506 research outputs found
Managing The National Landscape: Opportunities And Challenges
This plenary presentation summarized the principal landscape challenges and opportunities that accompany the human need for energy. Drawing from 50 years’ examining what I call “energy landscapes,” this presentation focused on land use conflicts resulting during the development of four types of renewable energy (solar, wind, geothermal, hydro), fossil fuels (mainly coal), and nuclear power (particularly siting of waste repositories and the decommissioning of generating stations). Many of the challenges derive from inherent resource characteristics, some from differences to cultural mores and histories, varying public perceptions of risk and fairness, demographic patterns, as well as jurisdictional and political differences. Many of the opportunities to better manage landscapes will result from more meaningful and calibrated public involvement, the growth of demand in developing world and totalitarian countries, rising worries about personal and national security, competition for water resources, and climate change. Recommendations are offered as to how to move forward, given these challenges, to simultaneously meet our resource needs while serving as caretakers of landscape quality. This paper is more of a reflective piece and does not include all of the original plenary content
Panel discussion presentation: U.S. – Mexico transboundary perspectives
Panel Discussion: U.S.-Mexico Transboundary Perspectives
Principal Question: What are the implications of the energy/ water nexus at the US/Mexico border?
1. Water Supply and Demand
2. Water Costs of Electricity
3. Virtual Water Transfers
4. Renewable Energy Resources
5. Solar/Water nexus at the US/Mexico Borde
Interpreting regional and local diversities of the social acceptance of agricultural AD plants in the rural space of the Moravian-Silesian Region (Czech Republic)
Agricultural anaerobic digestion plants have recently become a typical part of rural landscape in the Czech Republic due to massive governmental subvention programmes. Yet, their potential as an effective tool how to response to global climate changes at a local level is rather underused (maize used as a primary input mainly, usage of waste heat is limited, etc.). This situation is caused by misguided subvention policies. The aim of this contribution is first to analyse the agricultural anaerobic digestion plants in the rural space of the Moravian-Silesian Region, and second, to deepen the knowledge on the perception of the digestion plants among the population of municipalities in which such facility was constructed. A questionnaire survey has been carried out in three model municipalities (n = 369) located in the Moravian-Silesian Region. Several recommendations and notes for public administration and potential investors concerning the location of future anaerobic digestion plants projects and settings of supportive programmes have been defined
Sensitivity Studies for Third-Generation Gravitational Wave Observatories
Advanced gravitational wave detectors, currently under construction, are
expected to directly observe gravitational wave signals of astrophysical
origin. The Einstein Telescope, a third-generation gravitational wave detector,
has been proposed in order to fully open up the emerging field of gravitational
wave astronomy. In this article we describe sensitivity models for the Einstein
Telescope and investigate potential limits imposed by fundamental noise
sources. A special focus is set on evaluating the frequency band below 10Hz
where a complex mixture of seismic, gravity gradient, suspension thermal and
radiation pressure noise dominates. We develop the most accurate sensitivity
model, referred to as ET-D, for a third-generation detector so far, including
the most relevant fundamental noise contributions.Comment: 13 pages, 7 picture
Scientific Potential of Einstein Telescope
Einstein gravitational-wave Telescope (ET) is a design study funded by the
European Commission to explore the technological challenges of and scientific
benefits from building a third generation gravitational wave detector. The
three-year study, which concluded earlier this year, has formulated the
conceptual design of an observatory that can support the implementation of new
technology for the next two to three decades. The goal of this talk is to
introduce the audience to the overall aims and objectives of the project and to
enumerate ET's potential to influence our understanding of fundamental physics,
astrophysics and cosmology.Comment: Conforms to conference proceedings, several author names correcte
Astrophysically Triggered Searches for Gravitational Waves: Status and Prospects
In gravitational-wave detection, special emphasis is put onto searches that
focus on cosmic events detected by other types of astrophysical observatories.
The astrophysical triggers, e.g. from gamma-ray and X-ray satellites, optical
telescopes and neutrino observatories, provide a trigger time for analyzing
gravitational wave data coincident with the event. In certain cases the
expected frequency range, source energetics, directional and progenitor
information is also available. Beyond allowing the recognition of gravitational
waveforms with amplitudes closer to the noise floor of the detector, these
triggered searches should also lead to rich science results even before the
onset of Advanced LIGO. In this paper we provide a broad review of LIGO's
astrophysically triggered searches and the sources they target
Scientific Objectives of Einstein Telescope
The advanced interferometer network will herald a new era in observational
astronomy. There is a very strong science case to go beyond the advanced
detector network and build detectors that operate in a frequency range from 1
Hz-10 kHz, with sensitivity a factor ten better in amplitude. Such detectors
will be able to probe a range of topics in nuclear physics, astronomy,
cosmology and fundamental physics, providing insights into many unsolved
problems in these areas.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figures, Plenary talk given at Amaldi Meeting, July 201
Swift follow-up observations of candidate gravitational-wave transient events
We present the first multi-wavelength follow-up observations of two candidate
gravitational-wave (GW) transient events recorded by LIGO and Virgo in their
2009-2010 science run. The events were selected with low latency by the network
of GW detectors and their candidate sky locations were observed by the Swift
observatory. Image transient detection was used to analyze the collected
electromagnetic data, which were found to be consistent with background.
Off-line analysis of the GW data alone has also established that the selected
GW events show no evidence of an astrophysical origin; one of them is
consistent with background and the other one was a test, part of a "blind
injection challenge". With this work we demonstrate the feasibility of rapid
follow-ups of GW transients and establish the sensitivity improvement joint
electromagnetic and GW observations could bring. This is a first step toward an
electromagnetic follow-up program in the regime of routine detections with the
advanced GW instruments expected within this decade. In that regime
multi-wavelength observations will play a significant role in completing the
astrophysical identification of GW sources. We present the methods and results
from this first combined analysis and discuss its implications in terms of
sensitivity for the present and future instruments.Comment: Submitted for publication 2012 May 25, accepted 2012 October 25,
published 2012 November 21, in ApJS, 203, 28 (
http://stacks.iop.org/0067-0049/203/28 ); 14 pages, 3 figures, 6 tables;
LIGO-P1100038; Science summary at
http://www.ligo.org/science/Publication-S6LVSwift/index.php ; Public access
area to figures, tables at
https://dcc.ligo.org/cgi-bin/DocDB/ShowDocument?docid=p110003
Sensitivity to Gravitational Waves from Compact Binary Coalescences Achieved during LIGO's Fifth and Virgo's First Science Run
We summarize the sensitivity achieved by the LIGO and Virgo gravitational
wave detectors for compact binary coalescence (CBC) searches during LIGO's
fifth science run and Virgo's first science run. We present noise spectral
density curves for each of the four detectors that operated during these
science runs which are representative of the typical performance achieved by
the detectors for CBC searches. These spectra are intended for release to the
public as a summary of detector performance for CBC searches during these
science runs.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure
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