Category Environment/Geology

The mushroom cloud produced by the first explosion by the Americans of a hydrogen bomb at Eniwetok Atoll in the South Pacific.

The human impact on Earth’s chemistry and climate has cut short the 11,700-year-old geological epoch known as the Holocene and ushered in a new one, scientists said Monday. The Anthropocene, or “new age of man,” would start from the mid-20th century if their recommendation – submitted Monday to the International Geological Congress in Cape Town – is adopted. “Our working model is that the optimal boundary is the mid-20th century,” said Jan Zalasiewicz, a geologist at the University of Leicester. “If adopted – and we’re a long way from that – the Holocene would finish and the Anthropocene would formally be held to have begun.”

Scientists refer to the period starting...

The zinc-ion battery could help enable communities move into production of renewable solar and wind energy. Credit: Shutterstock/University of Waterloo

Chemists at the University of Waterloo have developed a long-lasting zinc-ion battery that costs half the price of current lithium-ion batteries and could help enable communities to shift away from traditional power plants and into renewable solar and wind energy production. The battery uses safe, non-flammable, non-toxic materials and a pH-neutral, water-based salt. It consists of a water-based electrolyte, a pillared vanadium oxide + electrode and an inexpensive metallic Zn – electrode...

Converting greenhouse gas emissions into energy-rich fuel using nano silicon (Si) in a carbon-neutral carbon-cycle is illustrated. Credit: Chenxi Qian

Saving the planet from climate change with a grain of sand. Every year, humans advance climate change and global warming – and quite likely our own eventual extinction – by injecting about 30 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. A team of scientists from the University of Toronto (U of T) believes they’ve found a way to convert all these emissions into energy-rich fuel in a carbon-neutral cycle that uses a very abundant natural resource: silicon, the 7th most-abundant element in the universe and the 2nd most-abundant element in the earth’s crust.

The idea of converting carbon dioxide emissions to energy isn’t new: there’s be...

The Jason series of U.S./European satellites can measure the height of the ocean surface. (Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

The amount of sea level rise in the Pacific Ocean can be used to estimate future global surface temperatures, according to a new report led by University of Arizona geoscientists. Based on the Pacific Ocean’s sea level in 2015, the team estimates by the end of 2016 the world’s average surface temperature will increase up to 0.5 F (0.28 C) more than in 2014. In 2015 alone, the average global surface temperature increased by 0.32 F (0.18 C). “Our prediction is through the end of 2016,” said first author Cheryl Peyser. “The prediction is looking on target so far.”

Scientists knew that both the rate at which global surface temperature is rising and sea level in the western Pacifi...