global briefs ‘Sink’ Setback
Tropical Forests Releasing Excess Carbon A study published in the journal Science found that forests across Asia,
Latin America and Africa release 468 tons of carbon per year, equivalent to nearly 10 percent of the annual U.S. carbon footprint. Thus, tropical forests may no
longer be acting as carbon sinks and could be releasing more carbon than they store. Lead author Alessandro Baccini, with the Woods Hole Research Center, in Mas- sachusetts, says, “These findings provide the world with a wake-up call on forests. If we’re to keep global temperatures from rising to danger- ous levels, we need to drastically reduce emissions and greatly increase forests’ ability to absorb and store carbon.”
Researchers think nearly 70 percent of this loss of carbon storage capacity is caused by small-scale degradation from logging, drought and wildfire. Researchers say that policies to curb deforestation, reduce degradation and restore the integrity of the land could turn forests back into carbon sinks.
Distributed Power Energy Users Control Own Supplies
Some municipalities spend between 20 and 40 percent of their annual budgets on the energy needed to operate wastewater treatment plants. The city of Thousand Oaks, California, has trans- formed their biggest energy user into an energy generator. Across the U.S., energy users of all sizes are taking control of their power supply and relieving stress from the grid. That’s the idea behind distributed energy. Atlantic Re:think and Siemens have partnered to explore this burgeoning energy revolution. View a video at
Tinyurl.com/ TheThousandOaksSolution.
Clear Gain
Window-Like Solar Cells Could Power 40 Percent of U.S. Needs
Solar energy is now the cheapest form of new energy in dozens of countries, with record-setting solar farms being built worldwide. Researchers have been investigating ways to make transparent solar panels that resemble glass that could be used as window panels at the same time as converting the light that shines on them into electricity.
“Highly transparent solar cells represent the wave of the future for new solar applications,” explains ma- terials scientist Richard Lunt, Ph.D., from Michigan State University. “We analyzed their potential and show that by harvesting only invisible light, these devices have the potential of generating a similar amount of electricity as rooftop solar while provid- ing additional functionality to enhance the efficiency of buildings, automobiles and mobile electronics.” As reported in Nature Energy, his team has developed a transparent, luminescent, solar con- centrator that looks like clear glass, covered in small, organic molecules adept at capturing only ultraviolet and near-infrared wavelengths of light. The visible light that enables human vision isn’t obstructed, so we can see through the cell. If scaled up to cover the billions of square feet of glass surfaces throughout the U.S., it could potentially supply about 40 percent of our country’s energy needs.
Scientists’ Security France Welcomes Beleaguered Climate Researchers
French President Emmanuel Macron awarded 18 climate scientists from the U.S. and elsewhere millions of euros in grants to relocate to his country for the rest of Donald Trump’s presidential term. Macron’s “Make Our Planet Great Again” grants are meant to counter Trump’s intent on the climate change front following his declaration to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris climate accord.
One winner, Camille Parmesan, of the University of Texas at Austin, who is working at an experimental ecology station in the Pyrenees charting how human-made climate change is affecting wildlife, says that in the U.S., “You are having to hide what you do.”
14 Greater Oklahoma/OKC Edition
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