The U.S. Navy just announced the end of big oil and no one noticed

Navy researchers at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), Materials Science and Technology Division, demonstrate proof-of-concept of novel NRL technologies developed for the recovery of carbon dioxide (CO2) and hydrogen (H2) from seawater and conversion to a liquid hydrocarbon fuel.

From AddictingInfo

Announcing a major breakthrough, Navy researchers for the first time have converted seawater into CO2 and hydrogen, which could be used to produce jet fuel within a decade.

Surf’s up!
The Navy appears to have achieved the Holy Grail of energy independence – turning seawater into fuel:

After decades of experiments, U.S. Navy scientists believe they may have solved one of the world’s great challenges: how to turn seawater into fuel.
…
The new fuel is initially expected to cost around $3 to $6 per gallon, according to the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, which has already flown a model aircraft on it.

Curiously, this doesn’t seem to be making much of a splash (no pun intended) on the evening news. Let’s repeat this: The United States Navy has figured out how to turn seawater into fuel and it will cost about the same as gasoline.

This technology is in its infancy and it’s already this cheap?
What happens when it’s refined and perfected?
Oil is only getting more expensive as the easy-to-reach deposits are tapped so this truly is, as it’s being called, a “game changer.”

I expect the GOP to go ballistic over this and try to legislate it out of existence.
It’s a threat to their fossil fuel masters because it will cost them trillions in profits.
It’s also “green” technology and Republicans will despise it on those grounds alone.
They already have a track record of trying to do this.
Unfortunately, once this kind of genie is out of the bottle, it’s very hard to put back in.

The Navy fleet line, but could be doing so under steam of a new kind of fuel.

The Navy’s 289 vessels all rely on oil-based fuel,

with the exception of some aircraft carriers and 72 submarines that rely on nuclear propulsion.

There are two other aspects to this story that have not been brought up yet:

1. The process pulls carbon dioxide (the greenhouse gas driving Climate Change) out of the ocean. One of the less well-publicized aspects of Climate Change is that the ocean acts like a sponge for CO2 and it’s just about reached its safe limit. The ocean is steadily becoming more acidic from all of the increased carbon dioxide. This in turn poisons delicate ecosystems like coral reefs that keep the ocean healthy.
2. If we pull out massive amounts of CO2, even if we burn it again, not all of it will make it back into the water. Hell, we could even pull some of it and not use it in order to return the ocean to a sustainable level. That, in turn will help pull more of the excess CO2 out of the air even as we put it back. It would be the ultimate in recycling. This will devastate oil rich countries but it will get us the hell out of the Middle East (another reason Republicans will oppose this). Let’s be honest, we’re not in the Middle East for humanitarian reasons. We’re there for oil. Period. We spend trillions to secure our access to it and fight a “war” on terrorism. Take away our need to be there and, suddenly, justifying our overseas adventures gets a lot harder to sell.

And if we “leak” the technology?
Every dictator propped up by oil will tumble almost overnight.
Yes, it will be a bloody mess but we won’t be pissing away the lives of our military to keep scumbags in power.
Let those countries figure out who they want to be without billionaire thugs and their mercenary armies running the show.

Why this is not a huge major story mystifies me.
I’m curious to see how it all plays out so stay tuned.

A Navy fuel ship replenishes the the U.S.S. Mount Whitney (right) on the Mediterranean Sea in October 2013.

(U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Collin Turner/Released)

UPDATE:
People have been asking for more details about the process.
This is from the Naval Research Laboratory’s official press release:

Using an innovative and proprietary NRL electrolytic cation exchange module (E-CEM), both dissolved and bound CO2 are removed from seawater at 92 percent efficiency by re-equilibrating carbonate and bicarbonate to CO2 and simultaneously producing H2. The gases are then converted to liquid hydrocarbons by a metal catalyst in a reactor system.

In plain English, fuel is made from hydrocarbons (hydrogen and carbon).
This process pulls both hydrogen and carbon from seawater and recombines them to make fuel.
The process can be used on air as well but seawater holds about 140 times more carbon dioxide in it so it’s better suited for carbon collection.

Another detail people seem to be confused about: This is essentially a carbon neutral process.
The ocean is like a sponge for carbon dioxide in the air and currently has an excess amount dissolved in it.
The process pulls carbon dioxide out of the ocean.
It’s converted and burned as fuel.
This releases the carbon dioxide back into the air which is then reabsorbed by the ocean.
Rinse.
Repeat.

Links :

• AFP : US Navy 'game-changer': converting seawater into fuel
  

The Ark: Could Noah's tale be true?

From LiveScience

The new film "Noah" stars Russell Crowe as the man chosen by God to collect pairs of Earth's animals on a massive ark to save them from a global flood.
The film, which opened March 28, is sizing up to be a Biblical blockbuster, replete with star power and stunning special effects.
But how realistic is it?
While many people consider the story of Noah's Ark merely an instructive myth or parable about God's punishment for man's wickedness, others believe that the story is historically accurate.
To them, Noah's tale describes events that really happened only a few thousand years ago.

A plausible ark?

Henry Morris, author of "The Biblical Basis for Modern Science" (Baker House, 1984), a creationist text, states that "The ark was to be essentially a huge box designed essentially for stability in the waters of the Flood rather than for movement through the waters. ...
The ark was taller than a normal three-story building and about one and a half times as long as a football field.
The total volumetric capacity was equal to 1,396,000 cubic feet [39,500 cubic meters] ... equivalent to 522 standard railroad stock cars, far more than enough space to carry two of every known kind of animal, living or extinct."

The flaws in Morris's calculations become evident when you consider that, according to many creationists, Noah's Ark included hundreds of dinosaurs.
That would mean, for example, the brachiosaurus (two of them, of course), each of which weighed about 50 tons and reached 85 feet (26 meters) long.
Even if two representatives all of Earth's animals could somehow fit on the ark, enough space would be needed for drinking water and food for an entire year.

Furthermore, contrary to many depictions of the ark, God actually asked Noah to collect not one but seven pairs of "clean" animals and one pair of "unclean" animals (Genesis 7:2-3) — resulting, in some cases, in fourteen of many animals.
There simply would not be nearly enough space for all of them.

There's also the problem of collecting all those animals in the first place, anthropology professor Ken Feder notes in his book "The Encyclopedia of Dubious Archaeology" (Greenwood, 2010).
"How would koala bears from Australia, llamas from South America and penguins from Antarctica have managed the trip to the ark's location in the Middle East?" Feder writes.
"And how would their human caretakers have looked after this vast menagerie of animals? Noah, his wife, and his three sons and their wives (that's only eight people) providing food and water to the animals would have been an impossible task. What (or who) would the carnivores, living in close quarters with all those delicious herbivores, have eaten?"

Since the ark's purpose was merely to float (and not necessarily go anywhere), it would have had no means of propulsion (such as a sail) or even steering.
According to Morris, "As far as navigation was concerned, God Himself evidently steered the ship, keeping its occupants reasonably comfortable inside while the storms and waves raged outside."

Of course, this rather begs the question, because if God created the global flood and divinely steered the ark, then presumably He could have done any other miracle to assure the success of Noah's mission, from temporarily shrinking all the animals to the size of rats or even allowing them all to live for a year without food or water.
Once a supernatural miracle is invoked to explain one thing, it can be used to explain everything.

A closer look 

Another problem with the Ark story arises becausethere is no evidence for a global flood.
Creation stories from many different religions and cultures include flood stories, and Feder notes that if a worldwide flood had occurred, "The archaeological record of 5,000 years ago would be replete with Pompeii-style ruins — the remains of thousands of towns, villages and cities, all wiped out by flood waters, simultaneously. ...
It would appear that the near annihilation of the human race, if it happened, left no imprint on the archaeological record anywhere."

The lack of physical evidence of the great flood hasn't stopped modern believers from searching for Noah's Ark itself.
But the boat is conspicuously missing. It has never been found despite repeated claims to the contrary.
Forty years ago, Violet M. Cummings, author of "Noah's Ark: Fable or Fact?" (Creation-Science Research Center, 1973) claimed that the Ark had been found on Mount Ararat in Turkey, exactly as described in Genesis 8:4, which states, "and on the 17th day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat."

In February 1993, CBS aired a two-hour primetime special titled, "The Incredible Discovery of Noah's Ark."
It included the riveting testimony of a man who claimed not only to have personally seen the Ark on Ararat, but also to have recovered a piece of it.
The claims were later revealed to be a hoax.
In March 2006, researchers found a rock formation on Mount Ararat that resembled a huge ark, but nothing came of that claim.

A few months later, a team of archaeologists from a Christian organization found yet another rock formation that might be Noah's Ark — not on Mt. Ararat but instead in the Elburz Mountains of Iran. That sensational discovery fizzled out, too.
In 2012, "Baywatch" actress Donna D'Errico was injured on Mount Ararat while on a quest to find Noah's Ark.
She said she had been inspired to search for the Ark ever since she saw a movie about it as a child.

The fact that Noah's Ark has been "discovered" so many times yet remains lost is something of a mystery in itself.
Whether "Noah" floats or sinks at the box office this weekend, it notably doesn't include the tagline "Based on a true story."
 

Searching for monsters : Nazaré - Big Sunday

Nazaré - Big Sunday: As Big as it Gets! (02/02/2014)

Nazaré, Portugal was the spot on February 2nd, 2014

Challenge to Titanic sinking theory

This iceberg, with a red streak of paint along its side, may have been the one that sank RMS Titanic

The risk of sailing into an iceberg is far higher now that when the Titanic sank, a team of Earth systems scientists have said.

And it's only going to get worse.

From BBC by Paul Rincon

UK scientists have challenged the idea that the Titanic was unlucky for sailing in a year when there were an exceptional number of icebergs in the North Atlantic.

 The White Star Liner RMS Titanic, built by Harland & Wolff in Belfast, 4th February 1912, aided by four tugs preparing to leave for Southampton for her maiden voyage to New York on April 10th 1912

photo R. Welch

The ocean liner sank on its maiden voyage 102 years ago, with the loss of more than 1,500 lives.
The new analysis found the iceberg risk was high in 1912, but not extreme, as has previously been suggested.
The work by a University of Sheffield team appears in the journal Weather.
The iceberg which sank the Titanic was spotted just before midnight on 14 April 1912, some 500m away. Despite quick action to slow the ship and turn to port, it wasn't enough.
About 100m of the hull buckled below the waterline and the liner sank in just two-and-a-half hours.
Reports of unusually bad ice in the North Atlantic started to emerge shortly after the disaster.
At the time, US officials told the New York Times that a warm winter had caused "an enormously large crop of icebergs".
In the days leading up to that fateful night, the prevailing winds and temperatures, assisted by ocean currents, had conspired to transport icebergs and sea-ice further south than was normal at that time of year.

 The iceberg which sank the Titanic was spotted just before midnight on 14 April 1912 and was 1,640ft (500m) away.

Pictured is one possible path taken by the iceberg that sank Titanic over 100 years ago

All this has led researchers to seek explanations for a supposedly awesome flotilla of ice in the North Atlantic.
One US group has proposed that an unusually close approach to Earth by the Moon caused abnormally high tides in the winter of 1912, which in turn encouraged a greater than usual amount of ice to break off Greenland's glaciers.

In the latest study, Grant Bigg and David Wilton from Sheffield University's department of geography studied data collected by the US Coast Guard and extending back to 1900.

Observational techniques have changed over the years, complicating comparisons.
But the researchers say that a good measure of the volume of icebergs is given by the number that passed the circle of latitude at 48 degrees North, across an area of ocean stretching from Newfoundland to about 40 degrees West.
They found that the record showed great variation in the volume of ice from year to year.
And although the iceberg flux from Greenland in 1912 was indeed high, with 1,038 icebergs observed crossing the 48th parallel, this number was neither unusual nor unprecedented.
In the surrounding decades, from 1901-1920, there were five years with at least 700 icebergs crossing 48 degrees North.
And the coast guard record shows there was a larger flux of icebergs in 1909 than in 1912.

Prof Bigg told BBC News the flux was at the "large end" but "not outstandingly large" for the first 60-70 years of the 20th Century.
Using the coast guard record and other data, the researchers also developed a computer simulation to examine the likely trajectories of icebergs in 1912.
Using this model, they were able to trace the likely origin of the iceberg that sank the Titanic to southwest Greenland.
They suggest that it broke off a glacier in that area in early autumn 1911 and started off as a floating hunk measuring roughly 500m long and 300m deep.
Its mass by mid-April 1912 - as predicted by the computer model - agrees very closely with the size of an iceberg bearing a streak of red paint that was photographed by Captain William Squares DeCarteret of the Minia, a ship that joined the search for bodies and wreckage at the site of the disaster.

Links :

• DailyMail : Titanic theory put on ice: Icebergs were not at dangerously high levels in 1912 - but they ARE today
• Forbes : Revealed: The Origin Of The Titanic's Iceberg
• GeoGraage blog : Titanic threat: why do ships still hit icebergs?

Hōkūle‘a: The dangers of sailing around the world

Over 1,000 years ago, the islands of Polynesia were explored and settled by navigators who used only the waves, the stars, and the flights of birds for guidance.

In hand-built, double-hulled canoes sixty feet long, the ancestors of today's Polynesians sailed across a vast ocean area, larger than Europe and North America combined.
To explore this ancient navigational heritage, anthropologist/filmmaker Sanford Low visited the tiny coral atoll of Satawal in Micronesia's remote Caroline Islands.

The Navigators reveals the subtleties of this sea science, transmitted in part through a ceremony known as "unfolding the mat," in which 32 lumps of coral are arranged in a circle to represent the points of the "star compass."

To master the lore of navigation was to attain great status in traditional Micronesian society. 

From National Geographic by Daniel Lin

For the past few months, I have been writing entries about the Polynesian Voyaging Society’s incredible Worldwide Voyage (WWV): a five-year journey to sail around the world aboard two Polynesian voyaging canoes, using non-instrument navigation.

The first year of the voyage was spent sailing around the Hawaiian Islands and in less than two months, the canoes will leave their home and begin the international portion of the voyage.

 Crewmember Attwood Makanani, or “Uncle Maka”,

handling some line at the edge of the bow while Hōkūleʻa passes through a squall in Kualoa.

(Photo by Kaipo Kīʻaha)

Why Take the Risk?

When people hear about the WWV, a question often arises around the risks involved with this 47,000-nautical-mile voyage.
Certainly, it goes without saying that a voyage of this nature is not always going to be idyllic or smooth.
But Pacific Island people have spearheaded these long-distance, open-ocean voyages of discovery for thousands of years.
Today, the Polynesian Voyaging Society believes that: “the Worldwide Voyage is a journey that charts a new course toward sustainability that Hawai’i and the world urgently need.”

 Sunshine after the rain.

Crewmember Haunani Kane holds on as Hōkūle‘a gets close to land.

(Photo by Daniel Lin)

For us, the opportunity to inspire current and future generations of leaders to care for the Earth–through outreach, education, science, and storytelling–far outweighs any risks.
Master Navigator and PVS President, Nainoa Thompson, puts it best when he says: “if you come from the lens of what the canoe is supposed to do … it will do nothing if we’re tied to the dock.”

Hōkūle‘a’s Worldwide Voyage: Island Wisdom, Ocean Connections, Global Lessons from Hōkūle‘a Crew

Safety Training

Like during any voyage–sea, land, or air–weather is always one of the major considerations for traditional captains and navigators.

For this reason, crewmembers undergo rigorous training around personal safety and foul weather situations.

Hōkūle’a has traveled over 140,000 miles in the Pacific Ocean over her forty-year history of voyaging, enough miles to circle the world over five times.

Thompson says that the crew preparations and safety training were carefully planned based on past experience.

“With the Worldwide Voyage, we are more prepared than we have ever been on any previous journey,” he adds.

 Micronesian Stick Chart of the Marshall Islands with island key

and overlaid on Google Earth for scale / context

Sail Planning

In addition to rigorous crew training, perhaps the best ways to prevent encounters with challenges during the voyage is through thorough research and meticulous planning.

For example, the sail plan for the WWV is dictated almost entirely by weather, specifically with regards to avoiding hurricane and cyclone seasons.

The leaders of PVS have put a great deal of effort into understanding the weather patterns of the world with guidance and input from scientists, meteorologists, and other sailors.

 Just because the crew doesn’t use a compass, that doesn’t mean they don’t take rain gear.

(Photo by Sam Low)

In addition the normal preparations for voyaging, PVS must now pay careful attention to new issues associated with new regions of the world.

Although Hōkūle‘a has logged an incredible amount of miles over her storied lifetime, all of her voyages have taken place in the familiar waters of the Pacific Ocean.

The opportunity to sail across new oceans is exciting, but it also makes the planning process even more critical.

By carefully planning and timing each leg of the voyage, Captains ensure that their crews and vessels have the best chance for a smooth sail.

Sailing On

Over the next three years of this monumental voyage, there will inevitably be challenges that test the physical and mental fortitude of the crew.

 Hōkūle‘a crew looking towards the western horizon.

We sail with the hope for a more sustainable future for our Island Earth.

(Photo by Daniel Lin)

However, the PVS family, or ‘Ohana wa’a, know from experience that even the roughest storms will pass.

What we must do is to continue to prepare, train, believe in the mission, trust in each other, and sail on.

Links :

• GeoGarage blog : Polynesian navigators revive a skill that was nearly lost