Science News

Energy storage is the key to deploying wind and solar energy on a vast scale, but exactly how much of it will be required remains to be seen...

MIT researcher Andreas Mershin has a vision that within a few years, people in remote villages in the developing world may be able to make their own solar panels, at low cost, using otherwise worthless agricultural waste as their raw material.

A new sunflower-inspired pattern increases concentrated solar efficiency.

Imagine charging your phone as you walk, thanks to a paper-thin generator embedded in the sole of your shoe. This futuristic scenario is now a little closer to reality. Scientists from the U.S.

Dogs meet and greet at the Cosmo dog park in Gilbert, Ariz. ASU students have developed a way to use dog waste to power a light at the park.

The US consumes 25% of the world's oil -- but as energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens points out onstage, the country has no energy policy to prepare for the inevitable. Is alternative energy our bridge to an oil-free future? After losing $150 million investing in wind energy, Pickens suggests it isn't, not yet. What might get us there? Natural gas. After the talk, watch for a lively Q&A with TED Curator Chris Anderson.

Now this is people power: A crematorium in the U.K. plans on capturing the heat given off from its furnaces and turning it into usable energy. Expect some controversy on this one, no matter how pragmatic the plan to install electricity-generating turbines in the Durham facility really are. After all, it's burning corpses that will be turning the turbine blades.