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After Falcon 9 Rocket Anomaly, SpaceX Seeks Rapid Return to Flight

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Wednesday, July 17, 2024

After Falcon 9 Rocket Anomaly, SpaceX Seeks Rapid Return to FlightSpaceX has filed a request with the Federal Aviation Administration to determine whether the company can resume launches of its recently grounded workhorse rocketBy Elizabeth Howell & SPACE.comScreenshot from the webcast of a SpaceX Starlink launch on July 11, 2024, showing a buildup of white material on the upper stage of a Falcon 9 rocket. SpaceX is seeking a rapid return to Falcon 9 launches following a rare failure of its workhorse rocket during a satellite launch last week.The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) received a request from SpaceX on Monday (July 15) to continue launching Falcon 9 flights during the mandatory mishap investigation following the ill-fated Starlink 9-3 mission in which the rocket's upper stage experienced a liquid oxygen leak. SpaceX has asked the FAA to make a public safety determination, which would allow the company to resume launches if the administration determines the anomaly "did not involve safety-critical systems or otherwise jeopardize public safety," SpaceflightNow reported reported on Tuesday (July 16). The FAA also provided Space.com with the statement, after a request."The FAA is responsible for and committed to protecting the public during commercial space transportation launch and reentry operations," the agency wrote in the e-mailed statement. "The FAA is reviewing the request [by SpaceX] and will be guided by data and safety at every step of the process."On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.If approved, SpaceX could potentially meet its schedule in launching two human spaceflight launches in the coming weeks. Falcon 9 uses different variants of the rocket for both crewed and uncrewed launches. The first astronaut launch, slated for July 31, is the privately-funded Polaris Dawn mission (financed by American billionaire Jared Isaacman) that will include the first commercial spacewalk in high Earth orbit. The second, expected in mid-August, is the Crew-9 launch to the International Space Station on behalf of NASA.NASA is following SpaceX's Falcon 9 launch failure investigation and its potential impact to future agency astronaut missions, the space agency said in a July 12 statement."Crew safety and mission assurance are top priorities for NASA," NASA officials wrote in the statement. "SpaceX has been forthcoming with information and is including NASA in the company's ongoing anomaly investigation to understand the issue and path forward. NASA will provide updates on agency missions including potential schedule impacts, if any, as more information becomes available."SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, which has launched 364 missions to space and suffered only two failures in 14 years, suffered a liquid oxygen propellant leak in its second stage during its July 11 launch."After a planned relight of the upper-stage engine to raise perigee — or the lowest point of orbit — the [single] Merlin Vacuum engine [on the second stage] experienced an anomaly and was unable to complete its second burn," SpaceX wrote in a July 12 update."Although the stage survived and still deployed the satellites, it did not successfully circularize its orbit, but it did passivate itself as normally performed at the end of each mission," SpaceX added. "This left the satellites in an eccentric orbit with a very low perigee of 135 km [84 miles], which is less than half the expected perigee altitude."In its July 16 statement, the FAA said the public safety determination request would be evaluated on matters including "safety-critical systems, the nature and consequences of the anomaly, the adequacy of existing flight safety analysis, safety organization performance, and environmental factors.""If the FAA agrees no public safety issues were involved," the statement added, "the operator may return to flight while the investigation remains open, provided all other license requirements are met."The FAA has not provided a timeline for its evaluation of the request, which is common practice in aerospace safety investigations due to the complex nature of spaceflight. Missions with humans on board, such as Polaris Dawn and NASA's Crew-9, would likely receive an extra level of scrutiny.The vast majority of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets are for Starlink satellites, also made by SpaceX, to push out its broadband satellite internet business. But the rocket is also used for critical national security missions as well as a selection of high-profile government satellite launches used for Earth observation, for example.Falcon 9 also launches the most frequently of any rocket today, having sent 69 launches to space so far in 2024 (including the one failure). China, the second-greatest launching entity in the world after SpaceX, has 30 successful launches this year so far.Copyright 2024 Space.com, a Future company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

SpaceX has filed a request with the Federal Aviation Administration to determine whether the company can resume launches of its recently grounded workhorse rocket

After Falcon 9 Rocket Anomaly, SpaceX Seeks Rapid Return to Flight

SpaceX has filed a request with the Federal Aviation Administration to determine whether the company can resume launches of its recently grounded workhorse rocket

By Elizabeth Howell & SPACE.com

Screenshot from the webcast of a SpaceX Starlink launch on July 11, 2024, showing a buildup of white material on the upper stage of a Falcon 9 rocket.

Screenshot from the webcast of a SpaceX Starlink launch on July 11, 2024, showing a buildup of white material on the upper stage of a Falcon 9 rocket.

SpaceX is seeking a rapid return to Falcon 9 launches following a rare failure of its workhorse rocket during a satellite launch last week.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) received a request from SpaceX on Monday (July 15) to continue launching Falcon 9 flights during the mandatory mishap investigation following the ill-fated Starlink 9-3 mission in which the rocket's upper stage experienced a liquid oxygen leak. SpaceX has asked the FAA to make a public safety determination, which would allow the company to resume launches if the administration determines the anomaly "did not involve safety-critical systems or otherwise jeopardize public safety," SpaceflightNow reported reported on Tuesday (July 16). The FAA also provided Space.com with the statement, after a request.

"The FAA is responsible for and committed to protecting the public during commercial space transportation launch and reentry operations," the agency wrote in the e-mailed statement. "The FAA is reviewing the request [by SpaceX] and will be guided by data and safety at every step of the process."

On supporting science journalism

If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.

If approved, SpaceX could potentially meet its schedule in launching two human spaceflight launches in the coming weeks. Falcon 9 uses different variants of the rocket for both crewed and uncrewed launches. The first astronaut launch, slated for July 31, is the privately-funded Polaris Dawn mission (financed by American billionaire Jared Isaacman) that will include the first commercial spacewalk in high Earth orbit. The second, expected in mid-August, is the Crew-9 launch to the International Space Station on behalf of NASA.

NASA is following SpaceX's Falcon 9 launch failure investigation and its potential impact to future agency astronaut missions, the space agency said in a July 12 statement.

"Crew safety and mission assurance are top priorities for NASA," NASA officials wrote in the statement. "SpaceX has been forthcoming with information and is including NASA in the company's ongoing anomaly investigation to understand the issue and path forward. NASA will provide updates on agency missions including potential schedule impacts, if any, as more information becomes available."

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, which has launched 364 missions to space and suffered only two failures in 14 years, suffered a liquid oxygen propellant leak in its second stage during its July 11 launch.

"After a planned relight of the upper-stage engine to raise perigee — or the lowest point of orbit — the [single] Merlin Vacuum engine [on the second stage] experienced an anomaly and was unable to complete its second burn," SpaceX wrote in a July 12 update.

"Although the stage survived and still deployed the satellites, it did not successfully circularize its orbit, but it did passivate itself as normally performed at the end of each mission," SpaceX added. "This left the satellites in an eccentric orbit with a very low perigee of 135 km [84 miles], which is less than half the expected perigee altitude."

In its July 16 statement, the FAA said the public safety determination request would be evaluated on matters including "safety-critical systems, the nature and consequences of the anomaly, the adequacy of existing flight safety analysis, safety organization performance, and environmental factors."

"If the FAA agrees no public safety issues were involved," the statement added, "the operator may return to flight while the investigation remains open, provided all other license requirements are met."

The FAA has not provided a timeline for its evaluation of the request, which is common practice in aerospace safety investigations due to the complex nature of spaceflight. Missions with humans on board, such as Polaris Dawn and NASA's Crew-9, would likely receive an extra level of scrutiny.

The vast majority of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets are for Starlink satellites, also made by SpaceX, to push out its broadband satellite internet business. But the rocket is also used for critical national security missions as well as a selection of high-profile government satellite launches used for Earth observation, for example.

Falcon 9 also launches the most frequently of any rocket today, having sent 69 launches to space so far in 2024 (including the one failure). China, the second-greatest launching entity in the world after SpaceX, has 30 successful launches this year so far.

Copyright 2024 Space.com, a Future company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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1803 Fund unveils renderings of $70 million investment for Portland’s Black community

Initial site work, including permitting, is expected to take roughly two years, with construction scheduled to take another two years after that.

The 1803 Fund, an organization working to advance Portland’s Black community, unveiled new renderings Tuesday for a combined ten acres it purchased on the banks of the Willamette River near the Moda Center and in the lower Albina neighborhood.The organization, formed in 2023 with a $400 million pledge from Nike co-founder Phil Knight and wife Penny Knight, said last month it was spending $70 million on several Eastside properties. It said the redevelopment of those sites would have a tenfold economic impact via the hundreds of local jobs it expects to generate. The total projected outlay for the redevelopment remains unclear.Project leaders say they expect initial site work for what they’re calling Rebuild Albina, including permitting, to take roughly two years, with construction scheduled to take another two years after that.At a Tuesday press conference, organization leaders detailed plans for two sites: a set of grain silos on three acres formerly owned by the Louis Dreyfus Co. and now called Albina Riverside; and a seven-acre property in the lower Albina neighborhood south of the Fremont Bridge and west of Interstate 5, in a district once known as The Low End.“We intend to give that name back to the community,” Rukaiyah Adams, chief executive of the 1803 Fund, said Tuesday of The Low End district, as a carousel of renderings flashed on a wide screen behind her.The group has said it wants to see those seven acres become a neighborhood gateway that connects the Black community to downtown. The Low End is slated to become a mixed-use neighborhood with housing and public spaces with art, businesses, culture and community initiatives, according to a factsheet provided by the 1803 Fund, while plans for Albina Riverside are still in the works. Still, the Albina Riverside renderings show a reuse of the grain silos, a basketball court and what appear to be community-access steps down to the waterfront.Properties in The Low End require environmental cleanup, which project officials say they are coordinating with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. It’s not clear at this point what environmental remediation the Albina Riverside site may need, officials said.On Tuesday, project leaders said $30 million went toward properties in The Low End, while they spent $5 million on Albina Riverside. Another $35 million in Albina-area property investments are forthcoming, according to the factsheet.Mayor Keith Wilson and City Council member Loretta Smith took turns at the lectern heaping praise on Adams for her leadership of the fund.Wilson said he was committed to supporting the 1803 Fund’s “transformational projects” as the redevelopment of Albina bolsters Portland’s broader renaissance. “I keep wanting to cry every time I look at you, Rukaiyah,” the mayor said. “It’s personal for me, and I know it is for you, as well.”Smith told attendees that whenever she travels to another city, there’s a district called The Low End where members of the Black community live and gather.“It had a stigma to it, and it does have a stigma to it,” Smith said. “Now you’re taking that stigma away and saying, come on down to Albina to The Low End. It’s a cool thing to do. So thank you very much for giving us back that history and that culture.”Retaking the stage, Adams said part of what prompted the purchase of the grain silo was stories she heard years ago from former state Sen. Avel Gordly – the first Black woman sworn into the Oregon Senate – of Black men who used to work and died in the silos.Gordly implored Adams to take more of a leadership role in helping to clean up the Willamette, Adams said. “The connection of Black folks who migrated here from watersheds in the Jim Crow South to that Willamette River watershed is deep and spiritual,” Adams said. “My family left the Red River watershed in Louisiana to come to the Willamette River watershed here. “Our stories are often told as the movement between cities, but we are a people deeply connected to the water,” she said. “We wade in the water.”--Matthew Kish contributed to this article.

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Colorado mandates ambitious emissions cuts for its gas utilities

Colorado just set a major new climate goal for the companies that supply homes and businesses with fossil gas. By 2035, investor-owned gas utilities must cut carbon pollution by 41% from 2015 levels, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission decided in a 2–1 vote in mid-November. The target — which builds on goals…

Colorado just set a major new climate goal for the companies that supply homes and businesses with fossil gas. By 2035, investor-owned gas utilities must cut carbon pollution by 41% from 2015 levels, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission decided in a 2–1 vote in mid-November. The target — which builds on goals already set for 2025 and 2030 — is far more consistent with the state’s aim to decarbonize by 2050 than the other proposals considered. Commissioners rejected the tepid 22% to 30% cut that utilities asked for and the 31% target that state agencies recommended. Climate advocates hailed the decision as a victory for managing a transition away from burning fossil gas in Colorado buildings. “It’s a really huge deal,” said Jim Dennison, staff attorney at the Sierra Club, one of more than 20 environmental groups that advocated for an ambitious target. ​“It’s one of the strongest commitments to tangible progress that’s been made anywhere in the country.” In 2021, Colorado passed a first-in-the-nation law requiring gas utilities to find ways to deliver heat sans the emissions. That could entail swapping gas for alternative fuels, like methane from manure or hydrogen made with renewable power. But last year the utilities commission found that the most cost-effective approaches are weatherizing buildings and outfitting them with all-electric, ultraefficient appliances such as heat pumps. These double-duty devices keep homes toasty in winter and cool in summer. The clean-heat law pushes utilities to cut emissions by 4% from 2015 levels by 2025 and then 22% by 2030. But Colorado leaves exact targets for future years up to the Public Utilities Commission. Last month’s decision on the 2035 standard marks the first time that regulators have taken up that task. Gas is still a fixture in the Centennial State. About seven out of 10 Colorado households burn the fossil fuel as their primary source for heating, which accounts for about 31% of the state’s gas use. If gas utilities hit the new 2035 mandate, they’ll avoid an estimated 45.5 million metric tons of greenhouse gases over the next decade, according to an analysis by the Colorado Energy Office and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. They’d also prevent the release of hundreds more tons of nitrogen oxides and ultrafine particulates that cause respiratory and cardiovascular problems, from asthma to heart attacks. State officials predicted this would mean 58 averted premature deaths between now and 2035, nearly $1 billion in economic benefits, and $5.1 billion in avoided costs of climate change. “I think in the next five to 10 years, people will be thinking about burning fossil fuels in their home the way they now think about lead paint,” said former state Rep. Tracey Bernett, a Democrat who was the prime sponsor of the clean-heat law. Competing clean-heat targets Back in August, during proceedings to decide the 2035 target, gas utilities encouraged regulators to aim low. Citing concerns about market uptake of heat pumps and potential costs to customers, they asked for a goal as modest as 22% by 2035 — a target that wouldn’t require any progress at all in the five years after 2030. Climate advocates argued that such a weak goal would cause the state to fall short on its climate commitments. Nonprofits the Sierra Club, the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project, and the Western Resource Advocates submitted a technical analysis that determined the emissions reductions the gas utilities would need to hit to align with the state’s 2050 net-zero goal: 55% by 2035, 74% by 2040, 93% by 2045, and, finally, 100% by 2050. History suggests these reductions are feasible, advocates asserted.

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The rewriting of Australia’s nature laws come as a relief, yet I can’t help feel a sense of foreboding | Georgina Woods

The minister says quick approvals can happen while protecting the environment, but my experience tells me that haste brings unintended consequencesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastI got a text from a biodiversity advocate around midday on Thursday asking me: are you glad, or sad?I wasn’t sure how to reply. Continue reading...

I got a text from a biodiversity advocate around midday on Thursday asking me: are you glad, or sad?I wasn’t sure how to reply.The Australian parliament is amending the country’s environment laws. Thanks to negotiating by the Greens, the amended laws will not enable the fast-tracking of coal and gas mining, which the government had proposed. Decisions about coal and gas mines that harm water resources will be retained by the commonwealth and not given over wholly to state governments as the government had proposed. That is an enormous relief.And yet, I am filled with foreboding.The bill introduced into parliament only a few weeks ago proposed to take the country backwards in environmental protection. It sought to strip communities of participation in environmental decisions, hand decision-making about environmental harm to the states and territories and give the environment minister sweeping power to tailor environmental regulations for certain developments, companies or industries.The government made it clear from the outset that the convenience of business, the desire for “quick yesses” that could harm the natural environment, was its chief priority. It has been made clear that the government intends to grant fast-tracked approval to renewable energy developments and minerals mines. There is excited talk about “abundance” – which is code for sweeping forests, wetlands, woodlands and local communities out of the path of business, mining and development.The minister is adamant this can be done while protecting the environment, but my 25 years of experience with environmental regulation tell me that haste brings unintended consequences. It makes communities angry. It leads to losses of our beautiful natural heritage that are mourned for generations. It impoverishes us by eroding the natural ecosystems that actually create the “abundance” that makes our society.Sign up: AU Breaking News emailThere is no abundance without reciprocity and we will learn this, to our sorrow, in the years to come if we continue treating the natural world as a magic pudding that can be cut and cut and cut and will come again.Coal and gas mining will not be fast-tracked and for that I am very glad. But the government ruled out embedding any formal consideration of the impacts of greenhouse gas pollution, the effect of climate change on Australia’s natural heritage, into decision-making. Only a few months ago, Australia’s first national climate risk assessment itemised a devastating prognosis for Australia’s marine, freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems across the continent if global warming exceeds the limits set down in the Paris climate agreement. It spoke of ecosystems collapsing and whole species dying out. The only way to prevent that warming is to stop the pollution that comes from burning coal, gas and oil for energy, and quickly. Indeed, an International Court of Justice advisory opinion has affirmed that all countries have a legal obligation to prevent climate harm and protect the climate system. For Australia, that means preventing the pollution from our energy exports.The greenhouse gas emissions from Australia’s energy exports, and the impact that this pollution is having on Australians, is not going to go away because the minister refuses to think about it, or because the prime minister is too squeamish to talk about it. The consequences will plague our descendents for generations to come, long after this generation of politicians are gone, but there will be more immediate demands from communities suffering the effects of climate change that will become increasingly impossible to ignore.

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Mind, hand, and harvest

A volunteer-driven pilot program brings low-cost organic produce to the MIT community.

On a sunny, warm Sunday MIT students, staff, and faculty spread out across the fields of Hannan Healthy Foods in Lincoln, Massachusetts. Some of these volunteers pluck tomatoes from their vines in a patch a few hundred feet from the cars whizzing by on Route 117. Others squat in the shade cast by the greenhouse to snip chives. Still others slice heads of Napa cabbage from their roots in a bed nearer the woods. Everything being harvested today will wind up in Harvest Boxes, which will be sold at a pop-up farm stand the next day in the lobby of the Stata Center back on the MIT campus.This initiative — a pilot collaboration between MIT’s Office of Sustainability (MITOS), the MIT Anthropology Section, Hannan Healthy Foods, and the nascent MIT Farm student organization — sold six-pound boxes of fresh, organic produce to the MIT community for $10 per box — half off the typical wholesale price. The weekly farm stands ran from Sept. 15 through Oct. 27.“There is a documented need for accessible, affordable, fresh food on college campuses,” says Heather Paxson, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Anthropology and one of the organizers of the program. “The problems for a small farmer in finding a sufficient market … are connected to the challenges of food insecurity in even wealthy areas. And so, it really is about connecting those dots.”Through the six weeks of the project, farm stand shoppers purchased more than 2,000 pounds of fresh produce that they wouldn’t otherwise have had access to. Hannan, Paxson, and the team hope that this year’s pilot was successful enough to continue into future growing seasons, either in this farm stand form or as something else that can equally serve the campus community.“This year we decided to pour our heart, soul, and resources into this vision and prove what’s possible,” says Susy Jones, senior sustainability project manager at MITOS. “How can we do it in a way that is robust and goes through the official MIT channels, and yet pushes the boundaries of what’s possible at MIT?”A growing ideaMohammed Hannan, founder of Hannan Healthy Foods, first met Paxson and Jones in 2022. Jones was looking for someone local who grew vegetables common in Asian cuisine in response to a student request. Paxson wanted a small farm to host a field trip for her subject 21A.155 (Food, Culture and Politics). In July, Paxson and Jones learned about an article in the Boston Globe featuring Hannan as an example of a small farmer hit hard by federal budget cuts.They knew right away they wanted to help. They pulled in Zachary Rapaport and Aleks Banas, architecture master’s students and the co-founders of MIT Farm, an organization dedicated to getting the MIT community off campus and onto local farms. This MIT contingent connected with Hannan to come up with a plan.“These projects — when they flow, they flow,” says Jones. “There was so much common ground and excitement that we were all willing to jump on calls at 7 p.m. many nights to figure it out.”After a series of rapid-fire brainstorming sessions, the group decided to host weekly volunteer sessions at Hannan’s farm during the autumn growing season and sell the harvest at a farm stand on campus.“It fits in seamlessly with the MIT motto, ‘mind and hand,’ ‘mens et manus,’ learning by doing, as well as the heart, which has been added unofficially — mind, hand, heart,” says Paxson.Jones tapped into the MITOS network for financial, operational, student, and city partners. Rapaport and Banas put out calls for volunteers. Paxson incorporated a volunteer trip into her syllabus and allocated discretionary project funding to subsidize the cost of the produce, allowing the food to be sold at 50 percent of the wholesale price that Hannan was paid for it.“The fact that MIT students, faculty, and staff could come out to the farm, and that our harvest would circulate back to campus and into the broader community — there’s an energy around it that’s very different from academics. It feels essential to be part of something so tangible,” says Rapaport.The volunteer sessions proved to be popular. Throughout the pilot, about 75 students and half a dozen faculty and staff trekked out to Lincoln from MIT’s Cambridge, Massachusetts, campus at least once to clear fields and harvest vegetables. Hannan hopes the experience will change the way they think about their food.“Harvesting the produce, knowing the operation, knowing how hard it is, it’ll stick in their brain,” he says.On that September Sunday, second-year electrical engineering and computer science major Abrianna Zhang had come out with a friend after seeing a notification on the dormspam email lists. Zhang grew up in a California suburb big on supporting local farmers, but volunteering showed her a different side of the job.“There’s a lot of work that goes into raising all these crops and then getting all this manual labor,” says Zhang. “It makes me think about the economy of things. How is this even possible … for us to gain access to organic fruits or produce at a reasonable price?”Setting up shopSince mid-September, Monday has been Farm Stand day at MIT. Tables covered in green gingham tablecloths strike through the Stata Center lobby, holding stacks of cardboard boxes filled with produce. Customers wait in line to claim their piece of the fresh harvest — carrots, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, herbs, and various greens.Many of these students typically head to off-campus grocery stores to get their fresh produce. Katie Stabb, a sophomore civil and environmental engineering major and self-proclaimed “crazy plant lady,” grows her own food in the summer, but travels far from campus to shop for her vegetables during the school year. Having this stand right at MIT gives her time back, and she’s been spreading the news to her East Campus dorm mates — even picking boxes up for them when they can’t make it themselves and helping them figure out what to do with their excess ingredients.“I have encountered having way too many chives before, but that’s new for some folks,” she says. “Last week we pooled all of our chives and I made chive pancakes, kind of like scallion pancakes.”Stabb is not alone. In a multi-question customer survey conducted at the close of the Farm Stand season, 62 percent of respondents said the Harvest Box gave them the chance to try new foods and 49 percent experimented with new recipes. Seventy percent said this project helped them increase their vegetable intake.Nearly 60 percent of the survey respondents were graduate students living off campus. Banas, one of the MIT Farm co-leads, is one of those grad students enjoying the benefits.“I was cooking and making food that I bought from the farm stand and thought, ‘Oh, this is very literally influencing my life in a positive way.’ And I’m hoping that this has a similar impact for other people,” she says.The impact goes beyond the ability of students to nourish themselves with fresh vegetables. New communities have grown from this collaboration. Jones, for example, expanded her network at MITOS by tapping into expertise and resources from MIT Dining, the Vice President for Finance Merchant Services, and the MIT Federal Credit Union.“There were just these pockets of people in every corner of MIT who know how to do these very specific things that might seem not very glamorous, but make something like this possible,” says Jones. “It’s such a positive, affirming moment when you’re starting from scratch and someone’s like, ‘This is such a cool idea, how can I help?’”Strengthening communityInviting people from MIT to connect across campus and explore beyond Cambridge has helped students and employees alike feel like they’re part of something bigger.“The community that’s grown around this work is what keeps me so engaged,” says Rapaport. “MIT can have a bit of a siloing effect. It’s easy to become so focused on your classes and academics that your world revolves around them. Farm club grew out of wanting to build connections across the student body and to see ourselves and MIT as part of a larger network of people, communities, and relationships.”This particular connection will continue to grow, as Rapaport and Banas will use their architectural expertise to lead a design-build team in developing a climate-adaptive and bio-based root cellar at Hannan Healthy Foods, to improve the farm’s winter vegetable storage conditions. Community engagement is an ethos Hannan has embraced since the start of his farming journey in 2018, motivated by a desire to provision first his family and then others with healthy food.“One thing I have done over the years, I was not trying to do farming by myself,” he says. “I always reached out to as many people as I could. The idea is, if community is not involved, they just see it as an individual business.”It’s why he gifts his volunteers huge bags of tomatoes at the end of a shift, or donates some of his harvest to food banks, or engages an advisory committee of local residents to ensure he’s filling the right needs.“There’s a reciprocal dimension to gifting that needs to continue,” says Paxson. “That is what builds and maintains community — it’s classic anthropology."And much of what’s exchanged in this type of reciprocity can’t be charted or graded or marked on a spreadsheet. It’s cooking pancakes with dorm mates. It’s meeting and appreciating new colleagues. It’s grabbing a friend to harvest cabbage on a beautiful autumn Sunday.“Seeing a student who volunteered over the weekend harvesting chives come to the market on Monday and then want to take a selfie with those chives,” says Jones. “To me, that’s a cool moment.”

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Have we found a greener way to do deep-sea mining?

There are widespread concerns that deep-sea mining for metals will damage fragile ecosystems. But if mining ever goes ahead, hydrogen plasma could shrink the carbon footprint of smelting the metal ores

Seafloor covered with manganese nodulesScience History Images/Alamy A process to extract metals from their ore with hydrogen could make deep-sea mining for valuable materials more sustainable than mining on land, a new study claims. Swathes of the ocean floor are littered with nodules the size of tennis balls. These polymetallic nodules are comprised largely of manganese, with smaller amounts of nickel, copper and cobalt, as well as other elements. As the construction of solar power and electric vehicles booms, demand for these metals is increasing because they are vital components of batteries and wiring. But plans to mine for the polymetallic nodules are highly controversial because operations to collect them would potentially harm the deep-sea floor – one of the last pristine ecosystems on Earth. Even so, some researchers suspect that deep-sea extraction will eventually take place. “I think there is a good chance that someday people… will mine the nodules,” says Ubaid Manzoor at the Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials in Germany. “So better to have a good process [for extracting metals] after mining than to have one more dirty process.” The Metals Company, a Canadian deep-sea mining company that has applied for a deep-sea mining permit from the Trump administration, plans to extract metals using a fossil fuel-based approach involving coke and methane. Its process involves placing the nodules first in a kiln and then an electric arc furnace – a greener alternative to a traditional blast furnace. Even so, the company says its approach will produce 4.9 kilograms of carbon dioxide emissions for every 1 kilogram of valuable metals. Manzoor and his colleagues have found a way to lower these extraction-related emissions. Their system doesn’t involve a kiln. Instead, the nodules would be ground into smaller pellets and placed straight into an arc furnace that also contains hydrogen and argon gas. High-energy electrons flowing from an electrode in the furnace to the pellets would knock electrons off the molecules of hydrogen gas, forming a plasma that can be heated up to temperatures exceeding 1700°C. The hydrogen ions in the plasma then react with the oxygen in the pellets, stripping the oxides away from the alloy and leaving pure metal behind. Besides water, the only by-products are manganese oxide and manganese ligates, which can be used for making batteries and steel. If the hydrogen gas used in the furnace is “green” – meaning it is produced by splitting water with electricity from renewable sources – and the electricity to run the furnace is generated from renewable sources, the process should emit no CO2, according to the researchers. Today, the vast majority of hydrogen is produced using fossil fuels. Metals like manganese are found on land as well as on the seafloor, but at concentrations about 10 times lower. Mining them on land involves moving large amounts of earth, and extracting the metal from the ore often relies on sulphuric acid. The process can result in razed rainforests and polluted rivers. However, land-based mining could be better regulated to prevent environmental destruction, and the smelting of the metals could be done with green hydrogen and renewable electricity rather than fossil fuels, argues Mario Schmidt at Pforzheim University in Germany. At that point, vacuuming up nodules from the seabed wouldn’t necessarily be more sustainable. “We do not see any fundamental advantage for deep-sea mining in terms of carbon footprint,” he says. “The sustainability of deep-sea mining fails because of the threat it poses to the biodiversity of deep-sea flora and fauna.” But the process that Manzoor and his colleagues have developed could help deep-sea mining become more economically viable, according to David Dye at Imperial College London. “In addressing how you would do the extraction metallurgy downstream of actually picking it up off the seabed, you may be able to then open up the business case and the environmental case to make that attractive,” he says. Manzoor stresses that the research isn’t meant to advocate for deep-sea mining, and the environmental impacts should be fully investigated.

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The Fellowship of the Springs

Florida’s artesian springs are a natural wonder of the world. As unique as the geysers of Yellowstone and as mesmerizing as Vernal Falls in Yosemite, these blue jewels surrounding the north Florida landscape are considered a treasure by many who see them. The state contains the largest and highest concentration of fresh water springs on earth. But today, the future of Florida’s springs is uncertain. With flow levels declining and nitrate pollution on the rise, the springs today bear the scars of a profound struggle. Florida's own government continues to approve permits for large companies that want to pump water from the springs and their springsheds, for nominal permit fees that often cost less than a day pass to Disney World. The Fellowship of the Springs takes viewers behind the scenes of the fight to save Florida's springs, from the halls of the state capitol in Tallahassee to deep caves of Ichetucknee spring.

Water
Government
Business

Una Perla de la Revolucion (A Pearl of the Revolution)

A documentary short that focuses on a sustainability project in Cojímar, Cuba

Sustainable
Business
Documentary

Let There be Light

Genesis 1:3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. Taiwan was founded on agriculture in the early days. However, in the face of rapid urbanization, there was no time to build infrastructure such as sewage pipelines, and a large amount of sewage was discharged indiscriminately, causing severe water pollution. To connect domestic sewage to the water purification plant and turn it into water resources that can be continuously recycled, the sewage engineering team adopted a most humane "equation" to appease and compensate the residents disturbed by the project. They invited the residents to participate in the beautification design of the back alley, which was damaged by the engineering project, and hired old painters who have painted "Roman Holiday" and "Back to the Future" movie billboards, and new generation painters to create with colorful brushes. The colorful paintings make the originally dark, dirty, and smelly back alleys clean and bright, and people are more willing to enter the back alleys to make tea and chat, a secret paradise for locals is then created. Let’s walk into the back alleys and see how the light makers light up the back alleys with human touch and let the light penetrate the water, creating Formosa’s unique “Light Making Equation”. This action has been carried out since 2016 and will continue in the future.

Water
Business
Pollution

The Story of a Forest

In 2004, a generation of activists arose in South Florida, carrying the passion of direct action groups like Earth First. and the deep analysis of the global justice movement that had swept the country in the preceding years. These activists sought local issues that exemplified the threats of corporate globalization. They stumbled upon a plan from biotech industry giants acting in collusion with the administration of then-Governor Jeb Bush to clear a vast swath of land in the Northeast Everglades of Florida to accommodate The Scripps Biotech Research Institute - And it was on. Over the next ten years, endless county zoning meetings were counter-balanced by dozens of civil disobedience arrests and a near-constant flow of news headlines about the battle: lawsuits, scandal, corruption, tree sits, endangered species, pranks, blockades, and a roller coaster of incremental victories followed by devastating losses for years on end. THE STORY OF A FOREST captures it all in a 1/2 hour documentary about the Palm Beach County Environmental Coalition (PBCEC) and Everglades Earth First!'s (EEF!) ten-plus year campaign to stop the Scripps Biotech development, with a focus on protecting biodiversity in the Briger forest and the Florida wetlands.

Activism
Forests
Business

Small Footprints: Crafting an Eco-Lodge in Wild Alaska

In 2008, a sustainable development project began in the middle of the Kenai Fjords of Alaska, 3 hours by boat from the nearest port of civilization. Told from the points of view of crew members, project coordinators and the Native Alaskan corporation that owns the land itself, the film is both a celebration of and a blueprint for sustainable construction, as well as an exciting battle against time and the elements deep within wild Alaska.

Sustainable
Business
Documentary

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