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(12) stories found containing 'hydrothermal'


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  • India's deep-sea exploration vehicle, the Matsya 6000

    China, Russia, India vie for sea minerals

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Apr 5, 2024

    With the U.S. still out of undersea race to the bottom of international waters, India strives for greener way toward trillion-dollar resource. The United Nations International Seabed Authority (ISA) has approved 31 license applications for permission to explore international waters, with only two belonging to India from 2016. This is in comparison to China's five and Russia's four. Having never ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which led...

  • The western hemisphere aglow at night.

    Will your home run on enhanced geothermal?

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Mar 6, 2024

    The Biden administration's Investing in America Agenda will fund three projects to scale enhanced geothermal systems to power the equivalent of 65 million U.S. homes. The U.S. Department of Energy has high hopes for enhanced geothermal, a process by which manmade hydrothermal power is produced by using hydraulic fracturing techniques to split rock at depths much greater than naturally occurring geothermal wells and injecting water to generate steam, subsequently driving...

  • Impossible Metals co-founders Jason Gillham, Renee Grogan, Oliver Gunasekara.

    Sustainable deep-sea mining needed

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 29, 2024

    Metal Tech News Q&A with Oliver Gunasekara, CEO Impossible Metals. As an entrepreneur and business development executive, Oliver Gunasekara has left his mark on the tech world over the past 30-plus years. His latest project, Impossible Metals, is poised to be a real game-changer in the quest of deep sea mining for minerals critical to clean energy – which can and should maintain equal ESG standards to land-based mining. Rather than dredging the seafloor for precious p...

  • Graphic of drill fracturing a rock for an enhanced geothermal system.

    Have enhanced geothermal, will travel

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 24, 2024

    Naturally occurring hydrothermal systems have always been a limited, localized energy source, offering steady production that doesn't vary with the weather or time of day – as long as there are very specific conditions of heat, water, and permeable rock. These specific conditions do not always occur where energy is needed, which is a primary reason why geothermal power provides less than 1% of global renewable energy capacity. Recent advances in the emerging technology of e...

  • Hand holding pieces of gray and crumbling core from drilling at Thacker Pass.

    Magmatic uprising and a lithium takeover

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Nov 25, 2023

    Results in largest known reserves of lithium on Earth being deposited in volcanic caldera spanning Nevada-Oregon border. The remnants of an ancient volcano spanning the Nevada-Oregon border likely holds the world's largest accumulation of the lithium for the batteries needed for electric vehicles and renewable energy storage, according to a scientific paper published by a trio of volcanologists and geologists. This roughly 25- by 30-mile basin known as the McDermitt Caldera...

  • The Tamagawa Onsen hot spring in Towada Hachimantai National Park.

    Raising rare earth recovery with yeast

    K. Warner, For Metal Tech News|Updated Apr 21, 2023

    While not quite as easy as whipping up a science experiment in the kitchen, a research group from the Osaka Metropolitan University Graduate School of Engineering has developed an inexpensive and eco-friendly way to condense various rare earth elements (REEs) from natural water sources using common, food-safe ingredients. The research group, led by Professor Masayuki Azuma and Associate Professor Yoshihiro Ojima, have successfully tested an adsorbent material using dry...

  • Graphic of potential geothermal uses for power generation, heating, and cooling.

    Geothermal promises increased potential

    K. Warner, For Metal Tech News|Updated Mar 13, 2023

    Geothermal power has generally represented region-specific and niche clean energy in the public consciousness for over a century. Today, thanks to a profusion of social outreach and government incentives, investors and leaders across both public and private sectors are exploring lesser-known applications and exciting advancements in the field. Just a few feet below the surface, the earth maintains a near-constant temperature that belies the seasonal extremes of aboveground...

  • A rendering of conventional li-ion battery chemistry and the new ORNL chemistry.

    ORNL process for cleaner cathode material

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Dec 13, 2022

    Exploring new chemistries to reduce the necessity for critical metals needed for renewable energy, especially in the form of batteries, Oak Ridge National Laboratory has developed a method for producing lithium-ion batteries without the need for cobalt. With the future expectantly being powered with batteries, all walks of studious life have been knuckling down to improve a nearly half-century-old technology that, until recently, was good enough – given the imperative need t...

  • Swiss researchers titanium nanowire filter paper mask UV radiation covid-19

    Titanium dioxide drafted in COVID fight

    Rose Ragsdale, For Metal Tech News|Updated Jul 10, 2022

    Researchers in a Swiss laboratory have developed a membrane made of titanium oxide nanowires with antibacterial and antiviral properties. The membrane, which resembles filter paper, may be used in the fight to curtail the COVID-19 pandemic more effectively than paper masks, which are increasingly becoming made mandatory, according to scientists at Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland. While the relative effectiveness of paper masks is no longer in...

  • Hydrothermal black smoker vent in ocean emits metal laden sulfide fluids

    Mining goes 20,000 leagues under the sea

    Matthew Lasley, For Metal Tech News|Updated Jul 2, 2022

    Reminiscent of Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, a small submersible scours the inky depths of the ocean, not in search of seams of coal, but towering spires created by thermal vents. The remotely operated sub's lights splash across the cluster of vents that spew mineral rich plumes of super-heated water from deep in the earth into the chill of the ocean depths. The ROV moves into position, its clawed arm reaching out and breaking off a sample of mineral rich rock...

  • GoldSpot Discoveries AI artificial intelligence Denis Laviolette Canada Quebec

    GoldSpot AI for Critical Elements Lithium

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Jul 1, 2022

    Just two days after signing an agreement to assist in the exploration of Opawica Explorations Inc.'s gold properties in Quebec Abitibi Greenstone Belt and Central Newfoundland properties, GoldSpot Discoveries Corp. has cut a deal to apply its proprietary machine learning technology and geoscience expertise to Critical Elements Lithium Corp.'s extensive land package in Quebec. "Our engagement with Critical Elements showcases GoldSpot's ability to work with mining leaders...

  • Scientists urge green energy metal policies

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Jun 27, 2020

    Scientists are urging world governments to get out in front of the skyrocketing demand for the minerals and metals that are going to be needed for solar, wind and other green energy initiatives in the coming years – whether they come from terrestrial or extraterrestrial sources. According to a research report from the University of Sussex, the amount of cobalt, copper, lithium, cadmium and rare earth elements needed for solar panels, wind turbines, rechargeable batteries, e...