A nickel metal hydride battery is a type of rechargeable battery. The chemical reaction at the positive electrode is similar to that of the nickel–cadmium cell (NiCd), with both using nickel oxide hydroxide (NiOOH). However, the negative electrodes use a hydrogen-absorbing alloy instead of cadmium. NiMH batteries can have two to three times the capacity of NiCd batteries of the same size, with significantly higher energy density, although much less than lithium-ion batteries.
Texaco, Inc. is an American oil brand owned and operated by Chevron Corporation. Its flagship product is its fuel "Texaco with Techron". It also owned the Havoline motor oil brand. Texaco was an independent company until its refining operations merged into Chevron, at which time most of its station franchises were divested to Shell plc through its American division.
A rechargeable battery, storage battery, or secondary cell, is a type of electrical battery which can be charged, discharged into a load, and recharged many times, as opposed to a disposable or primary battery, which is supplied fully charged and discarded after use. It is composed of one or more electrochemical cells. The term "accumulator" is used as it accumulates and stores energy through a reversible electrochemical reaction. Rechargeable batteries are produced in many different shapes and sizes, ranging from button cells to megawatt systems connected to stabilize an electrical distribution network. Several different combinations of electrode materials and electrolytes are used, including lead–acid, zinc–air, nickel–cadmium (NiCd), nickel–metal hydride (NiMH), lithium-ion (Li-ion), lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4), and lithium-ion polymer.
Robert Carl Stempel was chairman and CEO of General Motors (GM) from August 1990 to November 1992. He joined GM in 1958 as a design engineer at Oldsmobile and was key in the development of the front-wheel drive Toronado. He was also involved with the team that created the first catalytic converter.
Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd., stylised as SANYO, was a Japanese electronics company and formerly a member of the Fortune Global 500 based in Moriguchi, Osaka prefecture, Japan. Sanyo had over 230 subsidiaries and affiliates, and was founded by Toshio Iue in 1947.
The Toyota RAV4 EV is an all-electric version of the popular RAV4 SUV produced by Toyota until 2014. Two generations of the EV model were sold in California, and to fleets elsewhere in the US, with a gap of almost ten years between them.
A solar cell, or photovoltaic cell, is an electronic device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by the photovoltaic effect, which is a physical phenomenon. It is a form of photoelectric cell, defined as a device whose electrical characteristics, such as current, voltage, or resistance, vary when exposed to light. Individual solar cell devices are often the electrical building blocks of photovoltaic modules, known colloquially as solar panels. The common single-junction silicon solar cell can produce a maximum open-circuit voltage of approximately 0.5 to 0.6 volts.
Stanford Robert Ovshinsky was an American engineer, scientist and inventor who over a span of fifty years was granted well over 400 patents, mostly in the areas of energy and information. Many of his inventions have had wide-ranging applications. Among the most prominent are: the nickel-metal hydride battery, which has been widely used in laptop computers, digital cameras, cell phones, and electric and hybrid cars; flexible thin-film solar energy laminates and panels; flat panel liquid crystal displays; rewritable CD and DVD discs; hydrogen fuel cells; and nonvolatile phase-change memory.
Moixa is a British cleantech company that develops software and hardware for better use of renewable energy. In the UK they are well known for producing smart batteries that are installed with solar panels on residential properties. The company also designs its GridShare Software which adds optimisation to the battery systems and can also be used to create a VPP with other batteries such as the work they do in Japan with ITOCHU. GridShare Software can also be used to add intelligence to other battery and EV Chargers to help use energy more efficiently and reduce the costs to the household. They have a team of around 70 employees in London who work on their battery hardware products and GridShare software.
Konarka Technologies, Inc. was a solar energy company based in Lowell, Massachusetts, founded in 2001 as a spin-off from University of Massachusetts Lowell. In late May 2012, the company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection and laid off its approximately 80-member staff. The company’s operations have ceased and a trustee is tasked with liquidating the company’s assets for the benefit of creditors.
Cobasys LLC supplies nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries, battery control systems, and packaged solutions for automotive applications, uninterruptable power supplies, telecommunications applications, and distributed power generation. For 8 years ending in 2009, Cobasys was a 50-50 joint venture between California-based Chevron Corporation and Michigan-based Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. The intermediary hierarchy of ownership was that Cobasys LLC was owned by Chevron's subsidiary Chevron Technology Ventures LLC, and ECD Ovonics' subsidiary Ovonic Battery Company. Cobasys spent $180 million in funding from Chevron Technology Ventures, and the two owners were unable to agree on further funding of the company. After arbitration between the owners had stalled, a buyer was found.
An electric vehicle battery is a rechargeable battery used to power the electric motors of a battery electric vehicle (BEV) or hybrid electric vehicle (HEV).
A photovoltaic system, also PV system or solar power system, is an electric power system designed to supply usable solar power by means of photovoltaics. It consists of an arrangement of several components, including solar panels to absorb and convert sunlight into electricity, a solar inverter to convert the output from direct to alternating current, as well as mounting, cabling, and other electrical accessories to set up a working system. It may also use a solar tracking system to improve the system's overall performance and include an integrated battery.
Thin-film solar cells are made by depositing one or more thin layers of photovoltaic material onto a substrate, such as glass, plastic or metal. Thin-film solar cells are typically a few nanometers (nm) to a few microns (µm) thick–much thinner than the wafers used in conventional crystalline silicon (c-Si) based solar cells, which can be up to 200 µm thick. Thin-film solar cells are commercially used in several technologies, including cadmium telluride (CdTe), copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS), and amorphous thin-film silicon.
The patent encumbrance of large automotive NiMH batteries refers to allegations that corporate interests have used the patent system to prevent the commercialization of nickel metal hydride (NiMH) battery technology. Nickel metal hydride battery technology was considered important to the development of battery electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) before the technology for lithium-ion battery packs became a viable replacement.
Solarmer Energy, Inc. was a solar energy company that was developing polymer solar cells, a new type of solar cell; specifically, a subtype of organic photovoltaic cells (OPV). They claim their solar panels can be made flexible, transparent, and will cost less to manufacture than traditional cells.
There are currently many research groups active in the field of photovoltaics in universities and research institutions around the world. This research can be categorized into three areas: making current technology solar cells cheaper and/or more efficient to effectively compete with other energy sources; developing new technologies based on new solar cell architectural designs; and developing new materials to serve as more efficient energy converters from light energy into electric current or light absorbers and charge carriers.
Solar energy – radiant light and heat from the sun. It has been harnessed by humans since ancient times using a range of ever-evolving technologies. Solar energy technologies include solar heating, solar photovoltaics, solar thermal electricity and solar architecture, which can make considerable contributions to solving some of the most urgent problems that the world now faces.
At the time of commissioning in 2003, the 500 kW Chevron Solarmine solar photovoltaic (PV) system was the world's largest thin-film amorphous silicon solar PV system and one of the largest solar PV systems in the United States. Located at the Midway-Sunset Oil Field, Solarmine was the first solar PV system in California to power oil field operations.
Chevron Corporation has been one of the most widely-criticized companies in the world, mostly stemming from its activities and involving climate change. Chevron's most widely-known scandal involves Texaco's activities in the Lago Agrio oil field, which Chevron is deemed responsible for due to its acquisition of Texaco in 2001. Chevron has been most widely criticized for its handling of litigation against it filed by residents of the Lago Agrio region, which included what activists see as the "jailing" of Lago Agrio lawyer Steven Donziger.
