The melting of Arctic sea ice is one "tipping element"
Many of Earth's climate systems will undergo a series of sudden shifts this century as a result of human-induced climate change, a study suggests.
A number of these shifts could occur this century, say the report's authors.
They argue that society should not be lulled into a false sense of security by the idea that climate change will be a gradual process.
At greatest risk is Arctic sea ice, the Greenland ice sheet and the west Antarctic ice sheet.
The researchers have listed and ranked nine ecological systems that they say could be lost this century as a result of global warming. The nine tipping elements and the time it will take them to undergo a major transition are:
Melting of Arctic sea-ice (about 10 years)
Decay of the Greenland ice sheet (about 300 years)
Collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet (about 300 years)
Collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation (about 100 years)
Increase in the El Nino Southern Oscillation (about 100 years)
Collapse of the Indian summer monsoon (about 1 year)
Greening of the Sahara/Sahel and disruption of the West African monsoon (about 10 years)
Dieback of the Amazon rainforest (about 50 years)
Dieback of the Boreal Forest (about 50 years)
The paper also demonstrates how, in principle, early warning systems could be established using real-time monitoring and modelling to detect the proximity of certain tipping points.
full article
Tuesday 5 February 2008
Monday 4 February 2008
Landlords should prepare for EPCs
Paragon Mortgages, the specialist buy-to-let mortgage provider, has urged landlords to review the energy efficiency of their properties ahead of new energy performance rules being introduced later this year.
From October 1st landlords will be required to make an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) available to prospective tenants as part of the lettings process. The EPC, which is valid for 10 years, will rate a property's energy performance and make recommendations about how to improve the energy efficiency of the property.
Although landlords are under no obligation to carry out any recommendations made, prospective tenants could use the EPC as one of the factors to determine which property they choose to rent.
The certificates have already been introduced into the home sales process and could play a valuable role in boosting energy efficiency across the housing sector when they are extended to the private rented sector. Landlords and tenants can access a range of grants to improve the energy efficiency of their homes.
Schemes include:
The Landlord Energy Saving Allowance
The LESA was introduced by the Government in 2004 and allows private and corporate landlords who pay income tax to claim back up to £1,500 per property for the installation of energy saving measures, including loft, cavity wall, floor, hot water system and solid wall insulation, as well as draft proofing. The scheme applies per property, rather than per building, so a house converted into four flats would be able to claim up to £6,000. However, the allowance does not cover holiday lets or resident landlords.
To claim the relief, landlords must include the expenditure as a deduction in their self-assessment tax return. For more information, landlords should visit HM Revenue & Customs at www.hmrc.gov.uk.
Warm Front
Grants of up to £2,700 are available to tenants of private landlords if they are in receipt of certain benefits to make insulation and heating improvements to a property. The landlord doesn't have to make any financial contribution, only give permission to their tenants for the work to be carried out on the property.
The tenant must apply for the grant and a Warm Front assessor will visit the property to suggest which improvements should be made. People entitled to the grant include householders aged 60 or over in receipt of income support, council tax benefit, housing benefit, job seekers allowance or pension benefit, and householders with a child under 16 also in receipt of the same benefits. For a full list of the type of tenant eligible for the grant visit www.warmfront.co.uk. This scheme is only available for households in England.
Local council benefits and grants
Local authorities and councils in the UK offer a range of different grants and financial assistance to landlords to help them improve the energy performance of their property, but the level of assistance differs from council to council. To check what grants landlords are entitled to from their local authority, they should call the Energy Efficiency Advice Centre, a service funded by both the Government and the Energy Saving Trust, on 0800 512 012.
Energy Supplier Grants
Energy companies offer subsidised rates on insulation and certain grants to their customers. Many of these grants are available to customers that rent a property as well as homeowners, so tenants could be entitled to discounts on measures such as cavity and loft insulation. The Energy Saving Trust, www.energysavingtrust.org, has the full range of grants and subsidies available to energy customers.
full article
From October 1st landlords will be required to make an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) available to prospective tenants as part of the lettings process. The EPC, which is valid for 10 years, will rate a property's energy performance and make recommendations about how to improve the energy efficiency of the property.
Although landlords are under no obligation to carry out any recommendations made, prospective tenants could use the EPC as one of the factors to determine which property they choose to rent.
The certificates have already been introduced into the home sales process and could play a valuable role in boosting energy efficiency across the housing sector when they are extended to the private rented sector. Landlords and tenants can access a range of grants to improve the energy efficiency of their homes.
Schemes include:
The Landlord Energy Saving Allowance
The LESA was introduced by the Government in 2004 and allows private and corporate landlords who pay income tax to claim back up to £1,500 per property for the installation of energy saving measures, including loft, cavity wall, floor, hot water system and solid wall insulation, as well as draft proofing. The scheme applies per property, rather than per building, so a house converted into four flats would be able to claim up to £6,000. However, the allowance does not cover holiday lets or resident landlords.
To claim the relief, landlords must include the expenditure as a deduction in their self-assessment tax return. For more information, landlords should visit HM Revenue & Customs at www.hmrc.gov.uk.
Warm Front
Grants of up to £2,700 are available to tenants of private landlords if they are in receipt of certain benefits to make insulation and heating improvements to a property. The landlord doesn't have to make any financial contribution, only give permission to their tenants for the work to be carried out on the property.
The tenant must apply for the grant and a Warm Front assessor will visit the property to suggest which improvements should be made. People entitled to the grant include householders aged 60 or over in receipt of income support, council tax benefit, housing benefit, job seekers allowance or pension benefit, and householders with a child under 16 also in receipt of the same benefits. For a full list of the type of tenant eligible for the grant visit www.warmfront.co.uk. This scheme is only available for households in England.
Local council benefits and grants
Local authorities and councils in the UK offer a range of different grants and financial assistance to landlords to help them improve the energy performance of their property, but the level of assistance differs from council to council. To check what grants landlords are entitled to from their local authority, they should call the Energy Efficiency Advice Centre, a service funded by both the Government and the Energy Saving Trust, on 0800 512 012.
Energy Supplier Grants
Energy companies offer subsidised rates on insulation and certain grants to their customers. Many of these grants are available to customers that rent a property as well as homeowners, so tenants could be entitled to discounts on measures such as cavity and loft insulation. The Energy Saving Trust, www.energysavingtrust.org, has the full range of grants and subsidies available to energy customers.
full article
Sunday 3 February 2008
auto hydrogen fuel tank
An Israeli-Russian-German venture said it had developed a safe and lightweight hydrogen tank, overcoming a significant obstacle to the mass manufacture of automobiles operated by hydrogen fuel.
The venture, known as C.En, has completed a design and test programme aimed at producing the tank for use in cars, Moshe Stern, who leads the investors in the project, told Reuters on Thursday.
One of the biggest hurdles to building hydrogen-powered cars has been the safe and lightweight storage of hydrogen. Stern said C.En's technology solves three main storage problems: weight, volume and safety.
"We can build a 60-litre tank that can travel up to 600 km and weighs no more than 50 kg," Stern said, adding this compares with about 150-200 km for existing hydrogen cars. Unlike others working with hydrogen, C.En uses hydrogen gas rather than liquid.
"Our breakthrough is that we have succeeded in accumulating hydrogen in a glass material that is very small, only a few microns," said Stern, who is also president of Israeli waste treatment company Environmental Energy Resources (EER).
"You don't need to transport hydrogen to fuel stations and you don't need pipelines. The tanks will be like a battery that can be replaced and you can carry a reserve in the car."
He said this technology could also be used for laptops, mobile phones and military applications.
Long a centre for technological innovation, Israel is seeking to leverage that experience in the field of clean energy that has become popular due to soaring oil prices and pollution from heavy use of fossil fuels.
"It will help to achieve a practical solution for the hydrogen era," he said. "When you run out of fossil fuel you need another fuel source and you don't want everything to run on electricity. You also want a mobile source of chemical energy."
Storing hydrogen in the needed quantity has been one of the biggest obstacles to using it as a fuel source, as it has to be in a limited volume and weight, he said.
"It seems that they succeeded. Their tank is roughly the size and weight of a normal fuel tank," Riess said, noting that hydrogen fuel tanks currently in use are too heavy and therefore limited in how much they can store.
By Tova Cohen
full article
The venture, known as C.En, has completed a design and test programme aimed at producing the tank for use in cars, Moshe Stern, who leads the investors in the project, told Reuters on Thursday.
One of the biggest hurdles to building hydrogen-powered cars has been the safe and lightweight storage of hydrogen. Stern said C.En's technology solves three main storage problems: weight, volume and safety.
"We can build a 60-litre tank that can travel up to 600 km and weighs no more than 50 kg," Stern said, adding this compares with about 150-200 km for existing hydrogen cars. Unlike others working with hydrogen, C.En uses hydrogen gas rather than liquid.
"Our breakthrough is that we have succeeded in accumulating hydrogen in a glass material that is very small, only a few microns," said Stern, who is also president of Israeli waste treatment company Environmental Energy Resources (EER).
"You don't need to transport hydrogen to fuel stations and you don't need pipelines. The tanks will be like a battery that can be replaced and you can carry a reserve in the car."
He said this technology could also be used for laptops, mobile phones and military applications.
Long a centre for technological innovation, Israel is seeking to leverage that experience in the field of clean energy that has become popular due to soaring oil prices and pollution from heavy use of fossil fuels.
"It will help to achieve a practical solution for the hydrogen era," he said. "When you run out of fossil fuel you need another fuel source and you don't want everything to run on electricity. You also want a mobile source of chemical energy."
Storing hydrogen in the needed quantity has been one of the biggest obstacles to using it as a fuel source, as it has to be in a limited volume and weight, he said.
"It seems that they succeeded. Their tank is roughly the size and weight of a normal fuel tank," Riess said, noting that hydrogen fuel tanks currently in use are too heavy and therefore limited in how much they can store.
By Tova Cohen
full article
Honda’s hard cell can lead motorists to a fuel paradise
LATER this year a few lucky drivers will have the chance to experience a car that represents the holy grail of green motoring – a zero-emissions vehicle. The Honda FCX Clarity may not look much different from any of the company’s other medium-size cars but it is powered by a hydrogen fuel cell and the only emission from its engine is water.
The fuel cells in these cars generate the electricity that drives them from the chemical reaction of pure hydrogen from the tank with oxygen from the air. Hydrogen has many attractions as a fuel: it is the most common element in the universe and can be produced by methods that create hardly any emissions. A fuel cell needs no combustion and produces no emissions from the engine.
At present most hydrogen for vehicle use is produced by a process known as “reforming” from natural gas, a fossil fuel. But the technology has existed for more than a century to produce it by electrolysis, passing a current through water to separate the hydrogen and oxygen atoms. Until now that would have involved using large amounts of electricity generated from fossil fuels, cancelling out any advantage of zero-emissions running, but Honda says it is now feasible to use electricity from renewable sources for this process, thus producing the fuel with virtually no emissions.
However, the introduction of the Clarity illustrates some of the problems that even the biggest of car-makers face when trying to launch technologies that will slash the rate of carbon emissions rather than simply reduce the way in which vehicles use fossil fuels.
John Kingston, environment manager at Honda UK, would relish the chance to try the Clarity here. But, in the absence of a fuel infrastructure, he accepts that he is unable to put a date on when that will be possible: “Unfortunately, it is not imminent. We have looked at many alternative fuels: solar power, battery electric and hybrid. But this is no longer an experiment. Honda is convinced of the role that hydrogen vehicles can play in reducing emissions. We now have to maintain progress in bringing the cost down and getting infrastructure in place.” The company has been investing heavily in the development of a home energy station, a compact unit that could produce hydrogen domestically both for heating and vehicle use.
An experimental filling station in Hornchurch, East London, was used during the trial of fuel-cell buses, but that was dismantled when the first experiment with just three vehicles ended last year. Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London, has announced plans to acquire 70 fuel-cell vehicles – including ten buses – for Transport for London, the police, fire brigade and other services. They will rely on a network of fuel stations to be installed on Greater London Authority premises but these could be made available to other fuel-cell vehicles at a later stage of the trial.
Alan Copps
full article
The fuel cells in these cars generate the electricity that drives them from the chemical reaction of pure hydrogen from the tank with oxygen from the air. Hydrogen has many attractions as a fuel: it is the most common element in the universe and can be produced by methods that create hardly any emissions. A fuel cell needs no combustion and produces no emissions from the engine.
At present most hydrogen for vehicle use is produced by a process known as “reforming” from natural gas, a fossil fuel. But the technology has existed for more than a century to produce it by electrolysis, passing a current through water to separate the hydrogen and oxygen atoms. Until now that would have involved using large amounts of electricity generated from fossil fuels, cancelling out any advantage of zero-emissions running, but Honda says it is now feasible to use electricity from renewable sources for this process, thus producing the fuel with virtually no emissions.
However, the introduction of the Clarity illustrates some of the problems that even the biggest of car-makers face when trying to launch technologies that will slash the rate of carbon emissions rather than simply reduce the way in which vehicles use fossil fuels.
John Kingston, environment manager at Honda UK, would relish the chance to try the Clarity here. But, in the absence of a fuel infrastructure, he accepts that he is unable to put a date on when that will be possible: “Unfortunately, it is not imminent. We have looked at many alternative fuels: solar power, battery electric and hybrid. But this is no longer an experiment. Honda is convinced of the role that hydrogen vehicles can play in reducing emissions. We now have to maintain progress in bringing the cost down and getting infrastructure in place.” The company has been investing heavily in the development of a home energy station, a compact unit that could produce hydrogen domestically both for heating and vehicle use.
An experimental filling station in Hornchurch, East London, was used during the trial of fuel-cell buses, but that was dismantled when the first experiment with just three vehicles ended last year. Ken Livingstone, the Mayor of London, has announced plans to acquire 70 fuel-cell vehicles – including ten buses – for Transport for London, the police, fire brigade and other services. They will rely on a network of fuel stations to be installed on Greater London Authority premises but these could be made available to other fuel-cell vehicles at a later stage of the trial.
Alan Copps
full article
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