As I Stare at My Smoke-Clouded Sky, a Thought or Two About Tipping Points

Arctic sea ice is vanishing and quite rapidly to boot. The ice cover that once reflected solar radiation, heat, back into space has walked off the job. No brilliant white ice means dark green ocean that is a heat sink. That warming Arctic ocean warms the atmosphere that causes the tundra to dry out and catch fire. As the tundra burns it creates black soot that winds up turning the Greenland Ice Sheet a dirty colour and that accelerates the melting of the ice sheet and sea level rise.

The thawing, burning tundra also exposes the permafrost underneath that, as it thaws, releases massive amounts of once safely sequestered, formerly frozen methane, a very powerful greenhouse gas. As the Arctic ocean warms it also triggers the thawing of ancient, frozen seabed methane clathrates - methane ice if you like - that bubbles to the surface and then onward to the atmosphere.

From rampaging wildfires to tundra fires to ice caps covered in black soot to the release of ancient stores of methane from the permafrost and seabed clathrates these are all the feedback mechanisms your mother those scientists warned you about. They're happening now, not forty years from now, not even twenty years from now.

Have we passed the point of no return. The good news is that's a conversation we're not really having right now. We're still proceeding - although not very quickly and not very well - with talks that assume we're not there yet and can, if we just try hard enough dammit, avoid the worst - maybe.

Today we're at just 0.8 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. We're not at the 1.5C mark yet because that persistent atmospheric greenhouse gas needs time to work its magic. It will and as it does our children and grandchildren will experience the changes in creates.

There are two things that we must understand, and that includes you.

First off. That 1.5C is something we've already bequeathed our kids and theirs. What we need to realize is that emissions are cumulative which means our greenhouse gas emissions from today onward add to that 1.5C. Every tonne of CO2 we emit goes on top of that 1.5C pile. We're experiencing the impacts of barely 0.8C of warming (and it's a real bitch). As today's warming keeps getting hotter, those who follow us will endure a variety of impacts that are even greater, more dangerous, and demanding of new adaptation responses.

Second. These numbers don't include the natural feedback mechanisms we already seem to have triggered. The greenhouse gas emissions they create - CO2 from forest fires, methane released from the permafrost and seabed clathrates - also go atop that 1.5C we have already locked in.
http://the-mound-of-sound.blogspot.ca/2015/07/as-i-stare-at-my-smoke-clouded-sky.html

Evolving Tesla Electric Drivetrains

Electric drivetrains are much simpler, much lighter and much less costly than internal combustion drivetrains of similar power. Tesla's drive units consist of just an inverter, induction motor and single-speed reduction gearbox with differential. The Model S drive unit, for instance, is so compact that it fits entirely within the rear suspension assembly.

In mechanical terms, Tesla's drive unit is what one would get if the starter motor of an ICE drivetrain were mated with the differential, and everything else - the engine, transmission, drive shaft - were thrown away.

The complicated part is the inverter which changes the DC voltage of the battery into AC voltage of varying amplitude and frequency that operates the motor. Much like a mechanical transmission adjusts the ratio between speed and torque, the inverter adjusts the ratio of voltage to current. Low voltage and high current produce high motor torque at low speeds while higher voltage and lower current result in lower motor torque and higher speeds.
The cost, size, performance and efficiency of the inverter depends largely on the power switching transistors, and these are improving at a semiconductor pace. New silicon carbide and gallium nitride power transistors switch faster and operate at higher temperatures than silicon transistors. Faster switching reduces the size of filtering components and supports higher motor speeds, that in turn allow smaller, lighter motors. High temperature operation allows simpler mechanical design for cooling within the inverter. The result is that electric drivetrains are getting smaller, lighter and cheaper, quickly.

An indication of the weight and cost of electric drive systems can be found in this DOE presentation. Note (slide 5, bottom) that a 2010 development program at GM achieved the projected 2015 weight target, suggesting that the technology was even then 5 years ahead of DOE's optimistic expectations. Our cost and weight estimates for Model 3 drivetrains is based on this DOE data, extrapolated forward to 2017. Cost estimates for the high performance drivetrain versions used in the 366PD car include a substantial premium for "high spec" electronic components, high performance magnetic materials in the motor and presumably low production rates.

via
http://seekingalpha.com/article/3258855-will-teslas-model-3-compete

Useful chart comparing bang for the buck of various battery technologies

The other day, some other curious people and I ran numbers comparing the per-kWh price of the Tesla Powerwall & Powerpacks (the utility-scale battery options described on the bottom of this page) with top competitors on the market. Admittedly, that was too simplistic a comparison. The kWh rating provided for all of these products is simply the maximum amount of electricity they can store at one point in time. So, in the case of the Powerwall, 7 kWh means that the battery can hold up to 7 kWh of electricity at one time, similar to how a 5-gallon jug of water can hold up to 5 gallons of water.

You have to multiply that capacity rating by # of cycles (# of times the battery will be filled up and then emptied), depth of discharge (whether the battery can be fully emptied during each cycle or needs to be only 80% emptied, 70% emptied, etc), and efficiency (how much electricity is actually transmitted, not lost, in each cycle), and then divide by price to determine a per-kWh price for all of the kilowatt-hours your system is expected to produce… before degrading to 80% of its rated capacity, that is (at which point it’s actually still useful, but that’s apparently the global standard for “end of product life”).

As you can see, there are a number of assumptions you have to make to perform these calculations, and even if all of your assumptions are correct, it’s not like the products are completely dead at the end of the studied time period. This also leaves out operational costs (which we’ll assume to be $0 in the calculations below).

Anyhow, this is the best method I’ve found for comparing Tesla’s Powerwall and Powerpacks to top products on the market. More importantly, on the residential side, the numbers should help a consumer to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of getting a Powerwall (should you get commercial access to one) — that’s the main aim in the next section of this article. Note that I’ve actually left out “competing” lithium-ion and lead-acid batteries in the residential section. Basically, even at a glance, it’s clear that they don’t compete with the Powerwall, so I didn’t bother finding all of the specs and doing the calculations. If you want to do so for any particular battery, I’m happy to add the info in, but I’ll need links or company spec sheets indicating cycle life, expected DoD, efficiency, and price in order to do so.

With a ridiculous amount of help from three wonderful CleanTechnica readers, below are the assumptions and results, split into a “residential” section and a “utility-scale” section.
Residential Battery Storage — Tesla Powerwall x 4 vs Aquion Energy x 2 vs Iron Edison x 1

Subheading have you confused? I ran the numbers for 4 Powerwall purchase scenarios, 2 Aquion Energy products, and 1 Iron Edison product. Since the intro above was too long already, I’ll jump into the table first and list some of the takeaways and the assumptions underneath it:
http://cleantechnica.com/2015/05/09/tesla-powerwall-powerblocks-per-kwh-lifetime-prices-vs-aquion-energy-eos-energy-imergy/

The End Of The Lithium-Ion Era?

Lithium-ion technology is still the gold standard for energy storage as demonstrated by the popularity of the new Powerwall battery, Tesla Energy’s much-publicized foray into Li-ion energy storage for homes and businesses. However, some new technologies are sneaking up behind. In the latest development, lithium-sulfur batteries could benefit from a new “designer carbon” engineered by a team of researchers at Stanford University.


Li-S energy storage has important advantages over Li-ion in terms of cost, energy density, and toxicity, but until recently, some major drawbacks have stymied the development of Li-S batteries.

One solution crossed our radar back in 2013, when researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory developed a sulfur-enriched cathode (our sister site Gas2.org also took note).

In other developments, the University of Arizona has also been developing a method for converting waste sulfur to a lightweight plastic that could be used in EV batteries. Last December, researchers at Cambridge University came up with a graphene-based solution, and earlier this year, Drexel University announced that it has been leveraging its experience with MAX phase ceramics to push the Li-S envelope.

The new Stanford findings add more fuel to the energy storage findings. The team tested its new designer carbon material under real-world conditions in lithium-sulfur batteries and supercapacitors (supercapacitors are energy storage devices that charge and discharge rapidly).

For supercapacitors, the results were “dramatic,” with a threefold increase in conductivity compared to electrodes made with conventional activated carbon. Power delivery and stability also improved.

More to the point, the results showed a promising pathway to improving Li-S battery performance, as the designer carbon was able to trap lithium polysulfides, an undesirable byproduct from the interaction of lithium and sulfur.

The new material’s relatively low cost and easy fabrication method are added pluses. You can get all the details from the published study in ACS Central Science under the title “Ultrahigh Surface Area Three-Dimensional Porous Graphitic Carbon from Conjugated Polymeric Molecular Framework.”

You might not see much in the way of competition for Li-ion market share yet, but stay tuned.

Why Natural Is Not Better, Energy Storage Edition

The new designer carbon material could have a variety of applications, but the Stanford University team has zeroed in on the energy storage potential, particularly in respect to lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries.

The new material is actually a synthetic form of bio-based activated carbon. For those of you new to the topic, activated carbon is a common material that shows up in water filters and deodorizers, among many other things — but not energy storage devices, at least not yet.

Inexpensive forms of activated carbon are typically made from coconut shells, which involves a lot of high-temperature processing and chemical finishing. The result is a material rich in nanoscale pores, which gives it a high surface area ideal for storing electrical charges.

However, this “natural” form of activated carbon falls flat in terms of transporting a charge, partly because there is little connectivity between the pores. Here’s lead researcher Zhenan Bao describing the problem:

With activated carbon, there’s no way to control pore connectivity. Also, lots of impurities from the coconut shells and other raw starting materials get carried into the carbon. As a refrigerator deodorant, conventional activated carbon is fine, but it doesn’t provide high enough performance for electronic devices and energy-storage applications.

As a workaround, the Stanford team created its own synthetic sheets of carbon from a hydrogel polymer (hydrogel is fancyspeak for a class of super-absorbing “smart” materials). To activate the material, they added potassium hydroxide, which also increased its surface area.

The result is a carbon material with characteristics that can be controlled in two ways: by using different polymers and organic linkers, and by changing the temperature of the fabrication process.

Here are a couple of snippets from the new study:

For example, raising the processing temperature from 750 degrees Fahrenheit (400 degrees Celsius) to 1,650 F (900 C) resulted in a 10-fold increase in pore volume.

Subsequent processing produced carbon material with a record-high surface area of 4,073 square meters per gram – the equivalent of three American football fields packed into an ounce of carbon. The maximum surface area achieved with conventional activated carbon is about 3,000 square meters per gram.
The End Of The Lithium-Ion Era

Li-S energy storage has important advantages over Li-ion in terms of cost, energy density, and toxicity, but until recently, some major drawbacks have stymied the development of Li-S batteries.

One solution crossed our radar back in 2013, when researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory developed a sulfur-enriched cathode (our sister site Gas2.org also took note).

In other developments, the University of Arizona has also been developing a method for converting waste sulfur to a lightweight plastic that could be used in EV batteries. Last December, researchers at Cambridge University came up with a graphene-based solution, and earlier this year, Drexel University announced that it has been leveraging its experience with MAX phase ceramics to push the Li-S envelope.

The new Stanford findings add more fuel to the energy storage findings. The team tested its new designer carbon material under real-world conditions in lithium-sulfur batteries and supercapacitors (supercapacitors are energy storage devices that charge and discharge rapidly).

For supercapacitors, the results were “dramatic,” with a threefold increase in conductivity compared to electrodes made with conventional activated carbon. Power delivery and stability also improved.

More to the point, the results showed a promising pathway to improving Li-S battery performance, as the designer carbon was able to trap lithium polysulfides, an undesirable byproduct from the interaction of lithium and sulfur.

The new material’s relatively low cost and easy fabrication method are added pluses. You can get all the details from the published study in ACS Central Science under the title “Ultrahigh Surface Area Three-Dimensional Porous Graphitic Carbon from Conjugated Polymeric Molecular Framework.”

You might not see much in the way of competition for Li-ion market share yet, but stay tuned.

http://cleantechnica.com/2015/05/31/new-designer-energy-storage-breakthrough-packs-3-football-fields-1-ounce-carbon/

Highest efficiency in solar electric power generation with advanced Stirling!

Independent tests by IT Power in the UK confirm that a single Ripasso dish can generate 75 to 85 megawatt hours of electricity a year - enough to power 24 typical UK homes. To make the same amount of electricity by burning coal would mean releasing roughly 81 metric tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere.

Paul Gauche, director of the Solar Thermal Energy Research Group at the University of Stellenbosch has visited the test site many times. “The technology looks good to me. I’ve seen it working and I believe it meets the efficiency goals. The technology is proven with years of performance in the navy.”

He points out that it will be crucial to keep costs low enough to compete with photovoltaics, a significant challenge as their price falls every year. The system is also limited in that it is only useful in areas with consistent bright sunshine.

The technology works by using the mirrors as giant lenses that focus the sun’s energy to a tiny hot point, which in turn drives a zero-emission Stirling engine.

The Stirling engine was developed by Reverend Robert Stirling in Edinburgh in 1816 as an alternative to the steam engine. It uses alternate heating and cooling of an enclosed gas to drive pistons, which turn a flywheel. Because of the material limitations at the time, the advanced stirling engine that Ripasso uses was not commercially developed until 1988, when Swedish defence contractor Kokums started making them for submarines.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/13/could-this-be-the-worlds-most-efficient-solar-electricity-system

Greenhouse gas can be absorbed in soil, with organic soil management

What if there were a risk-free way of helping to mitigate climate change while simultaneously addressing food and water security?

A new report from the Center for Food Safety's Cool Foods Campaign says that such an opportunity is possible, and it's right below our feet.

Soil & Carbon: Soil Solutions to Climate Problems outlines how it is possible to take atmospheric CO2, which is fueling climate change, and plug it into the soil. Far from moving the problem from one place to another, this shift can reduce ocean acidification because the oceans are no longer the sink for vast amounts of CO2, and can regenerate degraded soils by providing needed carbon.

The report lays out the problem in this way:

Humans are altering the chemistry of where carbon is stored, and climate change is a manifestation of that alteration.

Another way of looking at the problem is that too much of the carbon that was once in a solid phase in the soil is now a gas. As a result, there is too much carbon in the atmosphere, too much in the ocean, but not enough stable carbon where it once was, in the soil.

The report adds that "cultivated soils globally have lost 50-70 percent of their original carbon content." Multiple factors have contributed to the problem, the report states: paving over land; converting grasslands to cropland; and agricultural practices that involve tillage and chemical inputs, which not only deprive soil of organic matter and rob it of the ability to store carbon but also contribute to flooding and erosion.

Regenerative practices like this help build healthy soil. (Photo: London Permaculture/flickr/cc)Healthy soils, in contrast, fed through organic agriculture practices, like polycultures, cover crops, and compost, give soil microbes the ability to store more CO2. Not only that, the report states, healthy soil can better weather both drought and floods because its structure allows it to act like a sponge. And healthy soil means better crop yields.

Just how much CO2 can be stored in soils is unclear, with one estimate cited in the report being 75-100 parts per million of CO.

But the bottom line, the report states, is that healthy soils will help communities have resilience in the face of climate change impacts.

The report concludes: "Unlike geoengineering, rebuilding soil carbon is a zero-risk, low-cost proposition. It has universal application, and we already know how to do it. All that stands in our way is a greater awareness of the opportunity and the political will to make it happen."

This story was originally published on Common Dreams.

Another strategy is to incorporate terra preta, charcoal, that remains active in the soil for thousands of years, and has been discovered in brazil in the amazon area, after all that time it still is active, absorbing carbon into the soil, and adding fertility all that time!

Natural cooling explained with great examples from India, middle east

In fact, cultural acceptance of air conditioning varies widely. They’re very rare in French homes and not that common in Spanish ones either, says Lloyd Alter, an adjunct professor at Canada’s Ryerson University School of Interior Design. “In France, they think air conditioners make you sick,” he explains. “In Spain, their culture revolves around being outside and taking advantage of it: ‘We go out and eat our dinner at 10 o’clock at night, and we take it easy mid-day.’”

Looking to the Future
Zaelke sees a future in which governments play a stronger role in setting manufacturing standards, as the Japanese are with their Top Runner program; tax credits to stimulate innovative technology; and comprehensive labeling programs, somewhat like the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) ratings system developed by the U.S. Green Building Council, to address elements of air conditioning beyond the energy efficiency covered by federal Energy Star ratings. He also thinks part of the answer is returning to a design mindset that was prevalent before the advent of air conditioning. “Before cheap energy, we used to do a better job designing our buildings,” he says. “For example, we used to know how to situate a building so you had deciduous trees providing shade during the summer and evergreens providing shelter from the wind.”


The Torrent Research Centre of Ahmedabad, India, uses wind-catching intake towers to pull in air and cool it by diverting it through a fine mist. The cooled air descends through an open central corridor and is drawn into work spaces on each level. Exhaust towers around the perimeter of the complex vent hot air at night.
Abhikram

Pearce asserts that air conditioning has made architects lazy. “Air conditioning has allowed them to design buildings based on formal concepts without any response to the natural environment,” he says. “Architects should design buildings whose form is shaped by a scientific understanding of natural processes at the building’s location and not by some purely whimsical sculptural shape.”

LaRoche believes it’s imperative for people in his profession to pursue minimal environmental impacts when designing structures and strive to incorporate alternative ways to cool them. He says HEED (Home Energy Efficient Design)—free software developed at the University of California, Los Angeles—is a good example of a residential energy design tool that can be used by anybody.31 “Tools such as this one help any homeowner or designer produce low-energy buildings,” he says.

Ultimately, LaRoche says, architectural education is key to change: “If the new architects aren’t trained in the design of low-carbon, low-energy buildings, nothing will happen. New students must be trained with new software and tools that we did not have just a couple of years ago.” He adds, “Whenever we do passive cooling in a building instead of mechanical cooling, we’re helping our planet. It’s also good for our pockets, and our buildings are more culturally responsive to the environment around them.”