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Mother Earth

Broken in the USA, Education, Environment

Mother Earth

Key UN reports warn urgent and collective action needed – as oil firms report astronomical profits

By Damian Carrington Environment editor    Thu 27 Oct 2022 13.37 EDT

After a slew of major reports laid bare how close the planet is to catastrophe, the climate crisis has reached a “really bleak moment”, one of the world’s leading climate scientists has said.

The world’s nations need collective action more now than at any point since the Second World War to avoid climate tipping points, Prof Johan Rockström said, but geopolitical tensions are at a high.

He said the world was coming “very, very close to irreversible changes … time is running out very fast”.

Emissions must fall by about half by 2030 to meet the internationally agreed target of 1.5C of heating but are still rising, the reports showed – at a time when oil giants are making astronomical amounts of money.

On Thursday, Shell and TotalEnergies both doubled their quarterly profits to about $10bn. Oil and gas giants have enjoyed soaring profits as post-Covid demand jumps and after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The sector is expected to amass $4tn in 2022, strengthening calls for heavy windfall taxes to address the cost of living crisis and fund the clean energy transition.

All three of the key UN agencies have produced damning reports in the last two days. The UN Environment Agency’s report found there was “no credible pathway to 1.5C in place” and that “woefully inadequate” progress on cutting carbon emissions means the only way to limit the worst impacts of the climate crisis is a “rapid transformation of societies”.

Current pledges for action by 2030, even if delivered in full, would mean a rise in global heating of about 2.5C, a level that would condemn the world to catastrophic climate breakdown, according to the UN’s climate agency. Only a handful of countries have ramped up their plans in the last year, despite having promised to do so at the Cop26 UN climate summit in Glasgow last November.

The UN’s meteorological agency reported that all the main heating gases hit record highs in 2021, with an alarming surge in emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

Separately, the IEA’s World Energy report offered a glimmer of progress, that CO2 from fossil fuels could peak by 2025 as high energy prices push nations towards clean energy, though it warned that it would not be enough to avoid severe climate impacts.

Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said: “It’s a really bleak moment, not only because of the reports showing that emissions are still rising, so we’re not delivering on either the Paris or Glasgow climate agreements, but we also have so much scientific evidence that we are very, very close to irreversible changes – we’re coming closer to tipping points.”

Research by Rockström and colleagues, published in September, found five dangerous climate tipping points may already have been passed due to the global heating caused by humanity to date, including the collapse of Greenland’s ice cap, with another five possible with 1.5C of heating.

“Furthermore, the world is unfortunately in a geopolitically unstable state,” said Rockström. “So when we need collective action at the global level, probably more than ever since the Second World War, to keep the planet stable, we have an all-time low in terms of our ability to collectively act together.”

“Time is really running out very, very fast,” he said. “I must say, in my professional life as a climate scientist, this is a low point. The window for 1.5C is shutting as I speak, so it’s really tough.”

His remarks came after the UN secretary general, António Guterres, said on Wednesday that climate action was “falling pitifully short”. “We are headed for a global catastrophe [and] for economy-destroying levels of global heating.”

He added: “Droughts, floods, storms and wildfires are devastating lives and livelihoods across the globe [and] getting worse by the day. We need climate action on all fronts and we need it now.” He said the G20 nations, responsible for 80% of emissions, must lead the way.

Inger Andersen, head of the UN environment program (UNEP), told the Guardian that the energy crisis must be used to speed up the delivery of a low-carbon economy: “We are in danger of missing the opportunity and a crisis is a terrible thing to waste.”

Prof Corinne Le Quéré, at the University of East Anglia, UK, said: “It is fundamental to avoid cascading risks that responses to existing crises are made in a way that limits climate change to the lowest possible level.”

Further reports published in the last two days said the health of the world’s people is at the mercy of a global addiction to fossil fuels, with increasing heat deaths, hunger and infectious disease as the climate crisis intensifies.

In the UK, the government was accused of a “severe dereliction of duty” in leaving critical UK infrastructure at risk to climate impacts. The new prime minister, Rishi Sunak, will not attend COP27, his spokesman said on Wednesday.

High gas and oil prices delivered huge profits to Shell and TotalEnergies on Wednesday, which booked $9.5bn and $9.9bn respectively. Shell said it would not pay any UK-imposed windfall tax this year as the profits were being offset against investment in North Sea fields.

The fossil fuel industry as a whole amassed $4tn in 2022, according to another new report from the International Energy Agency (IEA), a sum that could otherwise transform climate action.

The IEA report said: “Net income for the world’s oil and gas producers is set to double in 2022 to an unprecedented $4tn, a huge $2tn windfall.” The oil and gas sector has gained an average of $1tn a year in unearned profits for the last 50 years.

The IEA said clean energy investment would have to be at least $4tn a year by 2030 to hit net zero emissions by mid-century. “If the global oil and gas industry were to invest this [$2tn] additional income in low‐emissions fuels, such as hydrogen and biofuels, it would fund all of the investment needed in these fuels for the remainder of this decade.”

Prof Myles Allen, at the University of Oxford, said: “The combined profits, taxes, and royalties generated by the oil and gas industry over the past few months would be enough to capture every single molecule of CO2 produced by their activities and reinject it back underground. So why are we only talking about transforming society and not about obliging a highly profitable industry to clean up the mess caused by the products it sells?”

“The situation is serious and bleak,” said Prof Simon Lewis, at University College London. “Shell has made £26bn profit this year, carbon emissions are back at pre-pandemic levels, while 53,000 people died of heat stress in Europe in the summer, and floods have displaced millions from Nigeria to Pakistan. The solution is to do everything we can to defeat the fossil fuel industry – they stand between us all and a prosperous future.”

Rockström was pessimistic about any breakthrough in the speed of climate action at the Cop27 climate summit, which he said would be dominated by nations such as Pakistan demanding funding to rebuild their countries after climate disasters. Rich, high-emitting nations have long rejected such claims, fearing unlimited liabilities.

“This is a necessary discussion,” Rockström said. “But it leads to a deeper rift between the global north and the south. And that’s exactly what we do not need now.”

‘Like something you watch in a movie’: climate crisis intensifies with catastrophic floods.

But he said progress could be made within a few years: “The Ukraine war is the nail in the coffin for the fossil-fuel-driven advanced economies. In the short term, it costs us a lot and we lose speed on climate action.” But in the longer term, he said, the energy and food crises add national security to the planetary and health reasons for climate action.

Prof Michael Mann, at the University of Pennsylvania in the US, said it was important to note that progress was being made: “More work needs to be done if warming is to be kept below 1.5C, but nobody foresaw the major policy progress in recent months in both Australia and the US. It is estimated that the US legislation will lower national emissions by 40% this decade. With US leadership, we can expect other major emitters to now come to the table at Cop27.”

Climate experts agree that every action that limits global heating reduces the suffering endured by people from climate impacts. “The 1.5C target is now near impossible, but every fraction of a degree will equate to massive avoided damages for generations to come,” said Prof Dave Reay, at the University of Edinburgh, UK.

Röckstrom said: “Even though the situation is depressing and very challenging, I would strongly advise everyone to act in business or policy or society or science. The deeper we fall into the dark abyss of risk, the more we have to make efforts to climb out of that hole. It’s not as if we don’t know what to do – it’s rather that we’re not doing what is necessary.”

For a bit more on this from Noam Chomsky: Policies promoting climate change are ‘a resolute march toward suicide’ https://www.alternet.org/2022/10/chomsky/

From Carbon Dioxide to Methanol

Broken in the USA, Environment, Science

From Carbon Dioxide to Methanol

Researchers at the University of Michigan have developed a catalyst known as cobalt phthalocyanine that converts carbon dioxide—a significant driver of climate change—into renewable fuels such as methanol.

Published in the journal ACS Catalysis, U-M researchers studied using cobalt phthalocyanine as a catalyst to convert carbon dioxide into methanol through multiple reaction steps. The first step converts carbon dioxide (CO2) into carbon monoxide (CO) and the second step converts the CO into methanol.

This approach presents a sustainable method for reducing greenhouse gas emissions while offering an avenue to produce clean energy.

Scientists have long tried to find a way to convert CO2 into fuels like methanol chemically. Methanol could potentially be used to power vehicles in a more environmentally friendly way.

While the conversion of CO2 to methanol has been industrialized, achieving this transformation on a large scale through electrochemical processes has proven to be a significant challenge.

“Our approach is unique because we can bring and bridge all this knowledge that each field has on the same problem. We have scientists and engineers all within one team, brainstorming and gathering insights to design and understand the system in the best way possible,” said co-primary author Kevin Rivera-Cruz, who recently received a doctorate in chemistry from U-M.e g advanced computational modeling, the researchers calculated that cobalt phthalocyanine binds CO2 over three times more tightly than it binds carbon monoxide. They also confirmed this through experiments measuring reaction rates when varying the amounts of CO2 and CO.

The researchers showed that the difference in binding affinity has to do with how the catalyst’s electrons interact with the CO2 and CO molecules. To solve this issue, the researchers suggest redesigning the cobalt phthalocyanine catalyst to strengthen how it interacts with CO and lessen how strongly it binds to CO2.

Resolving this roadblock could pave the way for using catalysts like cobalt phthalocyanine to efficiently convert CO2 waste into methanol fuel on a large scale.

More information: Libo Yao et al, Electrochemical CO2 Reduction to Methanol by Cobalt Phthalocyanine: Quantifying CO2 and CO Binding Strengths and Their Influence on Methanol Production, ACS Catalysis (2023). 

Green’ hydrogen energy production

Broken in the USA, Environment, Science

Green’ hydrogen energy production just got a lot easier

Story by Sanjana Gajbhiye

I wonder how far along we would be today (on Hydrogen production) if we spent a fraction of the $ we have on EV technology?

‘Green’ hydrogen energy production just got a lot easier© Provided by Earth

The race for clean, sustainable energy is heating up, and green hydrogen is poised to take center stage. This versatile fuel has the potential to replace fossil fuels in everything from transportation to heavy industry. 

There’s just one catch — producing green hydrogen in the massive quantities we need has seemed impossible due to its reliance on a super-rare metal: iridium.

But a breakthrough from the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (CSRS) in Japan could be about to change everything. 

Their new technique reduces the amount of iridium needed in green hydrogen production by a whopping 95% – a game-changer for scaling up this transformative technology.

Green hydrogen

Hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, can be extracted from water through electrolysis, a process that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen. When used as fuel, hydrogen emits only water vapor, making it a zero-emissions energy source.

Traditionally, extracting hydrogen from water has required significant energy, often sourced from fossil fuels, which undermines the purpose of clean energy.

Electrolysis powered by renewable energy, like solar or wind, offers a solution. This process produces “green hydrogen” without leaving a carbon footprint.

Electrolysis needs efficient catalysts, and iridium, while highly effective, is both rare and expensive. This makes large-scale green hydrogen production costly and challenging.

Iridium in hydrogen production

The RIKEN team’s innovation lies in the way they combined iridium with manganese oxide. Instead of using a large block of iridium, they isolated individual iridium atoms and strategically dispersed them across the surface of manganese oxide, a more common metal. This careful arrangement and bonding trigger unique chemical interactions.

This new catalyst achieves the same excellent hydrogen production rate as pure iridium would but with a fraction (only 5%!) of the rare, expensive metal. This makes it a far more accessible and cost-effective solution.

In electrolysis, catalysts can degrade over time, decreasing efficiency and increasing costs. This breakthrough catalyst maintains consistent performance for a remarkable duration – 3000 hours translates to over four months of non-stop hydrogen generation without any performance loss.

Oxidation states refer to how many electrons an atom has lost or gained in a chemical bond. Researchers believe that the iridium bonded with manganese oxide achieves an unusual +6 oxidation state, which could be the reason behind its significantly enhanced performance.

Significance of green hydrogen

“We expect our catalyst to be easily transferred to real-world applications,” says Ryuhei Nakamura, the study’s lead researcher. This means existing green hydrogen plants might be upgradeable, making the transition smoother.

Less iridium means lower upfront costs, making green hydrogen more competitive and attractive for investment. Iridium’s scarcity and high price create a huge barrier to scaling up green hydrogen production. 

This new technique dramatically lowers the amount of iridium required, making the whole process significantly more affordable to set up and run.

When the cost of a technology decreases, it becomes a more enticing investment opportunity. Lower upfront costs due to reduced iridium needs could bring in a wider range of investors, accelerating funding for green hydrogen projects and development.

Faster transition

This breakthrough could give us decades of breathing room as we develop truly sustainable catalysts made from common metals. Ideally, green hydrogen production wouldn’t rely on rare metals at all. 

However, developing efficient catalysts using earth-abundant metals takes time. This breakthrough buys us decades by greatly improving efficiency while we work toward fully sustainable solutions.

The global energy transition can’t happen overnight. This technology provides a realistic pathway: increased green hydrogen production while giving us time to perfect catalysts that are completely independent of rare metals.

Green hydrogen is a part of the bigger picture

The team is already collaborating with industry heavyweights to test their catalyst at scale. We could see this technology rolled out sooner rather than later.

Collaborating with industry players means moving quickly from the lab to testing in large-scale hydrogen production facilities. This significantly speeds up practical application.

If tests are successful, this technology could be integrated fairly quickly into existing hydrogen production processes. This means we might not have to wait years or decades for the benefits.

The RIKEN catalyst is fantastic news, but remember, it’s one piece of a much larger puzzle. To really unleash green hydrogen’s potential, we need:

  • Investment everywhere: Governments, companies, and investors need to step up their funding of green hydrogen infrastructure, from production to distribution.
  • A team effort: Green hydrogen will work best alongside other renewables like solar and wind. Smart energy grids are needed to balance it all out.
  • The consumer factor: Industries need incentives to switch, but so do we as individuals. Green hydrogen-powered vehicles or energy storage solutions could become part of our daily lives in the future.

This breakthrough reminds us of the incredible potential science has to address our global energy challenges. The green hydrogen revolution is still in its early stages, but progress like this makes it feel excitingly within reach. 

Let’s stay informed, and engaged, and push for policies that accelerate innovation and drive down costs – a cleaner, greener future is waiting.

The study is published in the journal Science.