Maapõuest leitakse uusi triljoneid

Maapõuest leitakse uusi triljoneid

Kristjan Kaar

11. mai 2010, 10:49

Ilmselt tuleb paljudele uudisena, et erinevate maavarade maapõuest kaevandamine on paljastanud hiigelsuured maagaasivarud kiltkivis. Toetudes sektori prognoosidele võib ainuüksi Põhja-Ameerikas leiduda ca 1,000 triljonit kuupjalga puurimisvalmis maagaasi – enam kui riigi nõudlus järgmiseks 45 aastaks. Euroopa maagaasi varudeks hinnatakse 200 triljonit kuupjalga.

Kiltkivis leiduva gaasi potentsiaalidest on investorid teadlikud juba pikemat aega. Lihtsalt välja ei olnud saadaval madalahinnalist tehnoloogiat, millega sellest kasu lõigata. Esimene teadaolev horisontaalne puurauk tehti kiltkivisse 1929. aastal Texases, kuid kasumlikuks muutus uuenduslik lahendus alles vahemikul 2005 – 2008, kui fossiilsete kütuste kibekiire hinnatõus põhjustas puurimisseadmete ülepakkumise. Tänu kaasaeglsele tehnoloogiale ning selle mõistlikule hinnale võib täna USAs paiknevast The Haynesville kiltkivist saadava kildagaasi ekstraheerimise hind ulatuda $3 ühe Btu (British thermal unit) kohta. Võrdluseks võib tuua, et 1990ndatel oli Barnetti kiltkivis leiduva gaasi puurimise kulu aga ca $5 Btu kohta. Analüütikud on aga optimistlikud ning prognoosivad, et paari aastaga võib see langeda vaid paarile dollarile Btu kohta.

Vaatamata vähenevale, praegust tehnoloogiat arvestades puuritavatele USA maagaasivarudele on IEA (International Energy Agency) veendunud, et ameeriklased on võimelised oma maagaasi tootmist kahekordistama, kui ebakonventsionaalsed (eriti kildagaasi) varud võetaks efektiivselt kasutusele. Nimelt on kildagaasi tootmine vaid paari aastaga näidanud hämmastavat kasvu ning täna räägime me sellest, kui riigi kõige olulisemast nii-öelda ebakonventsionaalsest maavarast – seda tänu kildagaasi varude suurusele kui ka hüppelise sammu teinud tehnoloogia tõttu, mis parandab ligipääsetavust kiltkivile. IEA prognoosib, et USA kildagaasi varud võivad aastaks 2030 moodustada koguni 60% tervest riigi gaasivarust ja 15% terve maailma gaasivarudest (teadaolevatest varudest moodustad kildagaas täna vaid 3%).

USA maagaasi tootmine (triljonit kuuplajga)

Allikas: Standard & Poor's

Texase A&M Ülikool avaldas 2007. aastal arvamust, et uue kildagaasi puurimistehnoloogia kasutuselevõtt ainuüksi USAs võib tõsta maailma gaasivarusid 9x ehk 16,000 triljonile kuupjalale, mis on ümardatult 450 triljonit kuupmeetrit. The U.S. Federal Regulator Comission on samuti veendumusel, et tänu kildagaasile ei vajata USAs enam ühtegi uut kivisöe ega ka tuumaelektrijaama. The U.S. Energy Deparmentil on veidi realistlikum prognoos – kildagaas võib vähemalt 20 aasta pärast rahldada pool Ameerika energianõudlusest.

Mis on ebakonventsionaalne maagaas?

Ebakonventsionaalseks maagaasiks kutsutakse sisuliselt maapõuest raskesti kättesaadavaid süsivesinikke, mida on viimastel aastatel hakatud puurima tänu uuenduslikule puurimistehnoloogiale ja kõrgele toornafta hinnale, mis pakub mõistlikku kasumimarginaali. Ebakonventsionaalse maagaasi hulka liigitatakse tahke gaas (leidub vähese läbilaskmisvõimega kivimite sees olevates nii-öelda õhuaukudes), kivisöekihi metaan (gaas, mis on peidus kivisöe pragudes) ja kildagaas (selline gaas pärineb kiltkivist, või argilliidist, mis asuvad settebasseinis).

Kildagaasi ekstraheerimine kiltkivist on aga keerukas protsess, mis sisaldab endas hüdraulilist purustamist ja maasügavustes horisontaalset puurumist. Nii-öelda purustamine näeb välja selliselt, et kiltkivisse pumbatakse kõrgsurve vett, liiva, ja erinevaid kemikaale. Nii purustatakse kiltkivi, mille tagajärjel eraldub maagaas. Kiltkivi leidub maapõues nii-öelda ribadena ning horisontaalne puurimine võimaldab tekitada üle 3 kilomeetri pikkuse puuraugu, mis tõstab aga oluliselt kaevude tootmisvõimet.

Kildagaas on tekitanud huvi ka USA riigiisade seas. Riigi kildagaasi varud moodustavad 75% terve maailam kildagaasi varudest, mistõttu ei ole ka ime, miks Barack Obama poolt juhitav valitsus otsustas riigile kuuluvad maalapid kildagaasi varude uurimiseks ja uue tehnoloogia arendamiseks taas välja rentida. Tänu seadusemuudatustele ja soodsale energiahindade keskkonnale moodustab täna kildagaasi tootmine 10% tervest USA maagaasi tootmisest. Veel 2000. aastal oli numbriks vaid 1%. Seega on USAs praegust tarbimisintensiivsust arvestades 100 aasta jagu maagaasi varusid. Standard & Poor’s on oma klientidele andnud selgelt mõista, et eriti OECD väliste riikide üha kasvav energianõudlus ja üha suurenev maagaasi pakkumine võib pakkuda suurepärast investeerimisvõimalust just kildagaasi tootjatesse. Eriti peetakse silmas aga USA ettevõtteid, kuna kohalike energiatootjate tehnoloogilised lahendused on läbinud kiire arenguprotsessi ning riigi käsutuses on maailma suurimad seni avastatud kildagaasi varud. Investeerimisteesi toetamiseks võime tuua ka lihtsa näite: 2009. aastal omandas Exxon Mobil uudset tehnoloogiat kasutava ebakonventsionaalse maagaasi tootja XTO Energy.

Millised on väljavaated rahvusvahelistel turgudel?

Tõepoolest, eelpool mainitut lugedes võib jääda mulje, et gaasi on lademetes ja maavara jätkub igaveseks. Paraku vaatamata rikkalikule varubaasile on IEA tõdenud, et toetudes 600 gaasivälja põhjalikule tootmisvõime ning ammendamise (eelmainitud gaasiväljad moodustavad 55% praegusest maagaasi tootmisest) analüüsile on pooled praegustest maagaasiväljadest vaja 2030. aastaks väja vahetada, et rahuldada maailmanõudlust.

Selge on see, et kildagaas on kogumas hoogsasti populaarsust vähemasti Ameerikas. Mujal maailmas on olukord aga kardinaalselt teine ning ainuke Euroopa riik, mis on suutnud piltlikult öeldes USA jalajälgedesse astuda on Norra, kus kildagaasi tootmine on riigi oluline sissetulekuallikas ja tootmismahud on kasvanud igal aastal. Kohalike sõnul võib Norras kildagaasi tootmine ajavahemikul 2015 – 2025 kasvada koguni 8% aastas. Hoopis teistsugune näeb olukord välja Suurbritannias, kus maagaasi tootmise väheneb 2015. aastaks 40% võrra ning 2030. aastaks koguni 55% võrra. Teise juhtiva Euroopa maagaasitootja Hollandi tootmismahud vähenevad 2030. aastaks 49% võrra.

Riskid keskkonnale

Kildagaasi ekstraheerimiseks on maapõue vaja pumbata miljonite liitrite kaupa benseeniga leotatud liiva, mis segatakse hüdrokloriidhappega ja toksiliste kemikaalidega. Selline protseduur ohustab selgelt põhjavett. Näiteks 2009. aasta lõpul peatas The Department of Environmental Protection Pennsylvania osariigis sealse ettevõtte Cabot Oil & Gas tegevuse, kuna põhjavette lekkis ca 4,000 liitri jagu reostatud vett.

http://www.lhv.ee/news/index.cfm?id=1212570

Fears for crops as shock figures from America show scale of bee catastrophe

The world may be on the brink of biological disaster after news that a third of US bee colonies did not survive the winter

• Alison Benjamin on the prospect of a bee-less world
• In pictures: Why the decline in bees matters

• 
• 
• (2515)
• Tweet this (920)
• Comments (175)

• Alison Benjamin
• The Observer, Sunday 2 May 2010
• Article history

Honey bees are vital insect pollinators, responsible for the healthy development of many of the world’s major food crops. Photograph: David Silverman/Getty Images

Disturbing evidence that honeybees are in terminal decline has emerged from the United States where, for the fourth year in a row, more than a third of colonies have failed to survive the winter.

The decline of the country's estimated 2.4 million beehives began in 2006, when a phenomenon dubbed colony collapse disorder (CCD) led to the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of colonies. Since then more than three million colonies in the US and billions of honeybees worldwide have died and scientists are no nearer to knowing what is causing the catastrophic fall in numbers.

The number of managed honeybee colonies in the US fell by 33.8% last winter, according to the annual survey by the Apiary Inspectors of America and the US government's Agricultural Research Service (ARS).

The collapse in the global honeybee population is a major threat to crops. It is estimated that a third of everything we eat depends upon honeybee pollination, which means that bees contribute some £26bn to the global economy.

Potential causes range from parasites, such as the bloodsucking varroa mite, to viral and bacterial infections, pesticides and poor nutrition stemming from intensive farming methods. The disappearance of so many colonies has also been dubbed "Mary Celeste syndrome" due to the absence of dead bees in many of the empty hives.

US scientists have found 121 different pesticides in samples of bees, wax and pollen, lending credence to the notion that pesticides are a key problem. "We believe that some subtle interactions between nutrition, pesticide exposure and other stressors are converging to kill colonies," said Jeffery Pettis, of the ARS's bee research laboratory.

A global review of honeybee deaths by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) reported last week that there was no one single cause, but pointed the finger at the "irresponsible use" of pesticides that may damage bee health and make them more susceptible to diseases. Bernard Vallat, the OIE's director-general, warned: "Bees contribute to global food security, and their extinction would represent a terrible biological disaster."

Dave Hackenberg of Hackenberg Apiaries, the Pennsylvania-based commercial beekeeper who first raised the alarm about CCD, said that last year had been the worst yet for bee losses, with 62% of his 2,600 hives dying between May 2009 and April 2010. "It's getting worse," he said. "The AIA survey doesn't give you the full picture because it is only measuring losses through the winter. In the summer the bees are exposed to lots of pesticides. Farmers mix them together and no one has any idea what the effects might be."

Pettis agreed that losses in some commercial operations are running at 50% or greater. "Continued losses of this magnitude are not economically sustainable for commercial beekeepers," he said, adding that a solution may be years away. "Look at Aids, they have billions in research dollars and a causative agent and still no cure. Research takes time and beehives are complex organisms."

In the UK it is still too early to judge how Britain's estimated 250,000 honeybee colonies have fared during the long winter. Tim Lovett, president of the British Beekeepers' Association, said: "Anecdotally, it is hugely variable. There are reports of some beekeepers losing almost a third of their hives and others losing none." Results from a survey of the association's 15,000 members are expected this month.

John Chapple, chairman of the London Beekeepers' Association, put losses among his 150 members at between a fifth and a quarter. Eight of his 36 hives across the capital did not survive. "There are still a lot of mysterious disappearances," he said. "We are no nearer to knowing what is causing them."

Bee farmers in Scotland have reported losses on the American scale for the past three years. Andrew Scarlett, a Perthshire-based bee farmer and honey packer, lost 80% of his 1,200 hives this winter. But he attributed the massive decline to a virulent bacterial infection that quickly spread because of a lack of bee inspectors, coupled with sustained poor weather that prevented honeybees from building up sufficient pollen and nectar stores.

The government's National Bee Unit has always denied the existence of CCD in Britain, despite honeybee losses of 20% during the winter of 2008-09 and close to a third the previous year. It attributes the demise to the varroa mite – which is found in almost every UK hive – and rainy summers that stop bees foraging for food.

In a hard-hitting report last year, the National Audit Office suggested that amateur beekeepers who failed to spot diseases in bees were a threat to honeybees' survival and called for the National Bee Unit to carry out more inspections and train more beekeepers. Last summer MPs on the influential cross-party public accounts committee called on the government to fund more research into what it called the "alarming" decline of honeybees.

The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has contributed £2.5m towards a £10m fund for research on pollinators. The public accounts committee has called for a significant proportion of this funding to be "ring-fenced" for honeybees. Decisions on which research projects to back are expected this month.

WHY BEES MATTER

Flowering plants require insects for pollination. The most effective is the honeybee, which pollinates 90 commercial crops worldwide. As well as most fruits and vegetables – including apples, oranges, strawberries, onions and carrots – they pollinate nuts, sunflowers and oil-seed rape. Coffee, soya beans, clovers – like alfafa, which is used for cattle feed – and even cotton are all dependent on honeybee pollination to increase yields.

In the UK alone, honeybee pollination is valued at £200m. Mankind has been managing and transporting bees for centuries to pollinate food and produce honey, nature's natural sweetener and antiseptic. Their extinction would mean not only a colourless, meatless diet of cereals and rice, and cottonless clothes, but a landscape without orchards, allotments and meadows of wildflowers – and the collapse of the food chain that sustains wild birds and animals.

Leaked report: Government fears Deepwater Horizon well could become unchecked gusher

'The following is not public' document states

"The following is not public," reads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Emergency Response document dated April 28. "Two additional release points were found today in the tangled riser. If the riser pipe deteriorates further, the flow could become unchecked resulting in a release volume an order of magnitude higher than previously thought."

Asked Friday to comment on the document, NOAA spokesman Scott Smullen said that the additional leaks described were reported to the public late Wednesday night. Regarding the possibility of the spill becoming an order of magnitude larger, Smullen said, "I'm letting the document you have speak for itself."

In scientific circles, an order of magnitude means something is 10 times larger. In this case, an order of magnitude higher would mean the volume of oil coming from the well could be 10 times higher than the 5,000 barrels a day coming out now. That would mean 50,000 barrels a day, or 2.1 million gallons a day. It appears the new leaks mentioned in the Wednesday release are the leaks reported to the public late Wednesday night.

"There is no official change in the volume released but the USCG is no longer stating that the release rate is 1,000 barrels a day," continues the document, referred to as report No. 12. "Instead they are saying that they are preparing for a worst-case release and bringing all assets to bear."

The emergency document also states that the spill has grown in size so quickly that only 1 to 2 percent of it has been sprayed with dispersants.

The Press-Register obtained the emergency report from a government official. The White House, NOAA, the Coast Guard and BP Plc did not immediately return calls for comment made early this morning.

The worst-case scenario for the broken and leaking well pouring oil into the Gulf of Mexico would be the loss of the wellhead and kinked piping currently restricting the flow to 5,000 barrels -- or 210,000 gallons -- per day.

If the wellhead is lost, oil could leave the well at a much greater rate.

"Typically, a very good well in the Gulf can produce 30,000 barrels a day, but that's under control. I have no idea what an uncontrolled release could be," said Stephen Sears, chairman of the petroleum engineering department at Louisiana State University.

On Thursday, federal officials said they were preparing for the worst-case scenario but didn't elaborate.

Kinks in the piping created as the rig sank to the seafloor may be all that is preventing the Deepwater Horizon well from releasing its maximum flow. BP is now drilling a relief well as the ultimate fix. The company said Thursday that process would take up to 3 months.

Gulf oil spill

See continuing coverage of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill of 2010 on al.com and GulfLive.com.

To keep track of the Gulf of Mexico oil slick, visit www.skytruth.org or follow its Twitter feed.

To see updated projection maps related to the oil spill in the Gulf, visit the Deepwater Horizon Response Web site established by government officials.

How to help: Volunteers eager to help cope with the spill and lessen its impact on the Gulf Coast environment and economy.

"I'm not sure what's happening down there right now. I have heard there is a kink in what's called the riser. The riser is a long pipe that connects the wellhead to the rig. I really don't know if that kink is a big restriction. Is that really a big restriction? There could be another restriction further down," said LSU's Sears.

"An analogy would be if you have a kink in a garden hose. You suspect that kink is restricting the flow, but there could be another restriction or kink somewhere else closer to the faucet.

BP Plc executive Doug Suttles said Thursday the company was worried about "erosion" of the pipe at the wellhead.

Sand is an integral part of the formations that hold oil under the Gulf. That sand, carried in the oil as it shoots through the piping, is blamed for the ongoing erosion described by BP.

"The pipe could disintegrate. You've got sand getting into the pipe, it's eroding the pipe all the time, like a sandblaster," said Ron Gouget, a former oil spill response coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Gouget said the loss of a wellhead is totally unprecedented.

"How bad it could get from that, you will have a tremendous volume of oil that is going to be offgassing on the coast. Depending on how much wind is there, and how those gases build up, that's a significant health concern," he said.

The formation that was being drilled by Deepwater Horizon when it exploded and sank last week is reported to have tens of millions of barrels of oil. A barrel contains 42 gallons.

Smullen described the NOAA document as a regular daily briefing. "Your report makes it sound pretty dire. It's a scenario," he said, "It's a regular daily briefing sheet that considered different scenarios much like any first responder would."

Common graphical tricks and the Medieval Warm Period

The Hockey Stick is a climate celebrity and skeptics have their own graphs that ‘show’ it is wrong. One of the most common is from the 1990 IPCC report, showing the Medieval Warm Period or MWP.


Figure 1 – IPCC First Assessment Report estimate of temperature changes in Europe from 900AD onwards.

This is how it appeared in Durkin’s The Great Global Warming Swindle:

Figure 2 – Shot of the same IPCC graph slightly modified to be shown in The Great Global Warming Swindle

The conclusions of most recent studies are that the MWP was on average cooler than today, but The Great Global Warming Swindle, blogs and industry think tanks say otherwise, often based on graphs like this. It appears to be modified from Lamb 1965:

The data is for central England and from 1680 it uses the 50 year average of the HadCET thermometer record. Thankfully, the HadCET record has carried on since that graph finishes (around 1920), so we can find where ‘NOW’ really is. In Figure 4 we have HadCET with 10 year averages (dotted line) and 50 year averages (solid line). We continue the 50yr line and find that it’s now about 0.35C warmer than Lamb’s last point. However, global warming only really kicked off around 1980, so we’ve still got 20 years of no global warming in the 50yr average and it seems pretty fair to take a look at something that would catch suspected global warming – like the 10 year average. This has risen by just over 1 °C since Lamb’s last measurement.

Figure 4 – HadCET data since 1680 reported as a 10 year running mean (dotted line) and as a 50 year running mean (solid line)

So when you see that graph with ‘NOW’ marked on the right hand side, they are telling you that the temperature now is the 50 year average centred on the 1920s. As someone living in the 2000s, you probably think that’s a bit silly. The temperatures of the 2000s would be the upper ‘NOW?’ on figure. The lower ‘NOW?’ is the latest 50yr average.

Figure 5 – Where are we now? The lower box and line is the latest 50 year average in HadCET to be consistent with the rest of the graph. This, however, misses much of the period thought to be associated with global warming. The the latest 10 year average captures this and is just off the chart.

The Great Global Warming Swindle and every other skeptical source that shows you this graph and claims it shows that the MWP was warmer than today is not giving you the full picture. They are showing you evidence that central England was warmer around 1200AD than it was around 1920. They are showing you that the last decade was warmer than any 50 year period on the graph including the MWP.

Many similar graphs are loved by skeptical sites, but this is a useful demonstration because it contains all 3 of the common ‘tricks to hide the incline’ of global warming. Firstly they change the temperature scale and/or hide the values. Next they pick a single region, and finally they either cut off or ignore instrumental evidence showing recent warming.

There appears to be plenty of evidence for some places being warmer than today in the MWP, and whilst most studies say that globally it wasn’t warmer it seems that scientists still want more data to be sure (and if it was warmer, that might suggest higher climate sensitivity). The important thing is being able to properly interpret the evidence that arrives – which involves spotting the misleading half-truths by the likes of Martin Durkin.

SIIT

Scientists call for research on climate link to geological hazards

Experts say suggestions that climate change could trigger more volcanoes and earthquakes are speculative, but there is enough evidence to take the threat seriously.

GUARDIAN

Scientists today called for wide-ranging research into whether more volcanoes, earthquakes, landslides and tsunamis could be triggered by rising global temperatures under global warming.

Significant warming of the atmosphere in the distant past can be linked to changes in geological activity, they say. Suggestions that climate change predicted for coming decades could bring similar changes remain speculative, but the scientists say there is enough evidence to take the threat seriously. Some experts have already linked current levels of global warming to rockfalls and landslides in mountain regions.

Richard Betts, a climate modeller at the Met Office Hadley Centre in Exeter, said: "This is a new area of academic research with potentially interesting implications. It was previously assumed there was no link at all between climate change and these events, but it is possible to speculate that climate change might make some more likely. If we do get large amounts of climate change in the long term then we might see some impacts."

He said there was no evidence that current levels of global warming were influencing events such as last week's earthquake in China that killed hundreds of people and the volcanic eruption in Iceland that grounded flights across Europe.

Experts say global warming could affect geological hazards such as earthquakes because of the way it can move large amounts of mass around on the Earth's surface. Melting glaciers and rising sea levels shift the distribution of huge amounts of water, which release and increase pressures through the ground.

These pressure changes could make ruptures and seismic shifts more likely. Research from Germany suggests that the Earth's crust can sometimes be so close to failure that tiny changes in surface pressure brought on my heavy rain can trigger quakes. Tropical storms, snowfall and shifting tides have all been linked to shifts in seismic activity.

Writing in a special series of scientific papers on the topic published today by the Royal Society, Bill McGuire, head of the Benfield Hazard Research Centre at University College London, says: "In relation to anthropogenic climate change, modelling studies and projection of current trends point towards increased risk in relation to a spectrum of geological and geomorphological hazards in a warmer world, while observations suggest that the ongoing rise in global average temperatures may already be eliciting a hazardous response from the geosphere."

He adds: "In order to improve knowledge and reduce uncertainty, a programme of focused research is advocated ... The IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] is also strongly exhorted to address more explicitly in future assessments the impact of anthropogenic climate change on the geosphere, together with its manifold potentially hazardous consequences."

The papers follow a special meeting on the subject last year and are published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A. They include studies of the likely impact of rising temperatures on events such as earthquakes and volcanoes, as well as whether the release of gas from undersea deposits called gas hydrates could trigger landslides and tsunamis.

McGuire says: "No increase in the global incidence of either volcanic activity or seismicity has been identified to date ... It may be the case that modulation of potentially hazardous geological processes due to anthropogenic climate change proves too small a signal to extract from the background noise of normal geophysical activity, at least in the short to medium term."

MIT Trains Viruses to Split Water, Make Stored Solar Power

Jason Mick (Blog) - April 14, 2010 9:09 AM

---

Print

E-mail

del.icio.us

27 comment(s) - last by jRaskell.. on Apr 15 at 10:03 AM

---

In nature zinc paraffins act as an antenna, capturing solar energy and transfering it to other complexes to split water. The viruses in the new MIT work grab zinc paraffins, like the one seen here, and use them to split water.  (Source: Molbank)

Research raises new hope for a hydrogen economy

One critical question facing proponents of a hydrogen economy, the term tossed around for a nation that's switched from fossil fuels to hydrogen fuel cells and hydrogen combustion engines, is how to produce the hydrogen.  Current schemes require either expensive catalysts or require a secondary power source such as solar power.  However, solar power doesn't come cheaply itself.

Researchers are racing to find a cheaper way to produce solar energy.  One of the top ideas is to borrow from nature's highly refined solar energy capture system found in plants.  Scientists at MIT are building on past work, which used naturally occurring chemicals from photosynthetic organisms to directly convert solar power to split water and create stored hydrogen gas.  The MIT researchers have upped the ante by creating a virus to automate the difficult assembly of the necessary chemicals.  This could eventually make biochemical solar cells a viable and less expensive alternative to traditional panel designs.

Angela Belcher, the Germeshausen Professor of Materials Science and Engineering and Biological Engineering, led a team which modified a common, harmless bacterial virus called M13 to attract and bind with molecules of a catalyst (the team used iridium oxide) and a biological pigment (zinc porphyrins).

The bound compounds turned the virus into a mini-antenna, similar to the molecules found in plants that are responsible for absorbing water.  Energy absorbed by the virus was able to very efficiently split water in to oxygen and hydrogen gases.

Left free, the viruses would clump together and stop efficiently processing water.  However, the researchers took the extra step of embedding them in a hydrogel to prevent clumping.

The key to this work is that the researchers used a virus to assemble them.  States Professor Belcher, "We use components people have used before, but we use biology to organize them for us, so you get better efficiency."

Thomas Mallouk, the DuPont Professor of Materials Chemistry and Physics at Pennsylvania State University comments on the study, "This is an extremely clever piece of work that addresses one of the most difficult problems in artificial photosynthesis, namely, the nanoscale organization of the components in order to control electron transfer rates."

The work from Belcher's team was published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

The next goal is to create a self-sustaining and durable prototype within the next two years.

With such a prototype, some day it might be possible to produce pigments in bacteria via viral infection, use the viruses in this study to assemble the pigments and finally add the catalyst, to form a quick, biologically produced, and efficient solar hydrogen production unit.

Allikas: http://www.dailytech.com/MIT+Trains+Viruses+to+Split+Water+Make+Stored+Solar+Power/article18119.htm

Global oil demand will hit a record high this year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Tuesday, revising up consumption estimates as the wo

The Paris-based adviser to industrialized economies raised its forecast for world oil demand growth this year to 1.67 million barrels per day (bpd), up 100,000 bpd.

The agency said in its monthly Oil Market Report that world oil demand would reach an average of 86.60 million bpd this year, up from 84.93 million in 2009.

The previous record high for world oil demand was 86.5 million bpd in 2007 before the onset of the global financial crisis and economic slowdown.

"There are signs of oil demand picking up in North America and the Pacific, Asia and the Middle East although consumption in Europe still looks weak," David Fyfe, head of the IEA's Oil Industry and Markets Division, told Reuters.

But the extra demand will largely be met by production from outside the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

The IEA raised its forecast for non-OPEC output in 2010 by 220,000 bpd to around 52.0 million bpd due to higher output by OECD countries. Overall, non-OPEC supply is expected to rise by around 500,000 bpd this year.

As a result, the IEA estimated demand this year for OPEC crude and stocks would fall by 200,000 bpd to 29.1 million bpd.

OPEC COMPLIANCE FALLS

Oil prices were largely steady after the IEA report, with benchmark U.S. crude oil futures for May trading around $83.63 per barrel, down 71 cents, by 6:06 a.m. ET.

The IEA noted that oil prices, which hit an 18-month high above $87 last week, had risen above the range of $60 to $80 per barrel that OPEC and many industrialized countries see as ideal for producers and consumers.

It said oil prices could stifle world economic growth if they were allowed to rise too far.

"Ultimately, things might turn messy for producers if $80-$100 per barrel is merely seen as the new $60-$80, stunting economic recovery while prompting resurgent non-oil and non-OPEC supply investment," the IEA report said.

Total OPEC production declined in March, the IEA said, but this was largely due to a fall in production by Iraq, which is not bound by OPEC output targets.

It said production by the 11 OPEC countries bound by OPEC output targets rose by 30,000 bpd, taking their compliance as a group with promised output cuts to around 55 percent at the end of March, down from its previous estimate of 56 percent at the end of February.

Oil stocks in industrialized countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) rose to around 60 days of forward demand at the end of February from about 59.5 days at the end of January, the IEA said.

The IEA said refineries around the world would process nearly 1 million bpd more oil in the second quarter than in the same period last year with China and Asian countries raising output most. This is up 300,000 bpd over the last estimate.

"The return of economic growth and hence oil demand growth is fuelling the increase," the report said.

China's refinery output will jump by 900,000 bpd from a year ago, helping to offset a fall of 440,000 bpd in OECD countries.