Tuesday, November 30, 2021

 Nfld. & Labrador·Updated

Come By Chance refinery sold, will become biofuel operation by mid-2022

U.S. private equity firm Cresta bought a controlling stake in 

the plant

CBC News · 



The Come by Chance oil refinery has been sold to Cresta Fund Management. (CBC)

The refinery in Come By Chance, N.L., has been sold to a U.S.-based private equity firm.

Cresta Fund Management has bought a controlling stake of the idled refinery, and plans to convert the plant to make aviation fuel and diesel from used cooking oil, corn oil and animal fat.

The firm has also renamed the plant, which will operate as Braya Renewable Fuels.

"The refinery is an important asset for Newfoundland and Labrador, for the jobs it supplies directly and indirectly to the local communities, to the region, and indeed to the entire province," said Premier Andrew Furey at a media briefing Tuesday.

Among its commitments to the refinery, Cresta will be required to maintain employment equal to a minimum of 200 full-time positions, which is fewer than the 335 workers represented by United Steelworkers Local 9316.

In mid-June, oil refinery workers voted 96 per cent in favour of a new collective agreement between the union and previous ownership group Silverpeak.

Silverpeak will stay on board with a minority interest in the refinery, and will continue to direct marketing.

Refinery will be profitable on Day 1: Cresta

In July, North Atlantic Refining Limited Partnership and Cresta reached an agreement-in-principle for the sale.

Cresta says initial production capacity will be 14,000 barrels per day, and hopes to have the operation running by mid-2022.

In a media release, Cresta said the company will have the ability to grow and adapt by modifying the refinery to expand the total capacity to 35,000 barrels per day, and expand "feedstock flexibility."

Kaushik Amin, a parter at Silverpeak, said $400 million has been invested in the first phase of the project, with the potential for millions more in future phases.

Kaushik Amin, partner at Silverpeak, says conversion has already started. (Government of Newfoundland and Labrador)

The fuel produced at the refinery will be exported out of province, meaning fuel will still need to be imported to the island of Newfoundland. There are no immediate plans to eliminate the extra five cents per litre the Public Utilities Board charges to cover importation expenses, said officials.

Jim Stump, a representative of Cresta who will be responsible for the implementation of the project, said renewable diesel is expensive to produce, but is profitable because of a "potpourri of incentives" in places like California.

"We'll make money the day we start up," he said.

Amin said construction has already started and the company plans to begin operations in August.

Province puts cap on environmental indemnity

Taxpayers in the province took on some of a refinery's pre-existing environmental liabilities seven years ago, when new owners bought the operation. With another sale pending, the province is again being asked to play a role, albeit a smaller one.

The province was previously on the hook for anywhere from $34 million to $269 million in possible environmental cleanup costs during the 10-year period from 2014 to 2024.

Under the new agreement, the province is extending the environmental indemnity until 2031, but is only on the hook for contamination that occurred before Cresta acquired the refinery and introduces a cap of $180 million.

Any cleanup that the province will have to pay for will likely be revealed in the new environmental site assessment due within the next 18 months.

The environmental indemnity dictates that the province will have to pay up to $150 million for cleanup of any contamination that occurred up to November 2014, and up to $30 million for any contamination that happened from December 2014 to October 2021.

"Taxpayers should be happy that now we have a cap on this," said Energy Minister Andrew Parsons on Tuesday.

Environmental unknowns

Amin said the refinery will be one of the largest biofuel operations of its kind in the world.

The refinery will make renewable diesel, a type of fuel that is molecularly identical to diesel, but made from feed stocks rather than crude oil.

Stump said the refinery will produce significantly less emissions, though he did not specify the environmental impact of the refinery. He said the refinery will be more environmentally friendly after it is converted because it will have less equipment and feedstocks do not emit nitrogen and sulphur products.

Jim Stump, a representative of U.S. private equity firm Cresta, will oversee the implementation of the project, which is set to begin operations in August. (Government of Newfoundland and Labrador)

While renewable diesel comes from renewable sources, it still releases carbon emissions, just like regular diesel.

There are other environmental concerns that come with the refinery; some of its petroleum tank inspections are not up to date, or their status is "unknown" to the province.

Amin said the company is in the process of remediating the tanks, and Stump said any tanks that haven't been inspected will be before operations begin in August.

In 2014, Silverpeak promised to "immediately" repair Tank 106, which has a partially collapsed roof, with sludge on the inside. Stump and Amin did not say what the plan is for that tank.

"It's an ongoing process," Amin said.

Amin also did not commit to publicly releasing the environmental assessment due within 18 months of purchase by Cresta.

"We're a private company so we have to make sure that everyone respects the private nature of the company," he said.

A previous assessment, due 18 months after Silverpeak purchased the refinery in 2014, was never completed.

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Modular nuclear reactors a 'long shot' worth studying, says Yukon gov't

Critics call small reactors an expensive and unrealistic

 'nuclear fantasy'

Paul Tukker · CBC News · 
An illustration shows a NuScale Power Module on a truck. Many small nuclear reactors (SMRs) are designed to be small enough to transport by truck or by shipping container. The Yukon government is undertaking a study to determine how feasible SMRs might be in the territory. (NuScale Power)

The Yukon government is looking for ways to reduce the territory's emissions, and wondering if nuclear power is one way to go.

The territory is undertaking a feasibility study, to determine whether there's a future for SMRs — small modular reactors — as a low-emissions alternative to things such as diesel power.

The idea, said John Streicker, Yukon's minister of energy, mines and resources, is to bring the SMRs into the Yukon to generate electricity.

"Even the micro ones, you could consider in our remote communities or wherever you've got a point load of energy demand," Streicker said. "Especially electricity demand."

SMRs are nuclear reactors that use fission to produce energy, similar to existing large reactors, but with a smaller power capacity. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) defines reactors as "small" if their output is under 300 MW. A traditional nuclear power plant produces about three times as much power or more.

They're "modular" because they're designed to be factory-assembled, and then installed where needed. 

Several provinces have already signed an agreement supporting the development of SMRs, and Canada's first grid-scale SMRs could be in place in Ontario by 2028 and Saskatchewan by 2032.

A year ago, the government of Yukon endorsed Canada's SMR action plan, agreeing to "monitor the progress of SMR technologies throughout Canada with the goal of identifying potential for applicability in our northern jurisdiction."

The territory is now following through by hiring someone to look at whether SMRs could make sense as a cleaner-energy alternative in Yukon. 

The territorial government has set a goal of reducing emissions by 45 per cent by 2030, excluding mining emissions, and "future emissions actions for post-2030 have not yet been identified," reads the government's request for proposals to do the SMR study. 

'We need to look at all possible solutions,' says John Streicker, Yukon's minister of energy, mines and resources. (Chris Windeyer/CBC)

Streicker acknowledges the potential for nuclear power in Yukon is a bit of "long shot" — but says it's one that can't be ignored.

"We need to look at all possible solutions," he said.

"I don't want to give the sense like we're putting all of our emphasis and energy towards nuclear power. We're not."

According to Streicker, it's nothing more than a study at this point.

Don't bother, researcher says

Still, M.V. Ramana, a professor at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia, said it's a study that's likely a waste of time and money. He says there's been plenty of research already, and to him, SMRs are just not a realistic option for Yukon or anywhere in Canada.

"I would say that, you know, that study can be done in two weeks by a graduate student, essentially, all right? They just have to go look at the literature on SMRs and look at the critical literature on this," Ramana said.

Ramana co-authored a research paper last year, looking at the potential for SMRs in remote communities or mine sites. The conclusion was that SMRs will be too expensive and there won't be enough demand to justify investing in them.

He said nuclear reactors are expensive, which is why their construction has "dried up" in much of the world.

"They generate electricity at very high prices," he said.

'They just have to go look at the literature,' said M.V. Ramana, a professor at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia. (Paul Joseph)

"[For] smaller reactors, the overall costs go down. But the amount of electricity that they will generate goes down even further."

The environmental case is also shaky, according to a statement signed last year by dozens of Canadian environmental and community groups, including the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, the Council of Canadians and the Canadian Environmental Law Associaton (CELA). The statement calls SMRs a "dirty, dangerous distraction" from tackling climate change and criticized the federal government for investing in the technology.

"We have to remember that the majority of the rhetoric we hear is from nuclear advocates. And so they are promoting what I would call, and other legal scholars and academics have called, a nuclear fantasy," said Kerrie Blaise of CELA.

Blaise describes the nuclear industry as facing an unknown future, with some of North America's larger reactors set to be decommissioned in the coming years. SMRs are therefore touted as the future.

"They're looking for a solution. And so that I would say climate change presents that timely solution for them."

Blaise argues the same safety and environmental questions exist for SMRs as for any nuclear reactors — such as how to produce and transport fuel safely, what to do with waste, and how to decommission them — and those can't be glossed over in a single-minded pursuit of lower carbon emissions.  

Main focus is still renewables, minister says

Yukon's energy minister agrees, and he's eager to emphasize that the territory is not committed to anything right now beyond a study.

"Every government has a responsibility to do diligence around this," Streicker said.

A solar farm in Old Crow, Yukon. The territory's energy minister says Yukon is still primarily focussed on renewables, and energy efficiency. (Caleb Charlie)

He also dismisses the idea that studying nuclear power is any sort of distraction from his government's response to climate change right now. Yukon's main focus is still renewable energy such as solar and wind power, increasing efficiency, and connecting Yukon's grid to the hydro project in Atlin, B.C., he said.

Streicker has been open to nuclear energy in the past. As a federal Green Party candidate in 2008, Streicker broke with the party line to suggest that nuclear could be a viable energy alternative. 

He acknowledges that nuclear power is always a hot-button issue, and Yukoners will have strong feelings about it. A lot will depend on how any future regulatory process works, he says.

"There's some people that think it's the 'Hail Mary,' and some people that think it's evil incarnate," he said. 

"Buried deep within Our Clean Future [Yukon's climate change strategy], there's a line in there that says we should keep an eye on other technologies, for example, nuclear. That's what this [study] is — it's to keep an eye on it."

A public report is expected to be done by June. 

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Rain to replace snow in the Arctic as climate heats, study finds

Climate models show switch will happen decades faster than previously thought, with ‘profound’ implications
The sun sets as rain falls beyond floating ice and icebergs in Disko Bay, Greenland. Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty Images


Damian Carrington
Environment editor
THE GUARDIAN
Tue 30 Nov 2021 

Rain will replace snow as the Arctic’s most common precipitation as the climate crisis heats up the planet’s northern ice cap, according to research.

Today, more snow falls in the Arctic than rain. But this will reverse, the study suggests, with all the region’s land and almost all its seas receiving more rain than snow before the end of the century if the world warms by 3C. Pledges made by nations at the recent Cop26 summit could keep the temperature rise to a still disastrous 2.4C, but only if these promises are met.

Even if the global temperature rise is kept to 1.5C or 2C, the Greenland and Norwegian Sea areas will still become rain dominated. Scientists were shocked in August when rain fell on the summit of Greenland’s huge ice cap for the first time on record.

The research used the latest climate models, which showed the switch from snow to rain will happen decades faster than previously estimated, with autumn showing the most dramatic seasonal changes. For example, it found the central Arctic will become rain dominated in autumn by 2060 or 2070 if carbon emissions are not cut, instead of by 2090 as predicted by earlier models.

The implications of a switchover were “profound”, the researchers said, from accelerating global heating and sea level rise to melting permafrost, sinking roads, and mass starvation of reindeer and caribou in the region. Scientists think the rapid heating in the Arctic may also be increasing extreme weather events such as floods and heatwaves in Europe, Asia and North America by changing the jet stream.

“What happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay there,” said Michelle McCrystall at the University of Manitoba in Canada, who led the new research. “You might think the Arctic is far removed from your day-to-day life, but in fact temperatures there have warmed up so much that [it] will have an impact further south.

“In the central Arctic, where you would imagine there should be snowfall in the whole of the autumn period, we’re actually seeing an earlier transition to rainfall. That will have huge implications. The Arctic having very strong snowfall is really important for everything in that region and also for the global climate, because it reflects a lot of sunlight.”

Prof James Screen of the University of Exeter in the UK, who was part of the research team, said: “The new models couldn’t be clearer that unless global warming is stopped, the future Arctic will be wetter, once-frozen seas will be open water, rain will replace snow.”

Scientists already agree that precipitation will increase significantly in the Arctic in future, as more water evaporates from increasingly warmer and ice-free seas. But the research, published in the journal Nature Communications, found this would be hugely dominated by rain, which will more than treble in autumn by 2100 if emissions are not cut.

The scientists concluded: “The transition from a snow- to rain-dominated Arctic in the summer and autumn is projected to occur decades earlier and at a lower level of global warming, potentially under 1.5C, with profound climatic, ecosystem and socioeconomic impacts.”

Snow is important in producing sea ice each winter, so less snow means less ice and more heat absorbed by open oceans. The research shows rain increasing on the southern coast of Greenland. This could further accelerate the sliding of glaciers into the ocean and the consequent rise in sea levels that threatens many coastal areas.

Much of the land in the Arctic is tundra, where the soil has been permanently frozen, but more rain would change that. “You are putting warm water into the ground that might melt the permafrost and that will have global implications, because as we know, permafrost is a really great sink of carbon and of methane,” said McCrystall.

The impacts in the region include the melting of vital ice roads, more floods, and starvation for herds of animals. When rain falls on snow and then freezes, it stops the animals feeding. “The reindeer, caribou and musk oxen can’t break through the layer of ice, so they can’t get to the grass they need to survive and suffer huge die-offs,” she said.

Prof Richard Allan, at the University of Reading in the UK, who was not involved in the research, said: “Exploiting a state-of-the-art set of complex computer simulations, this new study paints a worrying picture of future Arctic climate change that is more rapid and substantial than previously thought. This research rings alarm bells for the Arctic and beyond.”

However, Gavin Schmidt of the Nasa Goddard Institute for Space Studies in the US said the claim of more rapid change was “unsupported”, because some of the new climate models forecast warmer than expected future temperatures.
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Earth's Ancient Mountains Rose Up With Help From The Ocean's Tiniest Organisms

(Feng Wei Photography/Getty Images)

CARLY CASSELLA
30 NOVEMBER 2021

Without an explosion in ocean life more than 2 billion years ago, many of Earth's mountains might never have formed, according to new research.

When tiny organisms in the shallows of the sea, like plankton, die and sink to the bottom, they can add organic carbon to Earth's crust, making it weaker and more pliable.

A case study of 20 mountain ranges around the world, including those in the Rockies, the Andes, Svalbard, central Europe, Indonesia, and Japan, has now linked the timing of high carbon burial in the ocean with the very generation of our planet's peaks.

"The additional carbon allowed easier deformation of the crust, in a manner that built mountain belts, and thereby plate margins characteristic of modern plate tectonics," the researchers write.

The changes seem to have begun roughly 2 billion years ago, in the middle of the Paleoproterozoic Era, when biological carbon from plankton and bacteria began to add exceptionally high concentrations of graphite to the ocean floor's shale. This made the rock brittle and more likely to stack.

Within 100 million years, most mountain ranges began to form in these weakened slices of crust. Mountain ranges that emerged more recently follow the same pattern.

In the Himalayas, for instance, tectonic thrusting around 50 million years ago was focused on Paleoproterozoic sediments with the most organic-rich beds.

The timing and location implies that biological carbon in graphite continues to shape the geology of our planet.

"Ultimately what our research has shown is that the key to the formation of mountains was life, demonstrating that the Earth and its biosphere are intimately linked in ways not previously understood," explains geologist John Parnell from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland.

The data for the study were collected from already published literature on mountain formation and buried marine biomass.

In the past, numerous studies have shown tectonic plates need to be weakened by graphite to create mountains, but how this initially occurs is less clear.

The new research suggests marine life is a key part of the process. All 20 of the mountain ranges studied ultimately held black shale highly concentrated with graphite, which appeared to come from a biological origin.

"We can see the evidence in the northwest of Scotland, where the roots of the ancient mountains and the slippery graphite that helped build them can still be found, in places like Harris, Tiree, and Gairloch," says Parnell.

The surge in marine life 2 billion years ago most likely occurred in response to the Great Oxidation Event, when photosynthesizing bacteria began to produce vast amounts of oxidation, capable of supporting new forms of single-celled life, like an abundance of marine plankton.

Yet the formation of mountains doesn't even require that much biological carbon. Just a small percentage of biomass is needed for the edges of tectonic plates to slip under or over one another when they collide.

In mountain ranges made from Paleoproterozoic sediment, however, carbon content is consistently above 10 percent. Scientists found it sometimes even reaches above 20 percent.

In short, it seems an exceptional surge in marine life billions of years ago set the stage for many of the mountain ranges we see today.

"As the carbon contents of the sediment were anomalously high in the Paleoproterozoic, the flux of carbon into subduction zones was greater, and hence deformation could take place more readily than had been possible hitherto," the authors explain.

If the team is right, it means microscopic single-celled organisms, invisibly floating in the sea, might have played a key role in creating some of the largest geological structures on our planet.

From the littlest things on Earth, the biggest things can grow.

The study was published in Communications Earth & Environment.
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How Sand Mining Is Quietly Creating A Major Global Environmental Crisis 

Forbes
Nov 29, 2021
Globally, it’s estimated that we mine as much as 50 billion metric tonnes of sand every year to build our roads, bridges, skyscrapers, homes and more. Rapid urbanization around the world has made sand a high value commodity, so much so that, for some, it’s even worth killing for. But not all sand is the same, and experts say some mining operations are damaging ecosystems, infrastructure and putting people in danger around the world. 

0:00 Intro
1:06  How the world uses sand
3:46  Inside the growing demand for sand
6:08  How the world mines sand
7:33  A look at the environmental effects of sand mining
9:20  Explaining sand mafias and cartels
11:14  Exploring alternative building materials
13:04  The future of sand and concrete
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UH OH
‘Amazing science’: researchers find xenobots can give rise to offspring

Xenobots are synthetic lifeforms made by cells from frog embryos and assembling them into clusters

PACMAN IN REVERSE
Xenobots. The parent organism in red next to an offspring cell coloured green. 
Photograph: Wyss Institute


Nicola Davis
THE GUARDIAN
Mon 29 Nov 2021 

Some species do it in pairs, some without knowing the other parties involved, and some even do it on their own: when it comes to replication, nature is nothing if not versatile.

Now researchers say they have found that clusters of frog cells can undergo a form of replication never before seen in plants or animals. The spherical clumps, known as xenobots, can give rise to “offspring” by sweeping up loose cells and swashing them into yet more clusters.

“These things move around in the dish and make copies of themselves,” said Prof Josh Bongard, of the University of Vermont, a co-author of the research.

Xenobots were first announced last year, and are what are known as “living robots”– synthetic lifeforms made by taking a few thousand cells from frog embryos and assembling them into clusters about 1mm in size.

Xenobots have no digestive system or neurons, and naturally fall apart after about two weeks. Bongard said the xenobots in the current study could propel themselves around using hair-like projections called cilia.

“They definitely do not grow into frogs, they actually keep the form that we impose on them. And they look and act in ways very different from normal frog,” he said.

One of those ways is the production of offspring. Anything that makes a copy of itself can be said to replicate, Bongard noted. But plants and animals have previously been found to do this by reproduction – mechanisms that range from the asexual process of budding to giving birth.

Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Bongard and colleagues report that xenobots take a very different approach called kinematic self-replication – a process previously seen for molecules but not organisms.

“Kinematic self-replication in molecules was definitely important at the start of life on Earth. But we don’t know whether this form of replication, which we now see in groups of cells, played a role in the life’s origins,” Bongard said.

The team made their discovery by watching the actions of xenobots in petri dishes containing room-temperature pondwater and loose cells from frog embryos.

“[The xenobots] move around in the dish in this corkscrew pattern and they crash into other loose cells, and sort of just smush and push them [into piles],” Bongardsaid.

The team found that as the cells are sticky, they can – if a pile is large enough – form a new, moving cluster over five days: a child xenobot.

But there is a hitch. “It turns out that these xenobots will replicate once, one generation, they will make children. But the children are too small and weak to make grandchildren,” said Bongard.

Using artificial intelligence, the researchers found that if the xenobots were formed into certain shapes, such as that of the video game character Pac-Man, replication continued for further generations.

Bongard said the hope was that self-replicating machines could eventually be developed to do useful work, with the team’s computer simulations suggesting the xenobots could fix electrical circuits.

“These are very small, biodegradable and biocompatible machines, and they’re perfectly happy in freshwater,” he said, adding that near-term applications could include collecting microplastics from waterways.

In the long-term, biobots made from our own cells could even be used in the body to remove the need for surgery, said Bongard.

Prof Mark Miodownik, the director of the Institute of Making at University College London, welcomed the research, saying it was “amazing science and another step closer to animate materials”.

WHAT ARE XENOBOTS? FIRST LIVING ROBOTS CAN SELF-REPLICATE AS PER SCIENTISTS

Filiz Mustafa

Xenobots are back in the media spotlight after a research found that the first living robots can reproduce. So, what are they?

The living robots have made headlines in the tech and science field after a study was published this week.

WHAT ARE XENOBOTS?

Xenobots are the world’s first self-reproducing living robots, according to a study published in the scientific journal PNAS.

They are formed from the stem cells of the African clawed frog and were first introduced in 2020 when research saw that they can move and group together.

As per a video from Vermont University, Xenobots are “computer-designed organisms gather single cells inside a Pac-Man-shaped “mouth”—and release Xenobot “babies” that look and move like themselves”.




WHO IS BEHIND THE STUDY?

Scientists from the University of Vermont, Tufts University and Harvard University’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering have teamed up to create the research.

The Xenobots are an entirely new form of biological reproduction, as per scientists, and are different from any animal or plant known to the science world to this date.

Professor of biology and director of the Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University Michael Levin, who served as co-lead in the study, said: “I was astounded by it. Frogs have a way of reproducing that they normally use but when you liberate (the cells) from the rest of the embryo and you give them a chance to figure out how to be in a new environment, not only do they figure out a new way to move, but they also figure out apparently a new way to reproduce.”

Lead author of the research and computer science professor and robotics expert at the University of Vermont Josh Bongard explained more about the Xenobots and said:

“Most people think of robots as made of metals and ceramics but it’s not so much what a robot is made from but what it does, which is act on its own on behalf of people.

“In that way it’s a robot but it’s also clearly an organism made from genetically unmodified frog cell.”


 

HOW TO FIND MORE ABOUT THE STUDY

If you want to find more about the study, you can follow University of Vermont, Tufts University and Harvard University on Twitter.

Or read the full research from this paper here.

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RIBBIT

SCIENTISTS SEE A STRANGE — AND WORRYING — CLIMATE CHANGE EFFECT IN FROGS

It's not a good sign.

TARA YARLAGADDA
11.29.2021 

THE ROLE human-induced climate change plays in the decline of frog species just took a strange turn.

Scientists are becoming keenly aware that animals’ bodies are being affected in peculiar ways due to climate change. Amphibians are no exception. A study published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences examines the link between rising global temperatures and senescence (mortality related to aging) in frogs and toads in Europe and North America.

Hugo Cayuela is a postdoctoral researcher at the Université Claude Bernard in France. He says the research ties changes in frog aging to climate change.

“Accelerated aging is a potential threat for amphibians because it removes from the populations old/large individuals that strongly contributed to breeding,” Cayuela tells Inverse.

In other words: amphibians are aging faster than ever before in warmer environments, it’s disrupting their numbers, and humans are to blame.

HOW THEY DID IT — The scientists measured the impact of temperature and precipitation on senescence and aging in four toad and frog species residing in North America and Europe.

The researchers gathered data, monitoring some of the amphibians for a nearly 30-year period between 1990 and 2019. They would search for toads using headlamps at night and seek out frogs by day, studying several different sites of frogs and toads.

Then, using climate data, the researchers calculated the average annual temperature and precipitation at each site.

Finally, the researchers used statistical models to calculate the relationship between climate and aging in amphibians. Frogs are “excellent biological models” to study the impacts of the climate crisis on animal aging since their metabolic processes are known to be vulnerable to warmer or cooler temperatures.

“We collected demographic data in natural populations of frogs and toads in North America, and we used mathematical models to show that mean temperature affects senescence measures,” Cayuela says.


An image of the common frog Rana temporaria — one of the four amphibian species studied in the new research.Mathieu Berroneau


WHAT THEY FOUND — The scientists found three key findings from their research:
There was a strong link between increased annual temperature and senescence. Researchers found higher senescence — aging — rates in frogs in warmer temperatures.
These increased rates of aging correlated with shorter lifespans in all but one of the amphibian species. These species diverged more than 100 million years ago, suggesting other amphibians not studied may also be at risk of accelerated aging.
Female amphibians aged faster than males at lower temperatures, whereas male amphibians experienced more significant aging at higher temperatures. The sex difference may be linked to reproduction in females.

Based on their findings, the researchers concluded, “Climatic conditions could be a primary driver of aging” in ectotherms — animals like frogs that require sunlight and other external sources to maintain their body temperatures.

Although researchers have previously established a link between senescence and laboratory animals — such as the common fruit fly — this is the first time scientists have observed such a connection in the wild. But it’s hardly good news for the longevity of the frog.

While some amphibian species may adapt, Cayuela says others with “low genetic variation” will have a harder time evolving to avoid climate-change-related senescence.

WHY IT HAPPENS — Typically, amphibians in the sites studied face long seasons of lower temperatures, causing them to wait out the cold weather for eight to nine months — a period known as “overwintering.”

During this cold season, amphibians’ bodies enter into a hypermetabolic state that interrupts aging. But warmer temperatures may be interfering with this metabolic process, potentially speeding up the aging — and the extinction — of this key animal group.

WHY IT MATTERS — In recent years, mounting evidence has revealed the ways the climate crisis threatens not only the long-term survival of animal species, but the development of their actual bodies.

Birds in the Amazon are evolving smaller bodies and longer wingspans to cope with drier and hotter conditions. Rabbits are “shapeshifting” and increasing their ear size in response to warmer temperatures.


Now, we can add amphibians to the list of creatures whose bodies are being upended by the climate crisis. The study’s findings come at a critical turning point for amphibians — one that could determine their survival or extinction.

“Amphibians are the most threatened vertebrate class on earth, with the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species listing 40 percent of species threatened with extinction,” Cayuela says.

Increased aging resulting from the climate crisis may impact not just amphibians’ metabolic processes but could also shorten their lifespans.

“Improving our understanding of the influence of climatic conditions on lifespan and actuarial senescence patterns is critical to predicting how climate change will impact population dynamics of ectotherms in the next decades,” the researchers write.

But why should we care about the death of amphibians? Cayuela says it’s because these animals serve critical functions in ecosystems, acting as a food source for some humans, reducing mosquito populations, and serving as test subjects in medical research.

Amphibians also “belong to ancient vertebrate lineages that colonized emerged lands more than 250 million years ago” and serve as an example of Earth’s ancient biodiversity, Cayuela explains.


Scientists find aging in the common frog, Rana temporaria, linked to warmer temperatures. Will the climate crisis drive amphibians to extinction? Mathieu Berroneau

WHAT’S NEXT — Global temperatures are on track to increase by at least 2.4 degrees Celsius— even taking into account green pledges made by world leaders at the recent UN COP26 summit — according to Climate Action Tracker.

That forecast likely spells bad news for not just humans, but amphibians as well.

“Increasing temperature caused by climate change could thus exacerbate the decline of amphibian populations that already face multiple anthropogenic stresses —e.g., habitat loss and degradation, landscape fragmentation,” Cayuela says.


Abstract: 
Variation in temperature is known to influence mortality patterns in ectotherms. Even though a few experimental studies on model organisms have reported a positive relationship between temperature and actuarial senescence (i.e., the increase in mortality risk with age), how variation in climate influences the senescence rate across the range of a species is still poorly understood in freeranging animals. We filled this knowledge gap by investigating the relationships linking senescence rate, adult lifespan, and climatic conditions using long-term capture–recapture data from multiple amphibian populations. We considered two pairs of related anuran species from the Ranidae (Rana luteiventris and Rana temporaria) and Bufonidae (Anaxyrus boreas and Bufo bufo) families, which diverged more than 100 Mya and are broadly distributed in North America and Europe. Senescence rates were positively associated with mean annual temperature in all species. In addition, lifespan was negatively correlated with mean annual temperature in all species except A. boreas. In both R. luteiventris and A. boreas, mean annual precipitation and human environmental footprint both had negligible effects on senescence rates or lifespans. Overall, our findings demonstrate the critical influence of thermal conditions on mortality patterns across anuran species from temperate regions. In the current context of further global temperature increases predicted by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change scenarios, a widespread acceleration of aging in amphibians is expected to occur in the decades to come, which might threaten even more seriously the viability of populations and exacerbate global decline.


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Research pushes auto industry closer to clean cars powered by direct ethanol fuel cells

Date:November 29, 2021
Source:Oregon State University

Summary:

Alternative-energy research is charting a path toward the mass adoption of clean cars powered by direct-ethanol fuel cells.



Alternative-energy research at Oregon State University is charting a path toward the mass adoption of clean cars powered by direct-ethanol fuel cells.

Zhenxing Feng of the OSU College of Engineering helped lead the development of a catalyst that solves three key problems long associated with DEFC, as the cells are known: low efficiency, the cost of catalytic materials and the toxicity of chemical reactions inside the cells.

Feng and collaborators at Oregon State, the University of Central Florida and the University of Pittsburgh found that putting fluorine atoms into palladium-nitrogen-carbon catalysts had a number of positive effects -- including keeping the power-dense cells stable for nearly 6,000 hours. A catalyst is a substance that increases the rate of a reaction without itself undergoing any permanent chemical change.

Findings were published today in Nature Energy.

Cars and trucks powered by gasoline or diesel engines rely on the combustion of fossil fuels, which results in emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. Motor vehicles are one of the main sources of atmospheric CO2, a primary factor in climate change.

"Combustion engines produce enormous amounts of carbon dioxide," said Feng, associate professor of chemical engineering. "To achieve carbon-neutral and zero-carbon-emissions goals, alternative energy conversion devices using the fuel from renewable and sustainable sources are urgently needed. Direct-ethanol fuel cells can potentially replace gasoline- and diesel-based energy conversion systems as power sources."

Feng and collaborators are in the process of soliciting funding to develop prototypes of DEFC units for portable devices and vehicles.

"If this is successful, we can deliver a device for commercialization in five years," he said. "With more industrial collaborators, the DEFC vehicle can be implemented in 10 years, hopefully."

Ethanol, also known as ethyl alcohol, consists of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen -- its chemical formula is C2H6O -- and is the active ingredient in alcoholic drinks. It occurs naturally through the fermentation of sugars by yeasts and can be derived from many sources including corn, wheat, grain sorghum, barley, sugar cane and sweet sorghum.

Most of the ethanol produced in the United States is made in the Midwest, most typically from corn.


A fuel cell, Feng explains, relies on the chemical energy of hydrogen or other fuels to cleanly and efficiently produce electricity. They can use a wide range of fuels and feedstocks and can serve systems as large as a utility power plant and as small as a laptop computer.

"In DEFC technology, ethanol can be generated from a number of sources, particularly biomass like sugar cane, wheat and corn," Feng said. "The benefit of using biological sources to produce ethanol is that plants absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide."

A liquid and thus easily stored and transported, ethanol can deliver more energy per kilogram than other fuels like methanol or pure hydrogen. Plus, Feng points out, infrastructure is already in place for both producing and distributing ethanol, making DEFC an attractive option for replacing internal combustion engines.

"The first vehicle powered by an ethanol-based fuel cell was developed in 2007," Feng said. "However, the further development of DEFC vehicles has significantly lagged due to the low efficiency of DEFC, the costs related to catalysts and the risk of catalyst poisoning from carbon monoxide produced in reactions inside the fuel cell."

To tackle those problems the research team, which also included OSU's Maoyu Wang and scientists from Southern University of Science and Technology in China and Argonne National Laboratory, developed high-performance palladium alloy catalysts that use less of the precious metal than current palladium-based catalysts.

Palladium, platinum and ruthenium are elements valued for their catalytic properties but expensive and difficult to obtain.

"Our team showed that introducing fluorine atoms into palladium-nitrogen-carbon catalysts modifies the environment around the palladium, and that improves both activity and durability for two important reactions in the cell: the ethanol oxidation reaction and the oxygen reduction reaction," Feng said. "Advanced synchrotron X-ray spectroscopy characterizations made at Argonne suggest that fluorine atom introduction creates a more nitrogen-rich palladium surface, which is favorable for catalysis. Durability is enhanced by inhibiting palladium migration and decreasing carbon corrosion."

Supporting this research were the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.

Story Source:

Materials provided by Oregon State University. Original written by Steve Lundeberg. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference:
Jinfa Chang, Guanzhi Wang, Maoyu Wang, Qi Wang, Boyang Li, Hua Zhou, Yuanmin Zhu, Wei Zhang, Mahmoud Omer, Nina Orlovskaya, Qing Ma, Meng Gu, Zhenxing Feng, Guofeng Wang, Yang Yang. Improving Pd–N–C fuel cell electrocatalysts through fluorination-driven rearrangements of local coordination environment. Nature Energy, 2021; DOI: 10.1038/s41560-021-00940-4

Cite This Page:
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Oregon State University. "Research pushes auto industry closer to clean cars powered by direct ethanol fuel cells." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 29 November 2021. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/11/211129122813.htm>.


File Photo: The logo of Hyundai Motors is seen on a steering wheel of an all-new Sonata sedan.

As Hydrogen economy grows rapidly, Hyundai is expected to lead the HEV market

 Updated: 30 Nov 2021ANI

  • Hyundai will release hydrogen-electric trucks next year following its HEV model NEXO.


  • There are some opinions that diesel trucks can be replaced with HEVs despite HEVs' high initial costs.

South Korea's hydrogen ecosystem grows rapidly. Hyundai Motor, the only automobile manufacturer produces hydrogen electric vehicles (HEVs), will release hydrogen electric trucks next year following its HEV model NEXO. Hyundai Motor's HEV market share is expected to be strengthened.

According to the industry on the 29th, the Environment Ministry has set a goal for supplying HEVs next year to 28,350 units, up 87% from this year.

Under the plan, 28,000 HEV passenger cars will be supplied. . The number of trucks has expanded from five to ten. 340 buses are set to be supplied. The budget for HEVs has also greatly expanded from 441.6 billion won this year to 892.7 billion won next year.

(Also Read: Worried about driving in narrow, tight spaces? Hyundai Mobis has a solution)

In addition, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced the first basic plan to implement hydrogen economy at the 4th Hydrogen Economic Committee on the 26th. The plan includes 15 tasks set based on four major strategies: leading domestic and foreign clean hydrogen production, establishing an optimized infrastructure, using hydrogen in daily life, and strengthening the ecosystem foundation.

The government is planning to expand hydrogen charging stations to more than 2,000 units iby 2050 by increasing the number of convergence charging stations that install hydrogen chargers at gas and LPG charging stations. The government will increase the number of hydrogen charging stations to 310 units next year, 450 in 2025, 660 in 2030, 1,200 in 2040, and 2,000 in 2050.

FILE PHOTO: Hyundai logo is seen during Munich Auto Show, IAA Mobility 2021 in Munich, Germany. (REUTERS)

For the plan, the Hydrogen Energy Network (Hynet), Kohygen, Korea Petroleum Association, and Korea LPG Association signed a partnership to improve eco-friendly energy infrastructure and expand hydrogen charging stations.

Hynet and Kohygen are planning to gradually establish hydrogen charging stations at gas and LPG stations, which have enough sites to build hydrogen charging stations, after evaluating the suitability.

In addition, the government will significantly expand the HEV production capacity to 5.26 million units by 2050 and improve its performance to the similar level of internal combustion engine cars by 2030. It will also expand the use of hydrogen to various transportations such as ships, drones, and trams.

According to Eugene Investment & Securities, the global hydrogen car market is expected to rise 70% year-on-year to 34,000 units next year. In particular, it is expected that the global competition will be fierce next year due to the sales expansion of hydrogen trucks and vans by global automakers such as SAIC, Stellantis, and Renault. In particular, it is predicted that the domestic market will drive the growth of the global hydrogen car market as the government's policy expands its goal of supplying hydrogen cars.

As eco-friendly trends are spreading in the logistics industry, the HEV commercial car market is also expected to grow.

HEVs are more expensive than electric vehicles (EVs) and have more disadvantages in terms of fuel efficiency and charging infrastructure. However, for commercial vehicles, HEVs are considered more competitive than EVs. This is because commercial vehicles travel longer than passenger cars and travel on fixed driving routes.

Considering the long charging time and load capacity of EVs, there are some opinions that diesel trucks can be replaced with HEVs despite HEVs' high initial costs. Considering the characteristics of the logistics industry that operates vehicles for a long time, the use of HEV models is expected to increase in the long run if supply contracts are signed through demonstrations.

Currently, only Hyundai Motor produces HEV models in the domestic automobile industry. Hyundai Motor's HEV model NEXO sold a total of 8,286 units from January to October this year, including domestic sales (7,341 units) and exports (945 units). It increased by 22.19% from 6,781 units last year (5,786 units in Korea and 995 units abroad). Kia is planning to unveil its HEV lineup in 2028.

Hyundai Motor will release its HEV truck 'Xcient' in Korea next year and accelerate the supply of hydrogen cars. The HEV market predicts that NEXO will lead the domestic passenger car market and Xcient will lead the commercial car market.

 

California green lights $1.4B for hydrogen fueling and electric truck charging infrastructure

November 29, 2021 1 By ALICIA MOORE

The Golden State announced its approval to help it to achieve its battery electric and H2 vehicle goals.

California has announced its approval of a three-year $1.4 billion hydrogen fueling and electric truck charging infrastructure investment. The funds are meant to help the state meet its ambitious electric vehicle and H2 powered car goal.

The majority of the funding from this plan will be poured into the 2021-2023 charging infrastructure.

There will be $314 million headed to light-duty vehicle charging, with another $690 million designated for medium-duty and heavy-duty zero-emission vehicle infrastructure. This, according to a California Energy Commission (CEC) news release. The medium-duty and heavy-duty vehicle infrastructure includes funding for both battery electric and fuel cell commercial truck infrastructure.

Additionally, another $77 million has been allocated for general H2 fuel infrastructure. Moreover, $25 million has been set aside for “zero-and near-zero-carbon fuel production and supply,” said the announcement. Beyond that, $15 million will be used for workforce training and development, and another $244 million will be used for zero-emission vehicle manufacturing.


The new EV and hydrogen fueling plan supports the 2020 executive order by Governor Gavin Newsom.

This new funding plan is in support of the executive order California Governor Newsom made last year. It required all new passenger vehicles sold by 2035 to be zero-emission such as battery electric or H2 fuel cell cars. Last June, the CEC stated that California would require almost 1.2 million EV chargers by 2030 in order to meet the demand that will result from Newsom’s goal.

This new investment plan aligns with other infrastructure projects, including a utility-based program that will boost the state’s charging stations by 38,000 over the next half decade. California electric commercial truck charging on a megawatt level will also be a component of the state’s future infrastructure strategy. Last May, WattEV announced its intentions for creating a Bakersfield solar-supplemented electric vehicle truck stop providing 4 megawatts of charging capacity which will later be raised to 25 megawatts.

The state’s announcement follows on the heels on a federal infrastructure bill by President Joe Biden which focuses on EV charging stations and hydrogen fueling infrastructure.

Interested in alternative energy and how hydrogen fuel works?

This article is focused on more of the financial ways to implement hydrogen infrastructure – Learn more about the largest green hydrogen projects – The U.S. green hydrogen projects are among the biggest! Australia green hydrogen projects along – BP hydrogen projects are all well established green hydrogen developers – Read more about – Who is the largest producer of green hydrogen? 

Also, make sure to visit our H2 Learning Center.



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