Transphorm, Google-Backed Startup, Claims Major Breakthrough In Energy Technology

Could a power conversion module really cut energy waste by 90 percent? Google's betting on it.

Transphorm, a southern California startup backed by Google Ventures and other investors, claims to have created an energy-saving technology that, when fully implemented, will save "the equivalent of taking the West Coast off the grid."

The New York Times reports that Transphorm's Umesh Mishra believes their power conversion module, based on gallium nitride (also used in LEDs), will save hundreds of terawatt hours. Currently, conversion modules are based on silicon, which struggles to efficiently convert power at high voltages. An estimated ten percent of energy currently generated in the U.S. is lost as electricity is converted back and forth from alternating to direct current. Mishra claims that gallium nitride can do the same conversion without wasting power.

Google Ventures' managing director, Bill Maris admits that they have been hesitant when it comes to clean tech investing. But, according to Grist, he feels that "the ultimate impact of this technology is inarguable."

This certainly isn't Google's first foray into green technology. Last year they tried out the Bloom Box, a fuel cell promising to produce more power with less environmental damage. In preparation for Cancun's climate change talks, Google Earth created online tours and videos highlighting various climate change issues. Plus, Google has created a three-step program focused on being carbon neutral.

Meanwhile, organizations around the world are looking for innovative ways to cut down on energy waste. Helsinki has revealed their underground master plan, which reportedly includes the world's greenest data center. At present, data centers consume at least 2% of all the world's energy. Fortunately, innovative methods are being tested to cut down on this waste, and Google's newest investment could very well be a step toward a much more energy-efficient future.

Comments

[Kenz300]

05:09 PM on 03/06/2011

Hopefully technology can move us off of our coal and oil treadmill.

The price of oil and coal keeps going up. The price of wind and solar keep dropping with new technology and research and development.

[Hebrew Socrates]

01:23 PM on 02/28/2011

The concept is good and all but, we will just have to wait and see. The move for clean energy needs billionaires, because they can be powerful allies to environmentalist. Unfortunately many billionaires are rich do to dirty energy and continually push against environmental laws and try to undermine the evidence of global warming. What America needs is a shot in the but to jump start a strong grass roots effort that is national and not just small pockets here and there. Also we need to get more media coverage for people out there who have brilliant ideas to combating global warming and cleaning up the filth that we as a species has dumped on Earth.

[ECP47]

06:53 AM on 02/28/2011

Would be great if we could get some more info here, any projections when it comes to market? Price? Etc. Not saying we can know everything but need more context, 1 year away? 5? 10?

[GuiltD]

08:23 PM on 02/27/2011

Corporations and banking industry invested in environmentalism is going to screw up the movement. It should always stay at a local level with strong social nets and not in the hands of billionaires.

[rodjard]

06:35 PM on 02/27/2011

If we can't score spectacular touchdowns
through the air, we will do it three yards at a time.
Big oil is on it's way out. Recon by fire.

[Master-T]

04:51 PM on 02/27/2011

People once again looking the wrong direction, thinking the solution is external. I hate to say it but technology zealots are even worse than religious zealots. How many times have we heard about some new tech that's going to transform the world, and blah, blah, blah. Never happens. It only gets worse.

Also - I work in tech. I'm an engineer. I don't need any lectures.

[GuiltD]

08:25 PM on 02/27/2011

I agree with you. I dont think enviromentalists should be blind when it comes to billionaire corporations taking control of the green movement. In fact the green movement title itself is becoming majorly corporate.

[Harvey Lacey]

07:49 PM on 04/24/2011

The fact that "green" is going corporate reflects the power of your average everyday person concerned with the waste in their world. Corporate is never a leader, they can't lead, its not in their nature.

I'm the inventor of Ubuntu-Blox, google it, check it out on facebook. It's open source no fossil fuel/no carbon footprint recycling of all plastics into a building material for developing nations.

It's also free. The idea is free, the machine's design is online and free. The blocks themselves are available for the picking up of plastic trash. The free part ties corporate America in knots. They believe no one will do good unless they are paid to do so.

[Genders]

08:04 PM on 03/26/2011

Wrong, we don't have to freeze in the dark, our quality of life can improve with our transition to green energy.

[Bogstomper2]

04:39 PM on 02/27/2011

This could be good news. Most of you know of a similar change that already happened.

Long ago, the only portable phones you could get were big, clunky gadgets. They used silicon-based electronics, and silicon puts limits on how well a circuit works. Then along came electronics made from gallium arsenide. Gallium arsenide enabled scientists and engineers to create smaller, faster chips, and that enabled the manufacture of the tiny portable phones we have today.

This improvement to power conversion technology won't be as visible, but it's easy to imagine the magnitude of the change. Just think of going from a briefcase-sized satellite phone to the tiny thing you slip in your pocket. That's how big this change is.

[Genders]

08:05 PM on 03/26/2011

It's already happened. rooftop pv solar is the cheapest electricity for millions of American, and billion of the people world wide, same for wind and waste bio char.

[stopoil]

03:09 PM on 02/27/2011

Regardless of how much new technologies and clean energy might cost, the most important thing is getting the F off oil. Big oil has way too much power over the world.

Stop using oil!

[Genders]

08:06 PM on 03/26/2011

Plug in Hybrids can reduce oil use by 90%. Then Waste bio char bio fuels can supply the rest.

[fireofenergy]

11:57 AM on 02/27/2011

Ya, the stuff of leds... They usually have a voltage drop of between 2 and 3.4 volts. I guess with this new deal, the voltage drop is much less and thus much less energy is wasted... Speaking about leds, the newest Cree is over TWICE as efficient than the CFL (compact florescent lighting), yet the conversion from 110 to 3 volts costs something. Hopefully, this discovery will help to make that part more efficient too.With CFL's I'm afraid of the fumes or dust or whatever and waste a trip to the recycling center just for that...
Or Am I being silly about the amount of toxicity? Anyways, we need a light bulb that doesn't have to be "disposed of properly"...
I say... BAN the CFL ! (because they have poison).

Since I'm in the green section, I want to add something about solar energy...

CSP has the molten salt advantage. Large wind and PV are still waiting for the cheap utility scale batteries.
All of them should be made by a company able to own the dirt, the lobby (to ward of FF competition and enviro's afraid of American mining operations), the thousands of robotic arms (needed for "free labor"), and all the "other divisions" including robotic battery (or other storage) production, all the big rigs and the hiring of the installers.
Which will be cheaper will be decided by that giant corporation that goes all out...

[SlinkyTWF]

10:28 AM on 02/27/2011

Since gallium is also used in the manufacture of microchips, expect the prices of all electronics to increase at the same time.

[Coyote50]

09:54 AM on 02/27/2011

This is what I'm talking about when I say, we need more money from the government in technology. We have some of the greatest minds in the world and we need to do an Apollo Project to get us out of our dependence on oil. Something like this would help make electricity way cheaper to produce and could have serious ramifications for running cars on electricity as well as letting our nuke plants die instead of re-upping them as we have been. It's all about our will as a people - and not letting the oil companies continue to run the show!

[SlinkyTWF]

04:29 AM on 02/27/2011

How much energy does it take to produce, install, and maintain the gallium nitride conversion modules? Is this another "ethanol technology" that requires more energy to create than it saves? I'd like to hear from a source that didn't have a vested economic interest in the technology on that subject.

[Coyote50]

10:06 AM on 02/27/2011

Good questions - but you have to admit it's pretty exciting. From the little I've read about Gallium, it's a byproduct of aluminum production, so that could be a good thing too - better to use up those byproducts when we can. Makes the whole system more sustainable.

[SlinkyTWF]

10:27 AM on 02/27/2011

I agree with you. I'm hopeful, but still a natural skeptic. Every night on the news people are getting bombarded with ads from the API telling them how good oil and natural gas is for them, and how clean it is, and how easy it is to get out of the ground, etc. Fingers crossed that only good comes from it.

[GuiltD]

08:29 PM on 02/27/2011

Sounds like a good system, but it might be under control of the wrong company. In my opinion Google has gotten out of control, I'm suspicious of their activites, from imaging the whole world, to using sattelites in space that can spy on citizens. In fact the government, which is little reported surprisingly, but CNN had a peice about how civilian intelligence groups in the US just got greenlighted from the state department to turn sattelites online that can video people on the streets. Its very alarming, and I feel this country and other countries are purely corporations. Call it a corporate world order if you will

[Agent672]

01:40 PM on 02/27/2011

installing, producing and maintaining silicon based modules is not free. Even if these modules cost more to install, produce and maintain is more, net-net, the energy savings is real.

[fireofenergy]

01:00 AM on 02/27/2011

Every bit helps!

[isis]

10:57 PM on 02/26/2011

I hope so! I have had enough of dirty oil.

[ChicagoBob]

10:29 PM on 02/26/2011

Here's hoping it works.