Lefebvre, David; Williams, Adrian; Meersmans, Jeroen; Kirk, Guy J. D.; Sohi, Saran; Goglio, Pietro; Smith, Pete (2020): Modelling the potential for soil carbon sequestration using biochar from sugarcane residues in Brazil. In Sci Rep 10 (1), p. 19479. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-76470-y. "Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) cultivation leaves behind around 20 t ha−1 of biomass residue after harvest and processing. We investigated the potential for sequestering carbon (C) in soil with these residues by partially converting them into biochar (recalcitrant carbon-rich material)." LINK
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE01569E, Paper Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. Ryo Asakura, David Reber, Léo Duchêne, Seyedhosein Payandeh, Arndt Remhof, Hans Hagemann, Corsin Battaglia A self-passivating cathode/electrolyte interface achieves stable, room-temperature long-term cycling of 4 V-class Na 3 (VOPO 4 ) 2 F|Na 4 (CB 11 H 12 ) 2 (B 12 H 12 )|Na all-solid-state sodium batteries with the highest reported discharge cell voltage and cathode-based specific energy. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02315A, Paper Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. Gaurav Bhattacharjee, Marcus N. Goh, Sonia E. K. Arumuganainar, Ye Zhang, Praveen Linga Solidified natural gas (SNG) storage via combustible ice or clathrate hydrates presents an economically sound prospect, promising high volume density, and safe long-term storage. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02491K, Review Article Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence. Hesan Ziar, Patrizio Manganiello, Olindo Isabella, Miro Zeman Electrification and digitization are two significant trends in the energy sector. Photovoltatronics unites these trends by combining solar electricity generation and information communication in PV-based intelligent energy agents. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02997A, Review Article Qiannan Liu, Zhe Hu, Weijie Li, Chao Zou, Huile Jin, Shun Wang, Shulei Chou, Shi-Xue Dou This work provides guidance on controlling anionic redox activity and finding novel high-capacity transition metal oxide cathodes for sodium-ion batteries. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02826F, Paper Hongjie Peng, Michael T. Tang, Xinyan Liu, Philomena Schlexer Lamoureux, Michal Bajdich, Frank Abild-Pedersen Electrochemical reduction of carbon-dioxide/carbon-monoxide (CO (2) R) to fuels and chemicals presents an attractive approach for sustainable chemical synthesis, but it also poses a serious challenge in catalysis. Understanding the key aspects... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02665D, Paper Arthur Hagopian, Marie-Liesse Doublet, Jean-Sébastien Filhol The whiskers/dendrites-growth phenomenon observed on metal anode-surfaces in batteries is shown to have a thermodynamic origin taking its root from negative surface tensions associated with a symmetry breaking of the crystal shape. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE03170D, Perspective Satish Amrutrao Patil, Aiswarya Abhisek Mohapatra, Vivek Tiwari Resonance energy transfer (RET) can potentially improve device efficiencies of ternary blend organic solar cells (TBSCs). However, several parameters such as domain morphology, exciton lifetimes, energy and charge transfer influence... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
High-power supercapacitors – already found within terrestrial electric cars, trains, lifts and cranes – are on their way to space.
Image: An enormous iceberg, called A-68A, has made headlines over the past weeks as it drifts towards South Georgia in the Southern Ocean. New images show the berg is rotating and potentially drifting westwards.
UK Government: Policy Paper: NIC Greenhouse Gas Removal Technologies Study: Terms of Reference. "The government asks the National Infrastructure Commission to provide recommendations to government on the technologies that should be deployed to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and deliver negative emissions, the policies needed to incentivise the rollout of these technologies and the timeline of decisions needed by government to enable the UK to use greenhouse gas removal technologies to achieve net zero." LINK
Guo, Rui; Wang, Jiaoyue; Bing, Longfei; Tong, Dan; Ciais, Philippe; Davis, Steven J. et al. (2020): Global CO2 uptake of cement in 1930–2019. In Earth System Science Data. DOI: 10.5194/essd-2020-275. "We adopted a comprehensive analytical model to estimate the amount of CO2 that had been absorbed from 1930 to 2019 in four types of cement materials including concrete, mortar, construction waste and cement kiln dust (CKD). Besides, the process CO2 emission during the same period based on the same datasets was also estimated." LINK
( National Institute for Environmental Studies ) GOSAT-2, launched in 2018, is a Japanese Earth observation satellite for the measurement of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Column-averaged dry-air mole fractions of carbon dioxide, methane, and carbon monoxide were retrieved from GOSAT-2 data and validated using ground-based observation data. These retrieved data are publicly available from the NIES website as GOSAT-2 Level 2 Standard Product
Fajardy, M., J. Morris, A. Gurgel, H. Herzog, N. MacDowell, S. Paltsev (2020): The economics of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) deployment in a 1.5°C or 2°C world. Joint Program Report Series Report 345. (http://globalchange.mit.edu/publication/17489). "Here we focus on quantifying the potential scale of BECCS and its impact on the economy, taking into account technology and economic considerations, but excluding sustainability and political aspects." LINK
Honegger, Matthias; Michaelowa, Axel; Roy, Joyashree (2020): Potential implications of carbon dioxide removal for the sustainable development goals. In Climate Policy, pp. 1–21. DOI: 10.1080/14693062.2020.1843388. "This review synthesizes the best available understandings of potential implications of CDR options aiming to complement emissions reductions. It seeks to identify effects on and interctions between specific social, environmental, and policy environments, in which various CDR options could be pursued. " LINK
An extraordinary number of arrows dating from the Stone Age to the medieval period have melted out of a single ice patch on a Norwegian mountainside in recent years because of climate change
Dr. Michael Freilich, second from right, speaks in 2013 about the handoff of Landsat 8 to the U.S. Geological Survey. The new U.S.-European satellite, which will continue the monitoring of global sea level and its changes over time, was launched from French Guiana. The satellite was formally renamed Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich earlier this year, following Dr. Freilich’s untimely death from cancer not long after his retirement from Federal service. The mission’s new name was a fitting tribute to Dr. Freilich, a pioneer in space-based oceanography and longtime leader of NASA’s Earth Science Division. He was a visionary leader in the field of Earth science, and a valued and longstanding partner of USGS and countless organizations and individuals involved in Earth observations. It is fitting...
Coley Glacier in Landsat images from Feb. 4, 2020 and Feb. 13, 2020. Magenta dots indicate the snowline The impact of a period of record warm weather over the Antarctic Peninsula during February 2020 was rapid development of melt features and expansion of melt area on many glaciers near the tip of the Peninsula, where the temperature records were set at Esperenza and Marambio Base. Here we examine Landsat imagery at Coley … The post Coley Glacier and Sjögren Glacier, Antarctic Peninsula Exhibit Rapid Melt Feb. 2020 appeared first on From a Glacier's Perspective.
Similar to hurricanes, they can hit land, but their slow pace could improve drought forecasts -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
"Following tests and demonstrations of the ongoing CarbFix2 EU-funded INEA project, CarbFix and Climeworks have recently signed ground breaking agreements against climate change with ON Power, laying the foundation for a new plant which will significantly scale-up carbon removal and storage in Iceland." LINK
"Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) systems put more greenhouse gases into the air than they take out." LINK
"By 2040, Mineral Carbonation International (MCi) wants to lock away 1 billion tonnes of CO2 in building materials." LINK
Thoni, Terese; Beck, Silke; Borchers, Malgorzata; Förster, Johannes; Görl, Knut; Hahn, Alena et al. (2020): Deployment of Negative Emissions Technologies at the National Level: A Need for Holistic Feasibility Assessments. In Front. Clim. 2. DOI: 10.3389/fclim.2020.590305. "We examine 17 Long-Term Low Greenhouse Gas Emission Development Strategies (LT-LEDS), and discuss them in the context of available NETs feasibility assessments. Our mapping shows that most countries include NETs in their long-term strategies, and that enhancement of natural sinks is the most dominating type of NET in these strategies." LINK
Deadline: 25. November 2020 "Carbon180 is seeking a Senior Communications Associate (Policy) to support our growing policy and legislative work in Washington, D.C. This role bridges Carbon180’s policy and communications teams to help enact meaningful, just, and durable climate policy." LINK
"But in the excitement of finally having the most progressive presidential platform yet seen for climate change in hopes of limiting temperature rise and achieving net-zero emissions, there remains an important question in this arena: will this administration grapple with solar geoengineering?" LINK
The Copernicus Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite has been launched into orbit around Earth on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Using the latest radar altimetry technology, this new satellite is set to provide a new overview of ocean topography and advance the long-term record of sea-surface height measurements that began in 1992 – measurements that are essential for climate science, for policy-making and, ultimately, for protecting the lives of millions at risk of sea-level rise.
Amador, Giana; Jacobson, Rory; Kosar, Ugbaard; Simonelli, Lucia; Steeves, Tim; Suarez, Vanessa et al. (2020): Transition Book. Priorities for Administrative Action on Carbon Removal in 2021+. Edited by Emily Reich. Carbon180. "The next administration will need to take bold action in 2021 and beyond to drastically and swiftly reduce emissions across all sectors of the economy. This report serves as a guide for transition teams as they explore pathways for administrative action on climate." LINK
Odoulami, Romaric C.; New, Mark; Wolski, Piotr; Guillemet, Gregory; Pinto, Izidine; Lennard, Christopher et al. (2020): Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering could lower future risk of ‘Day Zero’ level droughts in Cape Town. In Environ. Res. Lett. 15 (12), p. 124007. DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/abbf13. "Here, we assess the potential for geoengineering using stratospheric aerosols injection (SAI) to offset the risk of 'Day Zero' level droughts in a high emission future climate using climate model simulations from the Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering Large Ensemble Project. Our findings suggest that keeping the global mean temperature at 2020 levels through SAI would offset the projected end century risk of 'Day Zero' level droughts by approximately 90%, keeping the risk of such droughts similar...
"Today, the Virgin Group launched its new rewards club, Virgin Red, on an exclusive, invitation-only basis. In a world-first for a loyalty programme, Virgin Red has included an option for members to directly support the development of an emerging climate change solution – Direct Air Capture (DAC)." LINK
A little more than two weeks ago, Supertyphoon Goni blasted ashore in the Philippines with top sustained winds of 195 mph, becoming the strongest landfalling tropical cyclone on record. It topped STY Haiyan’s 190 mph land strike just seven years ago. With Hurricane Iota in the Caribbean explosively intensifying 100 mph in under 24 hours […]
Dr. Curtis Woodcock of Boston Univeristy with the graphic for the USGS EROS podcast Eyes on Earth . (Public domain.) As ecosystems in the high latitudes green or brown because of climate variability, Landsat’s rich archive of data—reprocessed in recent years to align and bring consistency to millions of observations that were collected using differing technologies from the 1970s, 80s and 90s—is revealing those transitions in ways no other satellite system can, said Woodcock, a renowned remote-sensing expert in Boston University’s Department of Earth and Environment. It’s capturing more near-real time changes as well. When gypsy moths began defoliating wide swaths of forest in New England in the last few years, Woodcock said Landsat time series provided significant detail about the...
A solar-powered device can generate enough high-pressure steam to sterilise medical instruments, and could be used by medics in resource-limited areas
Understanding the full impacts of warming requires factoring in the complexity of ecosystems -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
The UK will ban sales of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030, ten years earlier than planned, under prime minister Boris Johnson’s ten-point plan for more ambitious action on climate change
Delina, Laurence L. (2020): Potentials and critiques of building a Southeast Asian interdisciplinary knowledge community on critical geoengineering studies. In Climatic Change, pp. 1–15. DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02921-0. "This essay summarizes the deliberations of a workshop that sought to build an inter- and multi-disciplinary knowledge community on the critical study of geoengineering in Southeast Asia." LINK
"An Interview with Professor Jelle Bijma about enhanced weathering." LINK
Nature, Published online: 17 November 2020; doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2958-5Publisher Correction: Butterfly effect and a self-modulating El Niño response to global warming
Randers, Jorgen; Goluke, Ulrich (2020): An earth system model shows self-sustained melting of permafrost even if all man-made GHG emissions stop in 2020. In Sci Rep 10 (1), pp. 1–9. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-75481-z. "In this paper we report that in the ESCIMO climate model the world is already past a point-of-no-return for global warming. In ESCIMO we observe self-sustained melting of the permafrost for hundreds of years, even if global society stops all emissions of man-made GHGs immediately. We encourage other model builders to explore our discovery in their (bigger) models, and report on their findings." LINK
"The former archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and the leading climate scientist Michael Mann are among a group of prominent environmentalists calling for the “restoration of the climate” by removing “huge amounts of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere”." LINK
Title: Fish Oil, Vitamin D, and Exercise: How Helpful Are They? Category: Health News Created: 11/12/2020 12:00:00 AM Last Editorial Review: 11/13/2020 12:00:00 AM
A zero-carbon supplement to wind and solar -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
"The Intergovernmental Panel Climate Change poorly portrays the “institutional and social constraints to deployment related to governance”." LINK
( Stanford University ) Supercomputer simulations of planetary-scale interactions show how ocean storms and the structure of Earth's upper layers together generate much of the world's seismic waves. Decoding the faint but ubiquitous vibrations known as Love waves could yield insights about Earth's storm history, changing climate and interior.
Screenshot of LANDFIRE Remap Existing Vegetation Type (EVT) over the island of Maui. Tradewinds move across the Pacific Ocean and strike the windward side of Hawaii’s mountains to create dry conditions, for example. Rain soaks the leeward sides of the mountains as the air cools. That rush of rainfall can feed the rapid growth of the fast-growing non-native grasses and shrubs that now cover a third of the chain’s land—often in areas that were once home to sprawling sugar cane and pineapple plantations. Rainfall can fluctuate from 10 to 400 inches a year on average in the span of just a few miles, with fire-fueling biomass accumulating in kind. El Nino years exacerbate the extremes. “Our vegetation types and the variability in our climate is just incredibly diverse when compared to the...
"With the increasing focus on carbon capture and storage as a vital part of the effort to reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions, the hunt is on for new technologies to provide maritime transportation solutions for CO2 transport." LINK
Ambitions include promoting electric vehicles and incorporating environmental justice -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
Rivers of warm air transported across the atmosphere have been found to play a major role in the appearance of vast areas of open water in Antarctic sea ice
"With the climate crisis becoming ever more urgent, Chinese and international experts are looking at the governance of geoengineering research and deployment." LINK
"The president-elect’s transition plan also recommends research and development funding for batteries, renewable hydrogen and advanced nuclear." LINK
"After more than two years of joint research, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Total and Stanford University are releasing an open-source, high-performance simulator for large-scale geological carbon dioxide (CO2) storage." LINK
( Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ) A team from the University of Illinois and Monash University studied how the root crop cassava, which feeds over 1 billion people, will adapt to the amount of carbon dioxide expected by the second half of this century.
Abstract Cultural ecosystem services (CES) are associated with diverse and profound values, such as spiritual fulfillment, cultural heritage, and identity-related phenomena. Early ecosystem services research often omitted these deep meanings, but they are increasingly explored in recent studies through a range of disciplinary and epistemological perspectives. In the present article, we distill emerging frontiers of CES research. These frontiers help to characterize varied sources of meaning that are central to the CES ethos. They represent both advances in and opportunities for CES research, especially as related to justice and equity. The frontiers are: broadening definitions and conceptualizations of CES; addressing collective aspects of CES and attending to process; acknowledging that CES...
Researchers deploy an arsenal of underwater floats to monitor the Loop Current—one of the Atlantic Ocean’s fastest and warmest currents—to collect critical data for hurricane forecasting.
Hubert, Anna‐Maria (2020): A Code of Conduct for Responsible Geoengineering Research. In Glob Policy. DOI: 10.1111/1758-5899.12845. "This article explores the potential contribution of the development of a code of conduct to serve as a near‐term governance instrument to guide the responsible conduct of geoengineering research." LINK
Deadline: 05. February 2021 "The GGR Technologies Innovation Competition is to support the development of innovative greenhouse gas removals technologies. It is to support the development of technologies that are not yet commercial rather than supporting technologies that are already mature. Therefore, the technologies to be developed must be at a technology readiness level (TRL) between 4 and 7 at the start of the project. The ultimate objective is to trial the technologies at pilot scale." LINK
Title: High Ozone Levels Up Cardiac Arrest Risk: Study Category: Health News Created: 11/9/2020 12:00:00 AM Last Editorial Review: 11/9/2020 12:00:00 AM
From the "Reviewer 2 does geoengineering" podcast series. LINK
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE01860K, Review Article Shunji Xie, Wenchao Ma, Xuejiao Wu, Haikun Zhang, Qinghong Zhang, Yangdong Wang, Ye Wang Selective transformation of one-carbon (C1) molecules, which are abundant or easily available and inexpensive carbon feedstocks, into value-added multi-carbon (C2+) compounds is a very attractive but highly challenging research target.... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE03244A, Communication Xiong Peng, Zachary Taie, Jiangjin Liu, Yaqian Zhang, Xinxing Peng, Yagya N. Regmi, Julie C. Fornaciari, Christopher Capuano, Dustin Binny, Nancy N. Kariuki, Deborah J. Myers, Mary C. Scott, Adam Z. Weber, Nemanja Danilovic The unitized regenerative fuel cell (URFC) is a promising electrochemical device for intermittent renewable energy storage in chemical bonds. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02309D, Review Article De-Gao Wang, Tianjie Qiu, Wenhan Guo, Zibin Liang, Hassina Tabassum, Dingguo Xia, Ruqiang Zou The excessive depletion of fossil fuels and consequent energy crisis combining environmental issues calls for inexhaustible, clean and renewable energy sources and environmental-friendly energy technologies, such as solar energy and... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Advance Article DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02219E, Paper Danika G. Wheeler, Benjamin A. W. Mowbray, Angelica Reyes, Faezeh Habibzadeh, Jingfu He, Curtis P. Berlinguette The distribution and flow of water in a CO 2 electrolyzer can be defined at variable operating conditions using a 3D model coupled with an analytical electrolyzer. To cite this article before page numbers are assigned, use the DOI form of citation above. The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02525A, Review Article Yongfu Tang, Liqiang Zhang, Jingzhao Chen, Haiming Sun, Tingting Yang, Qiunan Liu, Qiao Huang, T Zhu, Jianyu Huang Using lithium as the anode to achieve high energy density of lithium-ion/metal batteries is the ultimate goal of energy storage technology. Recent development of solid state electrolytes (SSEs) with high... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02919J, Paper Deping Li, Linna Dai, Xiaohua Ren, Fengjun Ji, Qing Sun, Yamin Zhang, Lijie Ci Potassium-ion batteries (PIBs) have been regarded as promising alternatives to lithium-ion batteries in large-scale energy storage systems owing to the high abundance and low cost of potassium. However, the large... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
Energy Environ. Sci. , 2020, Accepted Manuscript DOI : 10.1039/D0EE02747B, Review Article Zhi-Zheng Wu, Fei-Yue Gao, Min-Rui Gao The electrochemical carbon dioxide reduction reaction (CO2RR) converts CO2 into value-added chemicals and fuels to realize the carbon recycling is a means to solve the problem of renewable energy shortage... The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry
A record-breaking Sahara dust storm that spread harmful air pollution across parts of North America in June 2020 was caused by winds linked to melting Arctic sea ice
Tree leaves could start falling earlier in autumn due to climate change. The finding suggests forests will store significantly less carbon than expected as temperatures rise
The periodic assessment reports of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) play a... The post Guest post: The perils of counter-intuitive design in IPCC graphics appeared first on Carbon Brief.
"In a new research paper published in Climate Policy, we mapped the potential implications that the scientific literature has identified to date, and where knowledge gaps remain." LINK
"Carbon Engineering CEO Steve Oldham speaks with Edward Emerson, Head of Global Commodities Trading, as part of the Goldman Sachs 2020 Carbonomics Conference." LINK
After the moon formed, Earth was probably left with an ocean of molten rock, which may have given the planet a thick atmosphere full of carbon dioxide like the one on Venus
Sekera, June; Lichtenberger, Andreas (2020): Assessing Carbon Capture: Public Policy, Science, and Societal Need. In Biophys Econ Sust 5 (3), pp. 1–28. DOI: 10.1007/s41247-020-00080-5. "Given the strong, if often unremarked, momentum of demands for public subsidy of these commercial methods, on what cogent bases can elected leaders make decisions that, first and foremost, meet societal needs? To address this question, we reviewed the scientific and technical literature on CDR, focusing on two methods that have gained most legislative traction: point-source capture and direct air capture–which together we term “industrial carbon removal” (ICR), in contrast to biological methods." LINK
Deadline: 29. January 2021 "Harvard’s Solar Geoengineering Research Program (SGRP) invites applications for post-doctoral and pre-doctoral fellowships, under the direct supervision of Harvard faculty." LINK
Nature, Published online: 25 November 2020; doi:10.1038/d41586-020-03250-zAlthough he faces a split Congress, the US president-elect has levers he can pull in the government to advance clean energy and curb global warming.
Nature, Published online: 24 November 2020; doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2986-1Publisher Correction: Large Chinese land carbon sink estimated from atmospheric carbon dioxide data
Bellamy, Rob; Fridahl, Mathias; Lezaun, Javier; Palmer, James; Rodriguez, Emily; Lefvert, Adrian et al. (2021): Incentivising bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) responsibly: Comparing stakeholder policy preferences in the United Kingdom and Sweden. In Environmental Science & Policy 116, pp. 47–55. DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2020.09.022. "In this paper, we contend that BECCS must be incentivised responsibly, through policy-making processes which account for diverse and geographically varying societal values and interests. More specifically, we make the case for responsible incentivisation by undertaking a comparative analysis of stakeholder attitudes to four idealised policy scenarios for BECCS, including representatives of government, business, nongovernmental and academic communities...
"Given the growing drumbeat for government action, what is government’s role and how can public decision-makers know which methods work and which don’t?" LINK
"Using our AIs, we are launching the world's first international soil carbon market where corporations, governments and individuals can pay to offset their carbon dioxide emissions, and farmers can get paid to increase their soil carbon levels." LINK
"The major global cement producer CEMEX has begun work with the solar fuel start-up Synhelion to demonstrate the world’s first zero emissions cement production with high temperature solar." LINK
No Deadline "Reporting to the VP Marketing, the Senior Product Marketing Manager - Concrete Products will be responsible for developing CarbonCure’s content marketing strategy to drive thought leadership, lead generation, pipeline conversion, and customer success." LINK
Lockley, Andrew (2020): State commissioning of Solar Radiation Management geoengineering. In Ethics, Policy & Environment. DOI: 10.1080/21550085.2020.1848176. "Notwithstanding concerns about privatisation, we assume state commissioning of SRM - proposing and analysing plausible governance, by adapting extant proposals. We consider two regulatory functions: legal/corporate; and scientific/technical. We briefly discuss mandatory, emissions-linked SRM funding." LINK
"Ethereal, swaying pillars of brown kelp along California's coasts grow up through the water column, culminating in a dense surface canopy of thick fronds that provide homes and refuge for numerous marine creatures. There's speculation that these giant algae may protect coastal ecosystems by helping alleviate acidification caused by too much atmospheric carbon being absorbed by the seas." LINK
( Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology ) The current global supply of crude oil is expected to meet demand through 2050, but there may be a few more drops to squeeze out. By making use of a previously undesired side effect in oil recovery, researchers have developed a method that yields up to 20% more heavy oil than traditional methods. Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT) team published their results on August 24 in Energy & Fuels , a journal of the American Chemical Society.
Title: Air Pollution May Harm Older Women's Brains Category: Health News Created: 11/19/2020 12:00:00 AM Last Editorial Review: 11/19/2020 12:00:00 AM
Video: 00:03:44 Learn how climate change is causing our seas to rise and how satellites have been measuring the height of the sea surface systematically since 1992. With global sea level now rising fast, Copernicus Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich picks up the baton as the latest satellite mission to extend the legacy of sea-surface height measurements. Learn how it makes these critical measurements.
"Anthropogenic sources of greenhouse gases rightfully occupy a central position in the roadmap towards achieving climate neutrality. However, we must also get serious about preserving and expanding CO2 sinks; in other words, about capturing CO2 from the atmosphere and storing it permanently." LINK
Deadline: 07. December 2020 "The new postdoctoral research will work with Dr. Morrow and the current postdoctoral researcher to: design, execute, and publish studies using ICRLP’s extended version of GCAM help the team extend GCAM further to incorporate other approaches to carbon removal" LINK
The UK prime minister Boris Johnson has announced a long-awaited “10-point plan” laying out measures... The post Media reaction: Boris Johnson’s ‘10-point’ net-zero plan for climate change appeared first on Carbon Brief.
The UK’s new 10-point climate plan is the first big step towards meeting a target of net zero emissions by 2050, but it doesn’t have the funding to make new climate policies a reality
Schneider, Tapio; Kaul, Colleen M.; Pressel, Kyle G. (2020): Solar geoengineering may not prevent strong warming from direct effects of CO2 on stratocumulus cloud cover. In Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2003730117. "Solar geoengineering that manipulates the amount of sunlight Earth absorbs is increasingly discussed as an option to counter global warming. However, we demonstrate that solar geoengineering is not a fail-safe option to prevent global warming because it does not mitigate risks to the climate system that arise from direct effects of greenhouse gases on cloud cover" LINK
( Wiley ) In a study of women aged 80 years and older, living in locations with higher exposures to air pollution was associated with increased depressive symptoms. The findings are published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
"Evonik and Siemens Energy today commissioned a pilot plant sponsored by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) that uses carbon dioxide and water to produce chemicals." LINK
Banerjee, Antara; Butler, Amy H.; Polvani, Lorenzo M.; Robock, Alan; Simpson, Isla R.; Sun, Lantao (2020): Robust winter warming over Eurasia under stratospheric sulfate geoengineering – the role of stratospheric dynamics. In Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss. (in review). DOI: 10.5194/acp-2020-965. "It has been suggested that increased stratospheric sulfate aerosol loadings following large, low latitude volcanic eruptions can lead to wintertime warming over Eurasia through dynamical stratosphere-troposphere coupling. We here investigate the proposed connection in the context of hypothetical future stratospheric sulfate geoengineering in the Geoengineering Large Ensemble simulations." LINK
Climate change isn’t just affecting global temperature, it’s also changing the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere with potentially significant impacts, finds a new study looking at global humidity.
Gangotri Glacier snowline averaging 5600 m on Oct. 16, 2020 in Landsat image, magenta dots indicate the snowline. Yellow line is the Randolph Glacier Inventory margin. Tributaries: K=Kirti; G=Ghanohim, Su=Sumeru, M=Maiandi, S=Swachhand. Gangotri Glacier, India is in the Bhagirathi River watershed and is the largest glacier in the Garhwal Range of the Himalaya. Gangotri Glacier supports hydropower as its meltwater runoff passes through three hydropower plants generating 1430 Megawatts including … The post Gangotri Glacier, India Smallest Observed Accumulation Zone in 2020 appeared first on From a Glacier's Perspective.
"The Mercure Hotel MOA Berlin is set to become the first hotel and eventlocation worldwide with a negative CO2 balance when generating heat." LINK
( Chalmers University of Technology ) The construction sector, the real estate industry and city planners must give high priority to the same goal - to drastically reduce their climate impacts. Powerful, combined efforts are absolutely crucial for the potential to achieve the UN's sustainability goals. And what's more - everything has to happen very quickly. These are the cornerstones to the roadmap presented at the Beyond 2020 World Conference.
Thwaites Glacier in western Antarctica is in serious danger. It's swiftly melting, and a collapse could cause a dramatic increase in sea level rise.
Today, ESA signed contracts with Thales Alenia Space in France and in Italy, and Airbus in Spain to build three of the new high-priority Copernicus satellite missions: CHIME, CIMR and LSTM, respectively. Each mission is set to help address different major environmental challenges such as sustainable agriculture management, food security, the monitoring of polar ice supporting the EU Integrated Policy for the Arctic, and all will be used to understand climate change.
Reynolds, Jesse L. (2020): Is solar geoengineering ungovernable? A critical assessment of governance challenges identified by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change. DOI: 10.1002/wcc.690. "I find seven such challenges identified in the IPCC reports: that SRM could lessen mitigation; that its termination would cause severe climatic impacts; that researching SRM would create a “slippery slope” to its inevitable and unwanted use; that decisions to use it could be contrary to democratic norms; that the public may not accept SRM; that it could be unethical; and that decisions to use SRM could be unilateral. After assessing the extent to which these challenges are supported by existing evidence, scholarly literature, and robust logic, I conclude...
"What our (extremely arduous) journey to find carbon removal offsets tells us about the state of voluntary carbon markets today, and some ideas about how we can fix them." LINK
Microbes will help decarbonize the construction industry -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
"Sempra Energy and the Salk Institute today announced a new project to advance plant-based carbon capture and sequestration research, education, and implementation to help address the climate crisis." LINK
DeLisi, Charles; Patrinos, Aristides; MacCracken, Michael; Drell, Dan; Annas, George; Arkin, Adam et al. (2020): The Role of Synthetic Biology in Atmospheric Greenhouse Gas Reduction: Prospects and Challenges. In BioDesign Research 2020, pp. 1–8. DOI: 10.34133/2020/1016207. "The long atmospheric residence time of CO2 creates an urgent need to add atmospheric carbon drawdown to CO2 regulatory strategies. Synthetic and systems biology (SSB), which enables manipulation of cellular phenotypes, offers a powerful approach to amplifying and adding new possibilities to current land management practices aimed at reducing atmospheric carbon." LINK
As global temperatures continue to rise, coastal areas will increasingly bear the brunt of storm surges and more frequent, intense weather events. Sea level is rising at 3.6 centimetres per decade and this trend is accelerating, compounding the threats faced by coastal communities: with every centimetre another three million people are put at risk of annual coastal flooding. Scheduled to be launched on 21 November, the Copernicus Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite is set to continue the long-term record of sea-level measurements that are needed for protect our coasts.
The average North Atlantic hurricane now takes 33 hours to weaken, compared with 17 hours around 50 years ago, as a result of global warming
"We can capture carbon from the air to fight climate change. But then what do we do with it?" LINK
Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (2020): Consultation Document. "The recommendations published in the Taskforce’s Consultation Document aim to identify the infrastructure solutions necessary to scale the voluntary carbon markets. These are recommendations for the private-sector, developed by both current and potential market users, to ensure this market can deliver to the needs of its participants without compromising the integrity of decarbonization." LINK
A bioinspired arrangement could save energy by allowing one plane to provide extra lift to another—if both aircraft can remain stable -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
The discovery of the ozone hole shocked the world and propelled nations into action. Decades later, where does the problem stand?
Joe Biden’s US election victory has been hailed as a significant turning point in US... The post Media reaction: What Joe Biden’s US election victory means for climate change appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Visible light can drive industrial processes -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
Kessler, Juliana (2019): Novel non-state sources of de facto governance in the solar geoengineering governance landscape: The case of SRMGI and C2G. MSc Thesis Environmental Policy Group. Wageningen University & Research, Wageningen. "Calls for anticipatory governance have been on the rise in discussions on solar geoengineering. Two influential governance initiatives, the Solar Radiation Management Governance Initiative (SRMGI) and the Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative (C2G), intervene in and steer the solar geoengineering governance landscape, thus de facto governing it. This research analyses the governance initiatives’ interventions and governance effects as it is argued that their steering has major implications, also for how (future) governance options are envisioned and constructed."...
Wind and solar capacity will double over the next five years globally and exceed that... The post IEA: Wind and solar capacity will overtake both gas and coal globally by 2024 appeared first on Carbon Brief.
After a drawn-out election that saw narrow wins in a handful of battleground states, Joe... The post US election: Climate experts react to Joe Biden’s victory appeared first on Carbon Brief.
"Science-based regulatory policies and a White House climate office could help counteract warming, no legislation required." LINK