Sandia Lab News

Power plants get watered down

Electricity production is one of the industries that uses the most water in the country each day. Sandia researchers are helping the largest power plant in the U.S. identify the most efficient and cost-effective strategies to reduce water use. They have developed a first-of-its-kind comprehensive system dynamics analysis that can show power plants which wet cooling systems can save them money.

Internships fuel research for Puerto Rico engineering students

The NNSA-sponsored Consortium for Integrating Energy Systems in Engineering and Science Education internship program connects engineering students from five Hispanic-serving institutions, including UPRM, with research at Sandia and the National Energy Technology Laboratory in Morgantown, West Virginia.

Building a medical-isotope producing reactor

Eden Radioisotopes LLC, a New Mexico company, secured funding this year and located 240 acres of land in the southeastern corner of the state to build a small reactor that exclusively will produce medical isotopes. The concept was developed and licensed by Sandia, and the effort, in partnership with Eden, earned a regional Excellence in Technology Transfer Award from the Federal Laboratory Consortium.

R&D 100

The venerable R&D 100 contest, slightly more than 50 years old, has a new owner, and the competition continues. Competing in an international pool of universities, corporations and government labs, Sandia inventions captured four R&D 100 Awards this year, as well as two environmental and one business award.

Exceptional service in the national interest

Two dates are well known to Sandians: the day President Harry Truman wrote a letter calling for “exceptional service in the national interest” and the day Sandia (previously Z Division) separated from its parent, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and became the entity we know it as today.