A DYNAMIC GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM ANALYSIS OF U.S. BIOFUELS PRODUCTION

With the rising global interest in energy security and climate change mitigation, biofuels have gained the prominent attention of researchers and policy makers. The U.S. has emerged as the leading producer of biofuels and is aiming for achieving a target of 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2022 under its updated renewable fuels standard (RFS2) policy. In this paper, we study the longer-term global implications of large-scale renewable fuels production in the U.S. We utilize the GTAP v7.1 data base and introduce a detailed breakdown of agricultural crops, first and second generation biofuels and by-products. We update this fully disaggregated data base to reflect the 2010 global economy, based on secondary data for the sectors and regions included. We adapt the Applied Dynamic Analysis of Global Economy (ADAGE) model developed by Ross (2009) into a recursive dynamic framework and introduce agriculture, biofuels, and land use linkages. We construct a dynamic baseline from 2010 through 2050 in five-year time steps. The dynamics in the model comes from growth in GDP, population, capital accumulation, labor productivity, growth in natural resource stocks, and technological changes in the energy intensive and agricultural sectors. We implement a representative RFS2 policy scenario in the U.S for 2025, using two alternative approaches: (i) RFS permits approach – which assumes biofuels and petroleum fuels are perfect substitutes after adjusting for energy content, and (ii) Target share of biofuels in transportation fuels approach – which treats biofuels and petroleum fuels as imperfect substitutes. Both approaches offer insights regarding potential policy impacts, particularly on the international market and indirect land use change. Because the share approach keeps the biofuels share fixed in the regions outside the U.S., it does not result in dramatic changes in the rest of the world. In the permits approach, however, the regions without a specific policy requiring a given level of biofuels tend to reduce biofuels consumption. This is a result of the reduction in relative price of petroleum products as U.S. policy increases demand for biofuels and reduces global demand for petroleum, making renewable fuels less cost-competitive in the rest of the world.ADAGE, Biofuels, Computable General Equilibrium, Recursive Dynamic, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Hydroacoustic monitoring of seafloor spreading and transform faulting in the equatorial Atlantic Ocean

© The Author(s), 2022. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Parnell-Turner, R., Smith, D. K., & Dziak, R. P. Hydroacoustic monitoring of seafloor spreading and transform faulting in the equatorial Atlantic Ocean. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, 127(7), (2022): e2022JB024008, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JB024008.Seismicity along mid-ocean ridges and oceanic transform faults provides insights into the processes of crustal accretion and strike-slip deformation. In the equatorial Atlantic ocean, the slow-spreading Mid-Atlantic Ridge is offset by some of the longest-offset transform faults on Earth, which remain relatively poorly understood due to its remote location far from land-based teleseismic receivers. A catalog of T-phase events detected by an array of 10 autonomous hydrophones deployed between 2011 and 2015, extending from 20°N to 10°S is presented. The final catalog of 6,843 events has a magnitude of completeness of 3.3, compared to 4.4 for the International Seismic Center teleseismic catalog covering the same region, and allows investigation of the dual processes of crustal accretion and transform fault slip. The seismicity rate observed at asymmetric spreading segments (those hosting detachment faults) is significantly higher than that of symmetric spreading centers, and 74% of known hydrothermal vents along the equatorial Mid-Atlantic Ridge occur on asymmetric spreading segments. Aseismic patches are present on nearly all equatorial Atlantic transform faults, including on the Romanche transform where regional rotation and transpression could explain both bathymetric uplift and reduction in seismic activity. The observed patterns in seismicity provide insight into the thermal and mechanical structure of the ridge axis and associated transform faults, and potentially provide a method for investigating the distribution of hydrothermal vent systems.This research was supported by National Science Foundation Grants EAR-1062238, EAR-1062165, and OCE-1839727. This paper is NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory contribution 5323

Identity dynamics as a barrier to organizational change

This article seeks to explore the construction of group and professional identities in situations of organizational change. It considers empirical material drawn from a health demonstration project funded by the Scottish Executive Health Department, and uses insights from this project to discuss issues that arise from identity construction(s) and organizational change. In the course of the project studied here, a new organizational form was developed which involved a network arrangement with a voluntary sector organization and the employment of “lay-workers” in what had traditionally been a professional setting. Our analysis of the way actors made sense of their identities reveals that characterizations of both self and other became barriers to the change process. These identity dynamics were significant in determining the way people interpreted and responded to change within this project and which may relate to other change-oriented situations

Understanding Movement Patterns of Chiricahua Leopard Frogs to Promote Species Persistence in Desert Ecosystems

One-third of the described species of amphibians worldwide are threatened with extinction, including the Chiricahua leopard frog (Lithobates chiricahuensis). This frog is highly aquatic, found in portions of Arizona and New Mexico, and listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Currently, habitat for the Chiricahua leopard frog generally is restricted to anthropogenic sources of water, including tanks maintained for livestock. Movement habits of this frog and patterns of dispersal between disjunct water sources are not well understood. On the Ladder Ranch, a working bison ranch in southern New Mexico, we constructed pitfall traps to capture frogs leaving stock tanks. We attached radio transmitters to 14 individuals during the summer of 2013 to study the potential for movement between widely-spaced tanks. Individuals captured in stock tanks (n = 11) showed very high site fidelity, never leaving their source location while carrying transmitters up to 18 days. Individuals captured in a nearby creek (n = 3) moved as much as 2800 m over a 17-day period. Daily movements of these individuals varied greatly (mean = 121 m, SD = 249) and do not appear to be related to temperature or precipitation. During the 2014 field season, we will attempt to track a larger number of animals moving along the creek corridor and to nearby tanks. Quantifying movement abilities of native amphibians will allow biologists to manage anthropogenic water sources to support movement between habitat patches and maintain functioning metapopulations, while preserving important features of the Ranch for livestock use

Assessing Wood Quality of Borer-Infested Red Oak Logs with a Resonance Acoustic Technique

Large numbers of black oak (Quercus velutina Lam.) and scarlet oak (Quercus coccinea Muenchh.) trees are declining and dying in the Missouri Ozark forest as a result of oak decline. Red oak borer-infested trees produce low-grade logs that become extremely difficult to merchandize as the level of insect attack increases. The objective of this study was to investigate the use of a resonance-based acoustic technique to evaluate the wood quality of infested red oak logs before processing as measured by grade, type and location of defects, and mechanical properties of the resulting boards. Principal component and canonical correlation analyses revealed that relationships do exist between log acoustic measurement and board grade yield, and between a linear combination of log acoustic velocity and diameter at breast height and a linear combination of board defect measurements. Although the acoustic technique was found capable of assessing wood quality at a stand level, the major advantage of the technique lies in segregating logs within the stand

The Remarkably Featureless High Resolution X-ray Spectrum of Mrk 478

An observation of Mrk 478 using the Chandra Low Energy Transmission Grating Spectrometer is presented. The source exhibited 30-40% flux variations on timescales of order 10000 s together with a slow decline in the spectral softness over the full 80 ks observation. The 0.15--3.0 keV spectrum is well fitted by a single power law with photon index of Gamma = 2.91 +/- 0.03. Combined with high energy data from BeppoSAX, the spectrum from 0.15 to 10 keV is well fit as the sum of two power laws with Gamma = 3.03 +/- 0.04, which dominates below 2 keV and 1.4 +/- 0.2, which dominates above 2 keV (quoting 90% confidence uncertainties). No significant emission or absorption features are detected in the high resolution spectrum, supporting our previous findings using the Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer but contradicting the claims of emission lines by Hwang & Bowyer (1997). There is no evidence of a warm absorber, as found in the high resolution spectra of many Sy 1 galaxies including others classified as narrow line Sy 1 galaxies such as Mrk 478. We suggest that the X-ray continuum may result from Comptonization of disk thermal emission in a hot corona through a range of optical depths.Comment: 21 pages, 7 figures; accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journa

Memorial: Albert O. Brecht (1946-2012)

Albert Brecht was born in Dallas, Texas, in 1946. He attended the University of North Texas, where he had a double major in government and sociology. His interest in government led him to the University of Houston College of Law. It was there that Albert found his calling in life. He worked part-time as a student assistant in the law library. After graduating from Houston, he enrolled in the Master of Law Librarianship program at the University of Washington

Deep brain stimulation for levodopa-refractory benign tremulous parkinsonism

Benign tremulous parkinsonism (BTP) is characterized by prominent resting tremor combined with action and postural components, and with only subtle rigidity and bradykinesia. This tremor is frequently disabling and poorly responsive to therapy with levodopa. Thus, BTP could be considered either as a distinct clinical disorder or a variant of PD. We present a case of a 57-year-old man who had a 3-year history of severe and functionally disabling resting tremor with action and postural features bilaterally but with left dominant hand predominance. There was only very mild rigidity and bradykinesia and no postural instability. His tremor was refractory to dopaminergic therapy, including carbidopa/levodopa. The dopamine transporter (DAT) imaging showed reduced tracer uptake in the putamen bilaterally, more so on the right side. He was treated with deep brain stimulation (DBS) targeting the right ventral intermediate nucleus of the thalamus. His tremor resolved immediately after procedure. The DAT imaging abnormalities indicate the presynaptic dopamine deficiency. In some autopsied BTP cases classic alpha-synuclein pathology of PD was observed. Thus, despite the lack of levodopa responsiveness BTP likely represents a variant of PD and not a distinct neurodegenerative disorder. DBS should be considered for patients with BTP PD variant despite their poor responsiveness to levodopa treatment