Israeli renewable energy company Phinergy has set out to reduce the amount of air pollution emitted by cars – among the world's heaviest polluters – with their innovative vehicles.

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According to CEO Avi Tzidon, Phinergy's cars use aluminum – one of the most common metals – to create energy, and as such, involve no pollution.

They are said to match the driving range of non-electric vehicles, reload to full energy capacity in less than 5 minutes, and are compatible with existing service networks.

"Phinergy's metal-air systems produce energy by combining metal, oxygen, and water. Oxygen is a key reactant releasing energy from metal," the company's website says.

The vehicles are set to be the most environmentally friendly on the market, as other electric alternatives are fueled with electricity provided by a polluting plant.

"Unlike conventional batteries that carry oxygen within a heavy electrode, metal-air energy systems freely breathe oxygen from ambient air, making the systems significantly lighter," Phinergy's website says.

Ahead of the United Nations climate conference in Glasgow in November, Phinergy presented their product to Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, "including metal-air technologies and range extenders for electric cars."

This article was first published by i24NEWS.

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Renewable energy options in Israel are "near zero," and the country will have no alternative to building additional power stations, an economist for the energy sector in the Budget Department of the Finance Ministry Ido Mor said Tuesday.

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Speaking at the 18^th Israel Energy and Business Convention 2021 at the Kfar Maccabiah Hotel in Ramat Gan, Mor said that "Israel was under-performing in terms of renewable energies, but even if we meet the goals we will have no choice other than to plan and build more power stations."

Mor said that the government's goal of transitioning Israel to 20% renewable energy by 2025 would "require a herculean effort, and we need to prepare for the possibility we won't meet it."

"In any case, moving the economy to electricity in the long term is more important than the short term, and we will need to ensure a supply of electricity when we bring a metro, light trains, electric trains, and more on line. All this requires preparation and more power stations," Mor said.

Chen Herzog, chief economist at BDO Israel, sounded more decisive and told the conference that "it is not feasible to meet the government's goal of 20% renewable energies by 2025," and that "so we don't have excuses in 2030, there need to be goals that can be met, rather than utopian ones."

According to Herzog, regulators would have to admit that Israel would not meet its 2025 goal and take steps to reduce emissions rather that focus solely on renewable energies: "For example, accelerating the developing of electric transportation and construction efficient power stations, as well as developing a competitive market for renewable energies."

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Israel's government unanimously agreed on July 25 to adopt a low-carbon economy, "part of its commitment to the global effort" to reduce greenhouse gases. It is the first time that Israel has set a national goal to reduce carbon emissions. In doing so, it joins a host of countries that have made similar announcements over the last several years.

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Some praise the plan, saying Israel must act as the "science is in," and the world faces an imminent global climate crisis. Others scoff at the "so-called science" and say there is no justification for overhauling Israel's economy – that it will be "all pain, no gain."

The plan calls for an 85% reduction in carbon emissions from 2015 levels by 2050 and sets an intermediate goal of a 27% reduction by 2030. To hit those targets, it calls for major changes to the transportation, manufacturing and energy sectors.

There already appears to be disagreement within the Ministry of Environmental Protection about the plan. As presented on the ministry's website, the plan calls for natural gas to play an integral role. Natural gas has led to a "dramatic decline in local pollutant emissions," it said. "Thanks to these measures, Israel already meets about 75% of the target required for reducing CO2 emissions within the framework of its obligations under the Paris Agreements."

Yet Environmental Protection Minister Tamar Zandberg criticized natural gas on June 29 during a climate change panel at an Israel Democracy Institute conference. "I want to correct a common mistake … natural gas is as natural as coal. It is fossil fuel," she said.

Israel's timing was meant to coincide with a new report by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which will underpin the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in November, where participating countries will likely undertake to curb their emissions more sharply.

"It was to show support of the IPCC and the UN in general and to say that we are concerned with climate change," Gideon Behar, special envoy for climate change and sustainability at Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told JNS.

The first installment of the IPCC's Sixth Annual Assessment Report, released on Aug. 9, lays the blame for global warming squarely on man-made emissions and for the first time (on the basis of what it says are improved models) links extreme weather to climate change.

"The evidence is clear that carbon dioxide (CO2) is the main driver of climate change," the IPCC said in a press release about the report, painting a bleak future for the planet if global warming rises above pre-industrial levels by two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit).

While stating that "the climate crisis demands from us immense changes to our lifestyle, to our economy," Behar said he sees opportunities for Israeli technology. "Know-how and technologies are very much needed. Israel is outstanding in its experience and capacity in the field of climate innovation," he said, noting Israeli advances in areas such as water conservation and desalinization, innovative energy technologies and alternative proteins, which could free up land areas currently devoted to raising livestock.

Behar said no one should question climate change: "There's no place for doubt anymore. We need to move forward and if skeptics need more examples, they should look at the huge firestorms in Siberia, Greece, Turkey."

Pinhas Alpert, professor emeritus in atmospheric sciences in the department of Geophysics at Tel Aviv University, told JNS that climate change is the greatest threat humans are facing. For him, the most dramatic evidence is his own research showing the Fertile Crescent has been drying up over the last 20 years. He also cited his 2002 study of extreme daily precipitation over the Mediterranean Sea.

Alpert says that, if anything, Israel did not go far enough given other developed countries have adopted 100% carbon reductions versus Israel's 85%.

'Demonizing carbon dioxide is just crazy'

Nevertheless, questions are being raised about the conclusions of the latest IPCC report, as well as the wisdom of Israel's transitioning to a carbon-free economy.

Richard Lindzen, a leading atmospheric physicist and professor emeritus of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been fighting the scientific establishment on climate change for 30 years.

When asked his opinion of Israeli solutions to climate change, Lindzen said: "Solution implies there is a problem." The real question is if the plan's worth doing. To that, he replied: "Not at all."

"Demonizing carbon dioxide is just crazy," said Lindzen. "It means we have a population that's forgotten elementary biology. They don't remember photosynthesis. We've already benefited due to the increase in CO2 by probably over a trillion dollars increase in agricultural productivity. The earth is greening due to this."

"If you were to believe the worst scenarios of the IPCC," it still wouldn't matter what Israel did, he said, referring to Israel's tiny carbon footprint when compared to major polluters like China, the United States and European Union.

According to the reference website Our World in Data, Israel accounted for only a 0.17% share of global emissions in 2017, the latest year data is available.

Lindzen, who was the lead authort on the third report, dismissed the new IPCC report. "What people focus on is the 'Summary for Policymakers,' which is about 40 pages vs. the 3,500-page full report. He said politicians write the summary and "count on the fact that people won't read the report. It doesn't even have an index. But if you read the report, you realize it doesn't say what the summary says."

He pointed to recent tweets from Roger Pielke Jr., professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado who has gone through the full report, finding comments like, "No likelihood is attached to the scenarios assessed in this report," and "The socio-economic assumptions and the feasibility or likelihood of individual scenarios is not part of the assessment." (Lindzen likened this to what lawyers call plausible deniability.)

Pielke also found that "the scenarios IPCC admits are unlikely dominate the report" with the most extreme climate scenarios getting the most mentions (53%).

Lindzen argued that the field of climate science was politicized when it became flush with government funding in the 1990s. "Until then, it was a tiny field. In 1990, no one at MIT called themselves a climate scientist. You were a meteorologist, a geochemist, an oceanographer. Within those disciplines you had an interest in climate. Now they're all climate scientists."

'We have to pay the price of more expensive energy'

Nir Shaviv, a professor of physics at Hebrew University, told JNS that he feels many climate scientists are under pressure to produce alarming reports.

There is "such a large climate industry that people need to publish things that show a large effect [from man-made emissions], or they don't get grants," he explained.

Shaviv said the IPCC's scientists are not looking at all the evidence. "The thing that they're totally missing is the fact that the sun has a big effect on climate. We can simulate it in large-scale simulations. So I'm totally confident after 20 years that the link is there, the sun has a large effect on climate."

"It warmed between 1910 and 1940, then for 30 years, there was a cooling trend, and then it warmed from 1970 to 2000, and that explains a large fraction of the warming," he explained.

Asked by JNS about the feasibility of Israel's carbon reduction plan, Shaviv said: "These kinds of things are feasible if they're willing to pay the price. Obviously, you can fill the Negev Desert with photovoltaic cells if you want. But is it the smart thing to do? I think the answer is no."

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He noted the high energy prices in Europe, whose economy is just emerging from a decade of stagnation. "Industries are leaving Europe because they can't afford the price of energy and manpower. They always had the problem with expensive manpower. They now have energy price problems."

Bloomberg reported on Aug. 5 that "in Europe, utilities pay near-record prices to buy the pollution permits they need to keep producing power from fossil fuels."

Israel announced on Aug. 2 that it, too, will adopt a carbon tax that will go into effect in 2023. Paid by consumers, it is meant to act as a brake on fuel consumption. "The step we are taking today is historic and aligns with the developed countries struggling with the climate crisis," said Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

"They think the world is going to end. So we have to do something. We have to pay the price of more expensive energy," said Shaviv, who blames not politicians but scientists for pushing false scenarios. "They are fooling the media. They are fooling the politicians. They are fooling the youngsters who want to do good for the environment."

He said that most ignore a solution that is staring the world in the face. "If global warming was a serious problem – and it isn't – but even if it was, there's a clear solution which you can adopt which is cheap and can supply all the energy requirements, it's stable, it's everything you want, and it's called nuclear," he said.

If he could give advice to Israel's government, he would say "concentrate on real environmental issues," like smog in the Tel Aviv area. "There are a lot of things in the here and now as opposed to something which is mostly extremely exaggerated."

Lindzen agreed. His advice to Israel? "Ignore the climate crisis. Israel's already an outlier. Let the rest of the world commit [economic] suicide."

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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Solar energy plays an enormous role in our lives. If we can harness it, we can eliminate the need for polluting fossil fuels like petroleum and gas. But the main challenge in switching to solar energy lies in the varying availability of sunlight as the day progresses and seasons change.

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Since the electrical grid needs stable power at all hours of the day and night, use of solar energy depends on our ability to store it. But the current technology for storing solar energy, batteries, is inapplicable to solar energy storage in the amounts need to supply a manufacturing site, a neighborhood, or an entire city.

Researchers from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology have made a scientific breakthrough on the storage of solar energy, as reported by Energy & Environmental Science. A project led by Professor Avner Rothschild of the Technion's Faculty of Materials Science doctoral student Yifat Piekner from the Nancy and Stephen Grand Technion Energy Program (GTEP  has shown that hematite can serve as a promising material in converting solar energy into hydrogen.

The process entails the use of photoelectrochemical solar cells, which are similar to photovoltaic cells, but instead of producing electricity, they produce hydrogen using the electric power (current × voltage) generated in them. The power then uses sunlight energy to dissociate water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen.

Hydrogen is easy to store and when used as fuel, does not involve greenhouse gas or carbon emissions.

One of the main challenges of photoelectrochemical cells is the development of efficient and stable photoelectrodes in a base or acid electrolyte, which is the chemical environment in which water can be efficiently split into hydrogen and oxygen. This is where hematite-based photoelectrochemical cells come into play. Hematite is an iron oxide that has a similar chemical composition to rust. Hematite is inexpensive, stable and nontoxic, and has properties that are suitable for water splitting.

However, hematite also has its disadvantages. For reasons that are still unclear, the photon-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency in hematite-based devices is not even half of the theoretical limit for this material. The new Technion research builds on findings recently published in Nature Materials and proposes an explanation. It transpires that the photons absorbed by hematite produce localized electronic transitions that are "chained" to a specific atomic location in the hematite crystal, rendering them incapable of generating the electric current used for water splitting.

But a new analysis method developed by Piekner and her research colleagues, Dr. David Ellis of the Technion and Dr. Daniel Grave of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the following data were measured for the first time: Quantum efficiency in the generation of mobile (productive) and localized (nonproductive) electronic transitions in a material as a result of photon absorption at different wavelengths, and electron-hole separation efficiency.

This is the first time that these two properties (the first, optical in nature and the second, electrical) have been measured separately, allowing for deeper understanding of the factors that influence the energy efficiency of materials for converting solar energy into hydrogen or electricity.

The research study was sponsored by the Israel Science Foundation's research center for photocatalysts and photoelectrodes for hydrogen production in the Petroleum Alternatives for Transportation Program, the Grand Technion Energy Program (GTEP) and the Russell Berrie Nanotechnology Institute (RBNI) at the Technion.

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The government on Monday approved the nation's first carbon tax, which is expected to cover about 80% of local greenhouse gas emissions by 2028.

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The pollution pricing plan to address climate change is slated to take effect in 2023 and slowly increase until 2028, charging companies that emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from coal, liquefied petroleum gas, fuel oil, petroleum coke and gas.

A government statement announcing the moves explained that carbon taxation "is intended to correct a market failure, which arises when the polluting factor does not pay for the damage caused as a result of greenhouse gas emissions.

"Carbon pricing is considered the most effective and efficient way to encourage the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and create certainty in the markets," the statement continued.

Israel has set an ambitious climate target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 85% by 2050 compared to 2015 levels and an immediate target of a 27% emissions reduction by 2030.

In a recent phone conversation with Environmental Protection Minister Tamar Zandberg, US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry praised Israel's climate and renewable energy targets.

This article was first published by i24NEWS

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Israeli slaughter-free meat production startup Future Meat Technologies has opened the world's first industrial cultured meat facility in the city of Rehovot, home to the Weizmann Institute of Science and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Faculty of Agriculture, the company announced Wednesday.

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With the capability to produce 500 kilograms (1,102 pounds) of cultured products a day, equivalent to 5,000 hamburgers, this facility makes scalable cell-based meat production a reality.

"This facility opening marks a huge step in Future Meat Technologies' path to market, serving as a critical enabler to bring our products to shelves by 2022," says Rom Kshuk, CEO of Future Meat Technologies. "Having a running industrial line accelerates key processes such as regulation and product development."

Currently, the facility can produce cultured chicken, pork and lamb, without the use of animal serum or genetic modification (non-GMO) with the production of beef coming soon. Future Meat Technologies' unique platform enables fast production cycles, about 20 times faster than traditional animal agriculture.

Professor Yaakov Nahmias, founder and chief scientific officer of Future Meat Technologies, explains that "After demonstrating that cultured meat can reach cost parity faster than the market anticipated, this production facility is the real game-changer."

"This facility demonstrates our proprietary media rejuvenation technology in scale, allowing us to reach production densities 10-times higher than the industrial standard. Our goal is to make cultured meat affordable for everyone, while ensuring we produce delicious food that is both healthy and sustainable, helping to secure the future of coming generations," Nahmias says.

Future Meat's cruelty-free production process is expected to generate 80% less greenhouse emissions and use 99% less land and 96% less freshwater than traditional meat production.

Future Meat Technologies aims to reach shelves in the United States in 2022 and is currently in the process of approving its production facility with regulatory agencies in multiple territories. The company is eyeing several locations in the United States for its projected expansion.

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Lag B'Omer bonfires cost the Israeli economy 43 million shekels ($13.2 million) per year, and the smoke from them is equivalent to the emissions from 70,000 cars over the course of an entire years, according to a new report prepared by Chen Herzog, partner and chief economist at the accounting firm BDO Consulting in cooperation with BDO economist Yael Armon.

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The BDO analysis used data from Lag B'Omer in 2018, which was the last year in which bonfires were allowed without restrictions. In 2019, due to severe hot weather, many local municipalities banned bonfires, and in 2020, bonfires and gatherings were subject to COVID regulations about public gatherings.

Research form the Environmental Protection Ministry indicates that while the bonfires are lighted, the rate of air pollution increases by four to 10 times in comparison to regular levels. The main damage comes in the form of particulate matter released while the bonfire fuel is burned and which create a health hazard. These particles range in size from 2.5 to 10 micrometers, approximately the thickness of a strand of human hair, and can penetrate the nose's defenses and collect in the lungs. Population sectors at risk include asthma sufferers, who are particularly vulnerable.

The fires also release various gases, including carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide. The damage increases even more when bonfires include not only wood, but materials such as plastic, which release various types of dioxins into the air that are poisonous, and in some cases carcinogenic.

According to Herzog, regulatory agencies in Israel are focused on the possible damage to property that Lag B'Omer fires can cause, but ignore the health and environmental problems they create.

"The Fire and Rescue Services issued a directive this year limited bonfires to dedicated areas only. This directive is designed to limit the dangers of the fires and resulting damage to property but not the environmental damage," Herzog said.

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Israel's UBQ Materials, developer of the most climate-positive thermoplastic material on the market, announced Monday that Israel's Keter Group will incorporate UBQ into multiple product lines in its effort to achieve its sustainability goal of incorporating 55% recycled content in its manufactured products within five years.

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A bio-based thermoplastic, UBQ is the product of a waste conversion process that transforms landfill-destined household waste into a cost effective, climate-positive, alternative to plastic, wood, and minerals. Every ton of UBQ produced prevents nearly 12 tons of CO2-eq from polluting the environment.

Established in 1948, Keter was among the first manufacturers to implement recycled materials into resin-based consumer goods. Keter operates in 100 countries and has 21 plants in Israel, Europe and North America.

"To reach our climate goals, we are going far beyond the classic recycling method by incorporating climate-positive UBQ," said Iftach Sachar, MD Global Sustainability, Marketing and Innovation of Keter Group.

"This partnership will allow us to differentiate ourselves in the market, bringing a new level of sustainability to consumers and retailers without compromising on quality or competitive pricing of our products," Sachar said.

"Innovation aimed to halt climate change exists and is readily available, but its ability to impact is dependent on the adoption and implementation across industries," said Tato Bigio, co-founder, and CEO of UBQ Materials.

"Continuing to deplete our natural resources is not an option, it is frankly no longer economically or environmentally viable. Through our partnership with Keter, we hope to set an example for industries to recognize sustainable manufacturing as a simple, cost-effective and necessary choice," Bigio said.

The Keter Group-UBQ partnership comes after UBQ announced that it plans to open an industrial-scale facility in the Netherlands. The new facility will have an annual production output of over 72,000 tons of UBQ, one third of which is already allocated to Keter.

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Tesla Inc. chief and billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk on Thursday took to Twitter to promise a $100 million prize for development of the "best" technology to capture carbon dioxide emissions.

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Capturing planet-warming emissions is becoming a critical part of many plans to keep climate change in check, but very little progress has been made on the technology to date, with efforts focused on cutting emissions rather than taking carbon out of the air.

Am donating $100M towards a prize for best carbon capture technology

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 21, 2021

The International Energy Agency said late last year that a sharp rise in the deployment of carbon capture technology was needed if countries are to meet net-zero emissions targets.

"Am donating $100M towards a prize for best carbon capture technology," Musk wrote in a tweet, followed by a second tweet that promised "Details next week."

Tesla officials did not immediately respond to a request for additional information.

Musk, who co-founded and sold Internet payments company PayPal Holdings Inc, now leads some of the most futuristic companies in the world.

Besides Tesla, he heads rocket company SpaceX and Neuralink, a startup that is developing ultra-high bandwidth brain-machine interfaces to connect the human brain to computers.

Newly-sworn-in US President Joe Biden has pledged to accelerate the development of carbon capture technology as part of his sweeping plan to tackle climate change. On Thursday, he named Jennifer Wilcox, an expert in carbon removal technologies, as the principal deputy assistant secretary for fossil energy at the US Department of Energy.

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Israel has a new energy efficiency goal: a new plan from the Energy Ministry, presented Monday, has set a target of reducing carbon emissions by 7.5% by 2030.

The ministry also recommended an interim goal of improved energy efficiency by 11% by 2025, compared to 2015 (which would work out to an average 1.2% improvement per year), and an 18% improvement in energy efficiency by 2030 compared to 2015.

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"The new goal links energy consumption to the amount of products and services in the country," the Energy Ministry explained in a statement.

"It is appropriate for Israel, where the population growth rate and economic growth are among the highest in OECD nations. In addition, these criteria allow us to compare ourselves to other countries," the ministry said.

"Implementing these policy steps are expected to reduce consumption of some 6 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions, which account for about 7.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions [projected for] Israel in 2030. This is in addition to implementing the government's decision to transition to 0% renewable energy sources by 2030.

The plan to cut Israel's carbon emissions also calls to stop sales of polluting cars starting in 2030 through the establishment of a viable infrastructure for electric vehicles.

According to Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, "The global climate crisis demands that we make major changes in our living habits, especially the ways in which we produce and consume energy. Through groundbreaking plans, we not only reduce the rise in energy demand, we also make Israel into a nexus of development and implementation of advanced technologies and methods that will allow Israeli companies to break into new markets all over the world."

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