Terra et Natura

    You've probably heard the old adage, "April showers bring May flowers." Well, it's April, and some of you may not have seen the rain yet, and some of you may have already seen more than enough, but either way, there's no debating that it is one of the most important things that happens on our planet. Water is, of course, essential for all life on Earth, and it is for this reason that rain has always been associated with the bringing or renewal of life. Whether filling our streams and lakes or watering our crops, ancient man saw rain as a gift from the gods. And who hasn't felt after warm spring rain that the world is not somehow renewed? After all, what can be more clean or pure than the water that's falling from the sky? Well, it turns out... a lot.     The unfortunate fact is that we may have already, possibly permanently, contaminated the world's rainwater with toxic "forever chemicals." These chemicals, known as PFAS, or per- and pol...

     Ok, so in Part 1, I focused a lot on ground transportation and electrification; unfortunately, despite the promise of battery and fuel cell electric vehicles, these technologies will likely not be able to get us where we need to be to make all of our transportation carbon neutral. This is especially true when one considers how rapidly we need to reduce our emissions to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. The answer to fueling aircraft, container ships, and the millions of ICE cars and trucks that are currently on our roads (there are an estimated 1.3 billion worldwide) is to make fuel right out of the air. If this seems silly, hang with me for a bit. We really can make fuels like gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel right out of the air. These fuels are all made of hydrocarbons. All that is needed to produce them is hydrogen, carbon, and some chemistry. Better yet, these synthetically produced fuels are drop-in, meaning no modifications to current internal combustio...