Revolutionary Nanotechnology Developments Part 2 - Innovations
in Renewable Energy and Homeland Defe
NanotechnologyInvestment.com Reports: Revolutionary
Nanotechnology Developments Part 2 - Innovations in Renewable
Energy and Homeland Defense Attributable to Nanotech
Nanotechnology developments spearheading new initiatives at Ford
Motor Company and Boeing.
Brian Eriksen Noer reports for www.NanotechnologyInvestment.com
November 2005
In the second of a two part report NanotechnologyInvestment.com
details the current advancements in the science of
Nanotechnology, and specifically as those innovations impact
diverse sectors such as Renewable Energy and Homeland Defense.
The emerging science is being embraced by everyone from giant
corporations like Ford and Boeing, to smaller manufacturing
firms like solar energy technology developer XsunX (OTCBB:
XSNX). To read the full text of Part 1 of this report, please
click here:
http://www.investorideas.com/Companies/Nanotechnology/Articles/Dr
iving_Force_Behind.asp
In part 2, further sector perspectives are revealed from
industry participants: John Ginder, Acting Manager of the
Physical and Environmental Sciences Department with Ford Motor
Company (NYSE: F); John Belk, Nanotechnologist with Boeing; Tom
Djokovich, CEO of solar technology developer XsunX, Inc. (OTCBB:
XSNX); and NanoDynamics Inc. CEO, Keith Blakely.
Government and Corporate Funding
As nanotechnology redefines the landscape of many different
industries, investors should be acutely aware of which companies
and organizations are in receipt of government or private
funding to drive their research and manufacturing activities.
Corporate nanotech R&D expenditure in 2005 (exclusive of
government funding) is expected to total $1.8 billion in the
U.S., $1.1 billion in Japan, $296 million in Germany, and $213
million in South Korea.
Earlier this year (January 2005) the Governor of New York,
George Pataki announced that corporate commitments amounting to
$2.7bn had been offered to New York State by 11 companies
interested in semiconductor and nanotechnology research and
development infrastructure. The companies who offered this
funding included IBM, Sony, Toshiba, Samsung, (chip equipment
manufacturer) ASML and a consortium of nanoelectronics equipment
suppliers.
Following Pataki's announcement earlier in the year, in late
September, IBM and Applied Materials Inc. launched their $300m
partnership to develop new microchip technologies. The
partnership would incorporate 80 researchers working at Albany
Nanotech (a research facility affiliated with the State
University of New York - funded both by the government and the
private sector).
The technologies developed by this partnership are expected to
generate applications within the fields of blood testing; DNA
sequencing; drug development and delivery; telecommunications;
artificial intelligence software; and sensors for environmental,
energy and defense applications.
Also in late September the Canadian government announced that
they would be funding $5.5m worth of research in India - an
amount that will be matched by the Indian government. The
project, part of Canada's International Science and Technology
Partnership Program (formed to develop research alliances and to
commercialize innovative technologies with India, China, Brazil
and Israel) aims to focus on the areas of biotechnology;
nanotechnology; information and communication technology;
sustainable energy and disaster management.
A technology like nanotech, which is anticipated to introduce
widespread changes and developments will almost certainly also
cause societal changes. The National Science Foundation has
granted $6.2m to Arizona State University's Center for
Nanotechnology in order to study and anticipate the societal,
ethical, and unintended consequences these technological
advances could have. The Center will also to study how societal
demands will direct and dictate research efforts. The effects
that will be studied include: privacy and security, human
identity and enhancement, potential use of nanotech by
terrorists, environmental and health risks, and societal and
economic equity.
Market Drivers
NanoDynamics Inc. CEO, Keith Blakely believes that the prospects
for incorporating nanotechnology and nanomaterials into
industrial and consumer products, along with significant use of
these materials in health care (from diagnostics and imaging to
antimicrobial surfaces and drug delivery) and in energy
applications, are significant.
"The continued reliance upon oil - a finite resource for energy
- will drive the research and applications of nanotechnology in
batteries, thermoelectrics, photovoltaics, hydrogen storage, and
fuel cells. Similarly, we believe that the need for clean water
around the world will drive further investigation and
utilization of nanotechnology based filtration, purification,
remediation, and desalination processes and systems. And, of
course, the incessant demand for improvements in personal health
and well-being will provide adequate incentives to companies to
develop improved materials and processes using nanotechnology
for a broad range of health care applications."
Solar Technology Developments
Tom Djokovich, CEO of solar technology developer XsunX, Inc.
(OTCBB: XSNX) agreed with Blakely that burgeoning global energy
demands will help to drive nanotechnology development towards
the field of renewable energy.
"There are exciting new opportunities opening up in the solar
energy markets for products that deliver performance
characteristics such as increased conversion efficiencies,
reduced costs per watt, flexibility of materials, light weight
cell structures, the use of more readily available materials,
and designs allowing the use of solar cells in common building
materials to promote wide scale use of solar technologies," said
Mr. Djokovich. "By manipulating materials at the nano scale
level to deliver the necessary performance requirements we are
helping to move the solar energy markets towards the next
generation of product applications and costs savings."
"The solar energy market is currently dominated by the use of
crystalline wafers accounting for over 90% of the market,"
Djokovich continued. "Largely through enormous expenditures in
manufacturing infrastructure of crystalline cells, costs have
been reduced, but there is a shortage of available materials to
fill the growth in demand and few if any further costs reducing
opportunities may be available to this industry. The general
market consensus is that only thin film technologies can provide
the route to lower costs."
"At XsunX we have focused on the development of new types of
thin film technologies that provide performance characteristics
to address cost reduction and application opportunities," said
Mr. Djokovich. "Our Power Glass