The cleantech snowball is just starting to roll; a Californian vineyard has just announced its intention to build a 901-kilowatt solar array to power its bottling plant. But that pales in comparison to the 11-megawatt plant that has just commenced construction in Portugal – which will presumably be used for more than just wine-bottling.

Don’t talk about it too loud, in case they change their minds and have another huge hissy-fit about it, but astronomers from the International Astronomical Union may finally come up with a standard definition of the word ‘planet’, after it being skewed by the discovery of…well, other non-planet lumps of stuff in the solar system. No doubt there’ll be plenty of disagreement over the new definition, due to be announced September this year.

It’s not just the social software people who are talking about the power of mobs. Worldchanging has an interesting round-up post regarding swarming satellites, and why they would be a sensible move in an industry fraught with risks, both financial and material.

Batteries are expensive, and eventually they lose their rechargability (if that’s actually a word). But our need for portable energy storage is not going away; rather, it is increasing, which has prompted some MIT boffins to reevaluate an old technology to solve the problem. Their answer? Coat capacitor electrodes with nanotubes to give them vastly higher capacities. They charge more quickly than batteries, too.

Infrared vision technology, due to the high costs involved, has long been the province of science and military applications. Developments at MIT could change that, however, as they are working on a method of producing quality infrared systems at a tenth of the current cost. Not only will this open up IR to the consumer, it could change the way doctors search for tumours and other diseases.