CAPITALI$T WA$TE

Many Drilled U.S. Wells Will Never Be Completed

By Julianne Geiger - Apr 08, 2021, 7:01 PM CDT

Fracking crews are increasing their activity in U.S. shale basins, finishing off a slew of DUC wells, according to the EIA’s latest Monthly Drilling Report. As oil and gas companies focus on finishing off wells they’ve already drilled, on the sidelines, observers are wondering whether this is a fluke or whether the industry has really learned its lesson about drilling rigs that they do not intend to complete. 

Are we seeing typical industry behavior, which may indicate that we are in for another DUC increase now that drilling activity has picked up?

Tackling the Fracklog

The way to describe the DUC count is a “fracklog” because it measures the number of wells that have been drilled but not yet completed—essentially creating a backlog of half-finished wells that are not producing oil or gas. The higher the DUC count, the more money oil companies have spent drilling wells that are not yet working—ostensibly while drilling more wells, which they also may not complete.

For the U.S. shale industry, the DUC count has been a bellwether for the oil industry; the higher the DUC count, the more money oil and gas companies are sinking into wells that are stuck in limbo and not producing. This could either mean fiscal irresponsibility or a rapidly changing shift in the markets that too quickly rendered wells once deemed wise as obsolete.

Of course, there are always DUCs. The logistics behind scheduling drilling and completion crews necessitate a certain number of drilled wells be made available to later complete. Companies often like to keep several months of drilled wells in inventory. And most wells that are drilled are finished within a year.

Related Video: The Conditions Are Ripe for A Second Shale Boom

But an excessive number of DUCs could signify that something is amiss in the industry.

The Whole Story

The true fracklog didn’t boom during the pandemic. The DUC counts started climbing ever higher sometime in 2017—around the time the U.S. shale industry was catching flack for out of control debt loads.  

True, during the pandemic, there were certainly a high number of DUCs. But the EIA reported DUC count of 7,685 in July 2020—after oil demand crashed, rendering foolish the process of spending more money to complete a well that a company didn’t need for production—is just par for the course, according to earlier EIA data. According to the EIA, the DUC count has been over 7,500, for the most part anyway, since mid-2018.

The Dead DUC is Still a DUC

But there are some, like Raymond James analyst John Freeman, who claimed this year in a note to clients that the United States’ true DUC count is much lower, given that many of the wells included in the EIA’s DUC count are dead in the water and many years old, likely never to be completed. According to Freeman, this figure is as much as 22% too high.

A 2019 Federal Reserve of Dallas survey of oil and gas company executives suggests that half of the respondents agree that the EIA is overestimating the number of DUCs.Related: Investors Rush To Oil Stocks Despite ESG Push

In a low oil price environment, oil and gas companies may spend money on finishing off an already drilled well, rather than on drilling a new well. But companies will continue to strive to keep that DUC inventory in their back pocket should the market call for it. But when oil prices have been low for a long time—and demand for crude or gas remains low, those low oil prices may never justify completing a well, resulting in another dead DUC.

Still, those DUCs are counted.

Where We Are Now

In 2014, the number of wells being drilled exceeded the DUC count. When drilling slowed at the end of that year, the number of DUCs continued to rise. There was a period leading up to 2017 that saw a dip in the DUC count. But before too long, DUCs were again on the rise.

The latest data suggests that the number of DUCs began to fall in July 2020 as oil inventories boomed, oil prices were ultra-low, and drilling and fracking activity had slowed to levels not seen in years. The DUC count has continued to fall since then, while drilling and completion activities have started to pick up. The gap between drilling and completion activity has closed over the last few years, while the gap between drilling activity and DUCs has inverted.  

But there is an unmistakable correlation between drilling activity and DUCs, with an anywhere from 20 to 50-week lag from rig count shifts to corresponding DUC shifts. If that pattern holds true, we may be in for another increase in the number of DUCs in the next few months. Unless, that is, the EIA revaluates the method it uses for establishing its DUC counts. Or, as some suggest, shale has learned to belt tighten, and spending is shifted more heavily toward completing rather than drilling.

By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

U.S. Boosts Oil Exports To Canada

By Charles Kennedy - 

Apr 14, 2021


Canada’s crude oil imports fell by 20 percent in 2020 due to lower demand in the pandemic, but the United States further cemented its position as top oil supplier to Canada, supplying nearly four out of every five barrels of oil, the Canada Energy Regulator said on Wednesday.

Canada is a major crude oil producer and exports much more oil than it imports, almost exclusively to the United States. Yet, Canada imports oil from abroad to feed refineries in its Atlantic Provinces, Quebec, and Ontario.

“Less than one third of Canadian crude oil is processed by Canadian refineries for a variety of reasons, such as lack of pipeline access to domestic supplies, specific product requirements of refineries, or because it costs less to import,” the regulator said in its analysis.

Last year, total Canadian crude oil imports plunged by 20 percent annually to 555,000 barrels per day (bpd), down from 693,000 bpd in 2019, because the pandemic crushed demand for fuels.

As imports dropped in volumes, the share of imports from the United States jumped to 77 percent of all imports in 2020 from 72 percent in 2019.

The second-biggest oil supplier to Canada was the world’s top oil exporter, Saudi Arabia, with a 13-percent share of Canadian oil imports, followed by Nigeria with 4 percent of imports and Norway with 3 percent, the Canada Energy Regulator said.

“The source for Canada’s crude oil imports has changed dramatically over the past decade. The United States has moved from a bit player in 2010 to a major supplier today, with the majority of oil imported into Canada coming from our southern neighbour,” Darren Christie, Chief Economist at the Canada Energy Regulator, said in a statement.

The surge in U.S. crude oil production in recent years was the key driver of the U.S. becoming the top provider­—by a wide margin—of foreign oil to Canada.

This year, demand for oil in Canada is returning, and with it, optimism in the Canadian oil sector.

“But the million-dollar question now in terms of what’s going to happen with demand is really what’s going to happen with the pandemic,” Canada Energy Regulator’s Christie told CBC in an interview.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

 

Shock Of The Week: Poll Reveals U.S. Pipelines Aren’t Actually Unpopular

By Julianne Geiger - Mar 31, 2021, 

When it comes to oil pipelines, it seems that the American people really haven’t lost that loving feeling after all, according to new research conducted by Wakefield on behalf of the Association of Oil Pipe Lines (AOPL).

AOPL’s new data suggests that oil pipelines have a 70% approval rating, despite the hoopla surrounding many of the pipelines that would lead one to believe that Americans are fed up with fossil fuel’s safest and most economical transportation mode.

That approval rating is higher than the maximum approval rating of President Biden, President Trump, or President Obama.

As it turns out, the American people seem to understand that right now, pipelines are the safest, most economical way to transport fossil fuels. And they are not ready to throw in the towel just yet.

That’s despite the appearance in the media that most people are behind President Biden’s cancellation decision of the Keystone XL. And it’s despite the protests at various oil pipeline sites throughout the United States, including the protests over the Dakota Access Pipeline a few years ago that monopolized news headlines.

Other than finding that 70% of all Americans have a “positive impression” of pipelines, the study found the intensity of support to be increasing.

But that’s not to say that Americans are unconcerned with climate change—they are. According to the poll, 68% of all Americans reported steady concern over the past year. But, as one might assume if left unattended, Americans are also concerned with how a climate change battle might affect their utility bills and steady supply of electricity.

As far as concerns go, the study found that Americans rank safety, affordability, and reliability as the three most important aspects of energy.

The survey also found that ultimately, Americans feel that canceling oil pipelines is not a good way to combat climate change, and oppose measures that would see oil and gas jobs cut.

By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:

THEY SHOULD ONLY USE MIDDLE SEAT
Blocking middle seats on planes reduces risk of COVID-19 spread: CDC

Leaving the middle seat empty could reduce virus spread by up to 57%

By Jeanette Settembre | Fox News


John Hopkins University professor of health policy Dr. Marty Makary weighs in on CDC's new air travel guidance on 'FOX News Live'

Blocking middle seats on planes reduces the risk of exposure to COVID-19, a new study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggests.

As airlines continue to allow passengers to book middle seats on planes, new research says that leaving the middle seat empty could reduce the spread of the virus by between 23% to 57%, according to the CDC’s report released Wednesday.

Blocking middle seats on planes reduces the risk of exposure to COVID-19, a new CDC report suggests. (iStock)

"Research suggests that seating proximity on aircraft is associated with increased risk for infection with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19," the CDC said in the report.

In the study, conducted with Kansas State University, researchers measured how far airborne virus particles traveled inside the aircraft using mannequins that emitted aerosol inside a mock plane cabin. The study did not take vaccinations or face mask-wearing into account.

TSA RECORDS 1.5 MILLION TRAVELERS IN SINGLE DAY FOR FIRST TIME SINCE MARCH 2020

Delta is currently the only airline in the U.S. that’s continued blocking middle seats, however, it will begin to allow passengers to book them after May 1. Other airlines have justified the re-booking by suggesting that air filters on most planes are safe to travelers wearing a facemask, a federal regulation. American Airlines ended its middle seat booking ban in July, allowing flight bookings at 100% capacity while United Airlines did not limit seating on planes during the pandemic at all. Southwest Airlines started rebooking middle seats in December.

U.S. travel continues to rebound with airports across the country seeing more than 1 million travelers daily, a milestone not seen since March 2020, the Transportation Security Administration reported. And it’s unclear if airlines will go back to blocking the middle seat on planes as the industry continues to bounce back. Trade group for the largest U.S. carriers, Airlines for America, referred to a Harvard University report that found a low transmission rate of the virus on planes citing the use of preventative measures to prevent the spread like face mask requirements and cleaning protocols, the Associated Press reported.

The CDC earlier this month released new travel guidance suggesting that fully vaccinated passengers can travel safely in the U.S. without getting tested or self-quarantining. The health agency continued to urge all travelers to continue wearing masks, hand washing and social distancing.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

‘SmartFarm’ device harvests air moisture for autonomous irrigation

By E&T editorial staff
Published Thursday, April 15, 2021

A solar-powered, fully automated device that can absorb air moisture at night and release it during the day for irrigation has been developed by a team of researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS).

Dubbed SmartFarm, the device uses a moisture-attracting material to absorb air moisture at night when the relative humidity is higher, and releases it when exposed to sunlight. The water harvesting and irrigation process can also be fine-tuned to suit different types of plants and local climate for optimal cultivation.

“Atmospheric humidity is a huge source of freshwater but it has remained relatively unexplored,” explained project leader Professor Tan Swee Ching.

“In this work, we’ve tried to mitigate food and water shortage simultaneously. We created a hygroscopic copper-based material and used it to draw moisture from the air. We then integrate this material into a fully automated solar-driven device that utilises the harvested water to irrigate plants daily without manual intervention.”
The research team holding the prototype device

The key component of SmartFarm is a specially designed copper-based hydrogel that is extremely absorbent, and takes in moisture up to three times its weight. After acquiring moisture, the hydrogel changes colour from brown to dark green and finally to light green when it is saturated. It also releases water quickly under natural sunlight - one gram of the copper-based hydrogel releases 2.24 gram of water per hour.

The NUS team also tested the quality of the water that was collected using the copper-based hydrogel, and found that it meets the WHO’s standards for drinking water.

At night, the top cover opens to allow the copper-based hydrogel to attract atmospheric moisture. In the day, at a pre-set timing, the top cover closes to confine the water vapour allowing it to be condensed on the enclosure’s surface, particularly on the top cover.

Water droplets will be gradually formed and when the moisture stored in the copper-based hydrogel is completely released, the top cover automatically opens and water droplets which are wiped off by the parallel wipers fall onto the soil to irrigate the plants. The remaining water droplets on the walls of the device continue to provide a humid environment for healthy plant growth.

As a proof-of-concept, the NUS team successfully used the device to cultivate Ipomoea aquatica (commonly known as kangkong): a popular vegetable in Southeast Asia.

“The SmartFarm concept greatly reduces the demand for freshwater for irritation and is suitable for urban farming techniques such as large-scale rooftop farming,” Tan said. “This is a significant step forward in alleviating water and food scarcity in the near future.”

Natural gel solution effectively removes pollutants from water


By E&T editorial staff
Published Friday, April 16, 2021


Researchers in Sweden have developed a more eco-friendly way to remove heavy metals, dyes and other pollutants from water.

Researchers from KTH Royal Institute of Technology, in Stockholm, Sweden, in collaboration with Politecnico di Torino, engineered a more sustainable technique for producing hydrogel composites, a type of material that is widely studied for wastewater decontamination.

The solution was found in filtering wastewater with a gel material taken from plant cellulose and spiked with small carbon dots produced in a microwave oven.

Minna Hakkarainen, who leads the Division of Polymer Technology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology, said that the hydrogels remove contaminants such as heavy metal ions, dyes and other common pollutants.

“The total amount of water on Earth doesn’t change with time, but demand does,” she said. “These all-lignocellulose hydrogels offer a promising, sustainable solution to help ensure access to clean water.”

The hydrogel composites can be made from 100 per cent lignocellulose, or plant matter, described by Hakkarainen as the most abundant bioresource on Earth. One ingredient is cellulose gum (carboxymethyl cellulose, or CMC), a thickener and emulsion derived commonly from wood pulp or cotton processing byproducts and used in various food products, including ice cream.

Added to the hydrogel are graphene oxide-like carbon dots synthesised from biomass with the help of microwave heat. The hydrogel composites are then cured with UV light, a mild process that takes place in water at room temperature.

Hydrogels consist of a network of polymer chains that not only absorb water, but also collect molecules and ions by means of electrostatic interactions – a process known as adsorption. According to Hakkarainen, the new process also reinforces the stability of the hydrogel composites so that they can outlast ordinary hydrogels for repeated cycles of water purification.




Graphene oxide has become a favoured additive to this mix, because of its high adsorption capacity, but the environmental cost of graphene-oxide production is high.

“Graphene oxide is a great adsorbent, but the production process is harsh,” Hakkarainen said. “Our route is based on common bio-based raw materials and significantly milder processes with less impact on the environment.”

Graphene is derived from graphite, a crystalline form of carbon. In oxidised form it can be used in hydrogels, but the oxidation process requires harsh chemicals and conditions. Synthesising graphene from biomass often requires temperatures of up to 1,300°C.

By contrast, the researchers at KTH found a way to carbonise biomass at much lower temperatures. They reduced sodium lignosulfate, a byproduct from wood pulping, into carbon flakes by heating it in water in a microwave oven. The water is brought to 240°C and then kept at that temperature for two hours.

Ultimately, after a process of oxidation, they produced carbon dots of about 10 to 80 nanometers in diameter which are then mixed with the methacrylated CMC and treated with UV-light to form the hydrogel.

“This is a simple, sustainable system,” Hakkarainen said. “It works as well, if not better, than hydrogel systems currently in use.”

The research was published in Sustainable Materials and Technologies, Volume 27, April 2021.

High carbon price should be set to minimise use of capture options, study finds

By E&T editorial staff

Published Friday, April 16, 2021

Researchers have called for a dynamic, long-term carbon price system in order to help reduce the demand for CO2 removal technologies and limit the impact of climate change.

The team from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, in Germany, found that while carbon capture and storage technologies will be an essential part of mitigating climate change, excessive deployment would carry risks in itself such as land conflicts or enhanced water scarcity due to a high demand for bioenergy crops.

Instead, they propose setting a high price for CO2 emissions from the outset that will encourage firms to reduce emissions and to achieve emissions neutrality relatively quickly.

Lead author of the study Jessica Strefler said: “Once we have achieved this, the price curve should flatten to avoid excessive CO2 removal.

“It can be a real win-win: Such a price path reduces both the risks associated with increasing reliance on CO2 removals and the economic risks of very high CO2 prices in the second half of the century.”

Current carbon removal technologies, including reforestation, direct air capture or bioenergy, would still be necessary under this scenario to compensate for the remaining few per cent of emissions that has no technological path to carbon neutrality, such as long-range flights.

Large-scale deployment of these would only be necessary if emissions were reduced too little or too late, the researchers said, such that net-negative emissions would become necessary to reduce global mean temperature again after the target has been reached. Both effects could be avoided with a high enough carbon price early on.

“Carbon pricing is key to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions - there is frankly no other way to reach that target,” said co-author Ottmar Edenhofer.

“After a high start and a rather steep increase, the price curve should flatten once emission neutrality is achieved, but it needs to remain on a high level if we want to maintain both a fossil-free world and a reasonable amount of carbon dioxide removal.

“Our calculations in fact show that we need a substantial pricing of CO2 emissions throughout the 21st century, with beneficial effects for both the economy and the people.”

Last month, Canada-based direct air capture company Carbon Engineering sold its first major contract to e-commerce firm Shopify as it looks to mitigate its carbon emissions.

No-cement concrete holds potential for decarbonisation and Moon buildings


By E&T editorial staff

Published Thursday, April 15, 2021


Researchers from the University of Tokyo have developed a new method of producing concrete without cement. Their technique offers a means for the construction industry to reduce its carbon emissions, as well as offering potential for building on the Moon and Mars.


Concrete consists of two parts: an aggregate (typically made of sand and gravel) and cement. Cement has been estimated to be associated with 8 per cent of global carbon emissions, making it difficult for the construction industry to reduce its climate impact. Another issue facing the industry is the limited availability of suitable sand for concrete production, which must have a specific size distribution to provide the correct properties.

“In concrete, cement is used to bond sand and gravel,” said lead author of the study, Yuya Sakai. “Some researchers are investigating how more cement can be replaced with other materials, such as fly ash and blast furnace slag, to reduce CO2 emissions, but this approach is unsustainable because the supply of these materials is decreasing owing to reduced use of thermal power systems and increased use of electrical furnace steel.”

A new approach will be required to produce concrete from more abundant materials with less environmental impact. “Researchers can produce tetraalkoxysilane from sand through a reaction with alcohol and a catalyst by removing water, which is a by-product of the reaction,” said Sakai. “Our idea was to leave the water to shift the reaction back and forth from sand to tetraalkoxysilane, to bond the sand particles with each other.”

The researchers placed a copper foil cup in a reaction vessel with sand and other materials. They varied the reaction conditions (such as amount of each material, heating temperature, and reaction time) to find the right conditions to obtain a strong enough product.

The product is likely to have greater durability than conventional concrete due to the absence of cement paste, which is relatively weak against chemical attack and which undergoes growing and shrinking with changes in temperature and humidity.

Ahmad Farahani, second author of the study, said: “We obtained sufficiently strong products with, for example, silica sand, glass beads, desert sand, and simulated Moon sand. These findings can promote a move towards a greener and more economical construction industry everywhere on Earth. Our technique does not require specific sand particles used in conventional construction; this will also help address the issues of climate change and space development.”

It is hoped that – as it does not require the specific type of sand required in conventional construction – this technique could help address climate issues as well as provide a potential way to construct buildings in desert regions and even on the Moon and Mars.

Man sentenced for shooting protected elephant seal dead on California coast

Jordan Gerbich, 30, will serve three months in federal prison and pay a $1,000 fine for killing the animal

SIX MORE ZERO'S ARE NEEDED FOR THAT FINE

An elephant seal pup in a pool at the Marine Mammal Center on 20 April 2017 in Sausalito, California. Photograph: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images


Guardian staff and agencies
Thu 15 Apr 2021 

A man has been sentenced to three months in federal prison for shooting a protected northern elephant seal to death on the central California coast.

Armed with a .45-caliber handgun and a flashlight, on the night of 2 September 2019 Jordan Gerbich, 30, opened fire on an elephant seal at a popular viewing area where the giant aquatic mammals haul out along the shore near the Monterey Bay national marine sanctuary. The elephant seal was discovered the following morning with a bullet wound to the head and its tail fins cut off, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Noaa’s office of law enforcement and the California department of fish and wildlife opened an investigation, and Gerbich, who now lives in Utah, pleaded guilty last year to a count of illegally taking a marine mammal, a federal misdemeanor.

Gerbich told prosecutors that he shot the seal after being challenged to do so by an intoxicated friend, “as a kind of grotesque test”, court documents show. He also told investigators he had a history of substance abuse and had suffered physical abuse as a child, which is why he struggled with the need to seek approval from others. He has expressed regret for the incident, saying that he knew the act was wrong, court documents show.

Elephant seals on a beach in San Simeon, California. Photograph: Nick Ut/AP

Gerbich’s attorney said his client viewed the act as “so unusual and troubling”, but prosecutors emphasized that it was premeditated and “did not happen by accident or on a whim”. Gerbich and the friend who told him to kill the seal drove out to the area where the mammals rest and give birth, to shoot the animal.

On Monday, Gerbich was sentenced by the US district judge Dale S Fisher for the crime. After his prison term, Gerbich will spend three months in home detention, will have to perform 120 hours of community service and will have to pay a $1,000 fine, the US attorney’s office said.

Northern elephant seals, named for their large protruding inflatable noses, are massive animals found along North America’s Pacific coast and are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

The second largest seal in the world, they struggle to move quickly on land, where they haul out on beach areas known as rookeries. Populations have rebounded in recent years, after reaching near extinction in the early 1900s when only a few hundred remained.

Now under protection, they are still under threat from being hit by ships and becoming entwined in fishing nets during their long migrations, which can extend up to 13,000 miles roundtrip.

UPDATED

The bioethics of the first human-monkey hybrid embryo

The creation of a human–long-tailed macaque hybrid embryo roiled the internet. We asked experts what this means

By MATTHEW ROZSA

SALON
APRIL 16, 2021 

Long-Tailed Macaques family (Getty Images)


Depending on your point of view, the creation of an embryo that is part-human and part-monkey is either a great opportunity for medical experts to create organs and tissues for human transplantation; or, the starting point of a horror movie.

Either way, that premise is now a reality.

Per a new study published in the scientific journal "Cell," a team of scientists led by Dr. Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte of California's Salk Institute for Biological Studies created the first embryo to contain both human cells and those of a non-human primate — in this case, those of long-tailed macaques. This type of creation is known as a "chimera," or an organism that contains genetic material from two or more individuals.

Izpisua Belmonte's team injected 25 human cells known as induced pluripotent stem cells (or iPS cells generally, and hiPS cells when they come from humans) into the embryos of long-tailed macaque monkeys. Human cells were able to grow inside 132 of the embryos and the scientists were able to study the results for up to 19 days. Many sources report this as the first half-human half monkey embryo, although The Guardian claims that the same team actually developed one in 2019. Salon reached out to Izpisua Belmonte to clarify and will update the story if or when he responds.

This chimera experiment wasn't the product of mad scientists testing ethical limits: it had real scientific purpose and value. Indeed, with more research and a bit of luck, scientists could use the knowledge from these experiments to grow human organs in other animals.

"This knowledge will allow us to go back now and try to re-engineer these pathways that are successful for allowing appropriate development of human cells in these other animals," Izpisua Belmonte told NPR.

The embryo in question is not the first chimera to be created by scientists: For instance, Izpisua Belmonte and the Salk Institute were marginally effective in creating human-pig chimeras in 2017, the same year that researchers in Portugal created a chimera virus (in their case, a mouse virus with a human viral gene). There are also chimeras that occur naturally, such as twins who absorb some of their sibling's DNA. American singer Taylor Muhl says that a large section of skin on her torso is darker because it comes from her fraternal twin's genetic material.

The potential advantage of creating human-monkey chimeras is significant. It is often difficult for doctors to have enough organs to provide transplants to patients who desperately need them, and creating successful chimeras could allow scientists to manufacture organs rather than depending on donors. As Izpisua Belmonte told NPR, "This is one of the major problems in medicine — organ transplantation. The demand for that is much higher than the supply."

Julian Koplin, a research fellow with the Biomedical Ethics Research Group, Murdoch Children's Research Institute and Melbourne Law School at the University of Melbourne, pointed out in an email to Salon that the bigger concern about chimeras is when they lead to live-born creatures. These were just in the early embryonic stage, but if scientists are eventually able to develop human-pig chimeric animals for organ transplants, things could become ethically questionable.

"Most people think that humans have much greater moral status than (say) a pig," Koplin explained. "However, a human-pig chimera would straddle these categories; it is neither fully a pig nor fully human. How, then, should we treat this creature?"




Indeed, the chimeric embryo experiment already entered some ethical gray areas. As Koplin noted, "in many jurisdictions, human embryo research is subject to the '14-day rule' (which limits research to the first 14 days of embryo development.) These chimeric embryos were cultured until some reached 19 days post-fertilization. Should the study have stopped at 14 days? Arguably not, since only a small proportion of their cells were human. But how many human cells are too many? At what stage should a chimeric embryo be treated like a human embryo?"

Dr. Daniel Garry, a professor at the University of Minnesota who has written extensively about the science and ethics of chimeras, broke down the issues with Salon by email. He noted that ethical concerns against the technology include fears of human cells contributing to "off-target" organs such as the brain, although he added that he and his colleagues "recently showed that this contribution does not occur." Likewise, he feared the possibility that a human embryo could wind up being inadvertently developed in a large animal.

Moreover, Garry said that with chimera research in general, ethics issues abound regarding the humans who contribute cells to such research. In the case of the monkey-human chimera embryo experiment, humans who contributed cells that were reprogrammed were aware and gave consent to have that happen.
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Garry added that there are also questions about "whether some organs might be appropriate but others not — for example, generating a pancreas or heart is OK, but having a monkey or a pig with human skin or human hair may not be OK for some." He also noted that there are usually ethical arguments that arise whenever there is a "paradigm shifting discovery" from people who are that "leery of scientific advances."

At the same time, Garry said that there are a number of strong ethical arguments in favor of chimeras. He pointed to how there are many terminal chronic diseases which do not have curative therapies and whose patients would benefit from the biotechnology created by chimera research. It could reduce healthcare costs, increase the supply of transplant organs and potentially reduce or eliminate the need for drugs to prevent an adverse immune system response.

THE SAME OLD EXCUSE SAME OLD JUSTIFICATION 

FOR SPECIES SUPREMACY

Koplin said such chimera studies could advance medical science.

"As I understand it, the aim of this study was to help improve techniques for creating human-animal chimeras," Koplin explained. "Chimeric animals could be used for disease modelling or to generate transplantable human organs. These advances could save lives — which is an important moral reason to pursue them."

Henry T. Greely, a professor for the Center for Law and the Biosciences at Stanford University who wrote about the ethical questions pertaining to chimeras in "Cell," told Salon that defining what counts as a chimera is "tricky."

"Every time a person gets an organ transplant, the result is an intra-species chimera: an organism made up of cells from two members of the same species," Greely noted. "Another example is the way that some pregnant women end up permanently carrying cells from their fetus. When a human gets a pig heart valve, she becomes an inter-species chimera. When a mouse gets human cells, for example to test to see how committed they are to a development path (whether or not they are "pluripotent"), that's a chimera." He also noted that scientists might put human brain tissue into a rat's brain to study the human cells in a way that would not be ethical to do in other people, since they eventually need to kill the test subject and study its brain slices.

  

Human cells grown in monkey embryos triggers 'Pandora's box' ethical concerns

Researchers say the work could help tackle transplant shortages, but experts warn such hybrid organisms pose major challenges.


Friday 16 April 2021 

Image:Human stem cells were inserted into macaque embryos. Pic: Salk Institute/Cell.com

Human cells have been grown in monkey embryos by scientists in the US, sparking ethical concerns and warnings that it "opens a Pandora's box".

Those behind the research say their work could help tackle the severe shortage of transplant organs as well as enable better overall understanding of human health, from the development of disease to ageing.

But some experts in the UK have highlighted the significant ethical and legal challenges posed by the creation of such hybrid organisms and called for a public debate.

Image:The chimeric embryos were monitored in the lab for 19 days before being destroyed. Pic: Weizhi Ji, Kunming University of Science and Technology

Concerns have been raised after researchers from the Salk Institute in California produced what is known as monkey-human chimeras.

This involved human stem cells - special cells that have the ability to develop into many different cell types - being inserted in macaque embryos in petri dishes in the lab.

The aim is to understand more about how cells develop and communicate with each other.

Chimeras are organisms whose cells come from two or more individuals.

In humans, chimerism can naturally occur following organ transplants, where cells from the organ start growing in other parts of the body.

Professor Izpisua Belmonte said the work was conducted with 'utmost attention to ethical considerations'

Professor Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, who is leading the research, said: "These chimeric approaches could be really very useful for advancing biomedical research not just at the very earliest stage of life, but also the latest stage of life."

In 2017, he and his team created the first human-pig hybrid, where they introduced human cells into early-stage pig tissue but found the environment provided poor molecular communication.

As a result, the researchers decided to investigate lab-grown chimeras using a more closely related species.

The human-monkey chimeric embryos were monitored in the lab for 19 days before being destroyed.

According to the scientists, the results, published in the journal Cell, showed human stem cells "survived and integrated with better relative efficiency than in the previous experiments in pig tissue".

The chimeras were produced by researchers from the Salk Institute in California

The team said understanding more about how cells of different species communicate with each other could provide an "unprecedented glimpse into the earliest stages of human development" as well as offer scientists a "powerful tool" for research on regenerative medicine.

Insisting that their research has met current ethical and legal guidelines, Prof Izpisua Belmonte said: "As important for health and research as we think these results are, the way we conducted this work, with utmost attention to ethical considerations and by coordinating closely with regulatory agencies, is equally important.

"Ultimately, we conduct these studies to understand and improve human health."

Human stem cells being injected into a pig embryo. Pic: Salk Institute

Responding to the research, Dr Anna Smajdor, lecturer and researcher in biomedical ethics at the University of East Anglia's Norwich Medical School, said: "This breakthrough reinforces an increasingly inescapable fact: biological categories are not fixed - they are fluid.

"This poses significant ethical and legal challenges."

She added: "The scientists behind this research state that these chimeric embryos offer new opportunities, because 'we are unable to conduct certain types of experiments in humans'.

"But whether these embryos are human or not is open to question."

Prof Julian Savulescu, director of the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics and co-director of the Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, University of Oxford, said: "This research opens Pandora's box to human-nonhuman chimeras.

"These embryos were destroyed at 20 days of development but it is only a matter of time before human-nonhuman chimeras are successfully developed, perhaps as a source of organs for humans. That is one of the long-term goals of this research.

"The key ethical question is: what is the moral status of these novel creatures? Before any experiments are performed on live-born chimeras, or their organs extracted, it is essential that their mental capacities and lives are properly assessed."

CHINA 2019

Scientists grow first ever HUMAN-MONKEY embryo in ‘promising’ step for organ harvesting — RT World News

Scientists Have Created Human-Monkey Embryos, and That's Ethically OK
The eventual goal is human organ transplantation.

RONALD BAILEY 

| 4.15.2021 

REASON MAGAZINE

AMERICAN LIBERTARIAN MARKET CAPITALISTS

(WEIZHI JI/KUNMING UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY)

An international team of researchers led by the Salk Institute biologist Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte report in Cell that they have created the world's first human-monkey embryos. Their goal is not to generate half-monkey, half-human servants; it is to figure out how human and animals cells interact, with the goal of eventually growing human transplant organs in animals like pigs and sheep.

The researchers injected human pluripotent stem cells into already growing monkey embryos and then traced how human cells developed and migrated as the chimeric embryos grew for 20 days in Petri dishes. In the mixed embryos, 3 to 7 percent of the cells were human.

Cell



The National Institutes of Health human stem research guidelines currently prohibit research in which human pluripotent stem cells are introduced into non-human primate blastocysts. Over the years, a number of state and federal bills have been introduced to ban this type of research. That is among other reasons why the laboratory work for this research was conducted in China.

Some bioethicists have expressed concerns about the research.

"My first question is: Why?" asked Kirstin Matthews, a fellow for science and technology at Rice University's Baker Institute, when interviewed by NPR. "I think the public is going to be concerned, and I am as well, that we're just kind of pushing forward with science without having a proper conversation about what we should or should not do."

One often-mentioned worry is that human neurons could possibly get installed into an animal's brain and somehow make its consciousness more humanlike. Another fear is that human cells that produce sperm and eggs could migrate into the testes and ovaries of monkeys, who might then mate and create a human fetus. Surely such possibilities require further ethical reflection, but the mixed cells in these experiments got nowhere near such possibilities.

As the researchers conclude, "this line of fundamental research will help improve human chimerism in species more evolutionarily distant that for various reasons, including social, economic, and ethical, might be more appropriate for regenerative medicine translational therapies." Translation: This research aims to help scientists figure out how to grow fully human organs in other animals, such as pigs and sheep, that are not as evolutionarily close to us as monkeys. Given the ongoing and persistent transplant organ shortage, let's hope this work succeeds.

Human cells grown in monkey embryos raise ethical concerns

By New Scientist and Press Association

15 April 2021

A human-monkey blastocyst, an early stage of embryo development
Weizhi Ji, Kunming University of Science and Technology

Researchers have grown human cells in monkey embryos with the aim of understanding more about how cells develop and communicate with each other.

Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte at the Salk Institute in California and his colleagues have produced what are known as human-monkey chimeras, with human stem cells – special cells that have the ability to develop into many different cell types – inserted in macaque embryos in petri dishes in the lab.

However, some ethicists have raised concerns, saying this type of work “poses significant ethical and legal challenges”.

Chimeras are organisms whose cells come from two or more individuals. In humans, chimerism can naturally occur following organ transplants, where cells from that organ start growing in other parts of the body.

Izpisua Belmonte says the team’s work could pave the way in addressing the severe shortage in transplantable organs, as well as help us understand more about early human development, disease progression and ageing. “These chimeric approaches could be really very useful for advancing biomedical research not just at the very earliest stage of life, but also the latest stage of life,” he said.

In 2017, Izpisua Belmonte and his colleagues created the first human-pig chimera, where they incorporated human cells into early-stage pig tissue but found that human cells in this environment had poor molecular communication. So the team decided to investigate lab-grown chimeras using a more closely related species: macaques.

Read more: Exclusive: Two pigs engineered to have monkey cells born in China

The human-monkey chimeric embryos were monitored in the lab for 19 days before being destroyed. The team says the human stem cells “survived and integrated with better relative efficiency than in the previous experiments in pig tissue”.

Izpisua Belmonte says the work meets current ethical and legal guidelines. “As important for health and research as we think these results are, the way we conducted this work, with utmost attention to ethical considerations and by coordinating closely with regulatory agencies, is equally important.”

“This breakthrough reinforces an increasingly inescapable fact: biological categories are not fixed – they are fluid,” said Anna Smajdor at the University of East Anglia, UK, in a statement. “This poses significant ethical and legal challenges.”

“The scientists behind this research state that these chimeric embryos offer new opportunities, because ‘we are unable to conduct certain types of experiments in humans’. But whether these embryos are human or not is open to question,” she said.

Julian Savulescu at the University of Oxford said in a statement: “This research opens Pandora’s box to human-nonhuman chimeras. These embryos were destroyed at 20 days of development but it is only a matter of time before human-nonhuman chimeras are successfully developed, perhaps as a source of organs for humans. That is one of the long-term goals of this research.”

“The key ethical question is: what is the moral status of these novel creatures?” he said. “Before any experiments are performed on live-born chimeras, or their organs extracted, it is essential that their mental capacities and lives are properly assessed.”

Journal reference: Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2021.03.020

Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2274762-human-cells-grown-in-monkey-embryos-raise-ethical-concerns/#ixzz6sL74E5gQ