GAC013 AE2 Draft: Case Study Investigation

Compare and Contrast Two

Scientific Advances

Student’s Name: Wonsuk Kim

Student ID#:

Teacher : Elmer Kang

Due Date: 19 July 2012

Word Count: 1185 Table of Contents GAC013 AE2 Kim Wonsuk (No Student ID#)

Abstract

There are two scientific advances researched in this report. One is storage method enhancement for hydrogen and the other one is changing the medium for transporting energy in batteries from metal wires to carbon nanotubes. The research was done by using the websites containing information about the related topics. By comparing and contrasting many aspects of these two topics, it is concluded that hydrogen storage enhancement contributes more to humans than changing mediums in batteries.

1.0 Introduction

Energy is used in everyday life in huge quantities. However, energy itself cannot be stored.

SoTherefore, many methods are being used in order to store and use energiesit. One of the main methods is using batteries. There are many ingredients that can be used when in making batteries such as lithium. However, new methods for making batteries keep on emerging. This research is written in order to search about the benefits that two new technologies for storing energy achieve for humans.

One The first method is by enhancing storage method for hydrogen. The second method to be introduced is changing the medium for transporting energy in batteries from metal wires to carbon nanotubes. It is done in order to enhance the speed of charging batteries and also to increase the energy storage ability. The hypothesis of this report is that hydrogen storage enhancement contributes more to human lives than changing mediums in batteries into carbon nanotubes.

2.0 Methodology

Information for research was first gathered after choosingfrom two data sources from on the reading list that was given and then reading them. Then, other sources were found via online research. After that, they were organized in Microsoft Word in a way that clearly showed the important information that will later on be used for writing this report. All references were gathered from Science Daily and

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Science News, which are reliable websites that can give clear guidelines to address the research purpose.

3.0 Findings

The research about efficient hydrogen storage was done by Berkeley National Laboratory and it was published by Physics & Chemistry on March 2011. That researchIt presents a new scientific advance of in storing hydrogen by using a type of flexible composite in nano-size. On the other hand, the research about extending battery life for mobile devices was done by Professor Eric Pop and his research team at the University of Illinois and the research was also published by Physics &

Chemistry on March 2011. It notifies a new scientific advance about in developing a kind of what’s called “ultra-low-power memory (or battery)” that can be charged much faster and use only a hundredth of the energy used by current batteries.

The two developments that are mentioned were developed in order to address similar problems; the problems related to saving certain energy resources. For the first issue, freezing the hydrogen was a strategy to store it in the past in order to prevent explosions and increase storage. Nevertheless, storing hydrogen was still dangerous because of the easy explosions and also because ofthe pressure and the energy needed for extreme temperature changes that was required. For the second issue, before carbon nanotubes, storing energy was dealt done by using metal wires in batteries and it is still common in our everyday livesnowadays. HoweverOn the contrary, the lives of batteries in mobile devices are so short that charging needs to be done every day. Fortunately, extending the battery life with new ingredients will seem to solve the people’s wish to have mobile devices with batteries of longer lifespan in everyday lives.

Both scientific advances share similar branches of science. They both cover nanotechnology, chemistry, and engineering. That is because they are both developed in order to enhance engineering efficiency, by using chemistry that requires access to tiny materials in nanotechnology.

Each of tThe scientific advances each havehas its own contribution to human progress. For the first advanceirst, hydrogen storage enhancement develops more environmentally friendly technologies for generating and storing energy than the modern fossil fuel based technologies by creating significantly lesser pollution. To explain in details, Figure 1 shows that hydrogen fuel causes no carbon based pollution. On the other handIn addition, efficiency enhancement in batteries can cut energy consumption and improve any areas that require battery charging.

Figure 1: Emission of carbon pollution by each energy sources. Reference: “With choices like Biodiesel and Ethanol, what’s the best fuel for your vehicle?” Green Econometrics. Green Econometrics, 3 October 2007. Web. 18 July 2012.

4.0 Discussion

By comparing the two scientific enhancements, it can be seen that the hydrogen storage enhancement contributes more to human lives than changing mediums in batteries into carbon nanotubes. One reason is because hydrogen storage enhancement leads to much lesser pollution than nowadays while enhancing battery mediums can’t do much work in that area. In figure 1, it is clearly shows shown that hydrogen creates no carbon pollution. This can significantly decrease global warming because much of it is created by carbon dioxides from automobiles and other vehicles. By doing that, John

Andrews of the School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, at RMIT

University says that "Yet increasing reliance on inherently intermittent and variable renewable will intensify the need for some kind of energy storage to ensure continuity of supply." What he means is that we need energy sources that can be continuously supplied without having risks of it running out.

Hydrogen is the best resource for this requirement. That is because hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. It can be easily collected from outer space.

Meanwhile, there have been problems in operating batteries using carbon nanotubes. According to the

National Institute of Standards and Technology, there have been continuous failures in the networks of carbon nanotubes. SoHence, the reliability of this scientific advance is being questioned, making it

hard to identify whether it can bring contributions to human lives.

What’s important is that they each effect quiteaffect different areas of energy storage. Hydrogen storage development has a larger scale than the changes in mediums of batteries. Not only does hydrogen storage enhance storage abilities like the second one, but it also creates a new path of gaining energy. What it means is that battery medium enhancement only increases the efficiency of using only one source of energy. However, when a the critical point of hydrogen storage technique is reached, it creates an innovation in the human progress. Suddenly, pollution by fossil fuels can decrease significantly, solving the many problems that global warming kept on creating. Even mobile batteries can be changed into hydrogen batteries, making the other scientific advance of this report become useless. Innovations like those cannot be created by simply enhancing the capacity of batteries. It might may not seem to be significant in our daily lives. HoweverStill, on the long run, it is clear that hydrogen storage development is much more beneficial than enhancing the medium of batteries.

Accessing data from simply typing words in search engines was inefficient. So,In order to enhance the effectiveness of the research, all sources except for graphs, were brought derived from Science Daily and Science News. After that, the information was easily found.

5.0 Conclusion and Recommendation

In conclusion, hydrogen storage enhancement contributes more to human lives than changing mediums in batteries into carbon nanotubes. It is mainly because of the larger scale of benefits that hydrogen storage enhancementthe former can give than changing mediums in batteriesthe latter. Also, another reason is because hydrogen storage enhancement is better on the long run. It can even solve problems outside of engineering problems such as air pollution from due to increased carbon dioxide.

Appendix

Figure 2: Energy that each source can make (not the same when considering the storage density in vehicles) Reference: “With choices like Biodiesel and Ethanol, what’s the best fuel for your vehicle?” Green Econometrics. Green Econometrics, 3 October 2007. Web. 18 July 2012.

Reference List

“Berkeley Lab scientists achieve breakthrough in nanocomposite for high-capacity hydrogen storage.” e! Science News. e! Science News, 13 March 2011. Web. 12 July 2012.

“Building a Sustainable Hydrogen Economy.” Science Daily. Science Daily, 8 December 2011. Web. 16 July 2012

“New technology would dramatically extend battery life for mobile devices.” e! Science News. e! Science News, 10 March 2011. Web. 12 July 2012.

“Reliability Issues for Carbon Nanotubes in Future Electronics Uncovered.” ” Science Daily. Science Daily, 17 August 2011. Web. 16 July 2012

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