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Hidden hydrogen

July 15, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The idea of using hydrogen as a fuel or an energy source has been around for a long time. Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe, but most of it is locked up in various chemical compounds, such as water. Hydrogen is a clean fuel; burning it or using it to generate electricity in a fuel cell produces no greenhouse gas emissions. But more than 99% of the hydrogen that people current produce is obtained by methods that result in greenhouse gas emissions.

A new study by scientists at the University of Oxford, the University of Durham in the UK, and the University of Toronto looks at geological environments in which naturally occurring hydrogen could be hiding. According to the study, over the last billion years, the Earth’s continental crust is likely to have produced enough hydrogen to satisfy the energy needs of modern society for 170,000 years.

Much of that hydrogen is likely to have been lost or is inaccessible; most of it is not economically feasible to extract. But even the relatively small amount of hydrogen left could provide thousands of years of energy for us. We just have to be able to find it.

The researchers have developed what they call an “exploration recipe” which identifies where natural hydrogen might be located as well as where it could be commercially feasible to extract. These places with hydrogen have so-called reservoir rocks and geologic formations that prevent the gas from leaking into the atmosphere.

A few such places have already been identified such as one in Albania. There are various candidates to explore, even including an area in Kansas. The study’s authors have founded a company whose mission is to find these natural sources of hydrogen.

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Scientists Say Hidden Hydrogen Could Power the World for 170,000 Years

Photo, posted October 4, 2019, courtesy of Tony Sprezzatura via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Finding peatlands

May 15, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Peatlands are a special kind of wetland that have enormous potential for helping to mitigate climate change. They are great at capturing carbon because their constantly soggy soils deprive decomposer organisms of the oxygen they need to break down dead plants. Living plants absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and incorporate the carbon into their tissues. When plants die, decomposers like bacteria digest the plant matter and release the carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere.

Researchers from the University of California Santa Cruz found that the average per-area carbon densities in peatlands in Colombia are four to ten times higher than those in the Amazon rainforest. This agrees with other studies around the world. On a global scale, peatlands cover only 3% of land areas but store more carbon than all the world’s trees. Peatlands are unsung heroes helping to reduce the impact of fossil fuel emissions.

Peatlands can only store carbon if they remain constantly wet. When they are drained for agriculture or other development, decomposer organisms get back to work digesting organic matter and releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere.

A major challenge in protecting peatland is finding them. They are often hard to distinguish from other types of wetlands.

The Santa Cruz researchers have been identifying and locating peatlands in Colombia, where decades of civil war had made many parts of the country inaccessible for research. Finding and protecting peatlands there and in many other places around the world is an important task in the battle against climate change.

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Colombia’s peatlands could be a crucial tool to fight climate change. But first we have to find them.

Photo, posted January 2, 2018, courtesy of Roni Ziade / U.S. Forest Service via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Fighting honey fraud

May 12, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Honey fraud is a significant issue for the food industry. What is honey fraud? Typically, it involves mislabeling where honey was produced or what types of flowers the bees collected nectar from. Honey made from a single type of flower is often more expensive because of the unique flavor it provides or from potential health benefits. Sometimes even cheap alternatives like sugar syrups are labelled as honey. It turns out that honey is one of the most fraud-prone commodities in global trade, with fraud estimated to occur in up to 10% of the honey traded internationally. Honey from some countries, such as China and India, has had 30% or more of samples found to be fraudulent.

Researchers at McGill University in Montreal have developed an AI-powered method to verify the origin of honey thereby ensuring that what is on the label corresponds to what is in the jar.

The McGill method can determine what kind of flowers the bees visited to produce a particular sample of honey. Previous honey authentication involved pollen analysis, which is ineffective for honey that was processed or filtered. The new method uses high-resolution mass spectrometry which captures a unique chemical “fingerprint” from the honey. Machine learning algorithms read the fingerprint to identify the honey’s origin.

The researchers tested their methodology on a variety of honey samples which they then compared with honey from known botanical sources. Using previous methods for honey authentication can take days. The McGill method takes only minutes and works regardless of how the honey was processed.

According to the researchers, people deserve to know that the honey they buy is what it claims to be, and honest honey producers deserve protection from fraudulent competitors.

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Fighting honey fraud with AI technology

Photo, posted May 6, 2012, courtesy of Emma Jane via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Artificial intelligence and lost oil wells

January 2, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

There have been commercial oil and gas wells across the United States for 170 years. Researchers estimate that there are between two and three million wells that have been abandoned. There are hundreds of thousands of them, across 27 states, that are “orphaned,” meaning that they are uncapped, unproductive, and nobody is responsible to manage their leakage or pollution.

Many are undocumented orphaned wells – UOWs – that are not listed in formal records and are basically out of sight and out of mind. Besides having nobody responsible for them, nobody even knows where they are. But they are potential sources of oil and chemical leaks into nearby water sources and can send toxic substances like benzene and hydrogen sulfide into the air.

Researchers are using modern tools like drones, laser imaging, and advanced sensors to try to locate UOWs. But these wells are scattered over an area of more than three million square miles.

To better predict where to look for undocumented wells, researchers are combining historical topographic maps with artificial intelligence. The US Geological Survey has scanned 190,000 topographic maps made between 1884 and 2006. AI is being used to find the symbols for oil and gas wells on the maps. People can recognize these symbols easily, but there are just too many maps to look at. The problem is equivalent to finding a needle in a haystack; there is just an awful lot of hay to look through.

Abandoned wells are a big problem and it will take lots of modern technology to try to solve it.

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AI Helps Researchers Dig Through Old Maps to Find Lost Oil and Gas Wells

Photo, posted August 16, 2022, courtesy of Larry Syverson via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

A month of extra-hot days

June 19, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The past 12 months have been the hottest ever measured across the globe. This may not be everyone’s experience in every location, but the average person on Earth experienced 26 more days of abnormally high temperatures than they would have in the absence of climate change.

Researchers considered a given day’s temperature to be abnormally high in a particular location if it exceeded 90% of the daily temperatures recorded there between 1991 and 2020. Nearly 80% of the world’s population experienced at least 31 days of abnormal warmth since May of 2023. Theoretically, the number of unusually warm days would have been far fewer in the absence of global warming.

In some countries, the extra-warm days added up to two or three weeks. In others, such as Colombia, Indonesia, and Rwanda, there were up to 4 months of them. The average American experienced 39 days of extra-warm temperatures since last May.

Scientists also added up how many extreme heat waves the planet experienced since last May. These are defined as episodes of unseasonable warmth across a large area, lasting three or more days, and causing significant loss of life or disruption to infrastructure or industry. In total, the researchers identified 76 such episodes, affecting 90 countries, on every continent except Antarctica.

The world’s climate is now shifting toward the La Niña phase of the cyclical pattern called the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. This usually leads to cooler temperatures on average, but the recent heat could have lingering effects on weather and storms for months to come, including what is expected to be an extraordinarily active Atlantic hurricane season.

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Climate Change Added a Month’s Worth of Extra-Hot Days in Past Year

Photo, posted December 21, 2011, courtesy of Maggie Lin Photography via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Where not to plant trees

May 10, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Planting huge numbers of trees is often proposed as a way to reduce the severity of climate change. Studies have looked at the potential for Earth‘s ecosystems to support large additional areas of forest and have found that it would be possible to have at least 25% more forested area than we do now. This in turn could capture large amounts of carbon and substantially reduce the amount in the atmosphere.

A recent study by researchers at Clark University in Massachusetts and The Nature Conservancy mapped the climate impact of tree planting across the globe, identifying where it would be most and also least beneficial. The study, published in Nature Communications, found that trees planted in arid, desert regions or in snowy places like the Arctic would, on balance, worsen warming rather than reduce it.

Trees take up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which helps to keep warming in check. But trees with dark, green leaves also absorb heat from sunlight. Snow and desert sand, on the other hand, are light-colored and reflect more sunlight back into space. For this reason, trees planted in snowy areas or in the desert will absorb more sunlight than their surroundings. This can negate the climate benefits of soaking up carbon dioxide.

Previous studies only looked at how much carbon dioxide would be removed by planting trees in order to determine how much warming would be prevented. The new study finds that it matters where the trees are planted.

Fortunately, the new study also shows that tree planting projects that are currently underway or that are in the pipeline are largely concentrated in regions where they will indeed help slow global warming.

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This Map Shows Where Planting Trees Would Make Climate Change Worse

Photo, posted April 5, 2022, courtesy of UC Davis Arboretum and Public Garden via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Summers are getting hotter

November 7, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Climate scientists have warned for decades that a seemingly small change in the global average temperature can lead to large changes in extreme heat. So far, the world has warmed by 1.2 degrees Celsius (or 2.2 degrees Fahrenheit) and that has been enough to cause big changes in summer heat.

This past summer was the hottest on record. The heat fueled deadly wildfires across the Mediterranean. Record highs caused Chinese cities to suspend outdoor work. Weeks of triple-digit temperatures in the U.S. southwest led to heat-related hospitalizations and deaths.

But not every recent summer has been hotter everywhere. Even this summer saw average or even colder than average temperatures in some places. But the distribution of summer temperatures across the Northern Hemisphere has shifted dramatically in recent decades.

Less than 1% of summers in the middle of the 20th century were extremely hot for their location. Over the past decade, more than a quarter of summers were extremely hot for their location.

Between 1950 and 1980, about a third of summers across the hemisphere were near average in temperature; a third were considered cold; a third were hot. Only a few summers in a few places were either extremely cold or extremely hot. Over the past decade, the vast majority of summers have either been hot or extremely hot.

We experience summer weather in the location where we spend our time, and it is entirely possible that our own experience may have been unremarkable. We may even have had a cool, rainy summer. But on a global scale, summers are getting hotter and hotter and making it harder to ignore what is happening to our planet.

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It’s Not Your Imagination. Summers Are Getting Hotter.

Photo, posted August 21, 2022, courtesy of Bonnie Moreland via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

How To Meet Protected Land Targets | Earth Wise

March 30, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

More than half of the world’s countries have set a target of setting aside 30% of land and sea areas across the globe for conservation by 2030, in order to preserve and protect nature and essential services to people. This pledge creates some difficult questions to answer.

What sorts of land should be protected and where should it be located? What effects of these new land protections will there be on carbon emissions and the climate and on land usage for food production and energy generation? Policymakers have to grapple with such questions in order to move forward on these ambitious biodiversity protection goals.

A recent study by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory attempts to answer many of these questions. The study found that meeting the 30% goal could lead to substantial regional shifts in land use and, in some cases, still fail to protect some of the most important biodiversity hotspots.

Protecting land entails tradeoffs with other land uses and can have negative impacts on the agricultural sector as well as land use for bioenergy crops and forest land use for timber.

In particular, the study found that the amount of land used for crops for conversion into biofuels could be significantly impacted by doubling current protected areas while still preserving the amount of land used for food crops. This is particularly true for land in Russia and Canada.

The study also found that while it may be possible to meet the 30% target by only protecting agriculturally unsuitable land, it may not end up protecting many of the world’s 36 identified biodiversity hotspots. The uneven distribution of species has a significant bearing on how to manage the conservation of biodiversity.

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Doubling Protected Lands for Biodiversity Could Require Tradeoffs With Other Land Uses, Study Finds

Photo, posted September 19, 2020, courtesy of John Brighenti via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Driving Electric Is Cheaper For Almost Everyone | Earth Wise

February 24, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

A study by University of Michigan researchers found that about 90% of U.S. households would save money on fuel costs by owning an electric car rather than a gas-powered car. So apart from the environmental benefits of electric cars, there are real economic benefits as well.

Both the price of gasoline and the price of electricity vary considerably across the country, so there are differences by location. The study found that 71% of U.S. drivers would see their fuel expenses cut at least in half by driving an electric car.

Drivers in California, Washington, and New York would see the largest fuel savings as well as the biggest emissions reductions from a new electric car. Those states have cleaner electric grids and a bigger gap between the cost of electricity and the cost of gas.

The study, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, only looked at fuel costs and did not take into account the purchase cost of new cars. Generally speaking, plug-in cars have higher sticker prices than gas-powered cars but multiple studies have shown that over their lifetimes, electric vehicles end up being cheaper to own than comparable gas-powered vehicles because of lower maintenance costs on top of the fuel savings. The price gap between equivalent gas and electric cars continues to narrow in any case as the cost of batteries continues to decline. On top of that, the recent expansion of federal tax credits on electric cars is making the vehicles cost-competitive right at the point of purchase.

Gasoline prices have come down considerably from their peak a year ago, but for almost everyone, it is still much cheaper to drive on electricity.

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Seven in 10 U.S. Drivers Could Halve Their Fuel Costs by Going Electric, Study Finds

Photo, posted April 23, 2022, courtesy of Pedrik via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Mauna Loa Eruption And Climate Tracking | Earth Wise

January 9, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Mauna Loa, the largest active volcano in the world, erupted for the first time in nearly 40 years in late November. A 124-foot aluminum tower at the top of the volcano has been the site of carbon dioxide measurements for over 60 years but the eruption cut off power to the site, stopping the monitoring.

Carbon dioxide measurements on Mauna Loa began in 1958. The project was started by geochemist Charles Keeling and eventually taken over by his son Ralph Keeling upon his father’s death in 2005. It is the longest continuous record of the rising levels of carbon dioxide in the world.

Mauna Loa is an ideal location for carbon dioxide monitoring because it is a remote location away from both carbon dioxide sources like dense population centers and roads, and carbon sinks like areas of heavy vegetation.

There are hundreds of carbon dioxide monitoring stations around the world, including more than 70 operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, so the interruption will not stop global recordkeeping. But Mauna Loa holds significant symbolism as the first and most frequently sited source of carbon dioxide data.

There have been other interruptions in the measurements. Federal budget cuts in 1964 paused them for about 3 months. A 1984 eruption also cut off power to the facility and shut it down for about a month.

When the facility first started operating, the average carbon dioxide concentration was measured at 313 parts per million. Most recently, levels have peaked at around 421 parts per million, the greatest concentration in at least 4 million years.

Power will be restored to the Mauna Loa facility and its measurements will resume.

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Mauna Loa Eruption Threatens a Famous Climate Record

Photo, posted November 29, 2022, courtesy of L. Gallant / USGS via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Importance Of City Trees | Earth Wise

January 28, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

It is well known that green spaces can improve the quality of life and create a better climate in cities. City trees and vegetation can help reduce urban heat island effects by shading buildings and roads, deflecting radiation from the sun, and releasing moisture into the atmosphere. City trees and green spaces have also been proven to increase property values, promote wildlife and plant diversity, reduce noise pollution, and improve human health. But how important are trees and vegetation for producing cleaner air in cities?

According to a new study led by researchers at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, trees do contribute to cleaner air in cities, but the degree to which they do so varies greatly between different locations.

The research team measured air pollutants across seven urban settings in the city of Gothenburg, and compared them with pollutants on the leaves of deciduous trees. The researchers chose to focus on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are pollutants generated primarily during the incomplete combustion of organic materials, like coal, oil, and wood.

The results revealed that the pollutants in leaves did increase over time. The researchers were able to show a clear correlation between the level of air pollutants and the concentration of pollutants in leaves.

But at the same time, the researchers discovered that pollution levels varied greatly between measurement sites. For example, the levels of PAHs were seven times higher at the most polluted site (the city’s main bus station) than they were at a location on the periphery of the city.

The research team hopes its findings will be used to help guide the planning of future urban landscapes.

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Trees are important for cleaner air in cities

Photo, posted November 5, 2021, courtesy of Maria Eklind via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Climate-Related Disasters | Earth Wise

January 27, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

In early December, a series of tornadoes struck multiple states, killing nearly 100 people and producing widespread damage in whole communities. These storms were at least the 19th weather or climate disaster that caused more than $1 billion in damage during 2021. The year suffered from droughts, wildfires, severe cold snaps, hurricanes, and other severe weather incidents.

The Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania has been studying how communities can prepare for and bounce back from such disasters.

A key issue is that the location and timing of disasters continues to shift. Homeowners along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts know that they need to prepare for and deal with hurricanes. People who live in places like Oklahoma and Kansas are aware that tornadoes are a frequent threat. But in recent years, strong storms are happening in areas where historically they haven’t.

Places need to start implementing changes to their infrastructure now in order to have an impact on risk reduction.

Presidential disaster declarations are just one part of recovery from disasters. Other issues to grapple with are the role of government support and how it isn’t just the financial costs of disaster recovery but all the impact on human and other resources that are often not covered by governmental funds. There is also the issue that low- and moderate-income households are disproportionately harmed and locked out of financial resources for recovery.

The Wharton study points out that innovative approaches will be needed to effectively prepare communities and individuals for disasters to come.

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Preparing, and paying for, climate change-induced disasters

Photo, posted December 12, 2021, courtesy of State Farm via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Deep Learning And Dirty Air | Earth Wise

May 6, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Poor air quality is a major global problem. According to the World Health Organization, exposure to air pollution is linked to the premature deaths of an estimated seven million people every year. In fact, 9 out of 10 people breathe air that contains more pollutants than what the WHO considers safe. Air pollution is the fourth largest threat to human health, trailing only high blood pressure, dietary risks, and smoking.

But predicting pollution levels at a given place and time remains challenging. According to a new study recently published in the journal Science of the Total Environment, scientists are turning to deep learning to improve air quality estimates.

According to researchers, satellite observations and ground observations both measure air pollution, but both have major limitations. For example, satellites may collect data at the same time and at the same location each day, but they miss how emissions may vary throughout the day. Ground-based observations from weather stations do continuously collect data, but they only do so in a limited number of locations.

As a result, scientists have turned to deep learning – a type of machine learning – to analyze the relationship between satellite and ground-based observations of nitrogen dioxide around Los Angeles. Nitrogen dioxide is associated with emissions from traffic and power plants. The researchers were able to rely on the learned relationship to take daily satellite observations and create hourly estimates of atmospheric nitrogen dioxide levels in approximately three mile grids.

According to the research team, this study could be repeated for other greenhouse gases, and applied to different cities and regions – or even whole continents.

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Scientists turn to deep learning to improve air quality forecasts

Air Pollution

Photo, posted November 4, 2019, courtesy of Ninara via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Largest U.S. Solar Project | Earth Wise

May 28, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The largest solar project to date in the U.S. has received final approval from the Department of the Interior. A $1 billion, 690-megawatt solar array will be built on federal land in the Mojave Desert in Nevada. The project includes battery energy storage and is expected to produce enough electricity to power more than a quarter million homes. It will also offset the greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to about 83,000 cars a year.

The current largest U.S. installation, the Solar Star Farm in Southern California, completed in 2015, generates 579 megawatts of power.

Construction of the Gemini Solar Array is expected to start sometime this year and be completed by 2022 or 2023. The first phase of the project will cover 11 square miles of desert land about 30 miles northeast of Las Vegas.

Some conservation groups have fought against the project, saying that it will destroy thousands of acres of habitat for endangered desert tortoises as well as other rare plant and animal species. The groups agree that solar energy is a good thing but are convinced that the location selected is the wrong one.

Interior Department representatives note that the Gemini Project will provide jobs and economic growth at a time when many Americans in general and Nevada citizens in particular are struggling with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The project is projected to generate $713 million in economic activity and employ about 2,000 people during construction. However, once it is up and running, it will employ just 19 full-time workers.

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The Largest Solar Project in the U.S. Gets Green Light

Photo, posted January 26, 2014, courtesy of Jannes Glas via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Online Shopping And Greenhouse Gas Emissions | Earth Wise

April 3, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

These days, consumers have multiple choices for how to shop for even the most mundane products. There are both traditional and online ways to buy most so-called fast-moving consumer goods, such as cleaning supplies and packaged foods. Price, quality, convenience, and time-frame guide our choices.

In the past, these things were always purchased by going to “Bricks & Mortar”, that is, physical retail stores. But now, we can order them from physical stores and have them delivered directly by the store – which is known as “Bricks & Clicks” – or we can order them online from an e-tailer and have them delivered by a parcel delivery company or the post office, so-called “Pure Play” online purchasing..

The carbon footprint of these three approaches depends on multiple factors according to a new study published in Environmental Science and Technology. The study looked at the impact of transport, warehouse storage, delivery, and packaging.

Overall, the greenhouse gas footprints per item purchased at Bricks & Mortar were higher than those of Bricks & Clicks but lower than that of Pure Players. But the results were highly dependent upon how many items were actually being purchased, and where the consumers lived. The type of items also mattered. For example, clothing purchased from a pure-play online source is much more likely to be returned than if purchased in a store.

Bricks & Mortar shoppers could reduce their footprint by 40% by walking or biking to stores, and Pure Players could cut emissions by 26% by switching to electric vehicles for the delivery of products from parcel distribution centers to consumers’ homes.

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Comparing greenhouse gas footprints of online versus traditional shopping

Photo, posted July 15, 2017, courtesy of Elaine Smith via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Lifestyle And Carbon Footprint | Earth Wise

March 23, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Many studies have shown, to no great surprise, that affluent lifestyles lead to larger carbon footprints. Households in Switzerland enjoy a high standard of living and a team of researchers there has been studying the consumption and travel habits of Swiss citizens to better understand the impact of various factors on carbon footprint. Key factors include household composition and income, and whether the households are in the city or the countryside – even though, in the end, people’s lifestyles do not differ greatly from one environment to another.

A team of researchers at EPFL’s School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental Engineering analyzed data from Switzerland’s household budget survey for 2008, 2011 and 2014. They combined that data with an environmentally extended input-output analysis to assess households’ carbon footprints by measuring their direct and indirect emissions.

Overall, households in the countryside have larger carbon footprints than those in the city, mainly because they travel more and use more energy in their homes. But urban households have larger carbon footprints than their rural counterparts when it comes to food, clothing, cultural activities and air travel.

A household’s composition directly influences its carbon footprint. A two-person household has the largest per-capita carbon footprint, and it falls as the size of the family grows since many of the same resources are shared by more people.

Income levels play an important role. People consume without much thought because they can afford to and enjoy doing it. But there is a trend towards people becoming more conscious of their levels of consumption and trying to be more responsible in Switzerland. Overall consumption has actually declined over the years studied.

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