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Top 5 reasons why the Senate must act now

Sheryl Canter — Thu, 15 May 2008 09:07:13 PDT

This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

The Senate is set to vote on landmark global warming legislationin early June -- just a few short weeks away.

Here are our top five reasons why legislators must act now.

Every year we wait means extra effort. If we delay this bill by just two years, weâll have to make twice the annual cuts in carbon emissions to hit the same cumulative reductions by 2020.

The science is unforgiving. As the Earth warms, we approach a "tipping point", after which large destructive climate changes become inevitable.

The political opportunity is ripe. Seventy-nine percent of Americans want Congress to act on global warming. We should take advantage of the tremendous momentum that exists today.

It would be a mistake to miss the opportunity to pass a good law in the hope we could have a more perfect one in the future.

Itâs in our economic interest. Someone is going to win the global race to develop the low-carbon technologies we need. Weâd like it to be America.

Renewable energy, for example, promises to become one of the worldâs most profitable industries. But advances in low-carbon technologies will not be fully realized without a national cap on global warming pollution. The sooner we act, the sooner these new industries will start to flourish.

What legacy will the 110th Congress leave? When future generations look back at this moment, they will either praise the Senate for starting us towards solving the global warming crisis or blame the Senate for squandering this opportunity.

As the Climate Security Act makes its way to the Senate floor next month, we must hammer these urgent points home. The Senate must seize this historic opportunity.

You can help by writing to Congress.

Algae biofuels 101

Miriam Horn — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:16:41 PDT

This post is by Miriam Horn, a writer at Environmental Defense Fund and co-author of the New York Times bestseller, Earth: The Sequel.

Who would have thought that algae (a.k.a. pond scum) -- the microscopic plants whose "blooms" choke off life in lakes and estuaries -- would emerge as the hottest new energy crop?

But sure enough, dozens of start-ups, backed by millions of dollars in venture capital, are racing to find the best way to turn algae into fuel, with exciting results.

This isnât a new idea. The Department of Energy (DOE) began exploring algal biodiesel in 1978 during the Carter Administration (see history [PDF]). But that effort was abandoned a decade ago. Government researchers concluded that algal biodiesel could never be produced cheaply enough to compete with petroleum.

Now the DOEâs National Renewable Energy Lab has resurrected its algal fuel program, alongside a rush in the private sector.

What changed in the last ten years?

The price of oil more than tripled.
Wars and hostile regimes in oil-producing nations raised energy-independence as a national security concern.
Europe and the other Kyoto signatories capped carbon.
California set a Low Carbon Fuel Standard, accelerating demand for low-carbon fuels.
Advances in bioengineering enabled much higher algae yields.

Algae-based biofuels are not yet being made at scale. Researchers are still working out engineering and process challenges, and algae-based fuels still cost more than petroleum-based fuels. But that may soon change.

A uniquely well-suited fuel source

Algae are extraordinarily adaptable creatures. They can grow almost anywhere, including land utterly unsuited for agriculture.

Since they donât have to compete against food crops for land, they avoid the problems this can cause: spiraling grain prices, food shortages, and conversion of tropical forests and wildlife habitat to plantations and cropland.

These single-celled wonders also have other notable virtues:

Algae are stunningly productive - the fastest growing plants on Earth. They can double in mass in just a few hours, allowing daily harvest.
Algae are oily and compact, producing 30 times more oil per acre than sunflowers or rapeseed.
Algae donât need fresh water and can thrive in water thatâs boiling, salty, frozen, or contaminated -- even in sewage.
Algae can eat pollution. They neutralize acids, split the nitrogen oxides that cause smog into harmless nitrogen and oxygen, and convert carbon dioxide (global warming pollution) into oxygen and biomass.

When algae are harvested, their lipids can be turned into biodiesel (main product), starches into ethanol, and proteins into animal feed.

Ray Hobbs, who runs the Future Fuels program for Arizona Public Service, describes algae this way (quoted in Earth: The Sequel, page 112):

You are looking at the origins of life, an organism that has survived for three and a half billion years and created the conditions for other life to emerge. They are the root of the food chain. And so elegant. Single-celled algae can crack water with a photon into hydrogen and oxygen, then metabolize that hydrogen with carbon dioxide to sugar. We canât do that. We canât even fully understand it.

Three ways to grow algae for biofuel

Innovators are exploring three main ways to produce biofuels from algae:

Growing algae photosynthetically in open ponds (lowest cost, lowest control)

This is the line of experimentation started by DOE. Open ponds are cheap, but must contend with invasive species. Also, water demands are high due to evaporation.
Growing algae photosynthetically in closed bioreactors (higher cost, more control)

Algae "bioreactors" are enclosed containers exposed to sunlight. Closed bioreactors prevent contamination by unwanted species and reduce water use. But they cost more than open ponds because of the need for "photomodulation" -- exposing the algae to just the right amount of light.

Bioreactor systems have another important advantage: they can capture and reuse waste CO₂ from coal plants and other industrial processes. Skeptics note that when the algae are burned, they release the captured carbon into the atmosphere. But because algal fuel displaces petroleum fuel, net carbon emissions are significantly reduced.
Growing algae in the dark through fermentation (highest cost, highest control)

This is the approach of Solazyme in San Franciso. When algae are grown photosynthetically, they manufacture their own sugar from water, air, and light. Solazyme turns off photosynthesis by growing them in complete darkness and feeding them sugar.

Feeding sugar makes the algae produce more oil. Plus the energy-dense food allows the algae to be grown in much higher concentrations, reducing costs and easing harvest. On the downside, it puts the process back in competition with food crops, undercutting one of algal fuelâs unique strengths.

You can read a detailed profile of one company exploring the algae frontier, and interviews with the founders, in our new book, Earth: The Sequel.

New nanomaterial doubles CO2 storage

Jozef Winter — Wed, 07 May 2008 00:42:08 PDT

As much as we reduce our current output of CO2 and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, it has become apparent that these efforts, while absolutely needed, will only mitigate the effects of global warming, making carbon sequestration as necessary tool in our fight against climate change.

Unfortunately, many popular ideas on how exactly to sequester the CO2 are simply not practical, though some new ones are quite promising. A new team of French researchers, led by GÃ©rard FÃ©rey at the University of Versailles, have decided to skip the pumping of CO2 underground and focus their efforts on nanotechnology, breaking a record in the process.

Their new material, dubbed MIL-101, has been officially called âthe best carbon sequestration materialâ bar none. 1m³ is capable of holding 400m³ of gas, compared to the 200m³ that the best commercially available technology can provide.

MIL-101, also known as chromium terephthalate, can accomplish this because its structure is only 2.9 to 3.4 nanometers thick, giving the substance a surface area of over 6000m² per single gram. The structure is also porous, which allows the small CO² molecules to become trapped, making it ideal for carbon capture directly from power plants, tailpipes, and smokestacks.

The technology also holds great promise for the storage of methane and hydrogen gas, making it a possible candidate for fuel storage in fuel-cell powered vehicles.

via Ecolectic, Physorg, and CRNS (if you can read French)

Blogger exposes fake global warming skeptics

Hank Green — Wed, 07 May 2008 00:36:15 PDT

Kevin Grandia, who we are proud to be well-acquainted with through working together in the eco-blogosphere, has just been through a bit of a saga.

Curious about the Heartland Institute's list of "500 prominent scientists" who deny global warming, Kevin decided to contact some of the folks on the list.

He put together a list of 150 email addresses ... simply the addresses he found it most easy to acquire. After only 24 hours, he'd received 45 emails from angry scientists saying that they, in no way, denied anthropogenic global warming.

It turns out that the Heartland Institute had never told the scientists they were going on the list, nor did they check to see if these people actually had any doubts about the causes of climate change. Just a sampling of quotes from emails Kevin received:

"I am horrified to find my name on such a list. I have spent the last 20 years arguing the opposite."

"I have NO doubts ... the recent changes in global climate ARE man-induced. I insist that you immediately remove my name from this list since I did not give you permission to put it there."

"Please remove my name. What [they] have done is totally unethical!"

The Heartland Institute has been publicizing this list for years, and not a single journalist took the time to check the names on the list. The Heartland Institute has now distanced itself from the list and withdrawn its claim that the institute is supported by 500 prominent global warming skeptic scientists.

But the institute has yet to apologize.

Kevin deserves a great big "thank you" from the world. Check out DeSmogBlog and, if you think he's as awesome as I do, you might even consider donating to help him keep DeSmogBLog alive.

Ethanol and land use

Robert Bonnie — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 13:07:48 PDT

This post is by Robert Bonnie, Co-director of the Land, Water, and Wildlife Program at Environmental Defense Fund.

The New York Times recently reported that thousands of farmers are dropping out of the federal governmentâs Conservation Reserve Program.

The prices for corn and other crops are so high that conservation subsidies canât compete with what farmers can make by planting the land.

One reason for the high prices is the ethanol mandate in the energy bill Congress passed last year.

Shifts in land use from diverting food-producing land to grow crops for energy -- called "indirect land-use change" -- can potentially negate the environmental benefits of corn ethanol.

There is still much debate on how to measure it, but no question itâs important to consider. One recent study published in Science (Searchinger, et. al.) found that using croplands for biofuels causes a significant increase in greenhouse gas emissions relative to gasoline when indirect land use change is taken into account.

Unintended consequences such as these highlight the danger of mandating a specific clean energy technology, and the importance of relying on performance standards instead.

What is "indirect land-use change"?

When food-producing land is diverted for energy production, the food that would have been grown on that land must be grown elsewhere. This prompts farmers to convert land not currently in production into cropland.

When grassland or forestland is cleared to grow crops, the carbon sequestered in the soil and trees is released into the atmosphere.

If a lot of new land is cultivated, the resulting carbon release can completely negate the benefits of using biofuels. The New York Times said as many acres as in Rhode Island and Delaware combined were removed from the Conservation Reserve Program, and thatâs just one corner of the country.

Not all the land was removed due to U.S. biofuel policy, but it plays a part. Some research has found that U.S. policies can contribute to deforestation in southeast Asia and the Amazon.

Assessing the impact of indirect land-use change is tricky, and experts disagree on how to quantify it. According to the Searchinger study, when indirect land-use change is factored in:

Corn ethanol nearly doubles greenhouse gas emissions relative to gasoline when considered over a period of 30 years, and emissions remain elevated for 167 years.
Even biofuels from switchgrass, if grown on U.S. corn lands, increase emissions relative to gasoline by 50 percent.

We canât say whether these numbers are exactly correct, but we can say that indirect land use effects -- particularly tropical deforestation -- are important to consider.

Shaping policy to reduce emissions

Government mandates for a specific technology to lower greenhouse gas emissions risk unintended consequences -- even higher net emissions.

An effective policy that ensures lower emissions has two key components:

A market-based system that rewards less carbon-intensive technologies and land-use practices, whatever they may be.

The Searchinger study suggests that a possible solution to the corn ethanol problem is to use waste products as a "feedstock" (raw material to produce biofuels). Unlike cultivated crops, waste products donât compete for agricultural land and drive up commodity prices. Sustainably produced cellulosic ethanol made from grasses and wood also may be a viable alternative. Another possibility weâll discuss in an upcoming post is using algae to make ethanol.

But a policy that specifically mandates corn ethanol doesnât encourage exploration of these other options.
Performance standards based on full lifecycle analysis, including emissions from tropical deforestation and other indirect land use changes.

There is some recognition of this in current policy, but also an important gap. The California Air Resources Board (CARB) Low-Carbon Fuel Standard and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) both require consideration of indirect land use in assessing emissions.

But the EPAâs RFS exempts corn ethanol from existing facilities from having to meet lifecycle emissions standards.

Biofuels may have a role in our energy future, but only if theyâre produced in ways that lower emissions. Performance-based standards and market incentives can prevent the unintended consequences of mandating the wrong technology.

Climate change's cost to U.S. transit

Sheryl Canter — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:59:40 PDT

This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

A new fact sheet on costs to U.S. transportation and infrastructure surveys the many ways that global warming will cause disruption and damage if we donât act to stop it.

Published by the Democratic Policy Committee, the fact sheet gives examples of known costs in different areas to give a sense of what the total might be -- and itâs big. Here are just a few examples from the transportation sector:

Flooding, droughts, and shipping on rivers.
In 1998, severe droughts stranded more than 4,000 barges, each capable of carrying 52,000 bushels of grain. Climate change increases the risk of similar droughts. At todayâs prices, the cost to the agriculture sector would be more than $1.2 billion.

Rail transportation.
Climate change increases the intensity of hurricanes, so we can expect more storms like Hurricane Katrina or worse. Reconstruction costs for the damage caused to rail transportation by Hurricane Katrina totaled about $300 million.

Muddy dirt roads and logging.
The frozen dirt roads that logging companies use will be muddy and difficult to traverse for more of the time. In Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York, almost 100,000 people are employed in forest-based manufacturing jobs that generate annual payrolls of $3 billion.

These are just a few examples from the transportation section. The infrastructure section examines potential damage to pipelines and costs of highway deterioration. All the numbers are documented with reference links.

CDC says climate change threatens health

Sheryl Canter — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:44:24 PDT

This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

At a congressional hearing last Wednesday, Howard Frumkin, a senior official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said there was strong scientific evidence of major health problems due to climate change in the next few decades, including:

Heat waves that put children and the elderly at risk
Danger of droughts and floods from extreme weather
Increased food-borne and water-borne infectious diseases
Worsened air pollution due to higher temperatures
Migration into new areas of vector-borne diseases like malaria

At least he got to say it. Last October, CDC testimony on the health risks from global warming was censored by the White House.

Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif), who chaired the hearing, said she suspected that "a layer of screening" continues to limit what CDC officials are allowed to say.

While insisting that CDC had no position on EPAâs pending regulatory decisions, Frumpkin said, "â¦there is strong evidence that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas â¦ and there is strong evidence that climate change affects public health in many ways."

Al Gore's new slideshow is even more awesome

Hank Green — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 17:30:35 PDT

I liked An Inconvenient Truth. I liked it because I thought it did a good job of conveying the magnitude of the climate crisis to a lot of people who hadn't thought much about it in the past.

But Al's recent talk at the TED conference is on another level of awesome. It's not about the problem -- it's pretty much all about the solution. The reason why we can't face the climate crisis, he says, is because we in America have to first face the democracy crisis. And I completely agree with him.

"As important as it is to change the lightbulbs ... it's more important to change the laws," he says. And we simply can't do that if Wal-Mart is a more effective leader on climate change than our own government. This problem will never be solved by individuals taking action in their own lives ... we have to make global changes.

So, yes, change the lightbulbs ... but also consider the environment when you're choosing careers, education, investments, and, possibly most important of all: voting. And tell your senators that you think it's disgusting that the U.S. is the only developed country that doesn't have the balls to sign onto the Kyoto protocol.

And, most pressing right now, find your senators' phone numbers, call them, and tell them to vote for the Solar Investment Tax Credit. It's what Al would tell you to do.

Oh, and also, if you watch the whole video, you'll see him liken our exploration of low-quality oil shale to junkies finding veins in their toes because the veins in their arms and legs have collapsed. There has never been a more apt and frightening metaphor. The whole thing really is worth watching.

New Aerogel 37x better than fiberglass

Mick Skolnick and Hank Green — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:45:05 PDT

Aerogel has been around for decades. It's the lightest substance ever created, being 99% air. It's strong, light, and translucent, and is excellent for sound-proofing.

But the really exciting thing about Aerogel is that it insulates 37 times better than fiberglass. Using Aerogel as insulation in walls, ceilings, and (as it's transparent) even between double-paned windows, could drastically reduce the amount of energy used in heating and cooling.

Unfortunately, Aerogel isn't easy to make. In fact, it costs about $1,300 per pound to produce. But a Malaysian researcher at the Universiti Teknologi, Dr. Halimaton Hamdan, has led a team of researchers who have created a way to produce Aerogel that will be 80% cheaper.

What's more, the new Aerogel is produced from rice husks, a discarded agricultural product. As you might expect, Malaysia has plenty of rice husks, so the team is pretty excited about the possibility of turning them into something valuable. As such, the government has given Hamdan a $65 million grant to help develop a technique for the large-scale production of the new Aerogels.

Hamdan's breakthrough was at first accidental. She wanted to do research on silica, but was having a hard time finding the raw material. One night, she saw a television program on the difficulty of disposing of rice husks. And rice husks, it turns out, are 20% silica. After eight years of work, Hamdan finally found a cheap way to produce pure silica from rice husks. And once the silica is acquired, making the Aerogel is a cinch.

If Dr. Hamdan and her colleagues are able to use that $65 million to scale up production of this material, we should soon be seeing it everywhere. If that happens, the energy savings would be incredible.Â As a bonus, the production of Maerogel (short for Malaysian Aerogel) would also make use of an abundant natural waste product.

Staggering video of our nation exhaling CO2

Hank Green — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 22:11:07 PDT

Scientists at Purdue University recently did an extremely detailed analysis of the emission of CO₂ in the United States. They included every sector: power generation, manufacturing, transportation, etc., and then they used advanced atmospheric models to track the gas.

It's part of a research project they're calling "Project Vulcan," presumably because Vulcans looking down at our planet would either be unimpressed by our technology or wonder how an entire planet could breathe.

The result is both staggering and unnerving. Watching our nation wake up in the morning in this way is just plain freaky. The CO₂ swells into the atmosphere, covering more of the nation hour by hour until folks get home and start relaxing more and consuming less.

I can proudly declare that my city in western Montana, in fact, remains completely unblemished by CO₂ emissions. Though, it's easy enough to spot the coal-fired power plant in south-east Montana that actually electrifies my house.

Via Wired Blogs

News from the Antarctic

James Wang — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 15:08:25 PDT

This post is by James Wang, Ph.D., a climate scientist at Environmental Defense Fund.

This month, while Arctic sea ice hits its annual wintertime high (such as it is; see previous post), Antarctic sea ice reaches its summertime low.

Weâve written before about the British Antarctic Surveyâs report of a vast ice berg on the verge of breaking off the Wilkins Ice Shelf. Hereâs more on whatâs happening at the South Pole from NASAâs recent briefing on polar sea ice.

Although the Arctic and Antarctic are both at the Earthâs poles, theyâre not mirror images of each other. There are some fundamental differences between them. Antarctica is a land mass surrounded by an ocean, while the Arctic is basically an ocean surrounded by land.

Unlike the Arctic, the Antarctic typically has little perennial sea ice. There are two main reasons:

Because there are no surrounding continents, Antarctic sea ice can float northward into warmer waters where it melts.
Because itâs at a lower latitude, Antarctic sea ice receives more direct sunlight and heat in summer.

Almost all the sea ice that forms during the winter melts during the summer.

Â Â Click to view Windows Media Viewer streaming video.

Also unlike the Arctic, which is one of the fastest-warming places on Earth, surface measurements and satellite data in Antarctica havenât revealed overall trends in temperature or sea ice area.

Warming and sea ice loss in some areas -- notably the Antarctic Peninsula, where the iceberg is breaking from Wilkins Ice Shelf -- have been balanced by little temperature change or even cooling and sea ice gain in other areas.

Still, that doesnât prove thereâs no warming trend in Antarctica. Satellite data has only been available since the 1970s. Earlier observations from whaling ships suggest that there was a greater sea ice area before satellite observations were available.

If Antarctica isnât warming -- or if itâs warming at a slower rate -- it may be due to the atmospheric vortex circulation that surrounds it (from being a land mass centered at a pole and surrounded by ocean). This tends to hold in cold air. But thatâs just one hypothesis that scientists are exploring.

Interviews with Environmental Defense's Fred Krupp

Sheryl Canter — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:49:15 PDT

This post is by Sheryl Canter, an Online Writer and Editorial Manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

I recently wrote about the TreeHugger interview with Environmental Defense Fund President Fred Krupp and Miriam Horn about their new book. Earth: The Sequel is an engaging look at emerging technology in the fight to stop global warming.

Fred has been getting around quite a bit lately. This week he also was interviewed by Forbes, Newsweek, and Mercury News. Each had a slightly different focus. Here are some excerpts:

On why a carbon tax wonât work, from the Forbes interview:

Thereâs no example of an air pollution problem anywhere in the world that has been solved without a cap or legal limit on how much of that pollution can be dumped into the sky. A cap gives you that legal limit, where a tax allows people to potentially keep on paying a modest amount and keep on polluting.

On biofuels, from the Newsweek interview:

I think weâve come to understand that the current generation of biofuels has problems and that we need a whole new generation. In the short-term, turning sugar into fuels other than ethanol would have many advantages, given the infrastructure problems ethanol creates. In the long-term, we are much better off when entrepreneurs develop ways to turn wood and fiber, not food, into energy.

On the power of markets, from the Mercury News interview:

Last night, we were up on Sand Hill Road. Somebody told me he had been walking around in a kind of funk, a depression. But, he said, now that heâs seen this future, heâs already starting to feel better. Itâs not a message that we can disengage. Itâs not a message that technology can solve it. It is a message that if government does the right thing, and if we put that entrepreneurism to work in service of a new profit motive thatâs been designed to create the very things we need to have a future, wow, watch what happens, such as a $1.9 billion order for Applied Materials to make solar cells.

Solar paint could produce 4,500 GW-hrs a year!

Hank Green — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:23:39 PDT

Swansea University has been working with steel companies for years. These companies produce those marvelously beautiful sheets of steel that cover buildings all over the world. While working on ways to help steel not degrade in sunlight, a Swansea student figured out how to make paint actually harness that energy and covert it to electricity.

The University announced that the 100 million square feet of steel that they produce could add 4,500 gigawatts to the grid annually. To that, I say "whoops... you seem to have made a typo," because I'm pretty sure they mean 4,500 gigawatt-hours.

But that is still an enormous number. 4,500 gigawatts is about a third of the generating capacity of the entire world... so I think it's safe to assume that every single publication (and there are lots) running this story has overlooked a pretty glaring typo.

The steel would be "painted' with the solar cells in the factory, hopefully at a rate no slower than current paints are applied. The research has spawned a $3M grant and has been expanded to include several universities including Bangor University, University of Bath, and the Imperial College London.

The technology remains lab-bound for now. Scientists working on the project hope to have 5% efficient solar steel paint in the relatively near future.

Two questions remain: Will it be worth redesigning the electricity grid to accept and pay for power from such small providers? And will the added cost of the solar "panels" and a DC to AC inverter prohibit the technology?

See the original press release (complete with glaring typo) at Swansea University

What will San Francisco look like in 2108?

Hank Green — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:51:06 PST

Taking home the History Channel's $10,000 prize for designing the "City of the Future," we have IwamotoScott's vision of San Francisco in 2108.

Sometimes we talk about technologies a few years down the road, but we like to keep stuff grounded here at EcoGeek. Looking more than 30 years into the future has always turned out to be craptastically inaccurate.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that this kind of vision is useless. While some elements -- like giant carbon nanotube algae towers and underground hovercar highways -- are fairly insane, thinking of the survival of our cities in the face of continued growth is pretty important.

I say hovercars are crazy because I don't really think they'll ever provide an advantage over traditional cars (especially not underground). And if we're going to have giant algae plants, I assume we'll build them outside of the city where land is exponentially cheaper. So we don't have to build giant carbon nanotube towers to house them.

Nonetheless, the elements of the plan that make sense make great sense. Pulling energy from the sun and storing it in algae on a large scale? Excellent.

Powering the city of San Francisco with local underground geothermal power? Fantastic.

Taking the load off the rivers and ocean with moisture collectors a la Tatooine? Absolutely fabulous.

Indeed, I think it deserves the $10,000 grand prize, even if I don't think humanity is ever going to graduate to the hovercar...

(O Future! Please prove me wrong!)

Via Inhabitat

LEDs two times more efficient than anything

Hank Green — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:07:07 PST

It seems like the word "breakthrough" gets tossed around a lot. But we try to save it for the real deal. Well here's the real deal.

LEDs are fantastic. But for a long time, they've been fantastic more because of what we think they can do than what they actually do. We've been pretty sure that LEDs can produce warm, white light at efficiencies far beyond even the much-touted compact fluorescent bulbs. But we've yet to actually see that.

Years ago, scientists were already producing LEDs that were far more efficient than fluorescents. The problem was, they only did it at very specific wavelengths. So the light was either pure red, pure orange, or pure blue. And while it'd be nice to have an efficiently lit workspace -- I'd prefer it if everything in my life wasn't purple.

So in the last ten years, scientists have switched their goals from producing efficient LEDs to producing "natural light" LEDs. Unfortunately, whenever they did this, they had to make significant efficiency sacrifices. Well, here's the breakthrough -- those days are no more.

Using a nano-crystaline coating, scientists at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey, have created an LED that produces attractive white light while wasting next-to-no electricity.

For every watt of light produced, about 300 lumens are visible to the human eye. Fluorescents produce about 80 lumens per watt, and other white LEDs are closer to 60.

300 lumens per watt is two times more visible light per watt of radiation than I've ever heard of for any light source, and they've done it with natural-looking light.

Honestly, the results are so spectacular that I must admit a bit of skepticism. If anyone can cast some light on how efficiencies like this could be possible, I'd love to hear from you.

The nano-crystalline coating bends the wavelengths exiting the light into a broad spectrum. The key is that the process is nearly 100% efficient, and the LEDs themselves (which are blue) are extremely efficient as well.

Of course, any scientist will tell you that making something happen in a laboratory and putting it on a shelf at Wal-Mart are two very different things.

The nano-crystalline coating is very expensive and difficult to produce, and, so far, there aren't a lot of ideas as to how to mass produce these things.

But the question is no longer "if," the question is now "when" and that's a breakthrough that I can celebrate.

Via New Scientist

Two key climate terms to know

Lisa Moore — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 15:23:16 PST

This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense.

Scientists use some technical terms in discussing climate change that can cause confusion. Two that are especially useful to know are "forcing" and "feedback."

Youâll hear these terms a lot in discussions of how human activity impacts climate -- and especially when the topic turns to the melting Arctic. If you know what they mean, youâll have a much better understanding of the dynamics behind climate change.

"Forcing" and "feedback" both refer to effects on the Earthâs climate system.

Climate changes when thereâs a change in climate systemâs energy balance -- the amount of energy absorbed from the Sun, versus the amount of energy radiated back into space from Earthâs lower atmosphere and surface. A process that changes this energy balance -- and thus the climate -- is called a "climate forcing".

Many things can cause climate forcing. Some, like shifts in the Earthâs orbit around the Sun or volcanic eruptions, are natural events. Others, like increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, are caused by human activities. Climate change caused by human activity is called "anthropogenic forcing."

A climate feedback is an indirect (or "secondary") change within the climate system that occurs in response to a forcing. For example, warmer air can hold more water vapor, and water vapor can trap more solar energy in the atmosphere, augmenting the warming effect. This is a positive climate feedback because the secondary effect is in the same direction as the primary effect -- both are warming.

Another example of a positive climate feedback occurs with sea ice, which is why you hear the term "feedback" in discussions of Arctic warming. As temperatures rise, sea ice melts and exposes open water. Water is darker than ice so it reflects less sunlight and absorbs more energy. This augments the warming effect, leading to more sea ice melting, and so on in a loop.

Climate feedbacks also can be negative, reducing the initial effect rather than augmenting it. For example, increased water vapor in the atmosphere due to warming can lead to more cloud formation. Thick low clouds can block sunlight from reaching the Earth by reflecting it back into space. This creates a cooling effect -- a negative climate feedback.

Positive climate feedbacks are dangerous because they can accelerate climate change towards tipping points, critical thresholds at which a small change qualitatively alters the state of some Earth system. For example, the Greenland Ice Sheet could start a slow but irreversible meltdown if global temperature rises above a tipping point, which scientists warn could be just 2Â°F above todayâs temperature.

Tipping points also can trigger climate feedbacks. For example, if the Earth warms enough to melt permafrost (a tipping point for the Arctic region), the melted ground can release greenhouse gases that, in turn, accelerate warming. In fact, studies show that methane emissions are increasing from areas of thawing permafrost in Siberia.

Sound scary? It is. This is why many scientists are pushing hard for legislation to cap greenhouse gas emissions.

Did global warming stop in January?

Lisa Moore — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 13:44:30 PST

This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense.

January 2008 was the coldest month in several years, according to the scientific groups that track global temperature. Is it true, as DailyTech concludes, that Januaryâs cold "wipes out a century of warming"?

Has global warming stopped?

In a word, no. A single month does not make for a climate trend. Letâs look at the data.

Source: Raw data from the U.K.âs Met Office Hadley Centre (see description of data).

This graph shows "temperature anomalies" -- that is, the variation from a long-term average of temperatures between 1961 and 1990. A temperature anomaly of zero would mean the temperature is exactly equal to the long-term average -- neither warmer nor colder. (For more on how scientists take the globeâs temperature, see our previous post.)

As you can see from the graph, temperatures are trending upward over time in a zigzag pattern, not unlike the stock market. A shallow dip is followed by an even greater rise. Short-term dips should not be mistaken for long-term trends -- in the stock market or in climate!

January 2008 (circled in red) is cooler than other months in the past decade, but still significantly warmer than previous decades. Global warming isnât likely to have stopped in January 2008 any more than it stopped in March 1976, December 1984, November 1992, or February 1994. These are all short-term dips in a long-term trend.

Global warming is a process that occurs over decades. It canât be proven or disproven by a single monthâs temperature.

How long do greenhouse gases last?

Lisa Moore — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 15:07:45 PST

This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense.

In a comment on my Global Warming Crib Sheet, johnmashey asked if I could say something about the lifetimes of greenhouse gases - that is, how long different greenhouse gases stay in the atmosphere. Great idea! Hereâs a whole post on it.

Many people donât realize that the greenhouse gases we emit can stay in the atmosphere for decades, centuries or even millennia. Thatâs why itâs so important that we cap emissions as soon as possible.

Hereâs a table showing a selection of greenhouse gases, their global warming potential (GWP), and their lifetimes:

Greenhouse Gas	Lifetime (Years)	100-Year GWP
Carbon Dioxide (CO₂)	hundreds	1
Methane (CH₄)	12	25
Nitrous Oxide (N₂O)	114	298
Hydrofluorocarbon-23 (CHF₃)	264	14,800
Sulphur hexafluoride (SF₆)	3,200	22,800
PFC-14 (CF₄)	50,000	7,390

Source: Table 2.14 in the IPCC AR4 WG-I Report. Original table lists many more gases.

Notice that the carbon dioxide lifetime is âhundreds of years,â rather than a specific number.

The IPCC Third Assessment Report defines a gasâs lifetime as the amount of the gas in the atmosphere divided by the rate at which it is removed from the atmosphere. That sounds simple enough, except that not all gases are removed by just one (or mainly one) process.

Ironically, the gas that accounts for the greatest proportion of global warming, carbon dioxide (CO₂), is the hardest to pin down. When CO₂ is released into the atmosphere, about three-quarters of it dissolves into the ocean over a few decades. The rest is neutralized by a variety of longer-term geological processes, which can take thousands of years.

From IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, Working Group I (AR4, WG-I) Executive Summary of Chapter 7:

About 50% of a CO₂ increase will be removed from the atmosphere within 30 years, and a further 30% will be removed within a few centuries. The remaining 20% may stay in the atmosphere for many thousands of years.

From U.S Greenhouse Gas Inventory Reports:

Atmospheric lifetime: 50-200 years. No single lifetime can be defined for CO₂ because of the different rates of uptake by different removal processes.

From RealClimate post "How long will global warming last?":

My model indicates that about 7% of carbon released today will still be in the atmosphere in 100,000 years. I calculate a mean lifetime, from the sum of all the processes, of about 30,000 years. Thatâs a deceptive number, because it is so strongly influenced by the immense longevity of that long tail.
If one is forced to simplify reality into a single number for popular discussion, several hundred years is a sensible number to choose, because it tells three-quarters of the story, and the part of the story which applies to our own lifetimes.

For other gases, a meaningful lifetime is easier to calculate because one process dominates their removal from the atmosphere:

Methane is mostly scrubbed from the atmosphere by hydroxyl radicals (a chemical reaction).
Nitrous oxide is destroyed by photolytic reactions (chemical reactions involving photons or light) in the stratosphere.

As you can see from the chart, some gases have extraordinarily long lifetimes. Because emission rates are vastly higher than removal rates, greenhouse gases are accumulating in the atmosphere and will affect climate for generations to come.

Robots could replace animals in toxicity tests

Hank Green — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 11:40:35 PST

Well, sometimes we talk about the environmental benefits of digitizing physical media...but today we're going to talk about the environmental benefits of digitizing physical bunnies.

According to the BBC, scientists are working on ways to replace live animal testing of everything from cosmetics to pesticides with "high speed, automated robots" and "live cells grown in a laboratory."

Samples of chemicals will be dropped onto dishes containing human or animal cells grown in the laboratory.

These will then be studied for signs of toxicity using a variety of biochemical and genetic tests.

The ultimate goal is to develop non-animal based testing methods that are rigorous enough to be submitted for regulatory approval.

Sounds preferable to the traditional systems. Of course, it wouldn't be a full approximation of the marvelous beauty and intricate systems of a real-live cute little bunny rabbit. So for pharmaceutical and broader carcinogen and system-wide effects, I'm afraid they'd still go under the knife.

Nevertheless, this would certainly be a step in the right direction.

Via Engadget from The BBC

Fusion power in the next five years?

Hank Green — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 14:07:58 PST

A prominent venture capitalist, Wal van Lierop of Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital, has begun to invest in companies (such as General Fusion) that are providing patents and technologies for economical fusion power. In a recent interview at the Clean Tech Investor Summit (which we're very sad we're not attending), van Lierop said that he expects large energy companies to start thinking about building fusion plants within the next five years.

As we've noted before here at EcoGeek, the best way to track down that technologies are going to (very shortly) change the world is to watch what the venture capitalists are doing. These are people who basically make ridiculous sums of cash by predicting the future...and investing in it. And since they've got so much riding on their bets, they like to do a lot of research.

Often this is research that people like me (because I don't have billions of dollars to invest) can't do. So I follow the VCs and pay attention to what they're saying.

And what van Lierop is saying seems almost crazy, on the surface. But dig a little deeper, and things start looking exciting. Despite sounding like a comic book hero, General Fusion's technology is very realistic. In a world where we're all used to hearing that "Fusion power has been 20 years away for 20 years" hearing that it's five years away is pretty remarkable.

General Fusion hopes to create small fusion reactors that cost around $50 million a piece and generate roughly 100 megawatts allowing for about 4 cent / kwh electricity. That's around the same cost as coal.

The fusion system the use, called Magnetized Target Fusion which uses lithium as a fuel. The lithium is heated and mixed with intensely pressurized plasma. The lithium then breaks down into tritium (hydrogen with two neutrons), which is then mixed with deuterium (hydrogen with one extra neutron). In the high energy environment, the tritium and the deuterium fuse to form helium and create a whole lot of heat.

The heat captured is significantly greater than the energy used to run the device and the only byproduct is helium and other harmless gasses.

Via CNet Clean Tech

Could it happen again?

Trystan L. Bass — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 12:28:53 PST

This is the fourth Mardi Gras since Hurricane Katrina struck the city of New Orleans and the U.S. gulf coast. Rebuilding projects continue, and some wonder if new levees will hold.

Scientists believe that hurricanes have become more frequent during the last century, and global warming is the likely culprit.

Even the most conservative scientific statements agree that human activity is significantly contributing to weather shifts, and we'll experience more extreme weather from now on. The American Meteorological Society predicts more intense precipitation and significant regional shifts in the patterns of rainfall. All of this may lead to persistent droughts and floods.

The Union of Concerned Scientists points out that increased rain plus melting glaciers will lead to rising sea levels. With so many people living on the coasts, more cities are threatened by storm swells and flooding ... just like Katrina.

California's capital of Sacramento currently lives with the greatest risk of flooding of any major American city. River levees were begun over 100 years ago, and not all of them have been upgraded.

The Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency recently declared that there's a 60% chance of a levee breach in some areas around the city. The Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency (PDF) estimates that at least 230,000 residents would be displaced in such a disaster, and the flood damages could cost $11.2 billion.

That's just one place where a Katrina-like disaster could be on the horizon. Some towns have already seen unusual flooding, like parts of Ohio in 2007. If you live in a river plain, expect the unexpected from now on.

It's not only folks with a beach view who have to worry, thanks to global climate change. Just another reason we all need to do our part and reduce carbon emissions in our everyday lives.

As a precautionary measure, homeowners should look into buying flood insurance. If you live in a recognized flood-prone area, you may be required to get it by your mortgage lender.

Everyone should assemble an emergency preparedness kit. The Red Cross has a good list of supplies for adults and children. Gather canned food, bottled water, first-aid supplies, flashlights, batteries, and other basics in a central place in your home. Make sure each family member knows where it is, and check on the contents at least once a year to replace stale food and expired batteries. Don't forget about your pets either!

All this gear is handy to have no matter where you live -- natural disasters, blackouts, and other emergencies can happen any time. One of the lessons Hurricane Katrina unfortunately taught us is that we have to look out for ourselves and our neighbors.

Five ways to bring back the night

Cher Seruto — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 15:12:26 PST

Cher Seruto is an analyst with the Built Environment Team at Rocky Mountain Institute.Â

They are magnificent, present yet untouchable, the object of much affection. No, I'm not talking about celebrities. I'm talking about stars in the night sky.Â

This year, I spent the winter holidays backcountry skiing from a small hut in the national forests of southwestern Colorado, and the abundance of stars reminded me that I miss their presence in my city.Â

"Where did the night sky go?" I wondered.Â

We city dwellers often don't see many stars because of light pollution. Much of this obtrusive light is caused by excessive interior and exterior lighting from advertising, commercial properties, offices, factories, streetlights, sporting venues, and our own homes.Â

The effects of light pollution
It's very clear how development and light pollution are linked. NASA's night image of Earth (below) is proof enough.Â

Back on the ground, light pollution is pretty easy to spot too.Â

If you ever have the opportunity to look at the night sky from outside a city, scan the horizon. You can often see the direct effects of excessive lighting as a halo in the night sky.Â

When I lived in Santa Barbara, I would often walk the beach at night and look across the ocean. Instead of stars, I would see light emanating from the Los Angeles Basin 100 miles away. And at the Grand Canyon, you can see a similar halo from Las Vegas, 175 miles away.Â

Besides marring the view, light pollution wastes energy. The International Dark-Sky Association estimates that every year the United States wastes 110 billion kilowatt-hours, or $10.4 billion, on "ill-conceived, ineffective, and inefficient lighting."Â

Generating all that unneeded electricity to power those lights results in more greenhouse gas emissions that increase the threat of global warming.Â

Simple steps to reduce light pollution
With so much at stake, I'm happy to report that there are simple solutions to drastically reduce light pollution and save energy.Â

First, start at home:Â

Light only what you need. Ask yourself whether your lights are located in the right places for your daily needs.Â
Light only when you need it. Use motion sensors to cut your electricity bill, and be diligent about turning off lights that are not in use.Â
Light where you need it. Make sure that outdoor fixtures don't emit light upwards or excessively outwards. Proper lighting does not shine into the night sky or across to a neighbor's property.Â
Light in the right quantity. Look at the effects of your outdoor lights. Are shadows created that actually obstruct vision? Lower the wattage and you may be able to see better due to the reduction of shadows. I recently installed a lower wattage motion detector light outside my back doorstep and was amazed at the increase in visibility.Â
Check placement, curtains, and window coverings to make sure your indoor lighting is not shining out and up at night.Â

Next, encourage your workplace and local government to standardize the use of lighting techniques that decrease or eliminate light pollution.Â

You can find more resources and tips on reducing light pollution from the International Dark-Sky Association.

Sustain us

Molly McCall — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 09:45:43 PST

Can Wal-Mart save the world? Does San Francisco really want to trash plastic bags? And are scientists truly at work on a machine that "zaps" garbage, converting it to pellets and fuel through "plasma gasification"?

Dig in to these questions and others on American Public Media's Sustainability page. Dedicated to following "the national and global dialogue over how we use Earth's resources," this treasure trove collects green-related reports from across the radio network's diverse pool of programming.

If you only have a moment, we recommend leaping in with "Consumed." This newly hatched, in-depth report traces the history of buying and sellingâand dares to wonder whether this consumer society of ours has a limited life span. As we ready ourselves for the most frenzied shopping days of the year, that question may be the most critical of all.

Climate change: A guide for the perplexed

Molly McCall — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 08:51:20 PDT

In the past years, untold numbers of scientists, politicians, talking heads, and family members have gone mano-a-mano over the contentious issue of global warming. Is it real? How fast is it happening? And are the polar bears truly on the brink of extinction?

In May 2007, New Scientist stepped into the ring with Climate Change: A Guide for the Perplexed, a "round-up of the 26 most common climate myths and misconceptions." With brief answers and links to supplementary information, this manual on Earth's temperatures debunks such statements as "we can't do anything about climate change," "the oceans are actually cooling," "Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming," and "it's all a conspiracy."

We even found a few we'd never heard of before, like "Mars and Pluto are warming too."

Finally, the guides addresses the fate of the "poster children of global warming"âno, not Al Gore and Sheryl Crow, but the wild and wooly polar bears. Consider us a little less perplexed.

Find the original review for this siteâand other reviews of the Web's coolest offeringsâon Yahoo! Picks.