Jesse Labbé: Innovating biotechnology for energy, security and health
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers developed and demonstrated algorithm-based controls for a hybrid electric bus that yielded up to 30% energy savings compared with existing controls.
Nearly a billion acres of land in the United States is dedicated to agriculture, producing more than a trillion dollars of food products to feed the country and the world. Those same agricultural processes, however, also produced an estimated 700 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2018, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
As the United States transitions to clean energy, the country has an ambitious goal: cut carbon dioxide emissions in half by the year 2030, if not before. One of the solutions to help meet this challenge is found at ORNL as part of the Better Plants Program.
Scientists at ORNL have discovered a single gene that simultaneously boosts plant growth and tolerance for stresses such as drought and salt, all while tackling the root cause of climate change by enabling plants to pull more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
When Kashif Nawaz looks at a satellite map of the U.S., he sees millions of buildings that could hold a potential solution for the capture of carbon dioxide, a plentiful gas that can be harmful when excessive amounts are released into the atmosphere, raising the Earth’s temperature.
The combination of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage could cost-effectively sequester hundreds of millions of metric tons per year of carbon dioxide in the United States, making it a competitive solution for carbon management, according to a new analysis by ORNL scientists.
About 60 years ago, scientists discovered that a certain rare earth metal-hydrogen mixture, yttrium, could be the ideal moderator to go inside small, gas-cooled nuclear reactors.
It’s a new type of nuclear reactor core. And the materials that will make it up are novel — products of Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s advanced materials and manufacturing technologies.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have developed artificial intelligence software for powder bed 3D printers that assesses the quality of parts in real time, without the need for expensive characterization equipment.
Scientists at the Department of Energy Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL have their eyes on the prize: the Transformational Challenge Reactor, or TCR, a microreactor built using 3D printing and other new approaches that will be up and running by 2023.