Amplified Green

An organization called the European Cooperation in the field of Scientific and Technical Research (COST) invites scientists from around the globe to submit proposals for projects contributing to the scientific, technological, economic, cultural or societal development of Europe. Proposals playing a precursor role for other European programmes and plans initiated by early-stage researchers are especially welcome.

The deadline for preliminary proposals is 26 September 2008 and reviewing the material takes around six months, the organizers say. COST aims to bring together researchers and experts in different countries by setting up networks of nationally funded research projects. COST financially supports the networking activities (not the research itself). For more information, visit the organization’s website.

Commercial hemp is a plant that scientists tout as having wonderful capabilities to combat climate change. The plant is outlawed in most countries including the US, but the EU subsidizes industrially grown hemp.

Commercially grown hemp has less than 1% tetrahydrocannabinol (THD), the psychedelic substance in ‘real’ cannabis. Most countries that shy away from growing it say they are fearful that farmers will also start growing the THD rich cannabis. Other than in the EU, the crop is grown in Canada, China, Russia and Australia.

Hemp takes in more carbon dioxide than any other plant and what’s more, hemp grows at an amazingly rapid speed. Wood made from hemp has 3-4 times the productivity of trees for paper manufacturing. And because it grows so fast, hemp can be used to solve the large-scale clearing of land and forests around the globe.

Various activists in the US are lobbying to get the crop reinstated. It was outlawed in the 1950s but Henry Ford ran his first car on hemp based fuel. Perhaps soon the activists will have their way. Already, the controlled substances act was amended last year to exclude industrial hemp from the legal definition of marihuana. The Campaign for the Restoration and Regulation of Hemp informs farmers and interested parties about the positive effects hemp has.

The applications of the crop for the energy industry are manifold and hemp is a way more powerful crop than rapeseed and other ethanol producing crops, without producing any harmful effects for the environment. Only one acre of hemp yields 1,000 gallons of methanol. Also, hemp can be used to create alternatives to coal, fuel oil, acetone, ethyl, tar pitch and creosote.

In the food sector hemp is also in strong demand. In 2004, the US alone imported $12 million worth of the stuff for the food sector. And the US healthcare market used $30 million worth of hemp.

Scientists at UK’s Newcastle University developed an energy efficient way to create a chemical reaction between epoxy and CO2. Big deal, you might think, but the resulting cyclic carbonates are estimated to cut Britain’s greenhouse gas by 4%!

The way it works is that cyclic carbonates are in high demand in the paints, petrol refining and biodegradable packaging industry, but until now the chemical component has been too expensive to create to consider it as a CO2 cutting agent. The process to create the chemical reaction required high temperatures and was therefore highly costly.

But in recent months, the Newcastle scientists found that using aluminum would create the chemical reaction at room temperature. They are now busy devising the most optimal ways to create the commercially very viable cyclic carbonate and the plan is to open a production plant that will manufacture the component for industrial supplies.

As much as 4% of the entire UK’s carbon dioxide can be ‘recyled’ this way, the Newcastle team claims. Professor Michael North who heads up the team says the technology has the potential to use up to 48 million tonnes of waste CO2 per year.

Writers at Carbon Balance and Management have published a study which shows just what happens as the cycle of carbon emissions and climate change reaches its saturation point.

We all know the theory underlying the global warming threat; landmass and oceans contain carbon and exchange carbon dioxide with the atmosphere. As our climate changes, the amount of CO2 absorbed by the land or the oceans changes. The link between the carbon cycle and CO2 emissions might very well only be relevant for the next ’several centuries. After that, there is no longer a connection between the two.

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UK researchers who studied the calcification process of phytoplankton report new findings; the creation of chalk at deep sea level could double by the end of this century, but its net contribution to CO2 levels will hardly be noticeable.

The findings, published by an international team of scientists in Science recently, contradict most studies to date on oceanic carbon dioxide emissions. But the scientists say they’ve obtained evidence that increased carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere actually causes increased activity of microscopic ocean plants’ photosynthesis and their production of chalk. The two processes level each other out, resulting in a neutral CO2 net effect.

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Scientists who went on a two month expedition to the Southern Ocean say that the Antarctic deep sea gets colder, which might stimulate the circulation of the oceanic water masses. It was the first finding of the expedition and in the next few years they will study information from autonomous buoys to find out if there’s a trend. The scientists studied ocean currents as well as the distribution of temperature, salt content and trace substances in Antarctic sea water whilst aboard an Ocean vessel called the Polarsten and ended their trip in Punta Arenas/Chile. Their findings coincide with satellite image information indicating that last summer the Antarctic sea-ice extent has been the largest on record.

The expedition which counted 58 scientists and two teachers from ten countries aimed to investigate the role of the Southern Ocean for past, present and future climate. Oceanographer Eberhard Fahrbach who led the group said that the sinking water masses in the Southern Ocean play a major role in global climate. „While the last Arctic summer was the warmest on record, we had a cold summer with a sea-ice maximum in the Antarctic. The expedition shall form the basis for understanding the opposing developments in the Arctic and in the Antarctic,“ Fahrbach said. His team also reported they found the smallest iron concentrations ever measured in the ocean. (more…)

The mixed blessings of biofuel are increasingly becoming an embarrassment for rich countries whose increased demand for crops which are used for its creation are causing massive price hikes of food in the Third World. Food shortages in countries like Haiti, Egypt and the Philippines are directly linked to biofuel mandates in the US and the European Union.

The Wall Street Journal quotes a study by the World Bank in an article today which asserts that wheat and rice prices this year will have doubled from 2004 levels.
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Green collar jobs are rapidly becoming fashionable. The new trend represents a shift to the mainstream of the good old environmentalist approach to life. But what exactly makes a job green? The experts are far from agreed.

Green collar jobs have a magic lure to them. Not only because the people involved in the sector are supposedly making a conscious effort to salvaging what’s left of the earth’s natural resources, but also because they’re believed to drag the ailing economy out of its quagmire. (more…)

A KMPG report just out underscores that aviation, healthcare, tourism, transport, oil and gas and the financial services sector are all in the “danger zone” when it comes to climate risks. The risks exist both physically and there are also adverse effects on the cards for companies in terms of regulations and reputations. The latter two especially are greatly under estimated by companies throughout all sectors. They score low on their preparedness to face with these risks.

Of all the 18 sectors reviewed, the oil and gas sector appeared best prepared for the risks. That is because the oil sector also scores highest on the physical, real, risk tally. Conversely, the transport sector scores lower on the level of risks it poses to the environment. And its level of preparedness is in line with this level of threat. The transport secor is the worst prepared for facing climate risks of all the sectors surveyed. Get a copy of the study here.

Companies involved in offsetting their carbon footprint have access to over twenty tools to calculate their emissions, most of which have been launched in the last year. So far, the voluntary carbon offsetting market is dominated by European players. Reviews of their efforts have not been all too positive, so US companies following in their footsteps do best to avoid the pitfalls.

The main criticism centers on what´s left out of the equasion. Companies embarking on greening up their business practices are faced with a daunting task and most go about it the `easy way´ at first. There´s the option to simply offset carbons on the Chicago Climate Exchange, the European Climate Exchange or on the newly established NYMEX venture, the Green Exchange. Businesses have access to these exchanges if they wish to reduce their overall greenhouse gas emissions by as little as 1%.

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