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A Pathway to Responsible Mining in Indian Country 11/09/2023

A Pathway to Responsible Mining in Indian Country

Payne Institute Program Managers Rick Tallman and Brad Handler, Director Morgan Bazilian and Daniel Cardenas write about how the demand for minerals critical to both the energy transition and U.S. national security is growing rapidly. At the same time, the reliability of the global supply chain is being challenged by geopolitical events. The result is a growing call to bring more mining for these critical minerals back to the United States, where the vast majority of critical mineral reserves are located on or within 35 miles of Native American reservations.  November 9, 2023.

Tabares-Velasco awarded two DOE grants for work toward energy efficiency at any income level 11/7/2023

Tabares-Velasco awarded two DOE grants for work toward energy efficiency at any income level

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Paulo Tabares-Velasco is featured in this article about receiving funding from the DOE Buildings Energy Efficiency Frontiers & Innovation Technologies (BENEFIT) program, for two projects specifically aimed at making energy efficiency, electrification and resiliency possibility for communities in Colorado: a home battery energy storage system for retrofitted housing in in Colorado and a new heat pump water heater with latent heat storage in low-income housing.  November 7, 2023.

How greater energy ambition can rescue COP28 11/7/2023

How greater energy ambition can rescue COP28

Ashvin Dayal, Andrew Herscowitz, and Payne Institute Fellow Todd Moss write about how we need an unambiguous agreement that everyone on the planet deserves abundant energy.  While higher energy consumption might sound counterproductive to climate goals, the two things can – in fact, must – coexist.  At the COP28 Summit later this year, world leaders must commit to a new Modern Energy Minimum of 1,000 kilowatt-hours per person per year.  November 7, 2023.

Measurement-based differentiation of low-emission global natural gas supply chains 11/2/2023

Measurement-based differentiation of low-emission global natural gas supply chains

Payne Institute Fellow Arvind P. Ravikumar, Erin E. Tullos, David T. Allen, Ben Cahill, Steven P. Hamburg, Daniel Zimmerle, Thomas A. Fox, Manfredi Caltagirone, Lara Owens, Robert Stout, Andrew J. Grimes, Tania M. Fernandez, Carrie Jenks, Riley Duren, Antoine Halff, Payne Institute Director Morgan D. Bazilian, and Stefanie Rucker write about how a differentiated natural gas market is emerging as a key mechanism to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across global natural gas supply chains. Trust in such voluntary markets across civil society, industry and governments depends on a transparent framework for reporting independently verifiable and accurate emissions data.  November 2, 2023.

‘Lunar gold rush’: NASA wants to mine the moon 11/1/2023

‘Lunar gold rush’: NASA wants to mine the moon

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Angel Abbud-Madrid contributes to this article about how mining the moon isn’t just fodder for the movies.  Scientists at NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey are using their Earthly expertise to identify and catalog resources on the celestial body to look for valuable materials — from minerals and crushed rock that can be used to make dwellings and equipment, to ice that can be turned into drinking water and even rocket fuel.  November 1, 2023.

Colleges and companies collaborate to study PFAS soil purification methods at Schriever SFB 11/1/2023

Colleges and companies collaborate to study PFAS soil purification methods at Schriever SFB

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Chris Higgins contributes to this article about how a team of scientists at the Colorado School of Mines alongside other major universities will be testing out soil purification technologies at Schriever Space Force Base.  It’s an international effort to defeat what is commonly known as “Forever Chemicals.”  The three universities and five companies, both foreign and domestic, are testing technologies to get these chemicals out of soils. The work is funded by the Department of Defense.  November 1, 2023.

Critical mineral demand estimates for low-carbon technologies: What do they tell us and how can they evolve? 10/31/2023

Critical mineral demand estimates for low-carbon technologies: What do they tell us and how can they evolve?

Mines Student Researcher Jordy Lee Calderon, Faculty Fellows Nicole Smith and Elizabeth Holley, and Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian write about how the transition to low-carbon energy systems will increase demand for a range of critical minerals and metals. As a result, several quantitative demand models have been developed to help understand the projected scale of growth and if, and to what extent, material shortages may become an obstacle to the deployment of clean energy technologies. October 31, 2023.

GUEST CONTRIBUTOR Circumventing the Chokepoint: Can the US Produce More Rare Earths? 10/30/2023

Circumventing the Chokepoint: Can the US Produce More Rare Earths?

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian and Gregory Wischer write about China’s dominance in the production of heavy rare earths affords it leverage over US national security and economic prosperity. To reduce this vulnerability, the US government has sought to increase domestic rare production, but to limited effect. To better encourage private sector investment in American rare earth projects, the industry’s high barriers to entry—including capital costs, technical challenges, and an incumbent oligopoly—must be addressed.  October 30, 2023.

VCMs’ other fragmentation problem 10/27/2023

VCMs’ other fragmentation problem

Payne Institute Sustainable Finance Manager Brad Handler writes about how in mid-October, he had the opportunity to attend and present at the biannual World Investment Forum (WIF), sponsored by the UN Conference on Trade and Development. The WIF’s goal is to spur more sustainable development investment in low- and middle-income economies. The agenda included full-throated support for voluntary carbon markets (VCMs), to lure capital towards the energy transition and to help countries meet decarbonisation commitments set out under their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).  October 27, 2023.

GOVERNMENTS’ RECENT STEPS TO ADVANCE CLIMATE IMPACT; SELECT WORLD INVESTMENT FORUM HIGHLIGHTS 10/25/2023

GOVERNMENTS’ RECENT STEPS TO ADVANCE CLIMATE IMPACT; SELECT WORLD INVESTMENT FORUM HIGHLIGHTS

Payne Institute Sustainable Finance Lab Program Manager Brad Handler writes about the 8th World Investment Forum focused on spurring sustainable development across low and middle income economies. The challenges loomed large, as speakers noted that not only were absolute spending levels far short of what was needed to be “on track” to meet energy transition and SDG targets, but that recent spending in the developing world was far too concentrated in select economies.  October 25, 2023.

America’s Trade War With China Spills Into Clean Energy 10/24/2023

America’s Trade War With China Spills Into Clean Energy

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian contributes to this article about how what began as a dispute over world-leading computer chips is now rocking the auto and clean energy industries. The new restrictions show that America and China’s growing trade battle over “dual-use technologies” — tools and materials that can be used by both civilians and the military — is proving difficult to contain. What began as a dispute over world-leading computer chips is now rocking the auto and clean energy industries.  October 24, 2023.  

Things Are Looking Up for Asteroid Mining 10/20/2023

Things Are Looking Up for Asteroid Mining

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Ian Lange contributed to this article about how asteroids are rich with the metals used in clean energy technologies. As demand soars, advocates argue that mining them in space might be better than mining them on Earth. While some companies are exploring the controversial idea of scooping cobalt, nickel, and platinum from the seafloor, some asteroids could harbor the same minerals in abundance—and have no wildlife that could be harmed during their extraction.  October 20, 2023.

China limits exports of graphite, a key mineral for EV batteries 10/20/2023

China limits exports of graphite, a key mineral for EV batteries

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian is featured on this podcast about how China said Friday that it would start requiring stricter permits on exports of graphite, a key mineral component of pencils, but perhaps more importantly, a key mineral component of electric vehicle batteries.  It’s the latest development in a China-U.S. trade war that’s making the transition to a green economy more expensive.  October 20, 2023.

Are PFAS really ‘forever chemicals’? It’s complicated. Here’s what to know 10/19/2023

Are PFAS really ‘forever chemicals’? It’s complicated. Here’s what to know

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Christopher Higgins contributed to this article about how for the past five years, public awareness around PFAS, or “forever chemicals,” has been growing in the U.S.  A growing body of evidence has shown that long-term exposure, even to low traces of these chemicals, can cause severe health issues that include cancer, developmental effects and reproductive disorders.  October 19, 2023.

TAKING THE FIGHT TO FOREVER CHEMICALS 10/16/2023

TAKING THE FIGHT TO FOREVER CHEMICALS

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Chris Higgins is featured in an article about how Mines launched a broad-based research initiative earlier this year to advance scientific understanding of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFASs, and develop practical engineering solutions to address these so-called “forever chemicals,” one of the largest-scale environmental and public health challenges facing the U.S. today. October 16, 2023

SHAPING THE NEXT TECHNOLOGICAL LANDSCAPE 10/16/2023

SHAPING THE NEXT TECHNOLOGICAL LANDSCAPE

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Sebnem Düzgün is featured in an article about how the world is now in the midst of the Fourth Industrial Revolution: a cyber-physical expansion that is, according to the World Economic Forum, “blurring the lines between the physical, digital and biological spheres.” October 16, 2023

Gaza Power Outage Observed From Space NOAA Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Day / Night Band 10/12/2023

Gaza Power Outage Observed From Space – NOAA Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Day/Night Band

Payne Institute Earth Observation Group observed using changes using their satellite VIIRS programming suite in the lighting during the ongoing conflict covering Gaza, the West Bank and much of Israel spanning August 1, 2023, to October 11, 2023.  There are controls on the bottom of the image to advance the frames one by one, to stream the temporal loop and to adjust the speed of the looping. The loop shows that lighting in Gaza is dimmer than the lighting in Israel.  The influence of clouds can be seen in blocking and blurring the detection of lights.  During the full moon reflectance is detected from the land surface outside the lit areas.  The lights in Gaza are absent on October 8 and 9 and are abnormally dim on October 10, 2023.  October 12. 2023.

Modular Carbon Capture and The Inflation Reduction Act 10/12/2023

Modular Carbon Capture and The Inflation Reduction Act

Payne Institute Program Manager Anna Littlefield writes about how as the field of carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) continues to evolve, the importance of modular carbon capture technologies has become increasingly apparent. August of 2023 marked the one-year anniversary of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) being signed into law, and its potential to incentivize smaller-scale capture systems is manifesting in modular capture innovation. October 12, 2023.