The quest to reduce carbon emissions is coming to Big Sky country. Berkeley Lab scientists are part of an effort to determine whether a large fraction of Montana’s and nearby states’ CO2 emissions can be stored deep underground — where it can’t contribute to climate change. The project will require extensive modeling, monitoring and lab analyses, which is where Berkeley Lab’s expertise comes in.

Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) are working on a wide variety of clean energy technologies—from biofuels to batteries to solar energy—but now these disparate efforts are being tied together with an in-depth and innovative analytical approach that will show which technologies are the most beneficial to pursue. The analysis will also give feedback to scientists before a technology hits the marketplace, allowing them to adjust and refine the technology so as to maximize its economic and environmental impact.

Kazakhstan is a nation rich in energy resources but plagued by a history of exploitation and a legacy of environmental disasters. With an eye to a diverse economy, sustainable growth, and responsible environmental stewardship, the newly opened Nazarbayev University is establishing a national Center for Energy Research, with guidance from a diverse team of Berkeley Lab scientists.

Berkeley researchers have developed a solution-based method for inducing polymer membranes with molecular-sized channels to assemble themselves. Fully compatible with commercial membrane-fabrication, this new technique is believed to be the first example of organic nanotubes fabricated into a functional membrane over macroscopic distances.

A new class of materials with a record-shattering internal surface area may have the right stuff to efficiently strip carbon dioxide from a power plant’s exhaust. Lab scientists hope to find out soon.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has been awarded $8.6 million in Recovery Act funding for what the DOE calls “ambitious research projects that could fundamentally change the way the country uses and produces energy.” The money will go towards four separate projects: one that will speed the development [...]

Scientists from the U.S. and China will jointly tackle carbon capture and storage research, thanks to a memorandum of understanding that was entered into between the University of California, which manages Berkeley Lab, and Peking University on Nov. 12.

Berkeley Lab researchers have produced non-toxic nanocrystals that efficiently emit blue light, making them a bright candidate for solid-state lighting. These materials could also play a role in long-term storage of carbon dioxide, a potential means of tempering the effects of global warming.

The biggest environmental challenges facing scientists today will require a better understanding of nanosized minerals, which abide by their own often mysterious rules. Scientists at the Berkeley Nanogeoscience Center are working to learn these rules.

The Department of Energy will invest $777 million in 46 new Energy Frontier Research Centers over the next five years as part of President Barack Obama’s plans to reinvigorate American science. Berkeley Lab will be home to the Center for Nanoscale Control of Geologic CO2, led by Don DePaolo, director of the Earth Sciences Division, to study carbon dioxide storage deep underground.