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Refrigeration just got a sustainable upgrade, and it didn’t come from a Silicon Valley startup or a government lab — it came from the brilliant minds of three teenagers. These young innovators recently won the 2025 Earth Prize for creating a refrigerator that runs on just salt and water. That’s right — no electricity, no fossil fuels, just simple science and groundbreaking ingenuity. Their invention isn’t just a clever science fair project — it’s already being deployed in hospitals to safely store medicine and even organs. The potential applications in developing nations, disaster zones, and remote areas are enormous. This...

A breakthrough in thermogalvanic refrigeration could make cooling cheaper and greener by optimizing electrochemical reactions, boosting efficiency, and expanding its practical use. (Prototype thermogalvanic refrigerator.) Credit: Yilin Zeng Scientists have enhanced thermogalvanic refrigeration, a cooling method that leverages electrochemical reactions. By refining the electrolyte composition, they improved efficiency dramatically, making it a promising, low-energy alternative for cooling applications, from wearable tech to industrial systems. A Breakthrough in Cooling Technology Scientists have introduced a promising new cooling technology that could be more efficient and environmentally friendly than traditional refrigeration. Published on January 30 in the Cell Press journal Joule, the study...

July 12 (UPI) -- The Biden administration has announced plans to continue its reduction of hydrofluorocarbons, releasing a new rule that aims to cut the United States' use of the greenhouse gases by almost half starting next year. Hydrofluorocarbon is a category of greenhouse gases used for refrigeration and air-conditioning as well as in a number of other applications, but is linked to global warming. The final rule announced Tuesday by the Environmental Protection Agency will reduce HFC consumption in the United States based on historic levels by 40% between 2024 and 2028. The reduction will be on top of...

President Biden on Thursday signed a treaty that aims to limit the use of potent planet-warming gases that are used in refrigeration. The treaty, known as the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, aims to phase down the use of gases called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). Unlike many other climate actions, this ones was relatively bipartisan, passing the Senate 69-27. It also had support from many industry players. While HFCs have been a major climate challenge, the U.S. was already on its way to limiting them — with or without the treaty. In 2020, Congress passed and then-President Trump signed a bipartisan...

The first form of artificial refrigeration was invented by William Cullen, a Scottish scientist. Cullen showed how the rapid heating of liquid to a gas can result in cooling. This is the principle behind refrigeration that still remains today. Cullen never turned his theory into practice, but many were inspired to try to realize his idea.

An amazing 'reverse microwave' that can chill a beer, bottle of wine or soft drink in seconds has been unveiled at CES 2020. The Juno has been developed by California-based Matrix Industries, which specialises in body heat-powered smartwatches. The 'chiller' uses a thermoelectric cooling engine that spins water around the beverage at high speed, rapidly decreasing the temperature of the can. As the container itself is held still, the contents will be ready to drink as soon as it comes out of the machine and won't 'fizz up' and, according to Matrix.

Refrigerators were originally used to store just a few perishable essentials such as meat and milk. In fact, the first electric units of the 1920s were only slightly bigger than modern mini-fridges. Nearly 100 years later, refrigerators are bigger than ever and used to store the bulk of the food consumed by a household. Americans spend anywhere from $130 to just under $300 a week stocking up on food for a family of four, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But those numbers include dry goods that wouldn't be kept in the refrigerator and leave out fridge such staples...

Like a Big Mac or a Coke, a Budweiser is one of the global economy’s more reliable pleasures, cheaply available almost everywhere. Historically, like the double-pattie burger and the iconic cola, the global dominance of light, fizzy, relatively bland, central European-style lager — from Budweiser to Molson and Corona — relied as much on cleanliness and consistency as it did on taste, as anyone who has tasted a Bud can tell you. In a talk to a gastronomy conference at the University of Toronto Mississauga this weekend, food historian Jeffrey Pilcher will argue that lager conquered the world, after first...

If you think that the world's greatest inventions came from the fevered minds of solitary geniuses, think again. As you scan this list of the 10 inventions that changed the world, note how many of them perfected workable designs. 10. Plow Compared to some of the gleaming, electronic inventions that fill our lives today, the plow doesn't seem very exciting. It's a simple cutting tool used to carve a furrow into the soil, churning it up to expose nutrients and prepare it for planting. Yet the plow is probably the one invention that made all others possible. No one knows...

A system that provides electricity, refrigeration and water - the three vital elements of emergency situations such as hurricanes and war - has been created by two University of Florida professors. William Lear, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, and S.A. Sherif, a mechanical engineering professor, combined a gas turbine power plant with a heat-operated refrigeration system. The cool air from the refrigerator makes the turbine more efficient and powerful, Lear said, while waste heat from the turbine then powers the refrigeration. The engine, which runs on conventional fossil fuels, biomass-produced fuels or hydrogen, also forms about one...

LONDON — Nanofreeze Technologies Lund AB, a startup company that claims to have developed cooling technology that is 10 to 15 times more efficient than Peltier coolers, has won 300.000 Swedish krone (about $40,000) in a competition organized by Vinnova in conjunction with Energimyndigheten. "In 5 years you will own a refrigerator cooled by Nanofreeze," the company asserted at its Website although the company expects to start with less demanding applications such as mobile phones. Nanofreeze (Lund, Sweden) was founded in September 2005 to develop research in the field of thermoelectrics originally performed at Lund University. The Vinnova competition...

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Mechanical engineers at Purdue University have new findings offering promise for modifying household refrigeration technology with small devices to cool future weapons systems and computer chips. The devices, called "micro-channel heat sinks," circulate coolant through numerous channels about three times the width of a human hair. Such devices might be attached directly to electronic components in military lasers, microwave radar and weapons systems, as well as in future computers that will generate more heat than present computers, said Issam Mudawar, a professor of mechanical engineering who is leading the research. The researchers are adapting refrigeration systems...