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Butylated hydroxyanisole

When attached to a nanotube delivery system, the same stuff that keeps Wonder Bread fresh is 5,000 times more effective than anything available in preventing radiation sickness, according to a trio of Texas researchers.

Jim Tour of Rice University and two colleagues from other Houston health institutions have found that common food preservatives BHA and BHT prevent radiation sickness in mice. Exposure to radiation can disrupt cells by "freeing molecules from their chemical bonds and allowing them to run amok inside the nucleus," the Houston Chronicle reported.

The "free radicals" destroy the cell's DNA, which kills the cell and prevents it from dividing. The result is slow death. But to be effective, the preservatives have to get inside the cells, where they can flush free radicals before they shut down the organs.

To do that, the researchers attached them to carbon nanotubes, "single layers of carbon atoms curved into tiny cylinders, which, because of their size, provided a perfect vehicle for traversing the body's arteries and entering cells," they were quoted as saying. "The same properties that make BHA and BHT good food preservatives, namely their ability to scavenge free radicals, also make them good candidates for mitigating the biological affects that are induced through the initial ionizing radiation event," Tour said.

Needless to say, the Department of Defense is very interested. So much so that it gave Tour, who directs Rice's Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory, a $540,000 grant for his research, while asking him to speed it up.

About half the deaths from a large nuclear blast would result from the initial explosion. Radiation medication would benefit victims in a fallout zone after a nuclear attack as well as first responders. It could also help cancer patients recover from radiation therapy, the team said.

Tour wants to take the research to the next stage by developing a pill that can be taken after exposure to radiation. Meanwhile, if you're concerned about your rad intake, Purdue University is developing a radiation-detecting cell phone. Or maybe it's easier to just eat your Wonder Bread.

The recently concluded K 2007 conference in Düsseldorf, Germany, featured a variety of recent advances in materials science that will change your life. No hyperbole there--just a safe prediction.

I didn't make it to the show, but I've been following the announcements on the Web site of Design News, a trade publication for mechanical engineers. The K Fair is all about plastics...but in truth, the line between plastic and metal is getting pretty blurry these days.

Indeed, companies such as DuPont are now talking about plastics climbing "the metals replacement curve." MetaFuse technology, co-developed by DuPont, Morph Technologies, Integran, and PowerMetal Technologies, combines "nanocrystalline" metals with engineering polymers to create objects with exceptionally high stiffness-to-weight ratios.

Carbon nanotubes promise to replace metal entirely in future automobiles, mobile electronics, and other products. At K 2007, companies such as Bayer and RTP showed carbon nanotube-based composite plastics. Earlier in October, Bayer announced it's building a second production facility for carbon nanotubes. The new facility's capacity is only 30 metric tons per year; Bayer and all of today's suppliers together can barely handle the demand for experimentation and prototyping, but Bayer says its "medium term" plan is to build another facility with the capacity to produce 3,000 tons per year. That's starting to become significant, I think.

Carbon-fiber composites are already strong enough to replace aluminum and steel in certain circumstances, chiefly where cost is secondary to weight or style, as in Toyota's 1/X concept, a carbon-fiber car weighing just 926 pounds, or the 2008 BMW M3--I'm planning to buy one of these next year myself.

But carbon nanotubes are so much stronger than carbon (graphite) fibers that they will likely enable entirely new design philosophies, in the same way that steel revolutionized shipbuilding, and aluminum made commercial aviation practical. We define prehistoric times in terms of materials science--the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age--and we're on the cusp of a new age based on practical nanotechnology.

IBM is launching an initiative to give its corporate customers a way to measure and potentially monetize energy-efficiency measures in their data centers using an emerging form of currency.

The computing giant on Friday detailed a program that will let companies earn energy-efficient certificates, which are awarded after a company undertakes a project to lower its data center power consumption. It's part of its Big Green Innovations program to invest in clean tech.

IBM is partnering with Neuwing Energy Ventures to verify the amount of kilowatt hours reduced through data center makeovers.

Companies can either claim those energy reductions as part of their own corporate environmental initiatives, which increasingly call for more quantifiable measures. Or they can sell the energy-efficiency certificates on the voluntary renewable energy certificate market. A handful of states also have a mechanism to sell these certificates to utilities that have renewable energy mandates.

IBM designed the program because more companies are looking for ways to accurately measure their energy consumption as part of environmental programs, said Rich Lechner, vice president of IT optimization at IBM.

He said he expects most customers to hold on to the energy-efficiency certificates rather than sell them. The monetary value of a large-scale energy efficiency program could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars if the company chooses to sell as credits, he said.

The energy-efficiency credits are part of a growing trend to use financial markets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Most corporations in the United States are not regulated on the basis of their greenhouse gas emissions. But that's expected to change within a few years.

There are a number of federal proposals designed to put a monetary value on emissions, such as carbon dioxide. Some regimes call for a tax on carbon emissions, while others are built around a cap and trade model where polluters have a maximum emissions target and are issued credits when emissions fall below that cap.

IBM will offer the energy-efficiency credits on its mainframes and midrange servers to clients in the U.S. this year. It intends to extend the offering to its entire server and storage line and offer it to customers in Europe next year, said Lechner.

I have mentioned my friend Justin Label, one of the partners at Bessemer Venture, before. Among other things he writes the Venture Again Blog. Bessemer is a highly respected old-line Silicon Valley venture capital firm. It has been an active investor in clean tech for a while, and is a backer of Miasole as well as SV Solar. I found myself on a plane recently with one his colleagues, Ted Lin. More than its investments, Lin was describing to me a new carbon friendly initiative that Bessemer itself is undertaking internally.

Its logic is simple, if it is investing in clean tech because it believes in being part of the global warming solution, not only making money, then it should practice what it preaches.

While still in its early days, it is targeting both its power and travel usage, and expects it will likely implement an internal reduction plan as well as purchasing offsets.

I asked Lin where this came from, and he said this initiative has come down from the top of the firm. It makes sense, and it is good to see the activity happening. My hat is off to the company.

Lin also pointed out that Bessemer is going to be buying offsets for its smaller portfolio companies (those under 50 people). "The goal is that when these companies grow into bigger companies and leave the nest, they will continue the tradition. We want them (our portfolio companies) to lead the next-generation of environmentally responsible enterprises."

One of the things he did ask: did I know any good offset providers? As with any venture capitalist, the company is looking for the "best of breed." So if you are interested in helping Bessemer, e-mail Lin at Ted@bvp.com.

"Without carbon capture and sequestration, we are all toast."

Jiang Lin, a scientist with the China Sustainable Energy Program with Lawrence Berkeley Lab, issued that gloomy proclamation earlier this week, and it's a fitting description of the current world situation when it comes to global warming. To make it worse, I asked Lin about how the world is responding to the challenge. Not well.

"We haven't invested in deep research or spent much money in testing out the scenarios," he said. "There are a lot of uncertainties."

Still, it's not over yet, and the University of Texas this week announced it has received a $38 million grant to study the feasibility of injecting carbon dioxide into brine-filled underground wells over a 10-year period.

The project is part of the Southeast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership (SECARB), funded by the National Energy Technology Laboratory of the Department of Energy. SECARB's goal is to study carbon-dioxide injection and storage capacity of the Tuscaloosa-Woodbine geologic system that stretches from Texas to Florida. The region has the potential to store more than 200 billion tons of the gas, which the department says it equal to about 33 years of emissions.

Beginning in the fall, SECARB scientists will start to inject a million tons of carbon dioxide a year into a brine reservoir near Natchez, Mississippi. The brine is up to 10,000 feet below the surface.

In some ways, the U.S. is the Saudi Arabia of gaping holes. The U.S. has produced more oil than anywhere else in the world, historically speaking--250 billion gallons have been sucked out of the ground here--there is lots of empty space underground, according to Chevron's CTO Don Paul, who spoke this week at the Dow Jones Alternative Energy Innovations Conference.

Sequestration, though, poses logistical and financial challenges, Paul said. Just to capture the carbon dioxide coming out of power plants, factories and other "stationary" carbon-dioxide emitters, it would take an infrastructure the same size as the natural gas infrastructure.

"That's a lot of pipe," Paul said. Paul also issued some interesting facts on peak oil.

It's a water-based molecule that repels water.

That's Hycrete's business in a nutshell, according to CEO David Rosenberg. The company has a molecule--which consists of a water molecule with a long hydrocarbon attached--that links up to metallic ions in whatever it's mixed into. In the right circumstances, the molecule behaves like an oil and pushes water away.

The company currently sells its material to concrete manufacturers and contractors who use it to replace the bound-to-fail plastic membranes employed to keep water out of building foundations and freeway pilings. With Hycrete's molecules mixed into the cement, water can't get into corrode rebars or start wicking into the foundation where it can create long-term problems.

"One of the fundamental problems with concrete is that it is a hard sponge," he said. "Through capillary action it sucks water in."

So far, contractors have mixed the substance into 53 major projects, including sound barriers on a freeway in New Jersey. In the future, the company may mix its material into drywall to prevent moisture seepage. You could also mix it into roofing material and then put a green roof--rooftop lawns are getting bigger in urban environments like Tokyo--on top of your house without worrying about trickle down.

Grandpa's invention
Hycrete is something of a family affair. Rosenberg's grandfather, Michael Rhodes, actually invented the material about twelve years ago. A serial inventor, Rhodes worked on a number of projects for NASA, including a solid rocket fuel.

With the growth of the clean tech market, concrete is suddenly hot again. (It hasn't been this way since the Roman Empire.) Building contractors are vying to green up their projects by installing environmentally friendly HVAC systems and carpets. Concrete, which invariably goes into every project, is a natural extension of that.

A couple of building supply companies already sell concrete made of fly ash, a leftover byproduct of coal-burning power plants. Putting in concrete cuts down on the pollution utilities would have to otherwise dispose.

Hycrete allows contractors to not use plastic membranes, which in turn lets the builders earn points under the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards. The more LEED points you get, the greener your building is.

More importantly, though, it can cut down costs and risks. In the building world, no one likes the waterproofing contractor. The membranes often fail and the end result is legal disputes.

"A lot of people get into this big fingerpointing game with the waterproofing contractor," he said. By using Hycrete's additive, the membrane is eliminated. The company also promises to warrant its performance. Hycrete, in fact, sticks around for about 90 days after the building is complete to make sure things worked out properly.

Traditional waterproofing also takes time. One builder estimated that construction time was reduced two months by using the additive.

Carbon counting, it seems, is a growth business.

Carbonetworks, from Victoria, British Columbia, has developed software that gives companies a way to make financial decisions around their carbon emissions. It's one of several organizations sprouting up and looking to build a business or derive revenue from regulatory limits on carbon.

Although North America does not yet have regulations that cap greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, companies are already keeping track of their emissions, said CEO Michael Meehan, who started Carbonetworks in early 2006.

Even after doing an inventory, though, companies don't have a unified way of managing that information, he said.

Carbonetworks' software lets people bring their inventory information from different sources, such as environmental, health and safety applications, into one place and make decisions on how to reduce it.

A company could purchase renewable energy credits, which are meant to promote clean energy projects, invest directly in a clean energy project, or undergo an energy-efficiency program. The software gives people a way to compare the financial impact among different types of projects, Meehan said.

The company also acts as a broker between providers and buyers of offsets, including renewable energy credits (REC), which are the green attributes of electricity generation.

Needless to say, accurate information on carbon emissions and offsets is increasingly important.

There are already local carbon-capping regimes being put in place in North America. At the federal level, there are a number of laws now in the works.

Corporations who aren't from typical "smokestack" industries, like power generation, oil, gas, or heavy manufacturing, take emissions seriously.

Yahoo, for example, on Monday detailed two projects it invested in--a hydroelectric plant in Brazil and wind turbines in rural India. It's part of its plan to be a carbon-neutral company.

At the same time, there is a growing scrutiny of carbon-offsetting practices. A BusinessWeek article published on Friday profiled an environmental officer at Aspen Skiing Company who is moving away from renewable energy credits because of doubts over their effectiveness. Voluntary carbon offsets for individuals have also faced the same sort of scrutiny.

Meehan said Carbonetworks works with verification companies on offset projects. At times internal projects prove more beneficial than purchasing carbon credits, he said.

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have come up with a way to detect potential structural problems with fighter planes while in flight, and in some cases repair them.

Carbon nanotubes in epoxy

(Credit: RPI)

The technique, which is still experimental, involves applying an epoxy later infused with a wire grid and carbon nanotubes onto a wing or other structure. The epoxy is similar to the materials currently used to make fighter plane components. The wire grid and the nanotubes function as a communication network. Mechanics (or a computer) will shoot an electrical charge through the structure and measure how long it takes an electrical charge to go from two selected points.

If there is a crack in the structure, the crack will create electrical resistance. In that case, the signal will have to travel a longer distance to get around the crack. The extra time required to get from point A to point B serves as a signal that a potential problem exists. The picture shows carbon nanotubes randomly dispersed in an epoxy.

The cracks can also be repaired, depending on the material the wing is made of and other factors. When a crack is detected, voltage to the carbon nanotubes can be increased. This generates heat, which melts the epoxy that fills the crack in. In certain circumstances, the repaired wing will regain up to 70 percent of its original strength, according to RPI. That should keep you from plunging to your death.

The beauty of this method is that the carbon nanotubes are everywhere. The sensors are actually an integral part of the structure, which allows you to monitor any part of the structure," said Nikhil A. Koratkar, an associate professor in Rensselaer's Department of Mechanical, Aerospace & Nuclear Engineering, in a prepared statement. Koratkar was the principal investigator on the project.

A more detailed paper was published this week in Applied Physics Letters.

Nanotubes, which are stronger than steel, can also add structural integrity, depending on how they are integrated into a structure. General Motors puts multiwalled nanotubes into some car parts.

Angela Belcher at MIT (and co-founder of Cambrios Technologies) is working on a different technology for detecting flaws in metal aircraft parts. She is trying to develop genetically engineered microorganisms that will secrete proteins that will attach to specific metal alloys. Smear it on, the theory goes, and the luminescent protein will stick to areas undergoing abnormal amounts of stress.

Michael Dell says he aims make his company "carbon neutral" in 2008, according to an article in The Wall Street Journal.

The computer giant is looking to zero-out its carbon emissions through a number of initiatives, such as offering small businesses and consumers curbside recycling of their old computers, stuffing small recycling bags with free postage into new printer-ink cartridge boxes, and operating a "Plant a Tree for Me" program. Companies implementing carbon-neutral programs can adopt pollution- and energy-management practices in their own operations and/or purchase carbon-reduction credits from other businesses, which, in turn, offset the level of pollution their products or services generate.

Dell apparently is of the same mind as Will Wynn, the mayor of the company's hometown, Austin, Texas. The city is taking steps to slice its greenhouse emissions by developing sustainable-energy practices in a state known for industries heavily reliant on fossil fuels.