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In 2015, a group of physicists at MIT did some calculations to rethink how we're approaching the problem of fusion power. High-temperature, nonmetallic superconductors were now commercially available and could allow the generation of stronger magnetic fields, enabling a simpler, more compact fusion reactor... they formed a company, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and set out to put their calculations to the test.

On Tuesday, Commonwealth Fusion Systems announced that it had hit a key milestone on its roadmap to having a demonstration fusion plant operating in 2025. The company used commercial high-temperature superconductors to build a three-meter-tall magnet that could operate stably at a 20-[T]esla magnetic field strength. This magnet is identical in design to the ones that will contain the plasma at the core of the company's planned reactor...

... "The vision is simple: Can fusion energy be in time to make a difference to climate change?" said Dennis Whyte of MIT. "That's what everybody on this team was dedicated to going toward. Fusion is the energy source that the world needs, and it needs [it] kind of fast. And we're on the brink of harnessing that for humankind."

Waiting for decades to get to fusion will allow renewable power to expand its current cost advantage over all other forms of energy generation. And the time will give engineers opportunities to learn how to manage the challenges of the intermittency of wind and solar power. In this timeline, fusion risks being irrelevant by the time it's a solved problem.

That's why by 2025, Commonwealth Fusion Systems wants to have a reactor that will break even—i.e., a system in which fusion reactions release as much energy as is needed to start them. That milestone will be followed by what the company hopes will be a commercially viable fusion plant in the early 2030s...

The world’s first and largest factory to capture and convert carbon dioxide from the air into stone began operations in Iceland on Wednesday.

The Orca plant set up by Swiss startup Climeworks AG to reduce the effects of the greenhouse gas on the planet represents a milestone in the direct air capture industry.

While Climeworks has built 16 installations across Europe, the Orca plant is the only one that permanently captures and stores CO2 rather than recycling it.

According to Climeworks, every year the factory has a capacity to capture 4,000 tons of CO2, which is safely and permanently stored via a chemical process developed by Carbfix, an academic-industrial partnership in Iceland.

In this process, CO2 captured from the atmosphere is mineralised underground and converted into stones.

The Monash team, assisted by CSIRO, report in today's edition of Nature Communications that using a glucose-based additive on the positive electrode they have managed to stabilise lithium-sulfur battery technology, long touted as the basis for the next generation of batteries.

"In less than a decade, this technology could lead to vehicles including electric buses and trucks that can travel from Melbourne to Sydney without recharging. It could also enable innovation in delivery and agricultural drones where light weight is paramount," says lead author Professor Mainak Majumder, from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Associate Director of the Monash Energy Institute.

In theory, lithium-sulfur batteries could store two to five times more energy than lithium-ion batteries of the same weight. The problem has been that, in use the electrodes deteriorated rapidly, and the batteries broke down. There were two reasons for this -- the positive sulfur electrode suffered from substantial expansion and contraction weakening it and making it inaccessible to lithium, and the negative lithium electrode became contaminated by sulfur compounds.

Last year the Monash team demonstrated they could open the structure of the sulfur electrode to accommodate expansion and make it more accessible to lithium. Now, by incorporating sugar into the web-like architecture of the electrode they have stabilised the sulfur, preventing it from moving and blanketing the lithium electrode.

A climate summit of world leaders in 40 days' time will be the "turning point for humanity", PM Boris Johnson has said in a speech to the United Nations.

He warned that global temperature rises were already inevitable, but called on his fellow leaders to commit to major changes to curb further warming.

Four areas needed tackling - "coal, cars, cash and trees", he said.

Countries must take responsibility for "the destruction we are inflicting, not just upon our planet but ourselves".

"It's time for humanity to grow up," he added ahead of the UK hosting the COP26 summit in Glasgow.

The prime minister also said it was time to listen to the warnings of scientists. "Look at Covid if you want an example of gloomy scientists being proved right."...

Fine words?

All just hot air?

Positive action?

Soon enough??

All on our only one planet,
Martin

Seventeen people have been arrested as climate activists blocked the Port of Dover, causing queues of vehicles attempting to cross the Channel.

Insulate Britain, which has brought chaos on the M25 five times in the past fortnight, said more than 40 people gathered at Dover.

The port - Europe's busiest ferry terminal...

... Insulate Britain also held a demonstration outside the Home Office's Westminster headquarters.

A government spokesman called the port protest "guerrilla tactics" and said the campaigners had "wreaked havoc" in recent weeks. He added: "Peaceful protest is a cornerstone of our democracy and there will always be space for people to make their voices heard, but that is not on busy roads or at a vital port..."

... Insulate Britain, which is calling for government action on home insulation, said: "We are blocking Dover this morning to highlight that fuel poverty is killing people in Dover and across the UK.

"We need a Churchillian response: We must tell the truth about the urgent horror of the climate emergency."...

Three scientists have been awarded the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work to understand complex systems, such as the Earth's climate.

Syukuro Manabe, Klaus Hasselmann and Giorgio Parisi were announced as the winners at an event in Stockholm.

Research by Manabe and Hasselmann led to computer models of the Earth's climate that can predict the impact of global warming...

... The climate models that have built on the winners' research form a crucial part of the evidence on which leaders at COP26 will base their decisions.

Syukuro Manabe, 90, who is senior meteorologist at Princeton University in New Jersey, demonstrated how increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could lead to increased temperatures at the surface of the Earth. In the 1960s, he led the development of physical models of the climate.

Roughly a decade later, Klaus Hasselmann, 89, from the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, Germany, created a computer model that linked together weather and climate. His work answered the question of why climate models can be reliable despite weather being changeable and chaotic...

... The technology entails firing a bolt of plasma at slurry to break up toxic ammonia and climate-heating methane.

The artificial lightning is plasma – a stream of matter heated so hot that electrons are ripped away from the atoms and molecules break down.

The action smashes ammonia molecules to produce pure nitrogen, which is absorbed into farm slurry.

That saves the farmer money because nitrogen applied to fields in slurry is an essential fertiliser...

... reduces ammonia in slurry by 90%. The plasma process also reduces the emissions of methane – a potent greenhouse gas – by 99%.

If the technology proves affordable it wouldn’t just tackle climate change and improve the smell of the countryside, it would also present an opportunity to tackle air pollution in urban areas...

... The big question is the cost of the electricity that produces the bolt of plasma. At Holly Green Farm it’s produced by an array of solar panels.

But the question will be who pays for farmers to clean up...

But the question will be who pays for farmers to clean up...

So wrong. what planet are from, clearly not this one?

There's obviously a story behind that interesting picture. Could you please post a link for it. Ta.