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Why New Tech is Key for EPA Methane Rule Compliance 7/2/2024

Why New Tech is Key for EPA Methane Rule Compliance

Payne Institute Fellow Arvind Ravikumar is featured on this podcast discussing how the EPA’s methane rules for the oil and gas industry will depend on new technologies to monitor and verify climate impacts. For the new rules to be effective, emissions will need to be measured across vast and geographically dispersed oil and gas infrastructure. July 2, 2024.

Mines-developed molecule improves performance of perovskite solar cells 7/1/2024

Mines-developed molecule improves performance of perovskite solar cells

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Alan Sellinger is featured in this article about how a new molecule, called EtCz3EPA, was designed, and synthesized by his research group.  The molecule, which forms stronger bonds within the solar cells, enhancing the connection between different parts of the cells. In doing so, the molecule increases the cell’s stability and efficiency – even when exposed to UV radiation and tested outdoors.  July 1, 2024.

Why Is China Stockpiling Key Resources? 6/28/24

Why Is China Stockpiling Key Resources?

Payne Institute Fellow Gregory Wischer is highlighted in an article about a question that prompted a hearing this month by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a government-funded organization that follows the relationship between the United States and China.  Is China preparing to invade Taiwan, or just flexing its muscles to attract attention? “The Chinese central government stockpiling minerals is one potential indicator that it may be preparing to invade Taiwan,”  ​Gregory Wischer of Dei Gratia Minerals told the Commission in a prepared statement. June 28, 2024.

US Stockpiles of the Rare Earth Minerals 6/27/2024

US Stockpiles of the Rare Earth Minerals

Payne Institute Fellow Gregory Wischer contributes to an article about how he suspects national stockpile levels are well below where they should be given the available information.  Rare earth minerals are needed to make all sorts of things, from F-35 stealth fighters and night-vision goggles to internet fiber-optic cables and MRI machines and suspects national stockpile levels are well below where they should be given the available information. June 27, 2024.

Will Congo move up the battery supply chain? 6/26/2024

Will Congo move up the battery supply chain? Strategic capitalism, friendshoring, and localized manufacturing in the time of the green transition

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Raphael Deberdt writes about how in recent years, countries where extraction of so-called green minerals occur have increasingly asserted themselves. Negatively dubbed as resources nationalism, these political decisions are more akin to a willingness to increase in-country value added for regions often suffering from centuries of colonial extractivism. In the battery sector, these strategies led to cobalt, lithium, and nickel producers aiming to develop local manufacturing of battery components. June 26, 2024.

Statistical Review of World Energy 6/26/2024

Statistical Review of World Energy

The Payne Institute Earth Observation Group provided the data for global gas flaring based on our satellite data algorithms for the Energy Institute Statistical Review of World Energy.  The Energy Institute Statistical Review of World Energy analyses data on world energy markets from the prior year. Previously produced by bp, the Review has been providing timely, comprehensive and objective data to the energy community since 1952.  June 26, 2024.

Comparable to Germany before World War II? China’s strategic metal reserves have attracted attention, especially copper and cobalt 6/20/2024

Comparable to Germany before World War II? China’s strategic metal reserves have attracted attention, especially copper and cobalt

Payne Institute Communications Associate Greg Wischer contributes to this article about how China’s control and reserves of key mineral resources such as rare earths, lithium, copper (Copper) and cobalt (Cobalt) have increasingly attracted the attention of the United States and the West. In addition to worries about being too dependent on China for key minerals, China’s control and reserves of key minerals also make the United States and the West worried that China is preparing for a potential war.  June 20, 2024.

Fostering Effective Energy Transition Report 2024 6/19/2024

Fostering Effective Energy Transition Report

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian and Advisory Board Member David Victor contribute to the report which looks at the Energy Transition Index (ETI), which benchmarks 120 countries on their current energy system performance and on the readiness of their enabling environment, finds that while there has been notable progress in energy efficiency and a marked increase in the adoption of clean energy sources, energy transition momentum has been held back by setbacks in energy equity, driven by rising energy prices in recent years. Energy security also continues to be tested by geopolitical risks.  June 19, 2024.

A new report says worldwide oil demand will peak in 2029. Some oil industry observers are skeptical. 6/13/2024

A new report says worldwide oil demand will peak in 2029. Some oil industry observers are skeptical.

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian is featured on this podcast discussing recent IEA and OPEC analysis on global oil markets and trends.  A new report from the International Energy Agency indicates that global oil demand will peak before the end of the decade.  However, OPEC, by contrast, predicts the peak won’t come until 2045.  So which one’s estimate is more likely to be right?  June 13, 2024.

Hearing on “China’s Stockpiling and Mobilization Measures for Competition and Conflict” 6/13/2024

Hearing on “China’s Stockpiling and Mobilization Measures for Competition and Conflict”

Payne Institute Fellow Gregory Wischer writes a Statement for the Record submitted to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission about why the Chinese central government stockpiling minerals is one potential indicator that they may be preparing to invade Taiwan. The National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration oversees China’s stockpile, which reportedly contains large volumes of minerals like aluminum, cobalt, and copper. June 13, 2024.

CRITICAL MINERAL FUTURES MARKETS: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION 6/9/2024

CRITICAL MINERAL FUTURES MARKETS: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION

Payne Institute Student Researcher Gabe Collins wrote this article about how the rise in demand for critical minerals begs the question of how to develop effective market-based pricing signals that encourage new supplies. Futures markets for many critical minerals are non-existent; those that do exist like lithium and cobalt, however, remain relatively small and less liquid in the U.S. compared to other commodity markets.  Efficient pricing mechanisms support long-run decisions in allocating capital through price discovery and transparency.  June 9, 2024.

A Canadian case study of carbon dioxide removals and negative emission hydrogen production 6/4/2024

A Canadian case study of carbon dioxide removals and negative emission hydrogen production

Payne Institute Fellow William Nuttall and Ian MacGregor give an expert perspective on a new Nature-Based Solution to contemporary problems in energy and climate policy. The paper presents an emergent industrial proposition which combines Canadian forestry technology with chemical engineering capabilities developed by the oil and gas industry.  June 4, 2024.

A Critical Mineral Trade War Is Brewing 6/4/2024

A Critical Mineral Trade War Is Brewing

Payne Institute Communications Associate Gregory Wischer and Director Morgan Bazilian write about how China and the United States have fired their opening salvos in a critical minerals trade war.  In all likelihood, this critical mineral trade war will intensify, with corresponding implications for U.S. industries that use these raw materials.  June 4, 2024.

The West needs to produce more critical minerals. Here’s how the Pentagon should help 5/30/2024

The West needs to produce more critical minerals. Here’s how the Pentagon should help

Payne Institute Director Morgan Bazilian and Communications Associate Greg Wischer write about how Western governments are seeking to build more mines and refineries for critical minerals, given their necessity in not only clean energy technologies like electric vehicle batteries but also defense applications like hypersonic glide vehicles.  But beyond capital challenges (and local opposition), the West’s paucity of mines and refineries faces structural realities: geology and technology.   May 30, 2024.

Mining Is Mired in Regulatory Delays. That’s Now a Climate Problem. 5/30/2024

Mining Is Mired in Regulatory Delays. That’s Now a Climate Problem.

Payne Institute Policy and Outreach Advisor Simon Lomax, Deputy Director Greg Clough, and Director Morgan Bazilian write an commentary looking at how Washington, D.C. continues to wrestle with the subject of NEPA reform, there are some pragmatic steps the federal government can take to accelerate the production of critical and strategic minerals in the United States. They examine how to make progress quickly as the wider NEPA reform debate plays out.  May 30, 2024.

Lori Tunstall wins NSF CAREER Award for research on concrete sustainability and durability 5/29/2024

Lori Tunstall wins NSF CAREER Award for research on concrete sustainability and durability

Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Lori Tunstall is featured in this article has received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award for her work on improving concrete durability with a focus on sustainability.  The research aims to create methods for concrete that lasts long enough to offset carbon footprint from production.  May 29, 2024.  

More Reporting Clarity Can Help Fund U.S. Lithium Growth 5/29/2024

More Reporting Clarity Can Help Fund U.S. Lithium Growth

Colorado School of Mines’ Mineral & Energy Economics Master candidate Reese Epper, SFL Program Manager Brad Handler and Payne Institute Faculty Fellow Ian Lange discuss the role of recent SEC reporting changes in fostering more investment in Lithium extraction, including using Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) techniques.   May 29, 2024.