LIVERMORE, Calif. — A Sandia National Laboratories team of materials scientists and computer scientists, with some international collaborators, have spent more than a year creating 12 new alloys — and modeling hundreds more — that demonstrate how machine learning can help accelerate the future of hydrogen energy by making it easier to create hydrogen infrastructure […]
Category Archives: Energy / Environment / Water
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Sandia uncovers hidden factors that affect solar farms during severe weather
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories researchers combined large sets of real-world solar data and advanced machine learning to study the impacts of severe weather on U.S. solar farms, and sort out what factors affect energy generation. Their results were published earlier this month in the scientific journal Applied Energy. Hurricanes, blizzards, hailstorms and wildfires […]

Extending nuclear power accident code for advanced reactor designs
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Nuclear power is a significant source of steady carbon-neutral electricity, making the design and construction of new and next-generation nuclear reactors critical for achieving the U.S.’s green energy goals. A number of new nuclear reactor designs, such as small modular reactors and non-light water reactors, have been developed over the past 10 […]

Sandia designs better batteries for grid-scale energy storage
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have designed a new class of molten sodium batteries for grid-scale energy storage. The new battery design was shared in a paper published today in the scientific journal Cell Reports Physical Science. Molten sodium batteries have been used for many years to store energy from renewable sources, […]

Sandia-led center to advance understanding of new solar panel technology
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Department of Energy recently awarded $14 million to form a Sandia National Laboratories-led center to improve the understanding of perovskite-based photovoltaic technologies and determine the best tests to evaluate the new solar panels’ lifetimes. The efficiency of perovskite-based solar cells has reached 25%, approaching the levels of common crystalline silicon-based solar […]

Sandia app assesses value of energy storage for businesses, utilities
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Utility companies and corporate project developers now have help assessing how much money adding an energy storage system will save them thanks to new Sandia National Laboratories software. The software, called Quest, can also be used by energy researchers to evaluate different energy storage scenarios and model the potential of new solutions. […]

A song of ice and fiber
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories researchers are beginning to analyze the first seafloor dataset from under Arctic sea ice using a novel method. They were able to capture ice quakes and transportation activities on the North Slope of Alaska while also monitoring for other climate signals and marine life. The team, led by Sandia […]

Retaining knowledge of nuclear waste management
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Have you ever started a new job and spent a lot of time figuring out everything from how to get paper for the printer to whether an important customer prefers quick phone calls to emails? Imagine if that important customer was the federal government and the project you were working on was […]

Finding fire and ice: Modeling the probability of methane hydrate deposits on the seafloor
RALEIGH, N.C. — Methane hydrate, an ice-like material made of compressed natural gas, burns when lit and can be found in some regions of the seafloor and in Arctic permafrost. Thought to be the world’s largest source of natural gas, methane hydrate is a potential fuel source, and if it “melts” and methane gas is […]

Catching energy-exploration caused earthquakes before they happen
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Geoscientists at Sandia National Laboratories used 3D-printed rocks and an advanced, large-scale computer model of past earthquakes to understand and prevent earthquakes triggered by energy exploration. Injecting water underground after unconventional oil and gas extraction, commonly known as fracking, geothermal energy stimulation and carbon dioxide sequestration all can trigger earthquakes. Of course, […]

International research team begins uncovering Arctic mystery
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Something lurks beneath the Arctic Ocean. While it’s not a monster, it has largely remained a mystery. According to 25 international researchers who collaborated on a first-of-its-kind study, frozen land beneath rising sea levels currently traps 60 billion tons of methane and 560 billion tons of organic carbon. Little is known about […]

New tool at Sandia brings some West Texas wind to the Duke City — virtually
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have a new tool that allows them to study wind power and see whether it can be efficiently used to provide power to people living in remote and rural places or even off the grid, through distributed energy. A new, custom-built wind turbine emulator has been installed […]