CHE 598 Seminar: Materials solutions for nuclear and solar energy

About the event

Presenter: Dr. John McCloy
Dr. McCloy is a Professor in the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering department at Washington State University.

The modern world requires more and more energy to power computers, vehicles, and everything in between. The US energy portfolio and corresponding sources of environmentally friendly and sustainable electricity have been hotly debated over the last decade. One energy source of importance for the state of Washington is nuclear power. The history of nuclear activities in the state, in this case not directly related to nuclear power, has resulted in significant environmental issues, notably at the Hanford site, which is resulting in the construction of what has been called the largest chemical engineering plant ever built – the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP). At the same time, other CO2-free energy sources are receiving increasing attention by the US Department of Energy; among these is solar energy. While not currently a significant source of electricity in our state, solar costs are going decreasing and performance of solar cells is improving.  In this talk, I discuss some issues in nuclear and solar energy and summarize some of the past and current work at Washington State University in these areas, specifically at the Nuclear, Optical, Magnetic, & Electronic (NOME) materials laboratory and the Institute for Materials Research (IMR).