February 12, 2016 A comprehensive research article published in Science Advances found that water scarcity is actually worse than first thought. The authors found that fully two-thirds of the global population suffer severe water scarcity at least 1 month per year, and nearly half of them live in India and … Continue reading
Category Archives: Hydrogen
Biodegradable Hydrogen Catalyst 150 Times More Efficient
January 6, 2016 Scientists at Indiana University Bloomington have created a biodegradable, easy to mass-produce catalyst called P22-Hyd consisting of a modified enzyme (hydrogenase) protected within the protein shell of a bacterial virus. The material forms a nano-reactor that catalyzes hydrogen formation 150 times more efficiently than the enzyme would … Continue reading
COP21 And The Distribution Of Wealth
January 1, 2016 Background COP21 is a pragmatic face-saving agreement for politicians, nothing more. Essentially, signatory nations have agreed only to commit individually and severally to maximum annual carbon emissions. Reporting the results is mandatory, but unlike global lending institutions that routinely force helpless quasi-bankrupt governments into painful austerity programs … Continue reading
Making COP21 Work
December 15, 2015 President Obama and Secretary Kerry have made the case that developing nations account for 65% of carbon emissions, and that consequently even if industrialized countries were to stop using fossil fuels instantly, now, that would not bring global warming under control. Statistically they are correct, but that’s … Continue reading
Paris FCCC 2015 Final Agreement
December 12, 2015 The Paris conference is over, and member nations have unanimously adopted a resolution to keep global mean temperature within 1.5°C of that which existed before the industrial era and to help needy nations cope with the effects of global warming. Pundits are already criticizing it due to … Continue reading
Sao Paulo’s Water Crisis
December 9, 2014 Sao Paulo, a city of 20 million people, has water for 60 days. Whether the cause is global warming, deforestation in the Amazon, or something else is irrelevant. The point is that the city depends on rainfall to replenish its reservoirs. Well, it’s not raining, and there’s … Continue reading
The Caribbean
G-20 Infrastructure Commitment On November 16, 2014 leaders of G-20 nations in Brisbane, Australia presented a plan to boost global GDP by more than $2 trillion over five years by investing in infrastructure and increasing trade. Presumably the infrastructure they have in mind will include projects to reduce the use … Continue reading
Better Than Grid Parity
Electricity in Hawaii costs $0.38 per kilowatt hour, almost treble the national average of around $0.13, which incidentally does not factor in the damage to the environment caused by using fossil fuels to generate electricity. Solar power, which can cost $0.30 per KWH, is now actually cheaper than grid electricity. … Continue reading
The Conquest of Drought
Speaking at Brookings on the economics of climate change, Secretary of the Treasury Jacob Lew remarked that “the cost of inaction or delay is far greater than the cost of action.” The fact of the matter is that there is no national or international consensus among leaders on what, if … Continue reading
Drawbacks
October 15, 2014 Lockheed Martin announced that it has made a fusion-related technological breakthrough. It would use deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen found in the ocean, to generate nearly 10 million times more energy that the same amount of fossil fuels. There would be no radioactive waste. At first glance … Continue reading