by: Aaron Dunlap

Rice University is the sort of dignified place where smart people do serious work. It also has a relaxed, easy-going atmosphere, where everyone you meet is polite, intelligent and all about the science.

Dr. Smalley seems to fit comfortably into this setting, as the Director of the Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory at Rice University. With a reputation for strong work, in hard science, Dr. Smalley has published & spoken at length on our collective energy future. I had the opportunity to visit, and ask some pointed questions; and got some interesting answers.

Among other views, Dr. Smalley believes it is essential that we aggressively pursue energy technologies to replace anticipated declines in cheap oil & gas, calling it "A moral obligation, for all of us. Without a successful and inexpensive solution to energy needs, our future is uncertain."

When is peak oil?

What are the consequences of failing to meet future energy challenges?

What are the prospects for nanotechnology and energy?

Senate Statement

Our Energy Challenge

Interview

Richard Smalley is University Professor, the Gene and Norman Hackerman Professor of Chemistry and professor of physics at Rice University. Dr. Smalley holds the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery of fullerenes, a family of carbon molecules that includes buckyballs and carbon nanotubes, tiny cyinders of carbon atoms that conduct electricity as efficiently as copper and have 100 times the strength of steel at one-sixth the weight. As the director of Rice's Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory, Dr. Smalley's current research focuses on how to most efficiently and effectively produce, process and use nanotubes.

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Published on: 2004-06-29 (1033 reads)