Road to the energy efficency based on Nanotechnology

 

How the nanotechnology could revolutionize the future of energy?. The number of scientific papers on this topic is growing so fast that it is almost impossible to keep pace with the many and exciting solutions that nanoengineered materials are bringing to the different energy technologies. Most of the attention is devoted to new production technologies (photovoltaic cells, hydrogen generation, thermoelectric materials, etc). These are all very important technologies, which will probably contribute in different extents to our future energy mix. However, for cleaner energy technologies to be competitive in the era of cheap and abundant shale oil and gas, more disruptive research is required. Nanotechnology holds the opportunity to provide these breakthroughs.

The principal challenges
There are very important challenges that need to be solved to achieve a energy rentable technology. Apart form the masive and efficent energy generation, the efficient energy storage and transportation is a keypoint for the revolution at energetic level. But continuous effords are being doing in terms of saving energy through gains in efficiency (i.e. reduction in energy losses, less resistive materials, more efficient photovoltaic devices, etc.). Moreover, nanotechnology can also greatly contribute to mitigate and adapt to climate change, for example, by using nanostructured materials like porous coordination polymers in the capture of CO₂ or using photocatalists for environment pollulants.

One of the most usual handicap is the scalablility and the production cost. Most of the current research are not sufficiently addressed to design a cost-effective and reliable process.  Many papers make very broad claims about the potential application of new formulations but important factors as fabrication cost, scalability, and reliability are overlooked. The lack of environmental regulations for new materials makes also this process lower than spected. A continous continuous change of mentality and regulations is recommended for the advance of the technology and translate it from the lab to the market. 

Nanotechnology and future
Over the past few decades, the fields of science and engineering have been seeking to develop new and improved types of energy technologies that have the capability of improving life all over the world. In order to make the next leap forward from the current generation of technology, scientists and engineers have been developing energy applications of nanotechnology. Creating devices smaller than 100 nanometers opens many doors for the development of new ways to capture, store, and transfer energy. The inherent le
vel of control that nanofabrication could give scientists and engineers would be critical in providing the capability of solving many of the problems that the world is facing today related to the current generation of energy technologies. People in the fields of science and engineering have already begun developing ways of utilizing nanotechnology for the development of consumer products. Benefits already observed from the design of these products are an increased efficiency of lighting and heating, increased electrical storage capacity, and a decrease in the amount of pollution from the use of energy. Benefits such as these make the investment of capital in the research and development of nanotechnology a top priority.