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Energy Efficiency Linked to Technologies that Drive Prosperity and Slash Emissions

Strategies for increasing the efficiency of energy use lie at the core of climate policy. And yet, "[i]n spite of decades of investment, enormous new opportunities in energy efficiency remain to be exploited," says Henry Kelly, the volume's editor and a non-resident Senior Fellow at Boston University's Center for Sustainable Energy.

7 Dec 2020

Mass Incarceration Associated with Increases in Industrial Emissions

Mass incarceration is as much an environmental problem as it is a social one, according to a new Portland State University study that finds increases in incarceration are significantly associated with increases in industrial emissions.

7 Dec 2020

Abrupt Climate Change Occurred Alongside Sea Ice Decline in the North

Researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen have, in collaboration with Norwegian researchers in the ERC Synergy project, ICE2ICE, shown that abrupt climate change occurred as a result of widespread decrease of sea ice.

7 Dec 2020

New System to Measure Solar Performance in Scalable Photovoltaic Systems

At Arizona State University, scientists have developed a new system to quantify the long-term solar performance in scalable photovoltaic systems. The study represents a revolution in the cost and longer life span of interconnected power delivery.

7 Dec 2020

Researchers Model Decarbonization of Sector-Coupled European Energy System

A clear and powerful investment in wind and solar power, with immediate effect, is the most affordable and simplest way to honor the Paris Agreement of restricting global warming to 1.5 °C.

7 Dec 2020

Knowledge of Underground Life of Plants Could Help Mitigate Climate Change

Plants competing for sunlight—stretching upward and outward to block each other’s exposure to the rays of the sun—is a usual sight. However, there is another competition occurring underground, unobserved.

4 Dec 2020

Robot Fleet Used to Study how Marine Life Captures and Stores Carbon

A fleet of new-generation, deep-diving ocean robots will be deployed in the Southern Ocean, in a major study of how marine life acts as a handbrake on global warming.

4 Dec 2020

Coastal Protection Declines as Coral Reef Ecosystems Collapse Under Ocean Warming, Acidification

A new study shows the coastal protection coral reefs currently provide will start eroding by the end of the century, as the world continues to warm and the oceans acidify.

4 Dec 2020

NUS Engineers Formulate New Cleaner Additive Mixture to Convert Natural Gas into Solid

Natural gas is the cleanest of all fossil fuels, but storing it safely and affordably remains a challenge. Now, engineers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) have devised a method to convert natural gas into a non-explosive solid that can be easily stored and transported. Using a novel, low-toxicity additive mixture they formulated, the conversion can be completed in just 15 minutes - the fastest time so far.

4 Dec 2020

Old Fossil Fuel Power Plants Could Complete Normal Lifespans and Still Close by 2035

Decarbonizing U.S. electricity production will require both construction of renewable energy sources and retirement of power plants now operated by fossil fuels. A generator-level model described in the December 4 issue of the journal Science suggests that most fossil fuel power plants could complete normal lifespans and still close by 2035 because so many facilities are nearing the end of their operational lives.

4 Dec 2020

Reduced Use of Water Pipes with High Chromium Alloy can Prevent Toxication

A new study performed by engineers from the University of California Riverside (UC Riverside) reports that rusted iron pipes could react with residual disinfectants present in drinking water distribution systems and generate carcinogenic hexavalent chromium in drinking water.

4 Dec 2020

"Bottle Tags" Boost Understanding of Plastic Litter's Movement Through Rivers

A new study demonstrates the potential for plastic bottles tagged with tracking devices to deepen our understanding of how plastic pollution moves through rivers. Emily Duncan of the University of Exeter, U.K., and colleagues present this research in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on Dec 2, 2020.

3 Dec 2020