Or maybe you can.

For the first time, the US Department of Energy (DOE) is using a social media strategy similar to Facebook’s “like” button to let website visitors choose which startup companies they think have the best chance of becoming “America’s Next Top Energy Innovator.” Between now and the morning of Monday, Feb. 6, people who visit the DOE’s Energy Innovator page can pick one or more companies they’d like to see go to the agency’s annual ARPA-E Innovation Summit, which brings together entrepreneurs, researchers, government officials and investors to share ideas and promote development of new energy technologies.

This year’s ARPA-E Summit is set to be held in Washington, DC, from Feb. 27 – 29.

The innovators being put to online voting include:

• 7AC Technologies, which has developed a liquid dessicant system for more energy-efficient heating, ventilation and air-conditioning units;
• Borla Performance Industries, whose technology can recover clean water from engine exhaust;
• California Lithium Battery, whose design for a low-cost, advanced lithium-ion battery could deliver improved battery life;
• Element One, which develops color-changing coatings to detect leaks of hydrogen and other hazardous gases;
• Integrated Dynamic Electron Solutions, whose technology enables imaging of nanoscale objects at “unprecedented time scales and frame rates”;
• Iowa Powder Atomization Technologies, which is working on a titanium powder-making process that’s 10 times more efficient than that used today;
• SH Coatings, which has created a coating to prevent ice accumulation on power lines;
• SynchroPET, which has developed an advanced PET scanner for biotech applications;
• Technikem, which makes an eco-friendly blend of chemicals for stripping paints and adhesives;
• TrakLok, which has designed “smart boxes” for electronic tracking of cargo containers in transit;
• Umpqua Energy, whose system lets a gasoline engine operate in “extreme lean burn mode”;
• US e-Chromic, which is developing a window film that can reflect sunlight on demand for greater energy efficiency;
• Vorbeck Materials, which created a new method for improving the performance of lithium-ion batteries; and
• Woodmont Enterprises, which makes a mold-resistant engineered wood product.

And that’s exactly the problem many business executives are reporting these days.

A whopping 88 percent of them say they’re finding it hard to access venture capital, private investment and government funding that could support innovation. And 77 percent say their companies have developed much less appetite for risk lately.

Those findings are part of GE’s second annual “Global Innovation Barometer,” which surveyed nearly 3,000 senior executives in 22 countries.

“Innovation is a powerful lever to address the challenges of a growing world,” said Beth Comstock, senior vice president and chief marketing officer of GE. “It allows us to use resources more efficiently, produce more with less and deliver better technologies to help markets drive economic growth and better quality of life.”

All those benefits have become harder to come by in the current climate, she added.

“This year’s study confirms a lot of what we’ve been seeing in the global marketplace, that the uncertainties inherent in today’s economic environment are challenging business’ ability to innovate,” Comstock said.

The biggest complaint among executives questioned for the study related to what governments around the world are doing — or, rather, not doing — to support innovation in business.

“Investing in innovation is a critical piece of global competitiveness and it comes in many forms — from traditional R&D to new products, markets and business models,” Comstock said. “Cutbacks today will have reverberations on economic and social progress for years to come, and may seriously hinder a company’s ability to compete. Governments and businesses both need to do their part to shore up the fragile innovation ecosystem.”

Engineering researchers at New York’s Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have proved otherwise by finding a quick and inexpensive way to make nanomaterials that could be used in super-efficient, solid-state refrigerators and cooling systems with no moving parts. How? By cooking those materials in a $40 microwave oven.

The key to such advanced refrigeration technologies are thermoelectric materials, which can convert electricity into a range of temperatures, from hot to cold. Those types of refrigerators do exist today, but they’re small, inefficient and depend on costly materials that are hard to produce in bulk.

Researchers at Rensselaer, though, have found they can “cook” those materials relatively quickly and cheaply in an ordinary microwave.

By mixing the right nanomaterials with the tiniest pinch of sulfur and microwaving them for a few minutes, engineers have been able to produce thermoelectric materials that are better than those available today. Their “kitchen-nuked” materials are also faster, easier and cheaper to make than any currently on the market.

“This is not a one-off discovery,” said Rensselaer professor Ganpati Ramanath, who conducted the experiments with colleagues Theodorian Borca-Tasciuc and Richard W. Siegel. “Our findings truly hold the potential to transform the technology landscape of refrigeration and make a real impact on our lives.”

Borca-Tasciuc added, “Our ability to scalably and inexpensively produce (these materials) paves the way to the fabrication of high-efficiency cooling devices, as well as solid-state thermoelectric devices for harvesting waste heat or solar heat into electricity.”

A growing number of people in the workforce are finding that smartphones, iPads and apps like Facebook and Google Docs are helping them to do their jobs better and more efficiently than their organizations’ in-house computing platforms. What’s more: in some cases, their employers are discovering they’re right … and switching technology strategies to take advantage of the benefits.

A recent study from the global consulting firm Accenture, for example, gives the example of a nurse at a Canadian hospital who found a way to save time, care for patients better and reduce staff aggravation with her mobile phone. Her simple innovation? Take a cellphone photo of a patient’s wound before applying a fresh dressing. That simple action prevented the need for doctors arriving later to remove new bandages to check on healing progress, something that would require a nurse to once again dress a wound that had just been freshly covered. The hospital’s IT department has since set up a system where photos can be uploaded to a central location for doctors to view securely as needed.

IT departments aren’t always so welcoming of such innovations, though. Accenture cites another study that found that 80 percent of IT professionals oppose the use of consumer electronics like cellphones and iPads in the workplace. That’s likely to be an objection they’ll have to give up eventually. For one thing, it would be all but impossible to require workers to, say, check their cellphones at the front desk at the start of the day. But an even bigger reason is that BYOT (bring your own technology) is actually helping many organizations do things better than before.

In another example, a tech-savvy US Army captain used $26,000 of his own money to — in a matter of weeks — develop a smartphone app that helps troops identify the location of the enemy, know where to direct artillery fire and call for medical helicopters. Compare that to the US Defense Department, which has spent 12 years working to develop a battlefield radio system that would feature devices far heavier, and more expensive, than any smartphone.

“The genie is already out of the bottle,” one executive surveyed by Accenture said.

“IT consumerization will present one of the biggest tests — and most exciting opportunities — for business and IT executives within in the next five years,” the consulting firm’s study concludes. “Ignoring it … and resisting it … are not viable options for most organizations. In fact, both of these responses are tantamount to capitulation.”

Instead, it continued, organizations will need to develop “thoughtful, pragmatic strategies regarding consumer IT.” Doing that will not only help to attract skilled and knowledgeable employees but will help businesses themselves sharpen their competitive edges.”

And now GE’s gone ahead and printed a three-dimensional ornament for its Christmas tree. Inspired by the design of a GE jet engine, the ornament isn’t likely to pose a threat to the demand for more traditional decor like Santas and snowflakes. And, considering the printing process takes 10 hours or so, we’re probably not going to be using this technique anytime soon to replace that favorite glass ball that slips out of our hands and splinters on the floor while trimming the tree.

Still, it is a pretty cool demonstration of what’s becoming possible in 3D printing. What’s next? Printed Christmas trees?

In all, three dozen companies are competing in the first-of-its-kind challenge by the DOE. Members of the public will be able to vote for their favorites starting in mid-January, and — following an expert review — the top innovators will be named at next year’s ARPA-E Energy Innovation Summit.

For now, the Energy Department is offering a sneak preview at five of the would-be top innovators. They include:

• Maryland-based Vorbeck Materials, which is using a method developed by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to create a material that could help lithium-ion batteries store twice as much electricity at high charge and discharge rates as current technology. The innovation could also increase battery capacities and life cycles.
• TrakLok, a Tennessee company that’s using GPS technology and satellite communications as part of its tracking and warning capability and international container locking technology. The innovation, first developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, could help to protect against container tampering, theft, vandalism and smuggling.
• Iowa-based IPAT, which is working on gas atomization technology for lower-cost, more efficient titanium powder-making. Developed at Ames Laboratory, the improved method could be used to create components for artificial limbs, biomedical implants, aerospace fasteners and other equipment. Improving ways to work with titanium powder is important because liquid titanium tends to react with the materials used to form molds.
• e-Chromic of Boulder, Colorado, which is working with electrochromic technology developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to create a new thi- film window material that reflects sunlight on demand.
• Oregon-based Umpqua Energy, which is developing a system that lets a gasoline engine operate in an “extreme lean burn mode” for improved gas mileage. The technology was first developed at Argonne National Laboratory.

“How do you clean your laundry in space?”

Turns out, for now, the answer is, “You don’t.” As NASA explains here, astronauts on board the International Space Station wear their clothes for as long as they can, eventually stuffing their dirty undies into a non-reusable spacecraft that’s “de-orbited” (ie, sent down into Earth’s atmosphere to burn up meteor-like over the oceans).

In the future, though, space-travelers might have less odoriferous options. UMPQUA Research Company, an Oregon-based organization, wants to develop an advanced, water-efficient washer-dryer combo that can work in space. The firm previously developed a single-phase laundry system that “facilitated microgravity compatible fluidics and eliminated problems associated with foams.” It aims to make its new appliance require even less water and energy … both especially precious resources when you’re stuck a few hundred kilometers above Earth for months at a time.

As with so many other space-related innovations, the new technology could prove plenty useful on Terra Firma as well. UMPQUA notes the low-gravity washer-dryer “has potential utility in any application where long term habitation in coupled with limited access.”

“Some obvious examples include isolated military outposts, research stations, naval vessels, research vessels, and commercial ships. Each of these installations feature similar restrictions on available clean water, energy, and waste storage. The ability to wash and reuse clothing with equipment that consumes small amounts of these valuable resources will reduce resupply requirements and improve quality of life. “

For them, the news that Iceotope — which makes just such a “free cooling” promise for data centers — has a new lease on life will be good news indeed.

The assets of Iceotope — an English company behind a scalable, modular liquid cooling platform for data centers — have been bought by a consortium that includes the original engineering team for the technology. Fund-raising for the seven-figure investment to acquire the company’s technology and intellectual property (IP) was led by Peter Hopton, the original inventor and newly appointed CTO.

The VC-backed Iceotope entered administration in October 2011. Hopton was not part of the management team when the company entered into administration.

Iceotope says its patented technology can dramatically reduce power consumption in data centers by cooling servers at the source of the heat: the component level. The electronic components are sealed inside giant heat-pipes containing an ultra-convective fluid. All the generated heat can then be captured and efficiently removed without heating up the surrounding data center environment.

According to the company, data centers with Iceotope servers can save 20 percent of power consumption at the server level and save 97 percent of the costs associated with cooling power, for an overall cost reduction of more than 50 percent for the typical data centre.

“With the data center industry growing by 12 percent each year, data center providers are struggling to keep up with demand for higher efficiency and higher density, while keeping power consumption and costs to a minimum,” Hopton said. “Iceotope’s unique technology can help data center providers to save half of all overall electricity costs compared to an average data centre.”

With Iceotope servers, the components are encapsulated in 3M Novec, an inert and environmentally sound coolant. Through a state of ultra-convection, waste heat generated by the servers is used to passively pump the coolant through the system, thus removing the need for fans, chillers and airflow. Waste heat can then transferred to outside of the data center or can even be repurposed to heat other office spaces.

“According to IDC, approximately 40 percent of today’s data center costs are power-related; however, by 2015, this figure will exceed 50 percent,” Hopton said. “In order to attempt to combat these escalating costs, many companies are looking to drastic measures to improve their cooling efficiency, such as moving their data centers to the Arctic Circle. Iceotope technology makes this move obsolete, as this unique liquid cooling technology allows full-time, free cooling everywhere on the globe.”

Inaugurated this week, the center is located at Alstom’s North American hydro headquarters in the Quebec town of Sorel-Tracy. It’s designed to serve as the company’s global hub for innovation in hydro retrofit processes and technology.

“Many Alstom customers in North America and Europe own hydro facilities that have been operating continuously for 30 years or more, such as some of those in the territory of James Bay,” said Maryse François-Xausa, Alstom’s vice president for Global Hydro R&D and Product Management. “These plants are a source of clean, reliable energy, but many need to be retrofitted and are opportunities for increases in efficiency/capacity. This new GTC is here to ensure those plants continue operating smoothly while making the largest possible contribution to a balanced portfolio of low and no-carbon energy sources.”

The Sorel-Tracy GTC houses a team of Alstom research experts and engineers working with industry and academic partners to study improvements in retrofit techniques that can significantly improve plant performance, availability and reliability without increasing overall plant size or environmental impact. During a retrofit, existing turbines, generators and other essential equipment are removed from a hydro plant. They are then renewed to boost efficiency or replaced with new designs resulting in an overall increase in electricity output.

In the world of hydroelectric technologies, Alstom certainly qualifies as a superpower, with its turbines, generators and equipment accounting for around 25 percent of the world’s hydropower output. The company also operates several other hydro-focused GTCs, including a high-tech, scale-model test laboratory in Grenoble, France; the Pelton turbine-testing centre in Vadodara, India; and a generator-focused GTC in Birr, Switzerland.

IBM this week rolled out just such a system at its software development lab in Bangalore, India. The system, which includes a 6,000-square-foot array of rooftop solar panels, should be able to supply a steady 50 kilowatts of power for an average of five hours a day, for up to 330 days per year.

By using high-voltage DC power conditioning methods, which helps to  reduce AC-DC conversion losses, the technology can also cut a data center’s energy consumption by about 10 percent, according to IBM.

In many emerging markets, electrical grids are undependable or non-existent. That often forces companies to rely on expensive diesel generators. As a result, it can be both difficult and costly for organizations in such regions to deploy a lot of computers, especially in the concentrated way in which they’re used in data centers.

IBM says its solar array technology package makes it possible for banks, telecommunications companies or government agencies to consider setting up a data center without having to rely on the grid. The combination of technologies effectively lets users create their own DC mini-grid inside the data center.

In many data centers, high-voltage, DC computer servers and water-cooling systems are already beginning to replace traditional, alternating current (AC)-powered servers and air-conditioning units. According to IBM, its Bangalore array is the first to blend solar power, water cooling and power conditioning into a “snap-together” package that can run massive configurations of electronic equipment.

“The technology behind solar power has been around for many years, but until now, no one has engineered it for efficient use in IT,” said Rod Adkins, senior vice president for IBM Systems & Technology Group. “We’ve designed a solar solution to bring a new source of clean, reliable and efficient power to energy-intensive, industrial-scale electronics.”

The Bangalore solar-power system will be connected directly into the data center’s water-cooling and high-voltage DC systems. The result: a compute power of 25 to 30 teraflops using an IBM Power Systems server on a 50 KW solar power supply. IBM also plans to make the new solar-power technology available to its clients.