Last month I told you how advances in future technology are compressing 57 years into 41 days and today I’d like to show you how one gram of material can be stretched into 2000 square meters.
The advance is enabled by nanotechnology and it possible because new nanomaterials are extremely porous. This trait allows copious amount of a liquid or gas—such as carbon dioxide—to come in contact with the material and either be captured or catalyzed. Technology Review was a good article on this topic, but I’d like to remind my readers that it isn’t necessary to have an advanced degree in nanotechnology to understand how such advances might impact your business within the next few years.
All you need to know is that these advances are coming. I have explained before how radical advances in computer modeling are accelerating the creation of new materials, and I have demonstrated how companies such as General Motors are already using new “smart materials” to gain a competitive advantage. If you want to “jump the curve” and stay ahead of your peers, however, you need to begin boning up on your material sciences now.
A case in point is this new nanomaterial which can pack 2000 square meters of surface area into one gram of material . It could, quite possibly, revolutionize the electrical utility industry by making coal-produced electricity both cleaner and less expensive to produce. This is because the new material could store up to 80 times its volume in carbon dioxide yet cost only a fraction of existing CO2-capture techniques. Better yet—the advance is only two to three years away from commercialization.
Interested in another look at how nanotechnology will impact the electrical utility industry? Check out this article:
Nanotechnology and the Changing Face of the Electric Utility Industry.
And if you want to know how new and future technologies might help reverse global warming, read this post:
Goodbye Global Warming
Jack Uldrich is a writer, futurist, public speaker and host of jumpthecurve.net. He is the author of seven books, including Jump the Curve and The Next Big Thing is Really Small: How Nanotechnology Will Change the Future of Your Business. He is also a frequent speaker on future technology and future trends, nanotechnology, robotics, RFID, innovation, change management and executive leadership to a variety of businesses, industries and non-profit organizations and trade associations.
