WHAT A WONDERFUL GREEN WORLD Improving our climate

Nuclear power is the only large-scale clean-energy-producing technology – meaning it does not release greenhouse gases, and also takes full responsibility for its waste. Researchers from the University of Saskatchewan use a range of CLS techniques to sequester and clean up nuclear waste. As governments move towards cleaner nuclear energy sources as a replacement for fossil fuels, understanding the best way to deal with their waste products is a high priority. Using CLS data, the research team is able to identify long-term, sustainable solutions to nuclear waste, helping work towards a cleaner future. DOI: 10.1016/j.jallcom.2013.02.152

Long-term nuclear cleanup

Airplanes and climate change

According to Transport Canada, in 2013 domestic aviation accounted for 4.5 per

cent of transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions. The long vapour trails that follow an aircraft’s exhaust are one of the

largest sources of uncertainty in climate models, but a nanoscale look at their

structure provides new insight into global environmental processes. Condensation

trails, more commonly known as contrails, follow aircraft as water condenses into ice crystals around engine soot. Aix-Marseille

Université researchers have revealed the unusual structure of aircraft soot that helps explain how contrails contribute to climate

change, especially improving models of light scattering in the atmosphere. Understanding

properties of matter at the molecular level will help us understand environmental

effects at the global scale of our planet.DOI: 10.1016/j.carbon.2016.01.040

Canadian crop and grazing land could store up to about 25 million tonnes of atmospheric CO2 every year, making soil one of the most important active carbon sinks in the country. Because of soil’s capacity to store and cycle carbon, it plays a key role in climate change. However, as land use changes with climate change, so might soil’s capacity to store CO2. Researchers from the CLS analyzed soils from fields, grasslands and forests across Saskatchewan and found remarkable similarities across all types. Overall, their analysis revealed greater differences based on soil depth than on location. The data helps predict how climate changes might affect the quality and uses of soils over time, and to prepare for those changes. DOI:10.1016/j.geoderma.2015.04.007

Climate change and Saskatchewan soil

hfossmark

While corn is a common source for the sugars necessary to create biodiesels, it is not the only option, nor the cheapest. Saskatchewan

is the world’s largest canola producer. Green seed canola oil is a great, inexpensive alternative option to corn. Given the abundance of canola

available in Saskatchewan, using raw green canola as a fuel source could be a lucrative match. To prepare the oil for biofuel processing

without chemically shifting the canola oil too significantly, researchers from the University of Saskatchewan tested catalysts for their ability to

produce biofuels cleanly and efficiently. DOI: 10.1016/j.apcata.2013.09.034

From green canola to green fuel

skeeze

Biofuels provide an important, lower-emissions renewable alternative to fossil fuels. One major challenge facing the industry is harnessing biomass sources that don’t cut into the food supply, as global food needs continue to increase. Grasses with high growth rates, such as Reed canary grass (RCG), can help fill this need. Researchers from Sweden and Canada tested RCG at high temperatures and low oxygen levels to investigate how it produces biofuel. They now have a better understanding of the chemical changes that take place during the conversion and have learned more about how the grass breaks down focusing on calcium and carbon, which may contribute to the creation of aerosol pollutants.

DOI:10.1016/j.fuel.2015.11.037

Biofuels that don’t cut into the food supply

Berkeley Lab

Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Arpingstone

Agriculture is the main source of income and employment for the 70 per cent of the world’s poor living in rural areas. In developing countries, agricultural byproducts can

be a source of serious environmental pollution. By recycling these byproducts into soils, potential pollutants can become sources of valuable nutrients, especially in tropical

countries where a lack of important plant nutrients like phosphates is one of the major soil-related reasons for low per capita food production. A research team from Germany

has shown that byproducts of several crops, including coffee and sugar cane, are sources of agriculturally useful phosphorus that could be applied to soils.

DOI: 10.1021/es902963c

Recycling agricultural byproducts

Johanan Ottensooser

The atmosphere of the earth is about 78 per cent nitrogen, making nitrogen a potential abundant and renewable fuel source. Under pressures millions of times stronger than the atmosphere at sea level, regular nitrogen from the air can hold five times as much energy as the most powerful explosives. A University of Ottawa team is using the CLS to probe the strange chemistry and physics of nitrogen solids under super high pressure to understand how to stabilize this ultra-energetic material at room temperature so it could be harnessed as a clean fuel. DOI: 10.1063/1.4902984

A fuel source from the air around us

Evan Forester Victoria Martinez

According to Natural Resources Canada, renewable energy sources currently provide about 18.9 per cent of Canada’s total primary energy supply. Plant materials are one of the oldest renewable energy sources, and today scientists are working to produce ultra-clean premium fuels from plants. Producing synthetic gas, or syngas, from plant biomass is a relatively straightforward process, but the process often leaves behind impurities such as ammonia, chlorine, and sulfur compounds, which make it harder to transform the gas into usable fuel. By pinpointing the threshold at which each chemical impurity blocks efficient conversion to usable fuel, researchers from University of Kentucky, Wichita State University and the CLS hope to improve the clean fuel production process. The CLS is one of only a few facilities that can access the right energy ranges to study these chemicals and their effects on catalysts, making it an important tool. DOI: 10.1016/j.jcat.2015.04.004

From plant matter to jet fuel

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