Infrastructure

Asteroid Hunting Using Heliostats?
Most planetary defense efforts use observatory-grade telescopes to produce images of the stars. Within those images, computational methods identify streaks, which are asteroids. This process is precise but time-consuming, and building new observatories is expensive. A Researcher says that heliostats, which typically turn solar energy into electricity, could help find asteroids at night. Most planetary defense efforts use observatory-grade telescopes to produce images of the stars. Within those images, computational methods identify streaks, which are asteroids. This process is precise but time-consuming, and building new observatories is expensive. A Researcher says that heliostats, which typically turn solar energy into electricity, could help find asteroids at night.
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Hundreds of Old EV Batteries Have New Jobs in Texas: Stabilizing the Power Grid
After reaching the end of their automotive lives, the batteries are being reused to provide lower-cost grid energy storage.
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Geological Mapping Project Supports Critical Mineral Explorations, Enhances Public Safety in the Southeast
A key focus of a new USGS mapping project is to identify where critical minerals vital to the economy and national security might be located. As demand for rare earth elements and other critical minerals grows for use in technology, energy, and defense sectors, this project can provide vital data that helps the U.S. secure domestic sources of critical minerals, thus reducing the nation’s dependence on foreign sources.
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Plugging America's Forgotten Wells: Study Addresses Decades Long Problem
Since the drilling of the first oil well in 1859, millions more oil and gas wells have been drilled across the nation. Today, millions of wells – bout 3.4 million of them — sit idle, some for decades. One option for limiting the environmental and health impacts of orphaned wells is to plug them. But the question remains, with so many orphaned wells in the United States, what’s the best way to address this issue?
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Why the U.S. Is Letting China Win on Energy Innovation
The frontiers of global technology have pivoted to AI and next generation energy. In AI, the U.S. has far outpaced any other nation, but in energy, the U.S. has just tied its shoelaces together. The reason isn’t technology, economics or, despite the administration’s misleading official line, even national security. Rather, it is politics. The fact is, the U.S. does not have an energy security problem. It does, however, have an energy cost problem combined with a growing climate change crisis. These issues will only be made worse by Trump’s enthusiasm for fossil fuels.
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U.S. Moves Decisively to Avoid Dependence on China’s Rare Earths
The Pentagon’s package of support for rare earths company MP Minerals, announced on 10 July, should free the US military and eventually much of US industry from dependence on Chinese supply chains for rare earth magnets.
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Will New Interior Department Rules Shackle Wind and Solar? Insiders Are Divided.
Some Republicans felt that the massive budget bill that President Trump signed into law earlier this month did not go far enough in discouraging the growth of wind and solar power. So we know new Interior Department rules will slow wind and solar development — but we don’t yet know how much.
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Water Wars: A Historic Agreement Between Mexico and US Is Ramping Up Border Tension
As climate change drives rising temperatures and changes in rainfall, Mexico and the US are in the middle of a conflict over water, putting an additional strain on their relationship. Partly due to constant droughts, Mexico has struggled to maintain its water deliveries for much of the last 25 years, deliveries to which it is obligated by a 1944 water-sharing agreement between the two countries.
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Nuclear Energy and AI Companies Seek Solutions at Argonne Summit
Three U.S. Department of Energy labs host major forum dedicated to building the energy infrastructure needed to secure America’s digital competitiveness. Leaders in artificial intelligence and nuclear energy explored ideas for powering a digital future and streamlining nuclear technologies.
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Trump Is Fast-Tracking New Coal Mines — Even When They Don’t Make Economic Sense
In Appalachian Tennessee, mines shut down and couldn’t pay their debts. Now a new one is opening under the guise of an “energy emergency.”
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Model Predicts Long-Term Effects of Nuclear Waste on Underground Disposal Systems
The simulations matched results from an underground lab experiment in Switzerland, suggesting modeling could be used to validate the safety of nuclear disposal sites.
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How Israel Used Innovation to Beat Its Water Crisis
Israel is a desert, and water resources are scarce, but today it produces 20% more water than it needs. What can the world learn from Israel’s experience?
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Undersea Cables Are Vulnerable to Sabotage – but This Takes Skill and Specialist Equipment
Countries have come to rely on a network of cables and pipes under the sea for their energy and communications. So it has been worrying to read headlines about communications cables being cut and, in one case, an undersea gas pipeline being blown up.
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Despite Bipartisan Backing, Nuclear’s Future Is Uncertain Under Trump
As President Trump seeks to cut clean energy funding across the country, nuclear energy emerges as a rare area of bipartisan alignment and a priority for the administration. Yet inconsistent and conflicting federal policies threaten to impede efforts to promote nuclear energy production.
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Keeping the Lights on with Nuclear Waste: Radiochemistry Transforms Nuclear Waste into Strategic Materials
How UNLV radiochemistry is pioneering the future of energy in the Southwest by salvaging strategic materials from nuclear dumps –and making it safe.
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