New analysis shows eastern US can handle 30 percent renewable electricity

http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/08/new-analysis-shows-eastern-us-can-handle-30-percent-renewable-electricity/

"both Hawaii and California have set targets of 50 percent renewable energy by 2030. But, in an effort to keep the pace, New York recently announced that it, too, would be aiming to get to 50 percent renewables by that date."

Still not enough, but getting the grid to handle such intermittent sources of energy may be the sticking point.

Engineers Design a New Solar Cell That is More Efficient and Costs Less

http://scitechdaily.com/mit-engineers-design-a-new-solar-cell-that-is-more-efficient-and-costs-less/

"The team’s step-cell concept can reach theoretical efficiencies above 40 percent and estimated practical efficiencies of 35 percent."

‘Star in a jar’ could lead to limitless fusion energy

http://www.kurzweilai.net/star-in-a-jar-could-lead-to-limitless-fusion-energy

It's always 30 years away...but it would still be a great option to have in addition to solar and wind.

LEDs, Not Solar, Have Transformed Their Industry

http://breakingenergy.com/2016/08/29/leds-not-solar-have-transformed-their-industry/

"We expect the light output per unit of electricity for LEDs to double from 2015 to 2125 as efficiency gains continue."

Great, and the LED bulbs I bought five years ago are already obsolete, though they should last until 2030!

Offshore wind costs hit a record low with Dutch wind farm

http://www.triplepundit.com/podium/offshore-wind-costs-hit-record-low-dutch-wind-farm/

"This is a major contribution to the Netherlands’ goal of 16% sustainable energy in 2023, states the Dutch government."

The part that I don't quite get is that despite these major developments, we're still talking projected sustainable energy percentages (both in this article and the Texas one before this) in the teens. I hope they are making the classical mistake of not taking into account the rapid economies of scale and technological improvement. Because we need to do a lot better than that over the next couple decades.

Offshore wind costs hit a record low with Dutch wind farm

http://www.triplepundit.com/podium/offshore-wind-costs-hit-record-low-dutch-wind-farm/

"This is a major contribution to the Netherlands’ goal of 16% sustainable energy in 2023, states the Dutch government."

The part that I don't quite get is that despite these major developments, we're still talking projected sustainable energy percentages (both in this article and the Texas one before this) in the teens. I hope they are making the classical mistake of not taking into account the rapid economies of scale and technological improvement. Because we need to do a lot better than that over the next couple decades.

How Texas Raised the Bar on Renewable Energy

http://247wallst.com/energy-economy/2016/08/29/how-texas-raised-the-bar-on-renewable-energy/

Big data, Google and the end of free will

The humanism argument's a bit weak, but the rest is interesting. It ties well into David Brin's "The Transparent Society," which argues that privacy will soon disappear due to impending technological advances:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/50bb4830-6a4c-11e6-ae5b-a7cc5dd5a28c.html

Flying with the Fourth State of Matter

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/space/plasma-air-control/

New Lidar Chips for Self-Driving Vehicles are Smaller Than a Dime, Cost $10 to Manufacture

https://mishtalk.com/2016/08/24/new-lidar-chips-smaller-than-a-dime-cost-10-to-manufacture/

Considering $10,000 was a low price a year ago, this is significant!

This Edible Packaging Is Made From Milk Protein

http://mentalfloss.com/article/84958/edible-packaging-made-milk-protein

Solar Cost Hits World's New Low, Half the Price of Coal

http://www.ecowatch.com/solar-price-chile-1982242311.html

NVIDIA's made-for-autonomous-cars CPU is freaking powerful

https://www.engadget.com/2016/08/23/nvidia-parker-processor-autonomous-cars/

Beyond Wi-Fi

http://www.kurzweilai.net/beyond-wi-fi

GE is building America's first offshore wind farm with turbines twice as tall as the Statue of Liberty

https://amp.businessinsider.com/ge-building-wind-turbine-farm-at-block-island-2016-8

How to separate out semiconducting carbon nanotubes

http://www.kurzweilai.net/how-to-separate-out-semiconducting-carbon-nanotubes

Ford Aims to Have Self-Driving Cars Take to Roads by 2021

http://www.livescience.com/55783-ford-announces-self-driving-cars-by-2021.html

Half A Billion Solar Panels By 2021: U.S. Army Makes It Look Easy

http://www.triplepundit.com/2016/08/half-billion-solar-panels-2021-u-s-army-makes-look-easy/

Utilities Fighting Lower Electric Bill Zombie Apocalypse

http://www.triplepundit.com/2016/08/utilities-fighting-lower-electric-bill-zombie-apocalypse/

"What is obviously missing in EEI’s perspective is a utility’s obligation to keep bills low in the face of competition just like businesses not protected by regulators and legislators."

Self-propelling liquid metals: the future of soft electronics?

http://www.kurzweilai.net/self-propelling-liquid-metals-the-future-of-soft-electronics

"May be possible to build a [T-1000-style] 3D liquid metal humanoid on demand”

Oh, yeah!

A Robotic Suit Is Helping Paralyzed People Feel Their Legs Again

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/robotic-suit-paralyzed-breakthrough_us_57ac6892e4b06e52746f54f6?utm_hp_ref=whats-working

The oil industry's massive supply-and-demand problem is about to get even worse

http://www.businessinsider.com/iea-report-on-global-oil-demand-and-supply-2016-8

This doesn't help the alternative energies sector, unfortunately. I'd rather see oil prices go through the roof, galvanizing a "moon shot" for solar and batteries.

Elon Musk announces ‘Solar Roof’ product, Tesla/SolarCity will go after the roof industry

https://electrek.co/2016/08/09/tesla-solarcity-solar-roof-elon-musk/

Texas Is Drowning in Wind Energy

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/infrastructure/a22228/texas-is-drowning-in-wind-energy/

Nuclear Power Is Losing Money At An Astonishing Rate

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2016/08/04/3803499/nuclear-power-bail-out/

First Reprogrammable Quantum Computer Created

http://www.livescience.com/55642-reprogrammable-quantum-computer-created.html?utm_source=ls-newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20160805-ls

Federal regulator says car makers “cannot wait for perfect” on automation

http://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/07/federal-regulators-says-car-makers-cannot-wait-for-perfect-on-automation/

China has actually built an elevated bus that travels above car traffic

https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/02/china-has-actually-built-that-elevated-bus-that-travels-above-car-traffic/

Better put down your radio antenna....

A New Kind of Computer Chip Could Soon Make Your Smartphone Way More Powerful

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/a19318/a-new-kind-of-computer-chip-could-soon-make-your-smartphone-way-more-powerful/?click=my6sense

Resveratrol impacts Alzheimer's disease biomarker

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/09/150911164211.htm

Scientists invent a way to create CO2 fuel from a solar leaf

"The result: an artificial leaf that turns CO2  into fuel, "at a cost comparable to a gallon of gasoline" could render fossil fuel obsolete, according to the researchers."

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0801/Scientists-invent-a-way-to-create-CO2-fuel-from-a-solar-leaf

Federal Government Aims to Develop a 500 Wh/kg Battery, 350 kW Charging System

http://www.hybridcars.com/federal-government-aims-to-develop-a-500-whkg-battery-350-kw-charging-system/

China surges further ahead in solar power production

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3098893/sustainable-it/china-surges-further-ahead-in-solar-power-production.html

Energy, For U.S. Security

http://breakingenergy.com/2016/07/26/energy-for-u-s-security/

Uncle Sam Wants You — Or at Least Your Genetic and Lifestyle Information

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/us/politics/precision-medicine-initiative-volunteers.html?_r=0

New Battery Could Overcome Key Drawbacks of Lithium-Air Batteries

http://scitechdaily.com/new-battery-could-overcome-key-drawbacks-of-lithium-air-batteries/

The Hyperloop: BUSTED!

Hmm, looks like the hyperloop has some probably insurmountable obstacles:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNFesa01llk

And a follow-up video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDwe2M-LDZQ

Utahns’ enthusiastic embrace of solar power could cost the state $42M

http://www.sltrib.com/news/4123522-155/utahns-enthusiastic-embrace-of-solar-power#sthash.saiw2YSb.gbpl&st_refDomain=www.facebook.com&st_refQuery=/

Solar module prices hit all-time low as inventories pile up

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3098824/sustainable-it/solar-module-prices-hit-all-time-low-as-inventories-pile-up.html

Yale Researchers Cross the “Break Even” Point in Preserving a Bit of Quantum Information

http://scitechdaily.com/yale-researchers-cross-the-break-even-point-in-preserving-a-bit-of-quantum-information/

Why Can’t Consumers Stop Driverless Cars?

https://medium.com/@mitchturck/why-cant-consumers-stop-driverless-cars-3f1f27717638#.1usxmsr0v

Updated Brain Map Identifies Nearly 100 New Regions

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/07/21/science/human-connectome-brain-map.html?referer=

Musk Reveals Four New Vehicles and a Forecast for Tesla's Future

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-21/elon-musk-reveals-how-he-forecasts-tesla-s-future

Engineers Reveal a ‘New Universe’ of Organic Molecules That Can Store Energy in Flow Batteries

http://scitechdaily.com/engineers-reveal-a-new-universe-of-organic-molecules-that-can-store-energy-in-flow-batteries/

Peering into atomically thin transistors with microwaves, scientists make a radical discovery: a one-dimensional transistor

http://www.kurzweilai.net/peering-into-atomically-thin-transistors-with-microwaves-scientists-make-a-radical-discovery-a-one-dimensional-transistor

Obama makes new push on solar power

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/288340-obama-makes-new-push-on-solar-power

You’ll Never Believe How Cheap New Solar Power Is

Lots of encouraging news:

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2016/07/18/3797907/solar-energy-miracle-charts/

How Far Away Is Commercial Electric Aviation?

http://insideevs.com/far-away-commercial-electric-flight/

Mayo Clinic researchers discover drug combination that helps immune system attack cancer cells

http://www.kurzweilai.net/mayo-clinic-researchers-discover-drug-combination-that-helps-immune-system-attack-cancer-cells

Record-Setting Hard Drive Writes Information One Atom At a Time

http://gizmodo.com/record-setting-hard-drive-writes-information-one-atom-a-1783740015

Still a long ways off, though....

Berkeley Lab scientists grow atomically thin transistors and circuits

http://www.kurzweilai.net/berkeley-lab-scientists-grow-atomically-thin-transistors-and-circuits

A New Design Strategy for Better Lithium Oxygen Batteries

http://scitechdaily.com/a-new-design-strategy-for-better-lithium-oxygen-batteries/

Cheapest Offshore Wind Farm In The World, Thanks To Shell

http://www.triplepundit.com/2016/07/cheapest-offshore-wind-farm-in-the-world-thanks-to-shell/#

DARPA-funded prosthetic arm set to go on sale later this year

http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/11/12147726/prosthetic-luke-arm-commercial-launch-2016

Canadian Company Turns Air Into Fuel In Climate Change Fight

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/carbon-capture-fuel_us_577a177ae4b0a629c1aa7669

‘Soft Robots’ Look Nothing Like the Machines You Know

http://time.com/4391892/soft-robotics/

World's Largest Storage Battery Will Power Los Angeles...

...during peak demand. Note: the battery is not portable:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/world-s-largest-storage-battery-will-power-los-angeles/?wt.mc=SA_Facebook-Share

Discovery Could Boost Efficiency of Perovskite Solar Cells to 31%, and Perovskite is plentiful

http://nextbigfuture.com/2016/07/discovery-could-boost-efficiency-of.html

Engineers Design Programmable RNA Vaccines That Protect Against Ebola and H1N1 Influenza

http://scitechdaily.com/engineers-design-programmable-rna-vaccines-that-protext-against-ebola-and-h1n1-influenza/

Big solar is leaving rooftop systems in the dust

Once again it's probably wise to wait before getting a rooftop solar system:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/big-solar-leaving-rooftop-systems-050001843.html

Inside the Artificial Intelligence Revolution: A Special Report

A great summary of how things are moving along in robotics and AI:

http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/inside-the-artificial-intelligence-revolution-a-special-report-pt-1-20160229

Yale Engineers Turn Wasted Heat Into Power

http://scitechdaily.com/yale-engineers-turn-wasted-heat-into-power/

Falling Battery Prices Bring Opportunities and Pitfalls to EVs and Energy Storage

A 70% price drop in the last 18 months???

http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/07/01/falling-battery-prices-bring-opportunities-and-pit.aspx#.V3apwAfZ9E4.facebook

I keep wanting to get a solar system with battery backup, but the way prices keep dropping, it seems wisest to wait....

Tesla Driver Killed in Crash While Using Car’s Self-Driving System

http://time.com/4390853/tesla-self-drive-driver-killed-car-crash-auto-pilot/

I really hope this doesn't put a damper on robot cars. It shouldn't, since they're still a lot safer than humans...but you know, humans is weird.

Mad Scientist Builds a 200-Watt Laser Bazooka That Can Shoot Through a Computer Case

I want one of these hooked up to a motion sensor to blast mosquitoes, flies and ants!

http://laughingsquid.com/mad-scientist-builds-a-200-watt-laser-bazooka-that-can-shoot-through-a-computer-case/

Uber, Ford, and Google Teaming Up to Radically Change Driving Laws

It's gotta be done....

http://bigthink.com/stefani-cox/uber-ford-and-google-and-teaming-up-to-radically-change-driving-laws

SunPower's 24.1% Efficiency Record: Are We Near The Ceiling?

http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelkanellos/2016/06/27/sunpowers-24-1-efficiency-mark-are-we-near-the-ceiling/#7112a51f2be1

Chatbot lawyer overturns 160,000 parking tickets in London and New York

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/28/chatbot-ai-lawyer-donotpay-parking-tickets-london-new-york

Replacing the lawyers! Yay! That's the best way to have both sides have equal representation, so that one side doesn't have an advantage for being able to hire a better lawyer. Everyone gets the same software.

A.I. Downs Expert Human Fighter Pilot In Dogfight Simulation

Witness the birth of the Hunter-Killer unit from Terminator:

http://www.popsci.com/ai-pilot-beats-air-combat-expert-in-dogfight

Artificial synapse said to rival biological synapses in energy consumption and function

http://www.kurzweilai.net/artificial-synapse-said-to-rival-biological-synapses-in-energy-consumption-and-function

Powerful nanoengine built from coated nanoparticles

http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/?p=7083

"The forces exerted by these tiny devices are several orders of magnitude larger than those for any other previously produced device, with a force per unit weight nearly a hundred times better than any motor or muscle. According to the researchers, the devices are also bio-compatible, cost-effective to manufacture, fast to respond, and energy efficient."

Nice!

Introducing Boston Dynamics' SpotMini Robot

I want one as a pet! Although it still has the creep factor in spades, especially with the "hand":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf7IEVTDjng

Watch to the very end. Amusing.

Solar Is Going to Get Ridiculously Cheap

I suspect they're being far too conservative:

http://fortune.com/2016/06/13/solar-to-get-crazy-cheap/?xid=yahoo_fortune&yptr=yahoo

How to convert graphene into a semiconductor for scalable production

http://www.kurzweilai.net/how-to-convert-graphene-into-a-semiconductor-for-scalable-production

Real-time robot-motion planning

http://www.kurzweilai.net/real-time-robot-motion-planning

How the Science of CRISPR Can Change Your Genes

http://time.com/4377130/crispr-genome-editing/?xid=newsletter-brief

Pre and post testing show reversal of memory loss from Alzheimer's disease in 10 patients

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/06/160616071933.htm

New 'Artificial Synapses' Could Let Supercomputers Mimic the Human Brain

http://www.livescience.com/55114-artificial-synapses-could-improve-supercomputers.html?cmpid=NL_LS_weekly_2016-6-20

Samsung’s new solid-state drive hits 1TB mark, ships out next week

https://www.yahoo.com/tech/samsung-solid-state-drive-hits-180931958.html

Elon Musk Is Wrong. We Aren't Living in a Simulation

A long and annoying article against the possibility that we live in a simulation:

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/we-dont-live-in-a-simulation?utm_source=mbtwitter

His argument is mostly semantics. Sure, even a simulation is made of matter/energy, but when we talk about a simulation we're talking about a software-driven representation of the "real" world. And we're not talking about a virtual reality-type simulation (which would be on the path but not the end goal), where a virtual apple can't nourish a real person, but a software simulation of a human mind on a computer in a software world where virtual apples can have actual taste and nourishment to virtual beings. And there only needs to be ONE person simulated (YOU!) and only a small part of the world simulated (the places you actually visit); all the rest can be nothing more than AI beings that SEEM human (everyone you interact with) and distant places (like the moon and stars) with limited rendering (a star only needs to be a dot in the sky, not an actual sun). Even places you've visited in the past wouldn't necessarily have to have ever been simulated...just applied to your mind as a memory.

Ultra-flexible solar cells thin enough to wrap around a glass stirring rod

1/17 the thickness of a human hair!

http://www.kurzweilai.net/ultra-flexible-solar-cells-thin-enough-to-wrap-around-a-glass-stirring-rod

China’s Sunway TaihuLight tops world supercomputer ratings

I'm not a fan of China, but...

http://www.kurzweilai.net/chinas-sunway-taihulight-tops-world-supercomputer-ratings

Could deep-learning systems radically transform drug discovery?

http://www.kurzweilai.net/could-deep-learning-systems-radically-transform-drug-discovery

Bionic leaf 2.0

http://www.kurzweilai.net/bionic-leaf-2-0

"Harvard scientists have created a system a system that uses solar energy plus hydrogen-eating bacteria to produce liquid fuels with 10 percent efficiency, compared to the 1 percent seen in the fastest-growing plants."

This autonomous, 3D-printed bus starts giving rides in Washington, DC today

http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/16/11952072/local-motors-3d-printed-self-driving-bus-washington-dc-launch

These Experiments Are Building the Case to Terraform Mars

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2016/06/14/terraform-mars-experiments/#.V2L1irsrL-g

Man builds 100 mpg engine using 200-year-old technology

http://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/stirling-hybrid-engine/

THE HYPERLOOP COMPETITION: Here are the transportation pods of the future being built right now

http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-what-hyperloop-pods-could-one-day-look-like-2016-6

MIT graphene breakthrough could make chips one million times faster

http://www.zdnet.com/article/mit-graphene-breakthrough-could-make-chips-one-million-times-faster/

and

http://scitechdaily.com/graphene-provides-a-new-way-to-turn-electricity-into-light/

Future Weapons are Here

A nice summary:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/06/14/1526936/-Future-Weapons-are-Here

How creating defective nanodiamonds could revolutionize nanotechnology and quantum computing

http://www.kurzweilai.net/how-creating-defective-nanodiamonds-could-revolutionize-nanotechnology-and-quantum-computing

18 artificial intelligence researchers reveal the profound changes coming to our lives

http://www.techinsider.io/researchers-predictions-future-artificial-intelligence-2015-10

Everything You Know About Artificial Intelligence is Wrong

http://gizmodo.com/everything-you-know-about-artificial-intelligence-is-wr-1764020220

Should We Fear Supersmart Robots?

http://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~russell/papers/sciam16-supersmart.pdf

Solar Energy Is Now as Cheap as Fossil Fuels

http://singularityhub.com/2016/06/09/solar-energy-is-now-as-cheap-as-fossil-fuels/

Here's how much of the world would need to be covered in solar panels to power Earth

http://www.businessinsider.com/if-the-earth-was-covered-in-solar-panels-2016-6

Apple is making so much clean energy, it formed a new company to sell it

http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/9/11896502/apple-clean-solar-energy-subsidiary-wholesale?yptr=yahoo

Movie written by algorithm turns out to be hilarious and intense

AI has a ways to go before it makes a decent screenplay, but at least this is amusing and weird as hell!

http://arstechnica.com/the-multiverse/2016/06/an-ai-wrote-this-movie-and-its-strangely-moving/

Researchers Turn CO2 Into Stone in Climate Change Breakthrough

http://time.com/4364038/co2-stone-climate-change/

Scientists Turn Bacteria Into Living Hard Drives

Only 100 bytes, but still way cool:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/animals/a21268/scientists-turn-bacteria-into-living-hard-drives/