brightening the prospects of this concept reaching fruition.

+Except

ORIGINAL: Inhabitat

by Daniel Blaustein-Rejto, 

07/19/11

How to Provide Easy Access to Urban Agriculture in Over Populated Cities

Since the industrial age’s passing through the last century, the migration toward cities has increased headlong and keeps on going. According to statistics, in 2050 more than 80 percent of the urban population will be living in the urban areas (World Bank 2013). Considering the peak oil prices and the unbearable cost of gasoline lately, that increases the price of everything we consume because it all must be transported to our cities, giving rise to urban agriculture .

Do we have to rethink our lifestyle to adapt to the new urban conditions and be able to deal with all these factors that would continue to cause more problems? 
The main issue of the population in general is to produce enough food for all. How to do it if we all want to live in the city?

Plantagon urban greenhouse vertical farm

Urban Agriculture: A potential solution

The solution is called a Plantscraper!
This is a building exclusively designed for growing crops exactly as in agricultural fields, but in an urban environment — vertically — floor after floor. The strategy provides access to fresh production inside the urban limits, cutting the need for long-distance transportation and decreasing the price and time for delivery. The idea is not new, but it is finally becoming real as the construction of the first Plantscraper has already started in Sweden, in the heart of the city of Linkoping. The “urban farm,” 17 stories in height, will provide the city with a natural “farm market” in the city by the end of next year, when it is expected to be completed.

Plantagon has designed 3 ways of integrating farming in the city

First, by making the facade a productive greenhouse. Plantagon has designed a six-meter-deep greenhouse wrapping the building facade. The technology consists of conveyors carrying pots with plants and rotating them regularly on 90 degrees, so that they receive sunlight on all sides. This kind of facade provides, at the same time, enough light in the office spaces inside, but also a good shade and regulates the temperature.

Another example involves integrating the urban farm into existing buildings. They call it the Parasite, as it looks like one attached to the structure.

A concept image of the “vertical farm” by Plantagon

The third example is what the team believes can in the future become a common part of cities and suburbs, just like big supermarkets are now, and it’s the one under construction in Sweden.

How Does Urban Agriculture Work?

The innovative architecture of the building allows sunlight to all parts of the spirally organized space, covered by a glass sphere. The designers from Plantagon have won a Silver Stevie Award for being “the most innovative company of the year” in Europe. They have invented a self-sufficient system, which uses leftover heat, organic waste, and carbon dioxide to produce Biofuel. They also use excess heat generated during cold periods.

The production in the Plantscarper in Linkoping will happen in pots, which will be fit into trays that will be irrigated by funnels. All the wastewater will be collected and reused. The amount of pesticides and fertilizer will easily be controlled by an automatic system and, in this way, soil pollution will be avoided. Once planted, the trays will be transported by a special elevator to the top of the helix, where they will start their journey down the spiral structure as they grow. When they reach the ground floor, they will be ready to be automatically harvested. It makes all-year-round production easy, efficient, and compact.

Why Plantscrapers?

The smallest model of the Plantscraper will be able to feed about 10,000 people per year and will cost about $10 million to $20 million. But the trick is that it will be paid for in production.

Plantagon rendering

The Plantscraper is not only a way to produce food in crowded urban areas; it is a possible solution to other urban life conditions nowadays. But it is also a good example of multifunctional use of a building, including the waste materials in the productions process.

ORIGINAL: Land Architecture

by Yuliya Georgieva, Writer

Dec 5, 2013

Potable Water for All – More Than a Pipe Dream

ORIGINAL: OBR Review
by: Megan Barrett

15th July 2013

Many of us take for granted the availability of a clean glass of water. Yet even at the turn of the second millennium, approximately one billion people still did not have access to a sustainable source of potable water.[1] With water contamination and shortages most prevalent in the remote regions of developing countries (where money and technology can be limited), scientists are faced with a daunting challenge: to develop new ways of treating water to make it safe, using simple, locally sourced and inexpensive processes. Interestingly, the local environment may hold the key. Recent discoveries suggest that naturally occurring products, such as plant seeds and even tomato peel, may be used to help purify water.

Water is essential to our survival and health, with the human body being approximately 70% water. We use water in industry, to grow crops and cook; in sanitation; and for transportation purposes; yet, untreated water sources can contain many hidden threats including toxic heavy metals and dangerous pesticides. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), approximately 80% of illness in developing countries is known to be associated with contaminated drinking water.[2]

A number of methods for treating water currently exist, mostly involving the addition of chemical substances, such as chlorine or aluminium sulphate (alum), to contaminated bodies of water. The availability, cost and knowledge to ensure the correct dosage of such substances, however, is often lacking in remote communities.[2] Consequently, some scientists are looking for more natural solutions– ones potentially more accessible to people living away from areas of development.

Figure 1: Moringa oleifera pods

The Moringa oleifera (figure 1), a variety of plant found abundantly across rural India, Africa and Cambodia has drawn considerable attention in recent history. Parul Sharma and a team from the Faculty of Science at Dayalbagh Educational Institute, Dayalbagh investigated the ability of M. oleifera seed powder to remove cadmium, a dangerous heavy metal responsible for itai-itai disease, from water sources on a laboratory scale. Cadmium was labelled with a radioactive tracer so its levels could be tracked and the M. oleifera plant seeds were crushed to form a powder. Quite surprisingly, Sharma’s group found that cadmium levels were effectively reduced by the seed powder, suggesting this species of plant may be useful in remote and developing regions of the world to help reduce contamination of the local water supplies.[3]

A second ecologically friendly method of treating water has been developed by a group of scientists from Tshwane University of Technology, South Africa. Recently, Oranso Mahlangu and colleagues tested the ‘Silver Impregnated Porous Pot (SIPP) filter’, a clay-based filtering pot, as a tool to produce safe drinking water at a household level.[4] The SIPP filter is made using certain clay types that naturally remove contaminants (e.g. toxic heavy metals) by a process known as adsorption. This is when particles in a gas, liquid or dissolved solid bind to a surface, and is not to be confused with absorption: when a gas or fluid is taken into a solid (e.g. a sponge soaking up a puddle of water).

Figure 2: Diagram illustrating the set up of Mahlangu and colleagues ‘Silver Impregnated Porous Pot (SIPP) filter’

Mahlangu’s team filtered different river sources through the SIPP filter six times, for 3 hours at a time (figure 2). They then used a method known as atomic adsorption spectrophotometry (AAS) to analyse the level of metal contaminants (such as magnesium, iron and arsenic) in the water samples before and after filtration. What they found was remarkable: the SIPP filter reduced the amounts of magnesium and iron in the water samples by more than 50% to a level below the WHO’s acceptable maximum for these heavy metals (70–100micrograms per litre and 0.2–2micrograms per litre, respectively). Arsenic levels were also reduced, though unfortunately not to within the WHO’s stated guidelines, and the effectiveness of the SIPP filter did lessen with use.[4]

Figure 3: Peeling a tomato

Nevertheless, the search for an affordable and accessible way of acquiring potable water in remote parts of the world has continued. A few months ago, Ramakrishna Mallampati and Suresh Valiyaveettil from the University of Singapore investigated a somewhat unexpected tool for water purification— the tomato peel (figure 3).[5] Remarkably, this fruit‘s “biomembrane” (or cell-covering barrier) also acts as an adsorbent to the toxic heavy metals in polluted water and removes dangerous dyes and pesticides that may have contaminated a natural water source.

Mallampati and Valiyaveettil treated their local shop-bought tomato peels by boiling them, washing them with propanol (an alcohol that removes pigment, i.e. the red colour of the tomato) and drying them. These peels were then added to different solutions containing known water contaminants and were found to effectively lower the levels of chemicals such as arsenic, alcian blue and neutral red (two dyes) and phenol which is used in pesticides. Moreover, the effectiveness of the tomato peels to help remove the water pollutants did not seem to deteriorate over time, suggesting that the easily accessible and inexpensive tomato peel may be a useful material for treating drinking water.[5]

The availability of sustainable water sources for the more isolated communities around the world; (especially in developing countries) is a serious problem facing scientists and society today. Many of the current chemical processes for treating drinking water are not obtainable or affordable for remote populations, such as those in rural India or Sub-Saharan Africa. Yet scientists have made some bio-friendly breakthroughs. The recent findings that certain heavy metals and other contaminants toxic to human health can be reduced by natural materials, such as plant seeds, clay and tomato peel, is a significant achievement in the fight to provide safe potable water for all— a battle I will definitely be thinking about the next time I turn on my tap.

References

1. Rush EC. 2013. Water: neglected, unappreciated and under researched. Eur J Clin Nutr. 1-4. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23361160
2. Yongabi K, Lewis D, Harris P. 2012. Natural materials for sustainable water pollution management. In Prof Nuray Balkis (Ed). Water Pollution. InTech. http://www.intechopen.com/books/water-pollution
3. Sgarma R, Kumari P, Srivastava M, et al. 2006. Removal of cadmium from aqueous system by shelled Moringa oleifera Lam. seed powder. Bioresour Technol. 97:299-305. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15949938
4. Mahlangu O, Mamba B, Momba M. 2012. Efficiency of Silver Impregnated Porous Pot (SIPP) filters for the production of clean potable water. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 9:3014-3029. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23202668
5. Mallampati R, Valiyaweettil S. 2012. Application of tomato peel as an efficient adsorbent for water purification— alternative biotechnology? RSC Advances. 2:9914-9920. http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2012/ra/c2ra21108d

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