Emissions

Researchers at MIT have found that cement and carbon black can be combined with water to create a battery alternative, reports Robert Service for Science. Professor Franz-Josef Ulm and his colleagues “mixed a small percent of carbon black with cement powder and added water,” explains Service. “The water readily combines with the cement. But because the particles of carbon black repel water, they tend to clump together, forming long interconnected tendrils within the hardening cement that act like a network of wires.”

Merritt Jenkins MBA '21 co-founded Kodama Systems, a startup developing a semiautonomous timber harvesting machine to remove tree and debris from forests and bury them in an effort to help combat global warming, reports Christopher Helman for Forbes. “Scientists say burying trees can reduce global warming as well—particularly if those trees would otherwise end up burning or decaying, spewing their stored carbon into the air,” writes Helman.

Researchers at MIT have discovered that the ocean’s color has changed considerably in the last 20 years and is “another warning sign of human-driven climate change,” reports Maria Luisa Paul for The Washington Post. “These ecosystems have taken millions of years to evolve together and be in balance,” says Senior Research Scientist Stephanie Dutkiewicz. “Changes in such a short amount of time are not good because they put the whole ecosystem out of balance.”

A study by MIT researchers has found that over 65% of the world’s oceans have changed color over the past 20 years and “human-caused climate change is likely to blame,” reports Rebecca Falconer for Axios. The researchers found that: “Tropical ocean regions near the equator have been particularly affected by this steady change from blue to green,” Falconer notes. 

MIT researchers have found that over the past two decades, the color of the world’s oceans has changed significantly, reports Talib Visram for Fast Company. The change “is likely due to human-induced climate change,” explains Visram. “The color shifts matter in that they signal changes in ecosystem balance, which have the power to disrupt fragile marine food webs.”

CNN reporter Jack Guy spotlights a new study co-authored by researchers at MIT, which shows that the ocean’s color has changed considerably over the last 20 years and human-caused climate change is likely responsible. “All changes are causing an imbalance in the natural organization of ecosystems,” says senior research scientist Stephanie Dutkiewicz. “Such imbalance will only get worse over time if our oceans keep heating.”

Researchers at MIT and elsewhere have discovered that the ocean’s hue has changed significantly over the last 20 years, reports Laura Baisas for Popular Science. “A shift in ocean color is an indication that ecosystems within the surface may also be changing,” writes Baisas. “While the team can’t point to exactly how marine ecosystems are changing to reflect the shift, they are quite sure that human-induced climate change is likely behind it.”

A new study led by a team including researchers at MIT has found that more than half of the world’s ocean has changed color in the last 20 years, reports Coco Liu for Bloomberg. “The color shift could be caused by changes in plankton communities that are critical to the marine food chain,” writes Liu. “And biodiversity isn’t the only thing at stake: The shift could also affect how much carbon dioxide the ocean takes up, since different types of plankton have different abilities to absorb it."

Sublime Systems, a startup founded by Prof. Yet-Ming Chiang and former MIT postdoc Leah Ellis, is working to decarbonize cement making – a process which currently accounts for eight percent of global carbon emissions. “The world has a huge appetite for cement, and Sublime is working to scale its production to meet it,” writes Casey Crownhart for The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. 

Sergey Paltsev, deputy director of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, speaks with WCVB-TV about the pressing need for action to address the climate crisis, following the Earth’s hottest days on record. Paltsev emphasized that he hopes the record-shattering heat will motivate policymakers and the general public to take action to prevent extreme climate events in the future.

Prof. Yang Shao-Horn spoke at the State of the Art Jewelry Summit to discuss the jewelry industry’s impact on carbon emissions and sustainability efforts, reports Caroline Palmer for the Financial Times. Shao-Horn's suggestions to tackle the problem involved a mix of a carbon tax, “which could encourage the use of new technology, including electric vehicles, as well as shifting mining practices away from open site to the development of mobile mining vehicles powered by renewable energy or hydrogen,” writes Palmer.

Writing for the Financial Times, Prof. Robert Pindyck makes the case that households, private businesses and governments must "invest in adaptation to climate change, in order to counter its possible impact.” Pindyck writes, “Now is the time to put more effort into efficient CO₂ emission reduction, and invest in adaptation to limit the impacts of climate change.”

Randolph Kirchain and Hessam AzariJafari of the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub speak with Washington Post reporter Sharon Osaka about the importance of reducing the emissions produced during the cement manufacturing process. Kirchain noted there is a way to cut carbon emissions significantly and ensure safety at the same time. “The things that concrete goes into are things that we need to last,” he said.

Prof. Yet-Ming Chiang co-founded Sublime Systems, a company that has developed a new method for producing cement that is powered by electrochemistry instead of fossil fuel-powered heat, reports Catherine Clifford for CNBC. “I believe climate change has pushed all of us into an extremely fertile, creative period that will be looked back on as a true renaissance,” says Chiang. “After all, we're trying to re-invent the technological tools of the industrial revolution. There's no shortage of great problems to work on!  And time is short.”

MIT researchers have developed a new compact, lightweight design for a 1-megawatt electrical motor that “could open the door to electrifying much larger aircraft,” reports Ed Gent for IEEE Spectrum. “The majority of CO₂ is produced by twin and single-aisle aircraft which require large amounts of power and onboard energy, thus megawatt-class electrical machines are needed to power commercial airliners,” says Prof. Zoltán Spakovszky. “Realizing such machines at 1 MW is a key stepping stone to larger machines and power levels.”