Millions of homes in rural areas of Far Eastern countries are heated by charcoal burned on small, hibachi-style portable grills. Scientists in Japan are now reporting development of an improved “biomass charcoal combustion heater” that they say could open a new era in sustainable and ultra-high efficiency home heating. Their study was published in ACS’ Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, a bi-weekly journal.

In the study, Amit Suri, Masayuki Horio and colleagues note that about 67 percent of Japan is covered with forests, with that biomass the nation’s most abundant renewable energy source. Wider use of biomass could tap that sustainable source of fuel and by their calculations cut annual carbon dioxide emissions by 4.46 million tons.

Using waste biomass charcoal, their heater recorded a thermal efficiency of 60-81 percent compared to an efficiency of 46-54 percent of current biomass stoves in Turkey and the U.S. “The charcoal combustion heater developed in the present work, with its fast startup, high efficiency, and possible automated control, would open a new era of massive but small-scale biomass utilization for a sustainable society,” the authors say.

Source: American Chemical Society.

Discarded electronic hardware, including bits and pieces that built the information superhighway, can be recycled into an additive that makes super-strong asphalt paving material for real highways, researchers in China are reporting in a new study. It is scheduled for the Feb. 1 issue of ACS’ Environmental Science & Technology, a semi-monthly journal. They describe development of a new recycling process that can convert discarded electronic circuit boards into an asphalt “modifier.” The material makes high-performance paving material asphalt that is cheaper, longer lasting, and more environmentally friendly than conventional asphalt, the scientists report.

In the new study, Zhenming Xu and colleagues note that millions of tons of electronic waste (e-waste) pile up each year. The printed circuit boards used in personal computers, cell phones, and other electronic gear, contain toxic metals such as lead and mercury and pose a difficult disposal problem. The boards also are difficult to recycle. Xu’s group, however, realized that the boards, which provide mechanical support and connections for transistors and other electronic components, contain glass fibers and plastic resins that could strengthen asphalt paving.

The scientists describe a new recycling method that quickly separates toxic metals from circuit boards, yielding a fine, metal-free powder. When mixed into asphalt in laboratory tests, the powder produced a stronger paving material less apt to soften at high temperatures, the researchers say. -MTS

Source: Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.

It was the geological collision between India and Asia millions of years ago that created one of the world’s most distinctive places: The area around Lake Baikal in Siberia, which contains 20 per cent of the world’s fresh water reserves and a unique display of plant- and wildlife.

That is the conclusion reached by two Danish researchers from the University of Copenhagen, Professor Hans Thybo and PhD Christoffer Nielsen, after many seismic examinations, including blowing up tons of dynamite, and five years work of analyzing the data.

In the middle of Siberia lies the 2000km long Baikal Rift Zone, where, over the last 35 million years, a gigantic crack in the Earth’s crust has developed. In the middle of this rift zone lies the world’s deepest lake, Lake Baikal, which is almost 1700m deep. Due to Lake Baikal’s isolated location, far from the world’s oceans the microbial and animal life found here has undergone a unique evolution over the last 30 million years. The Baikal Rift Zone, or fracture zone, is also special because it is located 3000km away from the nearest tectonic plate boundary. Therefore, it has been difficult, until now, to explain the origin of the Baikal Rift Zone using commonly accepted geological premises and methods.

However, two Danish researchers from the University of Copenhagen in collaboration with Eastern European colleagues, have succeeded in uncovering what happened, and what is still happening, under the surface of one of the most special and distinctive areas on Earth. More than that; the results from the experiment in Siberia have lead to a new understanding of, and model for, the formation of and activity in rift zones, which are found in locations around the globe, including between the continents.

Lots of dynamite

In Siberia the Danish research team lead a seismic experiment known as BEST (Baikal Explosion Seismic Transects) carried out around Lake Baikal. The experiment included setting off of tons of dynamite so the scientists could follow the sound waves from the explosion as they traveled through the ground, using them to determine the structure of the Earth’s crust and the upper mantle and thus gain an understanding of the processes driving the rift zone’s development.

The fieldwork at Lake Baikal was carried out in 2003-2004 with financial support from the Carlsberg Foundation and the Danish Natural Science Research Council and in collaboration with geologists and geophysicists from the Russian Academy of Science’s Siberian departments and the Polish Academy of Science. Since then the scientists have spent 5 years interpreting the huge amount of data they collected and have ended up with sensational seismic results related to the general formation of, and activity in, rift zones around the world.

The sensational results from Siberia now form the basis for a new model for understanding the formation of rift zones on a global plan. The results from Lake Baikal show that the 40-50km wide crack in the Earth’s crust is around 10km deep. All previous models of rift processes have assumed that the bottom of the Earth’s crust would have a corresponding bulge. However to the researchers’ great surprise it turned out that the bottom of the crust is flat across Lake Baikal.

The two scientists explain this phenomenon by a greater thinning of the crust than expected but at the same time also by an intrusion of magma (liquid rock from the Earth’s mantle) into the bottom part of the crust layer. The volume of the magma corresponds to the thinning of the crust.

The research group has therefore reinterpreted data from a number of other rift zones around the globe, including from the East African rift in Kenya where Karen Blixen had her African farm and from an older rift zone in the Ukraine. In both places the researchers see the same phenomenon found in Siberia. This is an important reason for the Danish researcher’s new results.

Rift zones can divide continents

Rift formation is a fundamental process of plate tectonics, which can, given time, split a continent in two. Up until 60 million years ago, what is currently Europe and North America was one large continent. The northern Atlantic appeared when a rift zone developed between what is now Norway and Greenland. The rifting process continued and ca 55 million years ago a new ocean arose.

Rift zones are also important for oil exploration as many oil rich areas have arisen as a result of rift processes. This is true, for example, of the area around the Central Graben in the North Sea which is a former rift zone whose development halted. The Central Graben is the location where the countries bordering the North Sea obtain most of their oil. It is therefore important to understand the processes that lead to rift formation, as it may give us an opportunity to pump more oil up from underground.

Source:University of Copenhagen.

Now a Northwestern University-led research team has identified a promising new material that could transform a technology that currently cools and heats car seats — thermoelectrics — into one that also efficiently converts waste heat into electricity to help power the car and improve gas mileage.

The researchers discovered that adding two metals, antimony and lead, to the well-known semiconductor lead-telluride, produces a thermoelectric material that is more efficient at high temperatures than existing materials. The results are published online in the journal Angewandte Chemie.

“We cannot explain this 100 percent, but it gives us a new mechanism — and probably new science — to focus on as we try to raise the efficiency of thermoelectrics,” said Mercouri G. Kanatzidis, Charles E. and Emma H. Morrison Professor of Chemistry in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and the paper’s senior author.

Current thermoelectric technology is only used in niche markets, such as solid-state refrigeration and cooling, because the materials are not very efficient. With new materials and increased efficiency, devices based on thermoelectrics could find widespread use in the automotive industry, solar energy conversion and the conversion of waste heat from nuclear reactors, smokestacks and industrial equipment.

“It’s a big accomplishment to recover some of the heat or energy that would otherwise be lost and convert it into useful energy,” said Kanatzidis. “That’s what thermoelectrics can do, but we need to make them more efficient to really be practical.”

Thermoelectric materials are only 5 to 6 percent efficient today, but a new generation of materials based on recent discoveries including this one at Northwestern, could produce devices with 11 to 14 percent efficiency, says Kanatzidis. The long-term goal is to reach 20 percent.

Thermoelectric materials convert heat into electricity by taking advantage of temperature differences. Electrons move from the hot end of the material to the cold end, creating positive and negative electrodes and an electrical voltage.

A thermoelectric device, for example, could be attached to a car’s tailpipe. The side of the material in contact with the tailpipe would be the hot side, and the side exposed to the air would be the cold side. The temperature difference would be enough to generate electricity, which would be returned to the car’s engine for additional torque. Such devices also could be used in large industrial plants, such as those for power, chemical production and glass making.

Car companies are working on the thermoelectrics problem as part of their strategy to raise the overall gas mileage of vehicles, says Kanatzidis. They hope to raise mileage by 5 to 10 percent per gallon using thermoelectrics, which would be significant.

A superior thermoelectric material needs to have these properties to work: high electrical conductivity (to transfer a lot of power), low thermal conductivity (to maintain the temperature difference and prevent equilibrium) and the ability to generate a large voltage for as small a temperature difference as possible.

A material with all three properties is difficult to find, but Kanatzidis and his team found it — in an unexpected way.

Four years ago, Kanatzidis and his research group discovered a class of materials based on lead-telluride that doubled the efficiency performance of existing materials. They were able to lower the thermal conductivity without changing its electrical properties by putting nanodots — small particles of silver-antimony-telluride between two and 10 nanometers in diameter — inside the lead-telluride.

For the new work reported in Angewandte Chemie, Kanatzidis and graduate student Joseph Sootsman decided to add two different materials — the metals lead and alimony, also in the form of nanodots — to lead-telluride to see if they could lower the thermal conductivity even more. They were surprised when they saw the results.

“The thermal conductivity was not any lower than our earlier results, but we discovered a net gain in electrical conductivity at high temperatures that we didn’t expect,” said Kanatzidis. “This means we had a net gain in power coming out of the material that we didn’t have before. This was very surprising.”

Interestingly, the researchers also discovered that adding lead or antimony alone to the lead-telluride did not produce an improvement. Lead and antimony both had to be present in the lead-telluride to produce the electrical conductivity gain. The electrons scatter less and move faster with the two inclusions than with just one or none.

“This phenomenon will stimulate new scientific inquiries and generate new ideas on how to design even more efficient thermoelectric materials in the future,” said Kanatzidis.

Source: Northwestern University.

The new map design follows a series of historical and ongoing arguments about ownership, and the race for resources, in the frozen lands and seas of the Arctic.

The potential for conflicts is increasing as the search for new oil, gas and minerals intensifies.

The move to comprehensively map the region illustrates the urgent need for clear policy-making on Arctic issues – an area rich in natural resources. The Durham map shows (click here to view the map):

1. where boundaries have been agreed
2. where known claims are
3. the potential areas that states might claim

Director of Research at the International Boundaries Research Unit (IBRU), Martin Pratt says: “The map is the most precise depiction yet of the limits and the future dividing lines that could be drawn across the Arctic region.

“The results have huge implications for policy-making as the rush to carve up the polar region continues.

“It’s a cartographic means of showing, and an attempt to collate information and predict the way in which the Arctic region may eventually be divided up. The freezing land and seas of the Arctic are likely to be getting hotter in terms of geopolitics; the Durham map aims to assist national and international policy-makers across the world.”

It’s a year since Russia planted a flag on the seabed, underneath the North Pole, highlighting its claim to a huge chunk of the Arctic.

The Russian demands relate to a complex area of law covered by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS). Under that law, any coastal state can claim territory 200 nautical miles (nm) from their shoreline (Exclusive Economic Zone, EEZ) and exploit the natural resources within that zone. Some coastal states have rights that extend beyond EEZ due to their continental shelf. Areas of the seabed beyond the continental shelf are referred to as ‘The Area’ and any world state – landlocked or not – has equal rights in this area.

The continental shelf is the part of a country’s landmass that extends into the sea before dropping into the deep ocean. Under UNCLOS, if a state can prove its rights, it can exploit the resources of the sea and the seabed within its territory.

Russia claims that its continental shelf extends along a mountain chain running underneath the Arctic, known as the Lomonosov Ridge. Theoretically, if this was the case, Russia might be able to claim a vast area of territory.

The IBRU map shows what is currently possible and what might be permissible in terms of territorial claims under international law. It also highlights the areas of land and sea where clashes of interest are likely.

A new survey by the US Geological Survey estimates that a fifth of the world’s undiscovered, technically-recoverable resources lie within the Arctic Circle. The Lomonosov Ridge is just one area of contention between countries. Other disputes involve Canada, USA, (Greenland) Denmark, Iceland and Norway.

The problem with claims is that they must be verified by geological, geomorphological and bathymetric analysis (sub-sea surveys), and it’s not an easy or quick process to verify claims.

The new map will help politicians to understand areas of maritime jurisdiction and the methodology employed could be vital in helping to settle future sea territorial disputes.

Conservationists want laws to protect the North Pole region and climate change is likely to bring further pressure as ice melts and the seas open up to exploration.

Source: Durham University.

The journal paper, ‘Cow Power: The Energy and Emissions Benefits of Converting Manure to Biogas’, has implications for all countries with livestock as it is the first attempt to outline a procedure for quantifying the national amount of renewable energy that herds of cattle and other livestock can generate and the concomitant GHG emission reductions.

Livestock manure, left to decompose naturally, emits two particularly potent GHGs – nitrous oxide and methane. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, nitrous oxide warms the atmosphere 310 times more than carbon dioxide, methane does so 21 times more.

The journal paper creates two hypothetical scenarios and quantifies them to compare energy savings and GHG reducing benefits. The first is ‘business as usual’ with coal burnt for energy and with manure left to decompose naturally. The second is one wherein manure is anaerobically-digested to create biogas and then burnt to offset coal.

Through anaerobic digestion, similar to the process by which you create compost, manure can be turned into energy-rich biogas, which standard microturbines can use to produce electricity. The hundreds of millions of livestock inhabiting the US could produce approximately 100 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, enough to power millions of homes and offices.

And, as manure left to decompose naturally has a very damaging effect on the environment, this new waste management system has a net potential GHG emissions reduction of 99 million metric tonnes, wiping out approximately four per cent of the country’s GHG emissions from electricity production.

The burning of biogas would lead to the emission of some CO2 but the output from biogas-burning plants would be less than that from, for example, coal.

Authors of the paper, Dr. Michael E. Webber and Amanda D Cuellar from the University of Texas at Austin, write, “In light of the criticism that has been levelled against biofuels, biogas production from manure has the less-controversial benefit of reusing an existing waste source and has the potential to improve the environment.

“Nonetheless, the logistics of widespread biogas production, including feedstock and digestates transportation, must be determined at the local level to produce the most environmentally advantageous, economical, and energy efficient system.”

Source: Institute of Physics.

The automaker said today its first FCX Clarity hydrogen fuel cell-powered vehicle will roll off the assembly line next month, and go only to pre-selected customers for now. Honda also revealed the first auto dealership network in the United States to sell and service the next-generation cars. All three are located in California, Power Honda Costa Mesa, Honda of Santa Monica, and Scott Robinson Honda in Torrance.

The announcements were made during a ceremony for the start of FCX Clarity production at the world’s first dedicated fuel cell vehicle manufacturing facility in Japan.

Honda previously announced plans to deliver about 200 FCX Clarity hydrogen fuel cell-powered vehicles in the U.S. and Japan to customers in the first three years of production, with leases beginning in July. The lease program marks the world’s first large-scale retail initiative for fuel cell vehicle technology.

The FCX Clarity is a next-generation, hydrogen powered fuel cell-powered vehicle. Propelled by an electric motor that runs on electricity generated in the fuel cell, the vehicle’s only emission is water, and its fuel efficiency is three times that of a modern gasoline-powered automobile.

In the new study, Michael J. Heben, Paul W. King, and colleagues explain that bacterial enzymes called hydrogenases show promise as powerful catalysts for using hydrogen in fuel cells, which can produce electricity with virtually no pollution for motor vehicles, portable electronics, and other devices. However, scientists report difficulty incorporating these enzymes into electrical devices because the enzymes do not form good electrical connections with fuel cell components. Currently, precious metals, such as platinum, are typically needed to perform this catalysis.

The researchers combined hydrogenase enzymes with carbon nanotubes, submicroscopic strands of pure carbon that are excellent electrical conductors. In laboratory studies, the researchers demonstrated that a good electrical connection was established using photoluminescence spectroscopy measurements. These new “biohybrid” conjugates could reduce the cost of fuel cells by reducing or eliminating the need for platinum and other costly metal components, they say.

source:American Chemical Society.

Early research results show that tropical maize, when grown in the Midwest, requires few crop inputs such as nitrogen fertilizer, chiefly because it does not produce any ears. It also is easier for farmers to integrate into their current operations than some other dedicated energy crops because it can be easily rotated with corn or soybeans, and can be planted, cultivated and harvested with the same equipment U.S. farmers already have. Finally, tropical maize stalks are believed to require less processing than corn grain, corn stover, switchgrass, Miscanthus giganteus and the scores of other plants now being studied for biofuel production.

What it does produce, straight from the field with no processing, is 25 percent or more sugar — mostly sucrose, fructose and glucose.

“Corn is a short-day plant, so when we grow tropical maize here in the Midwest the long summer days delay flowering, which causes the plant to grow very tall and produce few or no ears,” says Below. Without ears, these plants concentrate sugars in their stalks, he adds. Those sugars could have a dramatic affect on Midwestern production of ethanol and other biofuels.

According to Below, “Midwestern-grown tropical maize easily grows 14 or 15 feet tall compared to the 7-1/2 feet height that is average for conventional hybrid corn. It is all in these tall stalks,” Below explains. “In our early trials, we are finding that these plants build up to a level of 25 percent or higher of sugar in their stalks.

This differs from conventional corn and other crops being grown for biofuels in that the starch found in corn grain and the cellulose in switchgrass, corn stover and other biofuel crops must be treated with enzymes to convert them into sugars that can be then fermented into alcohols such as ethanol.

Storing simple sugars also is more cost-effective for the plant, because it takes a lot of energy to make the complex starches, proteins, and oils present in corn grain. This energy savings per plant could result in more total energy per acre with topical maize, since it produces no grain.

“In terms of biofuel production, tropical maize could be considered the ‘Sugarcane of the Midwest’,”Below said. “The tropical maize we’re growing here at the University of Illinois is very lush, very tall, and very full of sugar.”

He added that his early trials also show that tropical maize requires much less nitrogen fertilizer than conventional corn, and that the stalks actually accumulate more sugar when less nitrogen is available. Nitrogen fertilizer is one of major costs of growing corn.

He explained that sugarcane used in Brazil to make ethanol is desirable for the same reason: it produces lots of sugar without a high requirement for nitrogen fertilizer, and this sugar can be fermented to alcohol without the middle steps required by high-starch and cellulosic crops. But sugarcane canít be grown in the Midwest.

The tall stalks of tropical maize are so full of sugar that producers growing it for biofuel production will be able to supply a raw material at least one step closer to being turned into fuel than are ears of corn.

“And growing tropical maize doesn’t break the farmers’ rotation. You can grow tropical maize for one year and then go back to conventional corn or soybeans in subsequent years,” Below said. “Miscanthus, on the other hand, is thought to need a three-year growth cycle between initial planting and harvest and then your land is in Miscanthus. To return to planting corn or soybean necessitates removing the Miscanthus rhizomes.

Below is studying topical maize along with doctoral candidate Mike Vincent and postdoctoral research associate Matias Ruffo, and in conjunction with U of I Associate Professor Stephen Moose. This latest discovery of high sugar yields from tropical maize became apparent through cooperative work between Below and Moose to characterize genetic variation in response to nitrogen fertilizers.

Currently supported by the National Science Foundation, these studies are a key element to developing maize hybrids with improved nitrogen use efficiency. Both Below and Moose are members of Illinois Maize Breeding and Genetics Laboratory (http://imbgl.cropsci.uiuc.edu/tradition.html), which has a long history of conducting research that identifies new uses for the maize crop.

Moose now directs one of the longest-running plant genetics experiments in the world, in which more than a century of selective breeding has been applied to alter carbon and nitrogen accumulation in the maize plant. Continued collaboration between Below and Moose will investigate whether materials from these long term selection experiments will further enhance sugar yields from tropical maize.

source:University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

“World record efficiencies are popping up almost every month, leading the OSC community into an endless and dangerous tendency to outbid the last report,” stated Dennler et al. in the article. “The current outbidding phenomenon does a severe disservice to the whole community, damaging its reputation. Solar cells and especially OSCs face enough difficulties in convincing people of their benefit over other energy sources.”

OSCs are potentially cheap and easy to fabricate. This makes them very attractive in comparison to the familiar silicon solar cells, which struggle to compete in cost with other energy sources. The promise of OSCs means the field is burgeoning. However, OSCs still show relatively low efficiencies that will need to improve significantly before they become a success.

Dennler and colleagues urge the field to press for independent verification of solar cell efficiencies. They call on researchers to question their results and constantly push the accuracy of their findings and ask journal editors to review claims of significant advances thoroughly.

“In essence, this should be a good thing. Increasing the number of people focused on this tremendous renewable will hopefully help solve the planet’s energy needs,” adds Dennler. “Unfortunately, OSCs currently suffer from their own success.”

The increasing number of researchers and choice of where to publish results means that everyone is finding it increasingly difficult to gain an impact within the community. The result is a pursuit of eye-catching claims of solar cell efficiencies.

source: Elsevier.