Each week, BIV staff will share with you some of the interesting stories we have found from around the web.
Timothy Renshaw, managing editor:
Dispatches from the long and winding road to a renewable energy reality.
First up, energy from the great beyond courtesy of the Sun and power beaming technology. – Brighter Side
https://www.thebrighterside.news/post/space-based-solar-power-beams-will-soon-be-powering-our-cities
Closer to home, an energy source that former Newfoundland premier Joey Smallwood summed up philosophically when he and his Liberal party were swept out of office by Frank Moore and the Progressive Conservative party in 1972: "The tide comes in and the tide goes out." Indeed it does, and in doing so it generates a natural source of power generation that has yet to be tapped much anywhere in the world. However, tapping tidal energy potential might be on the rise as the quest for renewables accelerates, according to this story from The Cool Down.
https://www.thecooldown.com/green-tech/tidal-energy-how-works-advantages/
Meanwhile, a "brick toaster" heat battery is showing much promise in the vital storage end of the renewable energy equation. – ElecTrek
https://electrek.co/2022/11/21/rondo-big-battery-is-like-a-brick-toaster-and-its-on-the-market/
Nelson Bennett, reporter:
Why no one is happy with the EU’s price cap on natural gas. Faced with an energy crisis, the European Union has agreed to implement a cap on natural gas prices. While some EU countries say the price cap is too high, and wouldn’t have even been triggered with the current record high prices, others worry that the cap is a market intervention that could backfire, with more LNG exports ending up being diverted to Asia. – Oilprice.com
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Natural-Gas/EU-Delivers-Nat-Gas-Price-Cap-Without-Silver-Bullet.html
You may have heard about the veritable rainbow of hydrogen. There’s grey hydrogen, made from natural gas, and green – made from water and electricity – and blue hydrogen, made from natural gas but with CO2 captured and sequestered. There’s even turquoise hydrogen – which is also made from natural gas, through methane pyrolysis, but with the CO2 fixed in a solid carbon form. Now a U.S. biotech called Cemvita Factory has come up with another colour – gold. Using special blends of bacteria injected into old spent oil wells, the company says hydrogen can be produced as a byproduct of bacteria eating up residual oil. But this process would also produce CO2, so the technical hurdle to overcome will be how to keep the CO2 sequestered in the oil wells while extracting the hydrogen. – Wired
https://www.wired.com/story/gold-hydrogen
Glen Korstrom, reporter:
With the World Cup on, it’s worth it to have a subscription to the Athletic. The two most talked about footballers in the world are probably Christiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. The Athletic did a good job of giving context for what this World Cup means for Ronaldo, given his recent parting of ways with Manchester United and his desire to still play on a Champions League club. – The Athletic
The Athletic’s profile of Lionel Messi, in contrast, hints that Messi is consumed with crass commercial partnerships, such as a deal with Saudi Arabia to promote tourism that is speculated to be in the $40 million range – much more than the $26 million deal he had to promote the cryptocurrency firm Socios. Its title: ”’He sold himself to the devil’ – Messi, 2030, and a very uncomfortable deal with Saudi Arabia.”
It is unclear how Saudi Arabia beating Argentina in the World Cup group stage will affect the strangeness of having an Argentinian superstar promote tourism in that kingdom. – The Athletic
https://theathletic.com/3918644/2022/11/22/messi-saudi-arabia-2030/?source=user_shared_article
