Tag: science

renewable energy sector’s ‘holy grail’ – DECC UK Subsidy

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In a show of support for innovation, in the UK the Department of Energy and Climate Change is introducing a subsidy for energy storage in the September 2012. The subsidy is part of that government’s willingness to create a market mechanism to help firms become more competitive.

Energy Live News interviewed Ian Ellerington, Head of Innovation Delivery at DECC and he said: “We see that in the long term electricity storage is going to be important so through the innovation programme at DECC we’re going to be supporting electricity storage through a scheme of grants that I’m hoping to announce formally in September this year”. Later he added: “We’re going to be giving assistance to companies to demonstrate technologies so they can get funding and bring their costs down to make them more competitive and I would hope that suitable market mechanisms can be found.”

CO2Land org is aware many companies in Australia have sought similar assistance here, and often move offshore to get the opportunity to prove there products out of Australia. This could be one such opportunity through the UK package. You may have noticed through posts on electric vehicles that we in Australia are dubbed as having a grid network that makes alterative electrical power transport more polluting than similar petrol driven vehicles, and you might agree if it was possible to fit energy storage support into the energy grid it would be a real boost to the renewable industry, it could make the energy system more cost effective, and if storage can be part of that then it would be good to have the commercial mechanism in place to take advantage of the benefits that can be realised.

It follows that energy storage is seen as the renewable energy sector’s ‘holy grail’ for the role it can play in storing energy from renewables, for example by storing electricity produced at periods of high wind or during the day time from photovoltaics and then used as a high demand management response tool. Good move, as the component of peak demand where price is high is about 20% of the time and when renewable power struggles to make a contribution to base load. It also follows that about 5% of the time energy prices are traded at levels that would break most supply companies if sustained and is one of the reasons we pay higher bills than we could have otherwise.

Source: Energylive News (www.energylive.com) Energy Storage Subsidy to be announced in Autumn.

Qualification – gap filled for AHC10

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There is a qualification that fills the gap in the current Rural Production Training package AHC10. In conjunction with NSW Dept. of Education and Training and George Gundry (g.gundry@bigpond.com), a course in Holistic Management has been developed to meet the needs of land managers for accredited training in holistic management. George supplied a background on the founder of holistic management (developed over a period of 40 years by Alan Savory) and the facts to support the importance of the principles that include:

  • Over 12 Million hectares worldwide are managed using holistic principles
  • Since 1994, 250 people in Australia have attended training in holistic management.
  • The principles are sound and are suitable for people who want to make decisions on ecological, financial and socially sound land use in the short and long term for what they manage.

The course starts at TAFE Goulburn Campus on 24 &25 August 2012. There will be 8 workshops in total. The delivery pattern is two consecutive days off-farm with a reasonable interval to focus and achieve the outcomes desired of the course. Cost $231 plus textbooks.

CO2Land org is happy to alert where worthwhile learning structures are put forward. While we do what we can to determine whether the material is factual, it cannot be verified as suitable for what you intend and cannot be seen as a recommendation to participate. However, unashamedly we give credit for effort when the material is for the purpose of building sound practices.

Sequenced – a banana genome

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Looking at a banana you might ask, how did this monoculture, a cultivar derived from only one seed become a major source of food (eighty-five percent of banana production is consumed locally in tropical and sub-tropical countries), and is a major source of income for over 500 million people.  You might then fairly come to the realisation a banana is a staple food and food security issues abound.

With a little research the prime issues surface as: Pests and diseases have gradually adapted to the cultivar that is predominating in banana production; the two main diseases at the moment are the Panama Disease and the Black Sigatoka Disease. The Black Sigatoka is now all over the world and the Panama Disease – a new type – is in Asia only, but it will probably extend to other areas.

The potential solution is reported by DW and according to Zulfikar Abbanyin: “France’s CIRAD – a centre for agricultural research for development – and the National Research Agency (ANR) say they have sequenced the DNA of banana. Led by CIRAD’s Angélique D’Hont, the researchers were able to map the genome of a wild Asian strain called Musa acuminate – a component in every edible variety of bananas. They say their work is an important step toward understanding the genetics of the crop – and toward improving varieties and strengthening them against fungus and pests. But Angélique D’Hont says CIRAD is focused on cross-breeding rather than genetically modifying bananas”.

So, how can the findings help farmers and cultivators beat the pests?

The work has the objective to breed new banana varieties – new cultivar. CIRAD say this type of breeding is quite complicated, as bananas have to produce sterile fruit – that is, fruit without seeds to make them edible. And to make new bananas you have to perform crossbreeding, so you need a fertile plant. So far CIRAD has sequenced one banana genome type and have identified 36,000 genes and the exact position of these genes on the chromosome. And, more work is required to find the specific genes that confer resistance to the main diseases and also for conferring good fruit quality.

Now comes the interesting question: Will they want to genetically modify…? No.

The answer comes in the term transgenesis – to modify current cultivar and then attempting to breed new cultivar by crossing different cultivar with different types of resistance. This breeding approach is possible because of knowing which gene and which genotype has the important gene that will help the breeder to create new cultivar by classical breeding techniques.

CO2Land org can see the approach to protect this important food source as most important and the other value added aspects for the environment become apparent including the reduced need for using pesticides and reducing cost for agriculture.  But a surprising barrier to the adoption of the new cultivar is the process for transporting and conserving bananas for export. The fact is current refrigerated means of transport are developed for one cultivar, the Cavendish banana. An interesting case of need for adaptation to changed needs, and the change will all come down to the money- Yes!

Carbon – the word confused in CFI

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A consortium of CO2Land org friends met with a government department recently and the discussion centred on how best to reach the target audience of the Carbon Farm Initiatives. It was quickly determined that large brand influence gave comfort to the executive level but gave little comfort to the target level – the landholders. Part of the problem is the word ‘carbon’ and carbon is directly linked to abatement and an offsets market.  Whereas the focus issue for farmers is methane production and it is part of the production cycle and it does seem contradictory to imply the backside of a cow can be abated as a constant! Or, that a field in production will have a constant and linear carbon footprint over time because that production will be affected by climate change.  No room for climate change deniers here, but the thinking caps might be needed on how to be more effective on how to reach the rural production people.

CO2Land org will go Greenhouse Gas 101 to give more detail on the problem: The GHG protocol provided principles when undertaking a GHG inventory – relevance, completeness, consistency, transparency and accuracy are the tests. Take consistency as an example: To allow for meaningful comparison of emissions performance over time. A market will make an accounting assumption and be consistent with that assumption, but in practice a cow or field will have two forces at work – The quality of feed available, and the natural microbe activity that nature balances to inputs. The other 4 requirements of the protocol are then compromised if they only measure a snapshot of the activity and assume a standard deviation of the mean is sufficient for productive outcomes. Only a full life cycle of the production is the proof for sustainable production and the market can only give an element of comfort – when dealing with rural livelihoods that operate on small margins in return for the activities. Therefore this point illustrates that the measures are very important considerations for participation.

Can you now see the connection of why CFI methodologies are so exhaustively vetted? Why it is so difficult to get a simple answer to your query? Is the word Carbon itself causing confusion?

 

Look in your garbage

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Gaze into the future, look in your garbage bin and think about the waste!

Think Zero Waste and chances are you will be embroiled in spirited debate over whether it is a concept, a physical, or a cultural idiom. CO2Land org suggests it is carbon management program and distinctly an approach to risk and opportunity, with products that evolve with the strategy. It is with consternation that Mother Jones published that “in the United States, we hear “zero waste” and think sanctimonious yuppies. But lets look at the rubbish facts and think:

  • The US has a big trash problem, but China’s will soon be even worse.
  • Projected World Trash Generation, increases per person by 2025 lbs./year
  •  Richer countries generate more paper waste, one third of it because of packaging

Poor countries have a very high proportion of organic waste such as food scraps or grass clippings. Paper, on the other hand, is the single largest component of waste in high-income countries; in the United States, one person generates 705 pounds of paper waste each year. According to an EPA report on trash in the US, one-third of that paper waste comes from the corrugated cardboard boxes in which nearly everything they buy gets packaged and shipped.

In the EPA report you will find composition data for China is missing from this analysis and India’s reporting it highly suggestive that the category of “other” is applying a different standard for sorting trash.

  • Even if we recycled all of our trash, it wouldn’t be enough.

Theoretically developed nations can achieve 86 percent recycling. The quoted report concludes all organic waste is compostable and all plastic, metal, paper, and glass are recyclable and the only trash meant for the landfill is the “other” category, which includes ash, electronic waste, and old appliances. What is frightening about the report is the “other” category in America means the per person ratio the other trash of each american is greater than the total trash of an average person in India.

The story, therefore says: Recycling alone won’t solve our trash problem.  CO2Land org has no reason to think Australia is any different – we need more to be done.

Credit for the story: Sarah Zhang (editorial intern at Mother Jones).

 

 

 

State of the Climate

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Whether you believe it is human induced (anthropogenic) or natural occurring (atmospheric, hydrospheric and biospheric) or otherwise the facts speak for themselves. From the Bureau of Meteorology the Fast Facts are:

  • Climate change is continuing
  • Warming has been measured around Australia and globally during recent decades
  • 2010 Global temperatures were the warmest on record (slightly higher than 2005 and 1998)
  • Australia experienced record rainfalls and the coolest temperatures since 2001 due to a very strong La Niña event in 2010 and 2011
  • Concentrations of long-lived greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a new high in 2011
  • Australian temperatures are projected to increase in coming decades

Rising CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels has affected global temperature much more than natural climate variability during the past century.

The State of the Climate(March 2010 release) highlighted a multi-decadal warming trend over Australia’s land and oceans, an increase in record hot days and decrease in record cold days across the country, a decrease in rainfall in southwest and southeast Australia, an increase in global sea level, and increases in global greenhouse gas concentrations.

The State of the Climate (2012 release) provides an updated summary of long-term climate trends. It notes that the long-term warming trend has not changed, with each decade having been warmer than the previous decade since the 1950s. The warming trends observed around Australia are consistent with global-scale warming that has been measured during recent decades, despite 2010 and 2011 being the coolest years recorded in Australia since 2001. Global-average surface temperatures were the warmest on record in 2010 (slightly higher than 2005 and 1998). 2011 was the world’s 11th warmest year and the warmest year on record during a La Niña event. The world’s 13 warmest years on record have all occurred in the past 15 years.

State of the Climate 2012 also highlights the increase in global sea level and notes sea-level rise around Australia since 1993 is greater than, or equal to, the global average. Our observations show that sea-surface temperatures around Australia have increased faster than the global average. The concentrations of long-lived greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a new high in 2011. Annual growth in global fossil-fuel CO2 emissions between 2009 and 2010 was 5.9 per cent, reversing a small decline of 1.2 per cent recorded between 2008 and 2009 during the global financial crisis”.

CO2Land org stresses that from a farmer perspective the interrupts to the season trends mean considerable adaption will be required, more than just improved management techniques. Evidence is given by the Bureau that  “There has been a general trend towards increased spring and summer monsoonal rainfall across Australia’s north during recent decades, and decreased late autumn and winter rainfall across southern Australia. The summary shows that the very strong La Niña event in 2010 followed by another in 2011 brought the highest two-year Australian-average rainfall total on record.

CO2Land org was impressed with Dr Karl Braganza from the Climate Monitoring Section of the Bureau of Meteorology where he discusses the State of the Climate in 2012 in a video. Visit www.bom.gov.au and follow the report.

 

Nanophosphate EXT technology – evolutionary improvement for electric cars

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Missing from full electric, and hybrid vehicle promotions is the Achilles heel for Li-ion. Extreme temperatures are the enemy of battery range and when the battery is also the fuel tank, a hot or cold day can stop electric vehicles in their tracks.

For best operating results and also longevity, EV batteries need to be maintained within a fairly narrow temperature band. To get around this, “thermal conditioning” is used to regulate battery temperature. Typically electric and hybrid cars require liquid coolant and battery heating to cope with the extremes. All this adds to the cost and complexity of the operational needs of the vehicles.

CO2Land org has taken note of the words of Steve Kealy, that Ohio State University’s Center for Automotive Research is well advanced in testing new technology called Nanophosphate EXT (EXtreme Temperature) and the company promoting the system, A123, is claiming that the lithium-ion variant can operate at both high and low temperatures without requiring conditioning. Nanophosphate EXT technology is expected to start volume production in 20Ah prismatic cells in the first half of 2013. The Nanophosphate EXT cells retain more than 90 percent of their energy capacity after 2,000 full charge-and-discharge cycles conducted at 45 degrees Celsius.

Testing in extreme cold suggests the new cells will deliver 20 percent more energy than conventional cells at -30 degrees C. This better power delivery implies they could be used to create smaller, lighter batteries for both electric and conventional cars.

So if that problem is solved, we still need to address the problem of tackling Generator Emissions Standards at the recharging points for electric vehicles. Maybe the carbon price will take care of that problem?