Worst December Solar in Ten Years

31/12/2021
It won’t be much of a surprise to anyone living in England that this has been the worst December for solar in 10 years, since I have been recording the weather and solo data. This year we’ve had high pressure over us with a significant amount of fog or low cloud or drizzle and we have barely seen the Sun at all which is why not surprisingly we’ve made our lowest solar gain in 10 years. So as we see out 2021 and welcome in 2022 let’s hope the weather turns a little better and that we get more solar this year than we did last year. The south of England did particularly worse this year. Looking at a three-year rolling average this is now spoil the rising trend by having a big dip in it. We wait to see what new technology 2022 will bring us in reducing our greenhouse gas emissions and into production of solar and wind energy.
 Image Philip M Russell

Lithium Batteries – Does it take more energy to make than you get from using?

30/12/2021
Every new device seems to require more power and that power comes from lithium batteries. But these batteries are made from Lithium which needs huge amounts of energy to extract and other unfriendly materials like Cobalt and Nickel. Typically, Lithium is mined in one of two ways, in the huge salt flats of Chile and Argentina by using enormous amounts of water which has disastrous effects on the local wildlife, or mined as in Australia where the ore needs to be heated to over 1000C using huge amounts of energy, then leached with acid. Even the so-called green lithium found in Cornwall needs deep bore holes to be dug and then the few parts of Lithium extracted from similar materials such as Sodium and Calcium, then extracted with dilute acid. This extraction can be done by selectively sticking the Lithium to special beads. One extracted then Lithium then needs to be turned into Lithium Carbonate and then into the pure metal. The amounts of energy required to do this is often more than the battery can store over its lifetime. One advantage of the system in Cornwall is that the water is hot from the geothermal energy so much of the power required is essentially free once the infrastructure is put in. 
 Photo Philip M Russell

German weed killing robot more eco friendly than using pesticides.

29/12/2021
Have you changed any of your Christmas habits to perhaps make your Christmas a little greener like using recyclable wrapping paper and perhaps not giving plastic toys that will last for thousands of years. Perhaps you sort of using second-hand gifts perhaps of swapping out your Christmas turkey for a vegetarian option. Some recent surveys seem to show that quite a few people have opted for a greener Christmas this year. Perhaps it is also Covid that has meant more e-cards which means that the Christmas cards that can’t be recycled don’t get put into landfill. More computer games which are now downloadable send list to landfill although use up more electricity. Reusing the artificial Christmas tree for yet another year or even hiring a living Christmas tree and returning it to be later planted in the forest. The gifts that people have been buying seem to be now thought of as being greener and apps this is a good thing that has changed society.    
Photo: ​Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation

Many people this year are dreaming of and achieving a greener Christmas

22/12/2021
Have you changed any of your Christmas habits to perhaps make your Christmas a little greener like using recyclable wrapping paper and perhaps not giving plastic toys that will last for thousands of years. Perhaps you sort of using second-hand gifts perhaps of swapping out your Christmas turkey for a vegetarian option. Some recent surveys seem to show that quite a few people have opted for a greener Christmas this year. Perhaps it is also Covid that has meant more e-cards which means that the Christmas cards that can’t be recycled don’t get put into landfill. More computer games which are now downloadable send list to landfill although use up more electricity. Reusing the artificial Christmas tree for yet another year or even hiring a living Christmas tree and returning it to be later planted in the forest. The gifts that people have been buying seem to be now thought of as being greener and apps this is a good thing that has changed society.    
Photo: Pixabay

Similar microplastics particles show different levels of toxicity

22/12/2021
The same plastic made by different manufacturers may have very different properties when they affect cells an interdisciplinary research team at the University of Bayreuth have discovered that branding a particular plastic as toxic may not be as correct as they thought because different manufacturers plastic when it is broken down into nano size plastic particles may have different shapes and different sizes for the same polymer type and this can affect both its chemical and physical characteristics. It shows that at present we do not understand the differences in structure and how they can give quite contradictory results under supposedly identical conditions. Often the differences lie in the fact that different companies making a chemical like polystyrene might use different monomers or different conditions to create the polymers and this will therefore affect cells and organisms in different ways. This will certainly make the study of the effect of nano plastics on organisms very much more difficult in the future.
  Photo: Pixabay

Oxygen Levels could be declining due to Global Warming

21/12/2021
Over the last 800,000 years it seems that the levels of oxygen in the atmosphere have been decreasing. Researchers at the Rice University have been studying air bubbles in the Antarctic ice and the best guess at what might be causing the very slight decrease in oxygen in the atmosphere is that as global warming causes the glaciers to melt and receive new rocks are exposed to the atmosphere and these oxidise taking up oxygen from the atmosphere. Before you start to panic the oxygen levels have only decreased very slightly. And this has been going on since the late Pleistocene. Generally, the levels of oxygen are not affected in the earths biosphere because that is a very balance system drawing in as much oxygen from the atmosphere as is produced however weathering on a global scale is the most likely geological process capable of us consuming enough of this excess oxygen to account for the decline. The global sea levels fell when glaciers were advancing and they are rising when the glaciers are retreating and this coincides with the oxygen in the atmosphere. 
  Photo: Pixabay

Are artificial Christmas Trees better for the environment?

20/12/2021
This has been an argument that has been going on for a while. Is it better to buy a Christmas tree that has been absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and then when you finish with it habit composted or is it better to buy a metal and plastic Christmas tree that requires quite a lot of greenhouse gases to be emitted in its manufacture but then using that tree for more than seven years and thus cutting down its share of its carbon footprint over many years. Perhaps the best way is to do the hire a Christmas tree or buy your own and bring it in every year the only problem with bringing it in every year is that after about seven years the tree won’t fit in your house. So if you want an artificial Christmas tree don’t keep it and use it for many years or better still buy real one and keep it for hire it.
 Photo: Philip M Russell

Wood burning stoves and fires produce 750 x more carcinogens than a vehicle

19/12/2021
Christmas is often the time when we think of having a log fire burning in the lounge. Normally most families don’t have open fires, but at Christmas time things often change. But we know from recent studies that the smoke from wooden logs albeit seasoned or green produce many more toxins and toxic chemicals that are carcinogens cancer forming. So when you go out and you think about oh let’s have a log fire this year consider what harm you actually might be doing to yourself, and others. Research undertaken last year showed that woodburning in homes is the single biggest source of small particle air pollution in the UK and it produced more than three times the amount the road traffic did from about 8% of the population using these woodburning fires. Even the new eco-design woodburning stoves still emit 750 times the amount of tiny particle pollution than a modern HGV vehicle. Many of these particles are toxic and can cause cancer.  
 Photo: Pixabay

A need to follow all the rules if you want solar panels

18/12/2021
In many places it’s no problem putting solar panels on your roof especially if it faces to the back of the house, but if you live in a conservation area then beware, investigate whether you need planning permission first. If you live in a designated conservation area then the councils have the power to stop you putting solar panels on your roof. They may not but really you need to try and get permission from them first. With councils it is better to get permission rather than Face enforcement action when the council decides that it doesn’t suit their plans and you need to remove the solar panels. for the fixing of most solar roof panels this comes as part of permitted development but if you live in a conservation area then the rules are often different. We have found that solar installation experts are often not planning experts.
 Photo: Philip M Russell

Tough times for Renewables

17/12/2021
December is a tough time for renewables. We have high-pressured over the UK and this means little wind. It is a cloudy hi with hundred percent cloud cover for most and over the east coast of the UK we also have fog. So, there is little wind and there is virtually no solar. We’ve been making virtually no solar on our panels on our house in the last week or so. Nuclear still provides about 14-15% of our basic electricity but with wind and only 2% then we can look at how we are making our electricity at the moment and much of this is with gas at 60% biomass which still produces a lot of carbon dioxide although is supposed to be more carbon neutral at 6% and we using 3% coal. Other electricity does come in from Europe via the links to Norway the Netherlands France and Ireland. The country talks about getting rid of gas and coal put on days and months like these this looks like a significant challenge. 
 Photo: Gridwatch.co.uk

The Carbon Dioxide that does not count

16/12/2021
The Drax group operates for renewable energy plants in England and Scotland. These plants used to burn coal but over the last few years they have been modified to use sustainably sourced biomass otherwise known as wood pellets. So these large power stations are classed as climate friendly and using sustained source biomass however they still managed to produce more than 15 million tons of carbon dioxide a year. The idea of using sustainable biomass from trees is that more trees are planted and they replace the carbon dioxide given out by tracks as they grow, however it does take many years to replace the amount of carbon dioxide produced. In fact the Drax Group would need to plant an enormous number of trees to find themselves carbon neutral. This isn’t really the Drax Group fault but the way that carbon dioxide a greenhouse gas emissions are counted. these power stations are considered by governments to be more environmentally friendly by not burning coal and although this is true, these power stations are still producing an enormous amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that does not really officially count.
Photo: A Chadwick | Credit: A Chadwick / www.webbaviation.co.uk
Copyright: A Chadwick / www.webbaviation.co.uk

Battery electrodes made from Lignin in Trees a renewable source

15/12/2021
The global battery market is projected to grow tenfold over the next decade as battery producers seek more sustainable materials for the electrification of mobility. Since sustainability is becoming a top priority for the automotive industry, car manufacturers and battery producers are focusing heavily on reducing carbon emissions in electric cars.

Today, fossil-based carbon is used in the anodes of rechargeable batteries. By converting lignin separated from wood into carbon-based anode materials, the synthetic and non-renewable graphite material can be replaced.

“With our pilot plant now ramping up operations, Stora Enso is entering a new value chain in supplying more sustainable anode materials for batteries. With Lignode, we can provide a bio-based, cost-competitive and high-performance material to replace the conventionally used graphite. To serve the fast-growing anode materials market, we are now exploring strategic partnerships to accelerate scale-up and commercialisation in Europe,” says Markus Mannström, Executive Vice President of Stora Enso’s Biomaterials division.

The pilot plant for bio-based carbon materials is located at Stora Enso’s Sunila production site in Finland, where lignin has been industrially produced since 2015. The biorefinery’s annual lignin production capacity is 50 000 tonnes, making Stora Enso the largest kraft lignin producer in the world. 
 Image ​Stora Enso

Does it make economic sense to replace methane with Hydrogen?

14/12/2021
Methane which is used for heating in Europe is responsible for 38% of the continents greenhouse gas emissions and it would seem to be a simple choice to replace the methane burning home boilers with hydrogen ones. However many independent studies have shown that this is a very expensive option and a cheaper option would be to use electric heat pumps instead. This is not stopping the main gas distributors from promoting 100% hydrogen as they can see a very disruptive end to their lucrative business model. These gas suppliers are paying many lobbying groups to write reports to claim that hydrogen is the way out because they can then use their existing grid to provide the hydrogen even though it could be a far more expensive option for many people.
Image Philip M Russell

Are hydroponic Farms the way to go?

13/12/2021
They get just the right amount of water, they get the right amount of lights, they grow at the right temperature all year round, there are no pests and insects, they get just the right amount of carbon dioxide. These plants grown in hydroponic greenhouses or farms. Hydroponics is an ideal way of growing many vegetable crops. Grown indoors they are away from pests and under the ideal growing conditions, so that these crops may be fully harvested all year round. Certain crops like lettuces and tomatoes grow extremely well in these conditions by just having the water flowing around the system and the plants growing typically waste height so they can be harvested easily. Generally the yield per area is greater than growing outside where rain or lack of rain or pests or diseases can severely harm the quantity of crop grown. It may cost a bit more to set these farms up but once going these farms can produce much better quality and higher yields of certain crops. Unfortunately not every crop can be grown this way but an increasing number of plants and vegetables certainly are.
Image Pixabay

US Tornado more evidence for shifting climate boundaries

12/12/2021
In the late 1800s the famous geologist and explorer John Wesley Powell described a clear longitudinal boundary running through North America along the hundredths bridge and west. This separated the humid eastern part of the continent from the arid Western Plains. this sharp climatic Boundary is slowly shifting east and we have seen this this week with the devastating tornado in Kentucky. The famous tornado alley now has moved a couple of hundred miles east. This change is solely due to climate change and it is also seen in the Sahara desert as that has grown by 10% over the last 30 years. The US boundary which was on the 100th Meridian now sits well and truly on the 98th meridian and it will continue to move east as the global warming temperatures increase the evaporation from the soil and the precipitation patterns across United States continue. So states like Kentucky can expect more tornadoes in the near future.
  Image Philip M Russell

Improved efficiency in cheap solar cells.

11/12/2021
A perovskite solar cell (PSC) is a type of solar cell which includes a perovskite-structured compound, most commonly a hybrid organic-inorganic lead or tin halide-based material, as the light-harvesting active layer. Perovskite materials, such as methylammonium lead halides and all-inorganic cesium lead halide, are cheap to produce and simple to manufacture. Perovskite solar cells have therefore been the fastest-advancing solar technology as of 2016. In a joint effort between Pavia University (Italy) and the Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden at Technische Universität Dresden (Germany), researchers developed a novel method to fabricate lead halide perovskite solar cells with record efficiency. Metal halide perovskites have been under intense investigation over the last decade, due to the remarkable rise in their performance in optoelectronic devices such as solar cells or light-emitting diodes. Researchers have developed a novel method to significantly improve the efficiency of inverted architecture solar cells. The method is based on a modification of the interfaces of the perovskite active layer by introducing small amounts of organic halide salts at both the bottom and the top of the perovskite layer. Such organic halide salts, typically used for the formation of two-dimensional perovskites, led to the suppression of microstructural flaws and passivation of the defects of the perovskite layer. Using this approach, the team has achieved a power conversion efficiency of 23.7% - the highest reported to date for an inverted architecture perovskite solar cell.   
  Image https://www.tno.nl/en/about-tno/events/2021/perovskite-solar-cells/

A new discovery makes a Sodium Sulfur battery more of a reality

10/12/2021
A new sodium sulphur battery created by engineers at the University of Texas in Austin have managed to solve one of the major problems in producing a commercially viable alternative to the lithium ion battery. The sodium sulphur battery is an excellent idea since both sodium and sulphur are very abundant and environmentally fairly harmless. One of the problems with lithium and sodium batteries is the formation of crystals called dendrites and this causes the battery to rapidly decrease to degrade and maybe even catch fire or explode. The researchers at the University of Texas have been using a new experimental electrolyte which solves the dendrite problems and enables the battery to last well over 300 charge and discharge cycles at present. With the cost of lithium batteries rocketing and the need for cobalt which is environmentally harmful, these new batteries look like they could be the answer for electric vehicles and a storage of renewable resources such as wind and solar power.
  Photo ​​​Pixabay

Greenwashing - the lies put out by polluting companies

6/12/2021
Have you read or heard the adverts we are looking into this we are currently researching. But what does it really mean? For many companies they seem to project a green image green washing whereas in fact they are spending more money on advertising than they are on spending on green technology. This is especially true of podcast adverts where the regulation is much weaker than on and in other media. When the COP26 climate summit was being held in Glasgow companies said that they could remove more than 90% of CO2 emissions company said that they were deploying this technology at scale which gave the sense that some of these companies were really trying to do something where is the actual facts, they were doing little or nothing about this. They didn’t lie because they really were investigating they really were trying out test systems or simulation but it is the fact that many of these companies weren’t really doing anything but we’re saying that they were doing a lot. So take what adverts you hear and see very much of a pinch of salt because the proof of the pudding is in what they’re actually doing.
Photo ​​ Pixabay

New photocatalyst made from an aerogel for more efficient hydrogen production

5/12/2021
Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a new photocatalyst made from an aerogel that could enable more efficient hydrogen production. One use for aerogels based on nanoparticles is as photocatalysts. These are employed whenever a chemical reaction needs to be enabled or accelerated with the aid of sunlight – one example being the production of hydrogen. The material of choice for photocatalysts is titanium dioxide (TiO2), a semiconductor. But TiO2 has a major disadvantage: it can absorb only the UV portion of sunlight – just about 5 percent of the spectrum. If photocatalysis is to be efficient and industrially useful, the catalyst must be able to utilise a broader range of wavelengths. Junggou Kwon has been looking for a new way to optimise an aerogel made of TiO2 nanoparticles. And she had a brilliant idea: if the TiO2 nanoparticle aerogel is “doped” (to use the technical term) with nitrogen, such that individual oxygen atoms in the material are replaced by nitrogen atoms, the aerogel can then absorb further visible portions of the spectrum. The doping process leaves the aerogel’s porous structure intact. Kwon developed a special reactor into which she directly placed the aerogel monolith. She then introduced a vapour of water and methanol to the aerogel in the reactor before irradiating it with two LED lights. The gaseous mixture diffuses through the aerogel’s pores, where it is converted into the desired hydrogen on the surface of the TiO2 and palladium nanoparticles. Adding the noble metal palladium significantly increased the conversion efficiency: using aerogels with palladium produced up to 70 times more hydrogen than using those without.  
Photo ​​ ETH Zurich

Norwegian firm N2 ​Applied Pilot Project Aims to Practically Eliminate Methane and Ammonia Slurry Emissions at New Scottish ‘Eco-Farm’

4/12/2021
N2 Applied has developed a small-sized unit which  enable farmers to produce their own fertiliser on the farm – using air, electricity and livestock slurry. The technology increases yield and cuts emissions, providing an attractive value proposition for farmers.
The N2 process enhances the livestock slurry with nitrogen and stops the loss of ammonia, leading to higher yields without the need for chemical fertiliser. The Nitrogen Use Efficiency is increased, losses reduced and sustainability improved.The unit is placed locally on the farm or biogas plant, enriching the slurry continuously, and is easily integrated in the existing local infrastructure. The capacity can fit farms of different sizes as the technology is modular and scalable. It can be adapted to variable production of renewable energy and take advantage of local available production like solar, wind and biogas.This re-distributes fertiliser production from large scale factories to the end-user, the farmer – cutting long and expensive value chains.​ Using a scientific technique that applies just air and electricity to slurry, the N2 Unit performs a plasma conversion that ‘locks in’ methane and ammonia to the liquid waste material, producing a sustainable fertiliser. As well as the project’s potential to achieve net-zero emissions from slurry management and improve grassland yields, the farm is a growing business attracting daily customers – so the ability to eliminate slurry odours is seen as an attractive fringe benefit.
Photo ​N2 Applied

Many people still cannot recycle properly

3/12/2021
Many councils recycle in different ways. My local council likes all the recycling in one bin. But my mum who lives in a different area has to put different types of recycling in different bins which in theory makes it easier for the recycling centres. Many councils find however that people cannot put the right recycling into the correct bin. This has been highlighted by East Suffolk Council which has said they need to reject about 20% of their recycled materials because people haven’t been sorting their waste properly. This councils recycling system doesn’t allow them to be able to sort out glass from cardboard whereas other councils can. With some councils being able to separate recycling materials and others not this makes quite a large disparity between different councils where some can recycle more effectively than others. But it is down to the people. People are asked to be able to put different types of recycling into different bins and even after several years of recycling many people either can't or still won’t recycle properly and this means that much of the material that could be recycled goes into landfill.
Photo ​Pixabay

Climate change is making one of the world’s strongest currents flow faster

2/12/2021
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC), the only ocean current that circumnavigates the planet, is speeding up. For the first time, scientists are able to tell that this is happening by taking advantage of a decades-long set of observational records .Researchers from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and UC Riverside used satellite measurements of sea-surface height and data collected by the global network of ocean floats called Argo to detect a trend in Southern Ocean upper layer velocity that had been hidden to scientists until now. Prevailing westerly winds have sped up as climate warms. Models show that the wind speedup does not change the ocean currents much. Rather, it energizes ocean eddies, which are circular movements of water running counter to main currents. From both observations and models, we find that the ocean heat change is causing the significant ocean current acceleration detected during recent decades. 
Photo ​Isa Rosso/SOCCOM

Rent a Christmas Tree virtually rented out.

1/12/2021
A few years ago the rent a Christmas tree idea came about. The idea was that instead of buying a Christmas tree and then after Christmas disposing of it, you instead put down a deposit, rent a Christmas tree over the Christmas period, and then return the Christmas tree to where you bought it and they will then look after the Christmas tree until next year. When Christmas trees are wanted to be planted really to survive they need to be about seven years old so often happens as these trees are grown in pots until they’re about seven years old and then they are planted out in the forest. Companies are found a way of making money on this by renting out these trees over the Christmas period on the condition that they don’t stay indoors for more than 3 1/2 weeks. But if you want to have a go this year it’s already too late the idea has become so popular that there is barely a tree to be rented anymore. 
 
Photo Philip M Russell

Solar Data Updated End September 2021

September didn't start well buty with a urst of sunshine in the middle of the month, the overall figure turned out to be just below average for sunshne. View Data

New ways, New technology