I thought I saw on the documentation that it was released under the modified BSD license. I guess they could take future versions closed source, but the current version should be available for folks to use and further develop.
Yes, most of the public uses the doctor which is assigned to them when they have something go wrong.
The trouble is that it’s hard to distinguish between “friendly and nice” and “competent”. This is how people end up paying a financial advisor almost 2% to buy index funds.
It would be nice if we could rely on certification by third parties as a mark of competence, but clearly that’s not enough.
There's substantial wafer capacity in the US, from silane production, through polysilicon granule production and wafer making. There are several different wafer makers in the US with both 200mm and 300mm wafer capacity.
Some of the silane and polysilicon companies are US owned, but I don't think that any of the wafer makers are US headquartered anymore.
I was in a CVS a few years ago where they were selling a tincture which was supposed to help children stop wetting the bed. It contained mercury. I’m not sure how they could legally sell that.
Heat pumps are somewhat limited in the heat they can provide. For example, it would be difficult for a heat pump to produce several hundred degrees C temperatures for an industrial process.
For applications in their wheelhouse, though, they are absolutely amazing.
There are a couple physical principles that work together to limit solar thermal collectors: heat flows from hot to cold, and mirrors and lenses work both ways. Together, they imply that a solar collector can't heat up anything hotter than the surface of the sun because if the target was hotter than the sun, it would heat the sun up and not the other way around. The surface of the sun is 5.7 thousand Kelvin. This is enough to melt, but not boil tungsten, which I must imagine is a major issue for the tungsten gas industry.
This is probably irrelevant, but due to the finite speed of light the target would be radiating to the place the sun was, rather than the place it will be.
Counter-intuitive for most people, but it cannot be done. The explanation is a mixture of heat flowing both ways, and a law called "conservation of étendue" (you cant focus light beams down as much as you'd think). The link explains the details much better than I could.
I'm still convinced the electrical energy collected on a few acres of solar panels fields, could be used to heat a small piece of metal hotter than the surface of the sun. Or am I understanding this problem entirely wrong?
I mean, I do understand why a large array of mirrors and/or lenses won't heat a surface up more than the source. But if we convert and then "upgrade" it (probably with a lot of efficiency loss) i'd think it possible.
And if we collect over time and store that (e.g. as hydrogen, or in batteries) I'm pretty sure we can get it even hotter.
"These [eddy current heaters/induction heaters] are comprised of a magnet mounted on a rotating shaft, and can reach temperatures of up to 600 degrees Celsius. Using eddy current heaters, windmills could provide direct heat at higher temperatures, making their potential use in industry even larger."
There's plenty of research going into very high-temperature heat pumps. It's likely that eventually that will absolutely be 'in their wheelhouse'. Sure, the COP might only ever be something like 2-3 instead of lower temperature heat pumps (under 80 or so °C) that can be > 4 COP but still should be more than 1...
