The Power+ Plan and citizen’s movement for just transition in Appalachia and beyond

In January 2015, President Obama announced a five-year plan to direct over $1 billion into economic transition and reclamation in Appalachia and elsewhere. The proposed POWER+ plan draws funds from the Abandoned Mine Lands Fund and from five federal agencies. Through 2015, the Alliance for Appalachia and other grassroots organizations lobbied local governments to support POWER+. Dozens of county governments across Central Appalachia have passed resolutions in support. This roundtable reflects on this remarkably successful mobilization for just transition policy. It analyzes POWER+ in historical context of past macrostructural shifts in the relationship of the Corporate to the Local State. Many of the panelists have been doing grassroots organizing to mobilize local governments and elected officials to endorse the POWER+ Plan. Others have been involved in earlier struggles to democratize the relationship between federal, state, and local levels of economic planning. The roundtable will seek to apply lessons from earlier eras of struggle to contemporary challenges of neoliberal globalization

COSMOS-UK user guide: users’ guide to sites, instruments and available data (version 2.10)

The COSMOS-UK User Guide is a comprehensive guide to the data collected by COSMOS-UK, including the near-real time soil moisture data derived from counts of netrons derived from cosmic rays. The User Guide contains: i) information about the sites, their locations and other meta data. ii) Details of the instruments deployed at each site. iii) Background information about the cosmic ray neutron counter which is used to derive soil moisture within a 12 hectare footprint. iv) Descriptions of data and information products that are available from COSMOS-UK

The OFDI Patterns and Firm Performance of Chinese Firms: The Moderating Effects of Multinationality Strategy and External Factors

The purpose of this paper is to examine how multinationality strategy, home political influence, and host-country risk explain the performance consequences of OFDI patterns of firms in the most important emerging economy, China. Two main patterns of OFDI (‘born global’ natured multiple simultaneous and IP-natured gradually growing) have been dominant in China during its first OFDI as a latecomer. In contrast to the conventional IP argument, we hypothesize that the multiple simultaneous pattern of a born-global nature leads to better performance. We also hypothesize that firm multinationality strategy and home political influence play greater roles in enhancing the performance effect of the multiple simultaneous pattern than another pattern, i.e., IP-natured gradually growing pattern. Using panel data of 4619 observations from 261Chinese publicly listed firms from 1991 to 2011, we find a superior performance effect for the multiple simultaneous pattern. Further, we find a greater moderating effect of firm multinationality strategy and home political influence affecting the OFDI and performance relationship undertaken by the multiple simultaneous pattern than by the gradually growing pattern. Our study extends understanding of OFDI patterns in emerging economies and suggests that the analysis of performance consequences should focus on external and firm factors that may facilitate the performance effect

Electrocatalysis in Alkaline Media and Alkaline Membrane-Based Energy Technologies

Hydrogen energy-based electrochemical energy conversion technologies offer the promise of enabling a transition of the global energy landscape from fossil fuels to renewable energy. Here, we present a comprehensive review of the fundamentals of electrocatalysis in alkaline media and applications in alkaline-based energy technologies, particularly alkaline fuel cells and water electrolyzers. Anion exchange (alkaline) membrane fuel cells (AEMFCs) enable the use of nonprecious electrocatalysts for the sluggish oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), relative to proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), which require Pt-based electrocatalysts. However, the hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) kinetics is significantly slower in alkaline media than in acidic media. Understanding these phenomena requires applying theoretical and experimental methods to unravel molecular-level thermodynamics and kinetics of hydrogen and oxygen electrocatalysis and, particularly, the proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET) process that takes place in a proton-deficient alkaline media. Extensive electrochemical and spectroscopic studies, on single-crystal Pt and metal oxides, have contributed to the development of activity descriptors, as well as the identification of the nature of active sites, and the rate-determining steps of the HOR and ORR. Among these, the structure and reactivity of interfacial water serve as key potential and pH-dependent kinetic factors that are helping elucidate the origins of the HOR and ORR activity differences in acids and bases. Additionally, deliberately modulating and controlling catalyst–support interactions have provided valuable insights for enhancing catalyst accessibility and durability during operation. The design and synthesis of highly conductive and durable alkaline membranes/ionomers have enabled AEMFCs to reach initial performance metrics equal to or higher than those of PEMFCs. We emphasize the importance of using membrane electrode assemblies (MEAs) to integrate the often separately pursued/optimized electrocatalyst/support and membranes/ionomer components. Operando/in situ methods, at multiscales, and ab initio simulations provide a mechanistic understanding of electron, ion, and mass transport at catalyst/ionomer/membrane interfaces and the necessary guidance to achieve fuel cell operation in air over thousands of hours. We hope that this Review will serve as a roadmap for advancing the scientific understanding of the fundamental factors governing electrochemical energy conversion in alkaline media with the ultimate goal of achieving ultralow Pt or precious-metal-free high-performance and durable alkaline fuel cells and related technologies.This work was supported by the Center for Alkaline-Based Energy Solutions, an Energy Frontier Research Center program supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, under Grant DE-SC0019445. This work acknowledges the long-term support of TEM facilities at the Cornell Center for Materials Research (CCMR) which are supported through the National Science Foundation Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (NSF MRSEC) program (DMR1719875), and Cornell high-energy synchrotron sources (CHESS), which is supported by the National Science Foundation under Award DMR-1332208