Climate disasters rising at 'staggering' rate since 2000

Extreme weather events have increased over the last two decades, a new report shows. Fiji is shown after being hit by a cyclone in 2016. File Photo by OCHA/Danielle Parry


Oct. 12 (UPI) -- United Nations researchers said Monday climate disasters have risen at a "staggering" rate in the first 20 years of this century.

From 2000-2019, 7,348 disaster events occurred worldwide, killing 1.23 million people, affecting 4.2 billion people, and resulting in approximately $2.97 trillion in global economic losses, researchers said. 

These new figures show a "staggering" rise in climate disasters compared with the previous two decades, according to researchers.

The previous 20-year period, from 1980 to 1999, had 4,212 reported disasters from natural hazards, with 1.19 million deaths, more than 3 billion people affected and economic losses totaling $1.63 trillion.

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Researchers said that better reporting may explain some of the increase, but the significant rise in climate-related emergency was the main reason for the increase.

Climate-related events, including extreme weather events, rose from 3,653 (1980-1999) to 6,681 (2000-2019), according to the report. Major floods alone more than doubled in the last 20 years, from 1,389 to 3,254, and the incidence of storms rose from 1,457 to 2,034.

Floods accounted for more than 40% of disasters affecting 1.65 billion people, storms 28%, earthquakes 8%, and extreme temperatures 6%.

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"This is clear evidence that in a world where the global average temperature in 2019 was 1.1 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial period, the impacts are being felt in the increased frequency of extreme weather events including heatwaves, droughts, flooding, winter storms, hurricanes and wildfires," the report said.

U.N. Office on Disaster Risk Reduction Chief Mami Mizutori said that disaster management agencies have "succeeded in saving many lives," through improving preparation, and dedicated staff and volunteers, but industrial nations are "failing miserably" in curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

"Disaster risk governance depends on political leadership above all, and delivery on the promises made when the Paris agreement and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction were adopted," Mizutori said. "But the sad fact is that we are willfully destructive. And that is the conclusion of this report; COVID-19 is but the latest proof that politicians and business leaders have yet to tune into the world around them."

Disasters include a dramatic rise in major fire events, such as over 4 million acres burning in California, Australia's 2019 bush fires that killed or displaced nearly 3 billion animals, illegal fires in the Amazon, and more than 100 fires in the arctic circle last year, a video linked to a U.N. Office Twitter post shows.

The report called the "Human Cost of Disasters" was published on the heels of Oct. 13, which marks the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Report data came from the Emergency Events Database that records disasters that have killed 10 or more people; affected 100 or more people; resulted in a declared state of emergency; or call for international assistance.

Belgium's Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters at UCLouvain maintains the database.

Fighting climate change is more cost-effective than cleaning up the mess, study suggests

The effects of climate change are having a greater impact on human systems and ecosystems than scientists previously predicted, new research suggests. Photo courtesy NOAA


Sept. 20, 2019 (UPI) -- It pays to fight climate change, new research suggests.

Transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources won't be cheap or easy. But new research suggests the investments will pay off in the long run.

That's because the cost of inaction -- letting climate change run its course and dealing with the consequences -- will be much more expensive than curbing emissions.

In other words, climate mitigation efforts yield a good return on investment, researchers said.

"That investment is even more compelling given the wealth of evidence that the impacts of climate change are happening faster and more extensively than projected even just a few years ago," Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, deputy director of the Australian Research Council Centre for Excellence in Coral Reef Studies, said in a news release. "This makes the case for rapidly reducing greenhouse gas emissions more urgent."

According to Hoegh-Guldberg and his colleagues, the "synergistic nature" of the effects of climate change are having a greater impact on human systems and ecosystems than scientists previously predicted.

For example, the combination of bigger storms and rising seas can combine to exacerbate a variety of already existing human problems. Increasingly damaging storms can worsen poverty and magnify inequality in coastal communities. Increases in poverty can trigger a variety of other societal problems.

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"Each risk may be small, but small changes in a number of risks can lead to large impacts," Hoegh-Guldberg said.

The cascade effect of climate change impacts ensures the human and economic costs are quite steep.

For the new study -- published this week in the journal Science -- scientists modeled the difference in risks to forests, biodiversity, food, crops and other critical systems under different warming scenarios. They found limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, as opposed to 2 degrees, has significant social and economic benefits.

To limit warming and prevent a cascade of negative effects, scientists with the United Nations suggest global greenhouse gas emissions need to be cut in half over the next decade. The global economy needs to be carbon neutral by 2050.

Authors of the new study estimated public and private entities will need to invest between $2 trillion and $4.5 trillion each year in energy supply and demand measures from 2016 and 2050 to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. But researchers estimated these investments would net a total of $496 trillion in savings by 2200.

The benefits will total "at least four or five times the size of the investments," researchers wrote in their paper.

"Current emission reduction commitments are inadequate and risk throwing many nations into chaos and harm, with a particular vulnerability of poor peoples," said Hoegh-Guldberg. "To avoid this, we must accelerate action and tighten emission reduction targets so they fall in line with the Paris Agreement. Our paper shows this is much less costly than suffering the impacts of 2 degrees or more of climate change."

11K scientists declare climate emergency in new paper

More than 11,000 scientists from 153 countries endorsed a new paper offering six areas of action for climate change mitigation based on analysis of 40 years of data.
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Authors of a new paper declaring a climate emergency said they're encouraged by the increase in public demands for climate change mitigation, especially by youth activists.

 File Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo

Nov. 5, 2019 (UPI) -- After compiling 40-years worth of publicly available climate change data, scientists have declared a climate emergency.

The climate scientists responsible for the declaration, published Tuesday in the journal BioScience, say experts have been sounding the alarm for decades.

"Yet greenhouse gas emissions are still rapidly rising, with increasingly damaging effects on the Earth's climate," scientists wrote in their paper. "An immense increase of scale in endeavors to conserve our biosphere is needed to avoid untold suffering due to the climate crisis."

The newly published paper was signed by 11,000 scientists from 153 countries.

"We have continued to conduct business as usual and have failed to address this crisis," William Ripple, distinguished professor of ecology at Oregon State University, said in a news release.

Before making their declaration, scientists analyzed a variety of models and data sets related to energy use, surface temperature, population growth, land-use changes, deforestation, polar ice melting, carbon emissions and more.

"Global surface temperature, ocean heat content, extreme weather and its costs, sea level, ocean acidity and land area are all rising," Ripple said. "Ice is rapidly disappearing as shown by declining trends in minimum summer Arctic sea ice, Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, and glacier thickness. All of these rapid changes highlight the urgent need for action."

RELATED Scientists publish strategy for carbon neutral land sector by 2040

Thomas Newsome, from the University of Sydney, said scientists have a moral obligation to warn the planet's citizens about the threat of catastrophic climate change.

"From the data we have, it is clear we are facing a climate emergency," Newsome said.

According to the new paper, world leaders and policy makers should focus their climate change mitigation efforts on six fronts: energy, short-lived pollutants, nature, food, the economy and population.

RELATED Report: Fewer than 25 percent of nations close to sustainability goals

"The world must quickly implement massive energy efficiency and conservation practices and must replace fossil fuels with low-carbon renewables," researchers wrote in their paper.

In addition to quickly curbing CO2 emissions, the study's authors called on the world's governments to enact policies that dramatically reduce short-lived pollutants like methane, black carbon and hydrofluorocarbons.

"Doing this could slow climate feedback loops and potentially reduce the short-term warming trend," researchers wrote.

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According to the study, a concerted effort to protect nature and restore ecosystems, including coral reefs, forests, wetlands and more would boost the planet's natural carbon absorption and sequestration abilities.

Additionally, study authors called on policy makers to transform the planet's economic and agriculture systems.

"Excessive extraction of materials and overexploitation of ecosystems, driven by economic growth, must be quickly curtailed to maintain long-term sustainability of the biosphere," scientists wrote.

Perhaps most controversially, the newly published paper also calls on world leaders to address population growth. Specifically, scientists suggest developing a framework for population stabilization -- and eventually, world population reduction -- that simultaneously boosts human rights while lowering fertility rates.

Several recent reports have highlighted similar strategies for climate change mitigation. According to one report by United Nations scientists, carbon emissions need to be halved in the next decade and reduced to zero by 2040.

Authors of the latest paper are hopeful that the world's governments and its populations can enact the necessary changes.

"Mitigating and adapting to climate change while honoring the diversity of humans entails major transformations in the ways our global society functions and interacts with natural ecosystems," researchers wrote. "We are encouraged by a recent surge of concern. Governmental bodies are making climate emergency declarations. Schoolchildren are striking. Ecocide lawsuits are proceeding in the courts. Grassroots citizen movements are demanding change, and many countries, states and provinces, cities, and businesses are responding. As an Alliance of World Scientists, we stand ready to assist decision makers in a just transition to a sustainable and equitable future."

Carbon capture could be climate change solution, or a waste of time
Carbon capture and storage promises to scrub CO2 from the exhaust pipes of coal and gas plants, for sale or storage, but high costs have prevented wide-scale adoption. And some scientists hope it stays that way.

Carbon capture and store technologies promise to clear CO2 from power plants from the air, but a data analysis suggests CCS may not reduce levels by useful amounts. Photo by Marak007/Pixabay

Nov. 8, 2019  (UPI) -- Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy announced $110 million in federal funding for research and development of carbon capture and storage projects.

According to DOE, carbon capture and storage technologies, or CCS, are "increasingly becoming widely accepted as a viable option" for coal- or gas-fired power plants to reduce their emissions.

Carbon capture technologies promise to scrub CO2 from the flumes and exhaust pipes of coal and gas plants. The captured carbon can be permanently buried underground or sold for other uses like making fertilizers or boosting oil extraction. The technologies have been tested on small scales, but high costs have prevented wide-scale adoption.

While subsidy-free wind and solar power now offer the cheapest sources of electricity generation in most major economies -- and continue to dominate new electric generating capacity -- only a handful of operating carbon capture facilities exist.

And quite a few climate scientists and clean energy advocates hope it stays that way.

"They're a boondoggle," Mark Jacobson, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University, told UPI.

The United Nations latest climate report calls on the world's governments to cut emissions in half by 2030 and to zero by 2040 in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial averages, a threshold for avoiding the worst impacts of climate change. The United Nations report -- and the cost minimization models used by the report's authors -- suggests carbon capture technologies could be part of the path to carbon neutrality.

Jacobson isn't convinced. He recently published a study in the journal Energy and Environmental Science suggesting these technologies do more harm than good.

SEE ABSTRACT BELOW

According to Jacobson, many of the models that purport to demonstrate the viability of carbon capture overestimate the technology's efficiency.

"All these other groups that use models, they just assume that the technology captures 85 to 90 percent," he said.

For his study, Jacobson didn't rely on models. He used the first six months of carbon capture data recorded at Petra Nova, a coal-burning power plant built in Texas with a post-combustion carbon capture treatment system. The data showed the technology was just 55.4 percent efficient during the six months, on average.

"But that's not even the major issue," Jacobson said. "The major issue is what is not even considered by their models, and that is that they literally built a natural gas plant to power their carbon capture technology."

Models favorable to carbon capture's potential ignore the upstream emissions and air pollution impacts, he said. In the case of Petra Nova, that is the emissions release and pollution caused by all that goes into constructing and fueling a gas power plant.

When Jacobson accounted for the upstream impacts, he found the Petra Nova project reduced the coal boiler's emissions by just 10 percent.

It would be much better, Jacobson contends, to simply build renewable energy to produce the equivalent power provided by the Petra Nova plant. In fact, Jacobson suggests it would be better to simply do nothing than increase upstream air pollution inputs with inefficient carbon capture projects.

James Mulligan agrees that all things being equal, renewable energy is superior to carbon capture as an energy solution for climate change mitigation. But according to Mulligan, things aren't always equal.

Billions of dollars are spent every year on new gas power plants, and thousands more power plants with purchasing agreements ensure they will be online for many more years.

Mulligan argues Jacobson's contention that it would be better to not do anything at all than to deploy carbon capture technology is based on flawed assumptions.

"Jacobson is a huge advocate of 100 percent renewable," Mulligan told UPI. "His research is a good reminder that we should be shooting for as much renewable as possible, but he's trying to kneecap an entire technology by painting a very shoddy picture of the very first power plant."

Mulligan's first issue is with Jacobson's use of Petra Nova's efficiency data.

"I'm not sure if someone botched the deployment of the system, or they simply weren't operating at full capacity in their first six months," he said. "Jacobson doesn't know either, because he doesn't ask. But we know this technology can capture up to 90 percent of CO2 emissions."

Mulligan likened Jacobson's assumption to taking an umbrella out in the rain, failing to open it up and concluding that it doesn't work.

"If we did that, we'd be called fools," Mulligan said.

Supporters of carbon capture technology suggest steps can be taken to reduce upstream emissions and other environmental impacts. Carbon capture systems also can be powered by renewable energy.

Jacobson's research suggests the Earth and its atmosphere would be better off if renewable energy were built to replace fossil fuels, not power technology designed to reduce the emissions of fossil fuel sources.

But scenarios might exist in which renewables aren't a viable option, Mulligan said.

"Renewable energy is great for providing electricity. Less great for providing on-demand high-quality thermal energy for industrial processes," Mulligan said. "It also does nothing for emissions from concrete. In these applications, even groups like Greenpeace and Sunrise acknowledge we'll likely need CCS."

A risk also exists that as renewable energy becomes the dominant source of energy, its reliability will become an issue. Solar and wind are cheap, but they're not available all the time. Until better, cheaper battery storage technologies come along, some fossil fuel plants will need to continue to operate to maintain the power grid's reliability and ensure prices don't skyrocket.

It would be better, Mulligan argues, if regulation mandated that fossil fuel power plants that must continue to exist, for whatever reason, be retrofitted with carbon capture technology.

But Jacobson's isn't the only study that has painted carbon capture in an unfavorable light. Another paper, published last spring in the journal Nature Energy, found that renewables were far superior to CCS from the standpoint of energy return-on-investment.

"Given its net energy disadvantages, carbon capture and storage should be considered a niche and supplementary contributor to the energy system, rather than be seen as a critical technology option as current climate agreements view it," Denes Csala, a lecturer in energy storage and system dynamics at Lancaster University, said in a statement.

Carbon capture has allies in the oil and gas industry and the labor sector -- many unions see it as a lifeline for fossil fuel industry jobs -- and has been characterized as "essential" to climate change mitigation by the International Energy Agency. The United Nations has acknowledged that the technology could be used as one of many solutions for carbon emissions reductions.

But plenty of environmental advocates remain opposed. In 2017, Michael Bloomberg told a crowd at the Bloomberg New Energy Finance summit that the technology was "a figment of the imagination." Last year, Al Gore told Axios that he thought carbon capture was "nonsense."

Critics of carbon capture worry that the technology will usurp public and private funds that otherwise might be used for renewable energy, as well as further entrench the interests of the fossil fuel industry, which controls much of the technology involved in carbon capture.

A report published this year by the Center for International Environmental Law echoes these concerns.

"We need to transition away from reliance on fossil fuels," researchers wrote. "Anything that moves us toward greater reliance will not be a solution, and the push for geoengineering is likely to do exactly that."

Another report by Clean Air Task Force, an environmental non-profit group friendly to "low carbon" alternatives to renewables determined the development of carbon capture technologies would not displace wind and solar projects.

Mulligan agrees that CCS should mostly be reserved for special circumstances, but he doesn't think the technology should be impugned unconditionally.

"I don't want to take the CCS option off the table," he said. "This isn't about doing CCS instead of renewable energy. This is about managing the risk that our first-best preference for decarbonization fails to fully and completely deliver on a tight timetable."

If there's one thing on which those friendly to and antagonistic towards CCS can agree, it's that carbon isn't properly priced by world governments or major economies. One way to fix that would be a carbon tax.

"We don't have a lot of CCS because we don't have a real price on carbon," Mulligan said.

But while a carbon tax and a real price on carbon would make CCS projects viable in the short run, a hard price on carbon also likely would accelerate the demise of fossil fuel energy and prove a boon to renewable energy and storage technologies.

The health and climate impacts of carbon capture and direct air capture

Mark Z. Jacobson  

Abstract

Data from a coal with carbon capture and use (CCU) plant and a synthetic direct air carbon capture and use (SDACCU) plant are analyzed for the equipment's ability, alone, to reduce CO2. In both plants, natural gas turbines power the equipment. A net of only 10.8% of the CCU plant's CO2-equivalent (CO2e) emissions and 10.5% of the CO2 removed from the air by the SDACCU plant are captured over 20 years, and only 20–31%, are captured over 100 years. The low net capture rates are due to uncaptured combustion emissions from natural gas used to power the equipment, uncaptured upstream emissions, and, in the case of CCU, uncaptured coal combustion emissions. Moreover, the CCU and SDACCU plants both increase air pollution and total social costs relative to no capture. Using wind to power the equipment reduces CO2e relative to using natural gas but still allows air pollution emissions to continue and increases the total social cost relative to no carbon capture. Conversely, using wind to displace coal without capturing carbon reduces CO2e, air pollution, and total social cost substantially. In sum, CCU and SDACCU increase or hold constant air pollution health damage and reduce little carbon before even considering sequestration or use leakages of carbon back to the air. Spending on capture rather than wind replacing either fossil fuels or bioenergy always increases total social cost substantially. No improvement in CCU or SDACCU equipment can change this conclusion while fossil fuel emissions exist, since carbon capture always incurs an equipment cost never incurred by wind, and carbon capture never reduces, instead mostly increases, air pollution and fuel mining, which wind eliminates. Once fossil fuel emissions end, CCU (for industry) and SDACCU social costs need to be evaluated against the social costs of natural reforestation and reducing nonenergy halogen, nitrous oxide, methane, and biomass burning emissions.

THE REALITY IS THAT CCS IS NOT GREEN NOR CLEAN IT IS GOING TO BE USED TO FRACK OLD DRY WELLS SUCH AS IN THE BAKAN SHIELD IN SASKATCHEWAN
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-myth-of-carbon-capture-and-storage.html

ALSO SEE https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=CCS

Study: Renewables, not nuclear power, 

can provide truly low carbon energy



Renewable energy programs are more likely to help countries reduce carbon emissions than nuclear energy projects. Photo by University of Sussex


Oct. 5 (UPI) -- Nuclear energy programs around the world have failed to deliver on promises of carbon emissions reductions, according to a new survey.

When researchers at the University of Sussex Business School, in Britain, and the ISM University of Management and Economics, in Lithuania, analyzed nuclear energy programs and renewable power operations in 123 countries over the last 25 years, they found the two tend not to co-exist all that well.

In low-carbon energy systems, the two programs crowd one another other out of the energy market, as well as diminish the efficiency of the other, researchers said.

The latest findings, published Monday in the journal Nature Energy, suggest countries are less likely to meet carbon emissions reduction targets when nuclear energy programs box out renewables.

"The evidence clearly points to nuclear being the least effective of the two broad carbon emissions abatement strategies, and coupled with its tendency not to co-exist well with its renewable alternative, this raises serious doubts about the wisdom of prioritizing investment in nuclear over renewable energy," lead study author Benjamin Sovacool said in a news release.

"Countries planning large-scale investments in new nuclear power are risking suppression of greater climate benefits from alternative renewable energy investments," said Sovacool, a professor of energy policy at Sussex.

Researchers relied on World Bank and International Energy Agency data to examine the impacts of nuclear programs on renewables, and vice versa.

The analysis showed that when electricity transmission and distribution systems are optimized for large-scale, centralized power production, like a nuclear power plant, small-scale, often-heterogenous renewable power sources are put at a disadvantage.

Likewise, when financial markets, regulatory bodies and employment practices are designed to facilitate large-scale nuclear power construction projects, small-scale renewable projects lose out on access to capital, permits and workers.

"This paper exposes the irrationality of arguing for nuclear investment based on a 'do everything' argument," said study co-author Andy Stirling.

"Our findings show not only that nuclear investments around the world tend on balance to be less effective than renewable investments at carbon emissions mitigation, but that tensions between these two strategies can further erode the effectiveness of averting climate disruption," said Stirling, a professor of science and technology policy at Sussex.

It's not that nuclear power programs don't provide any benefits, though.

Researchers found nuclear energy programs were associated with a small drop in carbon emissions in countries with high GDP per capita. However, the data also revealed a stronger correlation between investments in renewable energy and carbon emissions reductions in countries with high GDP per capita.

In less wealthy countries, nuclear energy projects were associated with slight increases in carbon emissions.

"While it is important to acknowledge the correlative nature of our data analysis, it is astonishing how clear and consistent the results are across different time frames and country sets," said study co-author Patrick Schmid.

"In certain large country samples the relationship between renewable electricity and CO2-emissions is up to seven times stronger than the corresponding relationship for nuclear," said Schmid, a researcher at ISM International School of Management München.

Energy report says COVID-19 has shown path away from climate change

"Solar is the new king of global electricity markets," 


Seats inside a terminal at New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport are seen empty on August 4. Decreased air travel and driving worldwide due to the coronavirus pandemic have driven down carbon emissions worldwide. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

Oct. 13 (UPI) -- While carbon emissions worldwide have fallen dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic, energy experts said in an influential report Tuesday that more global efforts are needed to prevent a return to the higher readings seen before the health crisis.

The International Energy Agency said in its World Energy Outlook 2020 it expects global energy demand to decline by 5% for the year, and fall a record 7% for energy-related emissions.

Under present scenarios, global demand is expected to return to pre-pandemic levels by early 2023 but that could be delayed until 2025 if the crisis endures, the IEA said.

According to one model, carbon emissions could surge next year, surpass 2019 levels by 2027 and rise to 36 gigatons by 2030.

Since the start of the pandemic, global emissions have declined sharply due to a major decrease in driving and air travel worldwide -- proof, many environmentalists say, that the world is capable of controlling the climate change crisis.

Carbon emissions from energy use are expected to fall to 33.4 gigatons for 2020, the lowest level since 2011 and the largest year-to-year decline since 1900 when record-keeping began, the IEA said.

If the world wants to continue affecting climate change for the better, the outlook says, it needs to take more advantage of the present downturn before carbon emissions return to 2019 levels. The outlook called the next decade "pivotal."

"It has been a tumultuous year for the global energy system. The COVID-19 crisis has caused more disruption than any other event in recent history, leaving scars that will last for years to come. But whether this upheaval ultimately helps or hinders efforts to accelerate clean energy transitions and reach international energy and climate goals will depend on how governments respond to today's challenges," it states.

"A surge in well-designed energy policies is needed to put the world on track for a resilient energy system that can meet climate goals."

"Despite a record drop in global emissions this year, the world is far from doing enough to put them into decisive decline," IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said in a statement.

"The economic downturn has temporarily suppressed emissions, but low economic growth is not a low-emissions strategy -- it is a strategy that would only serve to further impoverish the world's most vulnerable populations."

Birol called for quicker structural changes in the way energy is produced and consumed in the form of renewable sources to break the expected upward trend of carbon emissions.

"Governments have the capacity and the responsibility to take decisive actions to accelerate clean energy transitions and put the world on a path to reaching our climate goals, including net-zero emissions," he said.

The report said the pandemic has helped accelerate some renewable alternatives, such as solar power. The IEA report projects that the use of solar power will increase by an average of 13% per year between now and 2030.

"Solar is the new king of global electricity markets," Birol said.

Eight nations, including U.S., sign accords for moon missions


NASA's Space Launch System rocket is shown in this artist's concept launching into space for a lunar mission, which would be governed by a new framework signed Tuesday by eight nations. Image courtesy of NASA


ORLANDO, Fla., Oct. 13 (UPI) -- Eight nations have signed NASA's new framework to govern lunar exploration missions, the agency's administrator, Jim Bridenstine, announced Tuesday.

By signing the agreement, the eight nations commit to peaceful activities on the moon and in travel to the moon.

Provisions in the Artemis Accords stipulate that nations, and private companies in those nations, will openly disclose plans for lunar missions, and mine resources on the moon in accordance with the international Outer Space Treaty that dates to 1967.

The accords also commit signing nations to render aid to other nations on the moon if necessary, to minimize space debris and to register all objects taken to the lunar surface.

In addition to the United States, Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, United Arab Emirates and Britain signed the Artemis Accords.

"We are one human race and we are in this together. The Accords help us to work together to benefit all," Sarah Al Amiri, chair of the United Arab Emirates Council of Scientists, said in a live broadcast Tuesday.

Bridenstine had said in a press conference Monday that more nations are expected to sign the accords this year, and that he hopes all nations eventually will.

"As NASA, we always try to be very transparent and what our plans and policies are, and we think it's good for all nations to be transparent with their plans," Bridenstine said.

The new agreement comes as NASA plans to return astronauts to the moon in 2024, with further plans to establish a lunar base to tap water ice for possible long-term habitation.

NASA officials on Monday acknowledged they didn't approach all space-faring nations in drafting the accords because the agency wanted to move quickly. NASA sought a few nations believed to have common values, said Mike Gold, associate administrator for NASA's Office of International and Interagency Relations

"We wanted to begin with a group substantive and large enough to make an impact," Gold said. "It's very challenging to do that with too large a group. Now that the text of the accords have been finalized we can broaden the coalition."

Bridenstine said NASA couldn't approach China, which already has landed two robotic missions on the moon, because federal law prohibits negotiations with China.

When asked how the accords would be enforced, Bridenstine said the intent of the agreement is to pre-empt conflict by being transparent.

"If one of the participants chooses to disregard the guidance, other participants ... ultimately could be asked to leave the Artemis program, but I would hope that they will come to a better resolution," Bridenstine said.

Space agency leaders call for greater international cooperation


A Long March 5 rocket developed by China, which is one of six nations that have full launch capabilities, carried the Tianwen-1 Mars rover into orbit from Wenchang, Hainan province, China, on July 23. Photo by EPA-EFE/STR CHINA

Oct. 12 (UPI) -- Leaders of seven national space agencies called for greater international cooperation on space endeavors Monday during an online conference, and they cited climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic as areas in which cooperation could pay off.

"I want to work closely with international partners and exchange best practices," said Lisa Campbell, president of the Canadian Space Agency. "We need to do this together to ensure the benefits come back to Earth to solve challenges for future generations."

Campbell was joined by heads of space agencies in the United States, Europe, China, Russia, Japan and India at the 71st International Astronautical Congress, hosted by the Paris-based International Astronautical Federation.

Speakers noted that space activity is still growing despite the pandemic, and as eight nations now have full space exploration programs.

"If the whole world can actually unite together in the space endeavor, we can actually achieve greater success," said Kejian Zhang administrator of the China National Space Administration.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said the U.S. Artemis program to return people to the moon in 2024 makes international cooperation more important than ever.

"In the International Space Station, we've had 15 countries operating ... for 20 years with humans on board," Bridenstine said. "Now, when we go to the moon under the Artemis program and on to Mars, we can build on that framework and we can have more collaboration than ever before."

He noted that Japan and Europe and other nations are cooperating by building infrastructure for Artemis.

Despite Bridenstine's assessment, the head of Russia's agency, Roscosmos, said that his nation will not participate in the Artemis program because it is too "U.S.-centric."

"The most important thing here would be to base this program on the principles of international cooperation," which were used to fly to the space station, Dmitry Rogozin, the director-general of Roscosmos, said through a translator.

"If we could get back to considering making these principles as the foundation of the program, then Roscosmos could also consider its participation."

Rogozin said that, despite the lack of Russia's participation, he hopes the United States will include a port to accommodate Russian spacecraft on the proposed lunar Gateway, an orbiting station that missions would use as a staging ground to descend to the moon.

Bridenstine later posted on Twitter that the United States and its partners "look forward to working with the international community" on Artemis missions and on the Gateway.

He has said in the past that NASA's proposed Artemis Accords, governing principles for moon missions, will guide international cooperation while the Gateway has been designed using the same framework as the space station.

NASA advances plan to commercialize International Space Station


Axiom Space habitat modules are depicted attached to the International Space Station as part of NASA's plan to further commercialize work in low Earth orbit. Image courtesy of Axiom



ORLANDO, Fla., Oct. 12 (UPI) -- The planned launch of a private commercial airlock to the International Space Station in November will accelerate NASA's plan to turn the station into a hub of private industry, space agency officials said.

The commercialization plan also includes the launch of a private habitat and laboratory by 2024 and a project NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced on Twitter in May in which actor Tom Cruise will film a movie in space.

The 20-year-old space station may even have a private citizen on board again for the first time in years in late 2021, according to Phil McAlister, NASA's director of commercial spaceflight. It's part of a plan to wean the space station off NASA's public funding of $3 billion to $4 billion per year.

"We expanded the scope and range of activities that can be done on ISS," McAlister said in an interview earlier this year. "We carved out resources -- power, oxygen, data -- and we know we can support a paying customer, probably twice a year for up to a month."

Detailed plans for those stints at the space station are partly proprietary, he said.

Whether private citizens return or not, NASA has increased corporate missions to the space station in recent years.

One example was Estee Lauder, which sent 10 bottles of skin cream to the space station Oct. 1 as part of a $128,000 contract with NASA, according to the company and NASA.

The agency charges $17,500 per hour for the astronauts' time, according to its fee schedule. A representative for Estee Lauder confirmed the project last week, but declined to elaborate.

Anheuser-Busch has sent barley seeds to the ISS several times, including an experiment to see how the seeds could be sprouted, known as malting, in microgravity.

"By exposing barley to microgravity, we learned how to maximize production volumes, grow higher quality crops and overall, what it might take to successfully grow and malt barley in microgravity -- ultimately furthering our understanding of agriculture both on Earth and in space," a report from the beer company said.

Freeing up resources on the existing space station for private use will only take NASA so far, and additional infrastructure is needed in space, commercial spaceflight director McAlister said.

NASA plans to install a private airlock to release science experiments and a private habitation module for more space tourism or private researchers.

Pittsburgh-based space company Nanoracks plans to launch its Bishop Airlock to the space station on the next SpaceX cargo mission, scheduled for Nov. 22, the company and NASA confirmed last week.

Having a private airlock just for science experiments and small satellites will allow more efficient use of the station's airlocks and allow for more commercial activity, McAlister said.

Nanoracks funded the construction of the airlock, which cost about $15 million, for the opportunity to have private enterprise utilize it, according to the company. NASA signed an agreement with the company for the idea.

Houston-based Axiom Space, meanwhile, plans to launch the private habitat to the space station in 2024, the same year that NASA wants to land astronauts again on the moon.

Axiom intends to send multiple modules to the space station, growing its total indoor space exponentially through 2028, according to a company spokesman Beau Holder.

At that point, the space station will be nearing the end of its planned lifespan, and Axiom plans to detach its modules and create a separate space station, eventually freeing NASA from financing the operation.

"What Axiom provides is an opportunity for NASA to free up resources to take on the next exploration challenges while maintaining ability to do on-orbit research and exploration technology demonstrations," Holder said.


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Study: Nearly one in three U.S. college students smokes pot


Marijuana use among college students is on the rise, while alcohol consumption remains stable, a new study has found. Photo Jantaaa/Pixabay

Oct. 12 (UPI) -- Nearly one-third of all college students in the United States smoke marijuana, a study published Monday by JAMA Pediatrics found.

Roughly twice as many -- 62% -- drink alcohol, the data showed.

At the same time, the number of students who say they abstain from both has increased to 28% from just under 20% in the early 2000s.

The percentage of college students who meet the criteria for alcohol use disorder also has declined to 10% over the same period from just under 20%, they said.

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"Abstinence from both alcohol and marijuana have increased," study co-author Ty Schepis,, professor of psychology at Texas State University, told UPI.

And "the number of young adults with alcohol use disorders has significantly declined, [and] the same is true with combined alcohol and marijuana use disorders," he said.

The findings are based on an analysis of data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health for the period of 2002 through 2018, which included information on alcohol and marijuana consumption for between 7,000 and 11,000 young adults annually.

RELATED More using pot for depression, but it may not help, researchers say

In 2018, 31% of college students reported using marijuana, up from 27% in 2002, the data showed.

However, the percentage of students who met the criteria for marijuana use disorder remained stable over the study period, at about 6%, the researchers said.

Marijuana use disorder is a "problematic pattern of ... use leading to clinically significant impairment or distress," according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

RELATED Teen pot use may be climbing again since legalization

Although 62% of college students drank alcohol in 2018, a slight increase from 60% in 2002, the number who met the criteria for alcohol use disorder dropped by half over the same period, the data showed.

People with alcohol use disorder find that "drinking -- or being sick from drinking -- often interfere[s] with taking care of [their] home or family" and causes problems at work, school or home, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

Still, the percentage of students who reported co-use of alcohol and marijuana increased to 24% in 2018 from 17% in 2002. Young adults who were not in college reported roughly the same rates of alcohol and marijuana use, the researchers said.

"It is helpful for parents to know about the changes in the substance use landscape among adolescents and young adults," study co-author Sean Esteban McCabe told UPI. "These findings remind us that we need comprehensive plans for the full continuum of relationships people have with substances," he said.

"Parents can play a key role by having candid conversations with their kids about how they fit into the substance use landscape and discuss how their strategies are working during challenging times," said McCabe, director of the University of Michigan's Center for the Study of Drugs, Alcohol, Smoking and Health.