Generating Energy Innovation: Disrupting the Alternatives

In just the last few years, innovation in alternative-energy technologies have gained significant footholds in product development lifecycles and are rapidly changing our individual...

Fish Schooling as a Basis for Vertical Axis Wind Turbine Farm Design

Most wind farms consist of horizontal axis wind turbines (HAWTs), but an alternative paradigm for wind energy extraction is found in vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT) designs. A single spatially-isolated VAWT has a significantly lower power coefficient.

How Cool Is That? Ensuring Effective Thermal Design

Proper thermal design of any electronics-based system is key to its long-term reliability. NASA engineering expertise in this area is renowned. The International Space Station (ISS) operates...

Innovative Waste Heat Recovery Systems and Improvements with Advanced Turbomachinery

The increasing cost of fuel and U.S. dependency on foreign fuel supplies has renewed interest in conserving energy and in generating electric power using...

Mechanical Extraction of Power From Ocean Currents and Tides

A proposed scheme for generating electric power from rivers and from ocean currents, tides, and waves is intended to offer economic and environmental advantages over prior such...

Advancing Technologies Harness the Power of Wind, Water, and the Sun

Renewable energy will be the world’s fastest-growing source of electricity generation over the next two decades, although it will still make up a relatively minor portion of...

Designing the First Fully Sustainable Block in the U.S.

In the near future, a crumbling parking lot in downtown Dallas, Texas will be the location of the first fully sustainable, urban square block in the United States. Re:Vision Dallas is the...

Sustainable Technologies Category Winner

Lindsay Meek Perth, Australia This design improves the energy efficiency of a residential air conditioner by replacing the traditional reciprocating compressor (bore and stroke) with a higher efficiency...

"Create the Future" Sustainable Technologies Category Winner

The 2008 NASA Tech Briefs "Create the Future Design Contest," presented by SolidWorks, recognized innovation in product design in six categories: Consumer Products, Machinery &...

Sensor Technology Leads Manufacturing into Predictive Maintenance

Reactive, avoidable equipment repairs are a leading contributor to lost productivity in industrial manufacturing operations. Parts with an average selling price of just a few...

Green Energy for the Battlefield

The amount of energy the United States consumes increases every year and this growth in energy consumption outpaces energy production. To fill this gap, the U.S. imports 35% of its energy. More importantly, the...

Protecting AC Motors From Destructive Shaft Currents

The use of variable-frequency drives (VFDs) to control AC motors has increased dramatically in recent years. In addition to low operating cost and high performance, they save energy. Today,...

Passive Porous Treatment for Reducing Flap Side-Edge Noise

A passive porous treatment has been proposed as a means of suppressing noise generated by the airflow around the side edges of partial-span flaps on airplane wings when the flaps are...

30 Years of Power & Energy

In celebration of the 30th Anniversary of NASA Tech Briefs, our features in 2006 highlight a different technology category each month, tracing the past 30 years of the technology, and continuing with a glimpse into...

Compact Infrasonic Windscreen

A compact windscreen has been conceived for a microphone of a type used outdoors to detect atmospheric infrasound from a variety of natural and man-made sources. Wind at the microphone site contaminates received...

Estimating Attitude of a Robotic Balloon From Accelerations

An improved "sensor-integrating" algorithm has been developed for use in extracting partial information on the time-varying attitude of a balloon-borne robotic instrumentation system...