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by Georgina Rannard, 05/02/2022 in BBC News Science
Climate change: Satellites map huge methane plumes from oil and gas: Huge plumes of the warming gas methane have been mapped globally for the first time from oil and gas fields using satellites.
by Bronwyn Adcock, 05/02/2022 in The Guardian
Electric Monaros and hotted-up skateboards : the ‘genius’ who wants to electrify our world — After advising US president Joe Biden on energy, Saul Griffith is back in Australia to declare war on the climate crisis
by John Bartlett, 05/02/2022 in The Guardian
‘We need politicians and experts’: how Chile is putting the climate crisis first — President Gabriel Boric has brought renowned named climate scientist Maisa Rojas into government to help ensure a greener future
by Ashley Strickland, 04/02/2022 in CNN Space Science
Keeping a weather eye on Earth from 22,236 miles above the planet
by Adam Gristwood, 03/02/2022 – in EUMETSAT Science Blog
Southern Europe battles increases in major wildfires: As climate change drives longer heatwaves, experts say that strategies to prevent and suppress wildfires are increasingly important
Katharine Murphy’s list of political liabilities Scotty from Marketing is trying make disappear with blather, smoke and mirrors, and endless humbug is already awesome – even without Blarney Bulldust’s apparently heart-felt honesty as expressed to Brittany Higgins last year when on the back-bench.
And, all of this is before considering how Capt. Humbug has so honestly [not] responded to help Australians deal with/mitigate the accelerating growth of the existential global climate emergency driven by global warming. Humbug’s solution is the make the whole problem invisible in a cloud of smoke and fairy dust so that the COALition’s patrons in the fossil fuel and related industries have not been shut down by the time the electorate fully wakes up to oncoming catastrophic collapse of human civilization on the way to extinction.
by Katharine Murphy, 05/02/2022
in The Guardian
Scott Morrison doesn’t have to imagine the things that could cost him government in a few months’ time. Chaos and animus closed in this week.
New South Wales – the division supposed to deliver the Coalition its fourth federal term – made a big show of resisting Morrison’s urgent electoral imperatives, and the brinkmanship of his proxies intent on shoring up their own preselections. Morrison needed tranquility, and the state division of the Liberal party obliged him by roiling.
The bushfire in the Coalition’s base also burned through to Canberra. Protesters opposed to vaccine mandates – Australians who feel economically and culturally dispossessed by the creep of government during pandemic – spilled up the forecourt of Parliament House. There were sovereign citizens, anti-vaxxers, doomsday preppers, Trumpers and enraged owner-drivers, yes; but also grey nomads with packed lunches, Thermos flasks and sunsmart hats. …
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Morrison on Tuesday was sorry, not sorry – sorry enough to soften the edges of prime ministerial arrogance, but not sorry enough to accept any serious liability. He was sorry he was too optimistic before the summer. He had got people’s hopes up, and Omicron had dashed them. He was sorry he hadn’t sent in the army sooner to correct the infamous vaccine “strollout”.
Read the full story….
Following on from Tony Abbott’s almost religious commitment to denying climate science, Scotty’s marketing backed up by his troop of puppets, buffoons, and knaves in Parliament have been for years almost totally successful in blocking any effective action against the climate emergency. This has been achieved through a rich mix of humbug, denial, lying, misrepresentation, blocking, delaying, and distracting smoke and mirrors.
If our children and grandchildren are to have any hope of surviving into the future, we have to remove the humbug troop from Parliament and replace them with sensible people who can be trusted to put action against the climate emergency at the top of their priority lists if elected. Vote Climate One’s, Traffic Light Voting System is designed to help you rank your preferences to do this, without telling you who you should vote for. With a new Parliament focused on what needs to be done to protect our burning house, we might be able to offer our families a viable future in a still functional biosphere.
By Dan Gearino, 03/03/2022 — Inside Clean Energy
In the New World of Long-Duration Battery Storage, an Old Technology Holds Its Own: California power companies choose lithium-ion batteries for an eight-hour storage project, passing on some newer options.
by Jordan Wilkerson, 01/02/2022 in Scientific American
Recycled Lithium-Ion Batteries Can Perform Better Than New Ones: A novel method of recycling such batteries could help meet skyrocketing demand
There is a ‘goldrush’ by petrochemical companies currently going on in South Australia where they are looking to stake claims on and prove the existence of underground reserves of nearly pure hydrogen gas. The article touts a “Potential to drastically cut costs” of hydrogen production.
Despite the lack of research, Australians – and indeed a number of companies internationally – remain undeterred, likely because of the potential for natural hydrogen to be three to four times cheaper than that produced via electrolysis or gas reforming with carbon capture. Gold Hydrogen estimates it should be able to produce natural hydrogen for less than $2.30 per kg, compared to manufactured hydrogen projects being produced at greater than $6 per kg.
by Bella Peacock, 02/02/2022 – in PV Magazine
South Australia has found itself at the heart of a 21st-century gold rush, though this time for naturally occurring hydrogen. Since February 2021, 18 exploration licenses have been granted or applied for in the state by six different companies searching for natural hydrogen
In a rapid escalation from zero activity in February last year, exploration companies are now scrambling to look for what they believe could be the cheapest, easiest way to get their hands on the much hyped “future fuel”: hydrogen.
In the last 12 months, six different companies have either been granted or applied for 18 Petroleum Exploration Licences across the state of South Australia, according to Australian energy consultancy EnergyQuest. Combined, the area under permit equates to around 570,000 square kilometres (km2) or 32% of the entire state, the consultancy has found, referring to the sudden influx as a “boom”.
Natural hydrogen
Until now, natural or native hydrogen has been largely overlooked – despite it being described as “widespread in nature” by natural hydrogen researcher Viacheslav Zgonnik in a 2020 paper. Natural hydrogen deposits form through chemical reactions underground, with Zgonnik saying the molecule has been detected at high concentrations, often as the major gas, in all types of geologic environments.
Read the complete article….
Caveat emptor. This could be good news in that a potential source of low or zero emissions hydrogen for power generation has been found that could replace natural gas. However, I suspect that most or all of the hydrogen will found to be associated with methane rich natural gas. My guess is that this will be used as an excuse by the fossil fuel industry members funding the exploration to produce and burn more natural gas with consequent greenhouse gas emissions going into the atmosphere.
I would watch this very carefully, and would hope that by the time any concrete decisions need to be made regarding real hydrogen production projects that we will have replaced Capt. Humbug’s LNP Coalition Government with trustworthy people able to make sensible decisions where project approvals and he like are concerned.
Vote Climate One’s Traffic Light Voting System is designed to help you use our preferential voting system to elect these trustworthy people.
by Carolyn Gramling, 01/02/2022 in Science News
The past’s extreme ocean heat waves are now the new normal: More than half the global ocean experiences high temperatures that were rare a century ago.
See also 2021 might not have been the hottest year on record, but the heating oceans are hotter than ever
