Category Archives: 6 Conservation

Emerging Technologies: Smarter ways to fight wildlife crime

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UNEP Global Environmental Alert Services

UNEP-tech

Photo: CyberTracker workshop organised by the African Wildlife Foundation

The illegal trade of animals – for luxury goods, traditional medicine or cultural ceremonies, pets, entertainment, and even research – is a major threat to wildlife conservation and welfare (Baker et al., 2013). Poachers and illegal traders use highly sophisticated and rapidly changing techniques to avoid detection. To keep pace with the “war on wildlife”, conservation and law enforcement communities have started to adopt cutting-edge military tools and techniques. High-tech equipment can magnify counter-poaching efforts without requiring armies of rangers or risking lives. Tools include acoustic traps, mobile technology, mikrokopters, radio frequency identification tags, encrypted data digital networks, camera traps, DNA testing, radio collars, metal scanners, and satellite imagery.

Download pdf Document here

Animal Density and Track Counts: Understanding the Nature of Observations Based on Animal Movements

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Derek Keeping and Rick Pelletier

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Abstract

Counting animals to estimate their population sizes is often essential for their management and conservation. Since practitioners frequently rely on indirect observations of animals, it is important to better understand the relationship between such indirect indices and animal abundance. The Formozov-Malyshev-Pereleshin (FMP) formula provides a theoretical foundation for understanding the relationship between animal track counts and the true density of species. Although this analytical method potentially has universal applicability wherever animals are readily detectable by their tracks, it has long been unique to Russia and remains widely underappreciated. In this paper, we provide a test of the FMP formula by isolating the influence of animal travel path tortuosity (i.e., convolutedness) on track counts. We employed simulations using virtual and empirical data, in addition to a field test comparing FMP estimates with independent estimates from line transect distance sampling. We verify that track counts (total intersections between animals and transects) are determined entirely by density and daily movement distances. Hence, the FMP estimator is theoretically robust against potential biases from specific shapes or patterns of animal movement paths if transects are randomly situated with respect to those movements (i.e., the transects do not influence animals’ movements). However, detectability (the detection probability of individual animals) is not determined simply by daily travel distance but also by tortuosity, so ensuring that all intersections with transects are counted regardless of the number of individual animals that made them becomes critical for an accurate density estimate. Additionally, although tortuosity has no bearing on mean track encounter rates, it does affect encounter rate variance and therefore estimate precision. We discuss how these fundamental principles made explicit by the FMP formula have widespread implications for methods of assessing animal abundance that rely on indirect observations.

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The Value of Animal Tracking Skills

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By Janet Pesaturo

After generations of fading into obsolescence, wildlife tracking has grown in popularity in recent years. No doubt this is due to the work of evolutionary biologist, Louis Liebenberg. He recognized the value of animal tracking skills, and helped traditional African hunter-gatherers use them to earn a living in data collection for wildlife monitoring, research, and anti-poaching efforts.

Part of Liebenberg’s work involved development of the CyberTracker evaluation system, which became an international standard for tracking skills. This elevated the ancient art and science of tracking to a respected discipline within the modern world. But regardless of its status within the modern world, tracking is useful to almost anyone.

Tracking skills deepen your awareness and understanding of wildlife. And that can help you better protect pets, livestock and garden produce; develop competency in hunting; make more informed decisions that impact wildlife; and meet people from vastly different walks of life. Not to mention the fact that it’s great physical and mental exercise, all at once.

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Using Cyber Tracking Technology to Outsmart Poachers

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ImageJef Dupain

I’m just recently back in Lomie (on border of the Dja Faunal Reserve in Cameroon) from two days of practical training for rangers on the use of the CyberTracker/Trimble for ecological monitoring and anti-poaching.

Instead of counting living monkeys, elephants, and great apes, we witnessed the arrest of about 15 poachers on more than five different occasions. We have been hiding and running, sleeping on the ground next to the fire with guards at both sides of our overnight spot— switching every two hours, assuring security. The Conservator, Achile Mengamenya, who was with us, has a good and dedicated team of park wardens (we were about 20). Nobody complains, while equipment is lacking, and everybody works hard. We were fed water and some rice and tomato sauce in the evening, and in the morning we have one or two beignets for each.

The total amount of confiscated illegal wildlife, from the poachers, is surprising—sitatunga, forest duikers, living and dead pangolin, several species of monkey, freshly killed or smoked. No chimp, gorilla or elephant meat though…as these species are victim of a different type and more specialized category of hunters.

We heard only one group of chimps was heard about 1 km from our campsite, so we can consider that this periphery of this Natural World Heritage site is probably almost hunted out.

However, based on the interrogations of the arrested poachers, and witnesses of some park guards, it is clear that the Dja is still housing good numbers of all species, and remains attractive for a lot of people who prefer to put snares in the park instead of working on their fields in the village. With the Dja managers lacking any support for the last few years, and no control happening anymore, the Dja Biosphere is being hit very hard. And poachers are getting increasingly aggressive. Over the last few weeks, one guard got shot in his arm, another received a blow of a machete above his eye, and last night inhabitants of Lomie attacked the post of the Conservator and his team.

Alain Lushimba (who is here with me, taking the lead in the training on cybertracker) and myself agree on the area’s high resemblance with the Lomako Yokokala Faunal Reserve. While being a beautiful forest with high potentials for biodiversity, the Dja is probably in the same conditions today as the Lomako forest was in 2004 when AWF started working in DRC. Support is needed. “Performance Based Management” and “Evidence-based Conservation” à la Lomako, and the lessons learned, will prove most helpful here. The park authorities and their team are extremely happy with the support we are giving.

Today, we will adapt a work plan in order to respond, first of all, to the absolute priority to get those poachers out of the Reserve, restore law and order, and let the people know that the conservator and his team are operational again.

All paths will be georeferenced, poaching camps destroyed, traces of gorillas, chimps, elephants, bongo and buffaloes recorded, and groups of monkeys—now all frightened—counted. Data will be shared with AWF headquarters the AWF-GIS (mapping) Centre. Evaluation on the ground is planned about 4 to 5months from now.

About the Author

Jef Dupain is AWF’s Director, African Apes Initiative. He holds degrees in biology and zoology from the University of Antwerp, has served as an associate professor for great ape conservation at Kyoto University, and has nearly 20 years of practical experience working on great ape conservation in and out of the field—he has an esteemed reputation as an authority on great ape conservation in Africa.

Using technology in the fight against rhino poaching

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Information from Optron

Controlling rhino poaching with the country’s eyes on you is just one of the many tasks that fall under managing the massive area that is the Kruger National Park (KNP). With nearly 2-million hectares of diverse flora and fauna to keep track of, and only about 300 field rangers to do so, monitoring the park is a logistical nightmare. However, the use of innovative technology and customised open-source software is making the ongoing conservation of South Africa’s natural heritage possible. The Kruger National Park is divided into 22 sections, each managed by one section ranger with a number of field rangers to patrol each section every day. Field rangers are imperative for conservation – from the ground, they contribute directly to the management of the park by collecting basic environmental data during their daily patrols. Information such as the distribution of rare and endangered species, availability of surface water and disease outbreaks are integral in the ongoing management of the park. These indicators are used by the SANParks management to provide an early warning system for disease outbreaks, identify trends in illegal exit and entry points, and enable the detection and control of invasive alien species. Therefore, it is extremely important that the data collected is accurate, but when information is recorded manually it is almost impossible to ensure its complete accuracy, which makes collating and using the raw data for decision-making difficult.

When faced with the unique set of challenges that the Kruger National Park presents in terms of ecological conservation, Douw Swanepoel, a Section Ranger of the Kruger National Park, recognised the value of the CyberTracker system in 2000 and soon afterwards 44 GPS devices were purchased for the park. CyberTracker is an open-sourced programme developed by Louis Liebenberg who felt that there was a need for a tracking programme that could work from a palmtop device. The programme is freely available, and the Kruger National Park team has customised the programme specifically for the park’s needs with databases including ranger patrols, vegetation condition assessments, animal behaviour monitoring and invasive species distribution mapping.

The CyberTracker programme used on the Trimble device form a solid partnership, producing a piece of equipment designed specifically to assist with conservation in the park. With an icon-based interface and descriptions in both English and local language, the CyberTracker system is easily accessible to field rangers regardless of literacy. Information is recorded with latitude and longitude coordinates through the integrated GPS system, ensuring that separate GPS skills are not necessary, and as data is captured electronically using graphic check lists, inaccuracy is reduced and minimal training is needed before the rangers can begin recording data. Moving map functionality allows the ranger to pinpoint his exact location on a 1:50 000 or 1:250 000 topographical map or aerial photograph should a ranger urgently need assistance from the SANParks office. With a built-in camera, rangers can document and geotag exactly what they see and send the photo immediately from the field to the office for review, increasing field to office collaboration.

“The device assists the field ranger to accurately call for assistance once a suspicious spoor or even a poached rhino is found,” says Louis Lemmer, from the SAN Parks Honorary Rangers’ National Executive Committee when asked how the device is helping in the fight against rhino poaching. “Previously they had to rely on their general knowledge and geographical features when calling for help, often leading to slow response times due to possible inaccuracies and confusion. The use of GPS technology removes this. Furthermore it is now possible to track and accurately map poacher movements. In this way patterns can be established and plotted on maps. This helps to plan preventative operations.”

The devices are useful as part of a long-term solution because at the end of each day, the data that the field ranger has collected is downloaded on to the section ranger’s computer and then uploaded to SANParks’ GIS/RS Analyst, Sandra Mac Fayden. This allows her to create a full, sophisticated picture of the environmental state of the Kruger National Park with intricate detailing that can only be sourced by professional field rangers with a working knowledge of the area. Once the data has been downloaded it is archived and documented so that it is usable in the long-term.

Thresholds in the programme are set so that the limits of acceptable change in the environment can be monitored. The data in the database is then used in routine analyses run through the programme in order to assess whether there is any danger of ecological factors exceeding those thresholds, thereby warning park management of any unacceptable changes. For example, monitoring data is analysed for each river which flows through the Kruger National Park and should water levels lower and exceed the threshold set by park management, urgent action is required.

With something as volatile and ever-changing as ecology, correct data is essential in its efficient management. In the fight against rhino poaching in the Kruger National Park where intervention and constant vigilance is necessary, rapid decision making is critical and this is only possible when every step of the data collection and analysis is accurate. By using the irreplaceable knowledge and ability of field rangers, curbing human error through easy-to-use software and technology with GPS capabilities, the SANParks team is efficiently managing the vast and diverse ecosystem of the Kruger National Park and engaging in the ongoing fight against rhino poaching.

Read full article here…

Timbavati now home to one of only four Master Trackers in South Africa

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ImageNews24 2014-01-30

South Africa – Have you ever thought about the skill it takes (not to mention the guts) to be able to track animals of the wild? We’re talking lions, leopards and pretty much every other animal you can think of.

Lucas Mathonsi from Sgagula, South Africa knows what we’re taking about because he is now one of only four coveted Master Trackers in the world.

Where the story begins:

His story begins as a five-year-old boy who used to accompany his father who was a ranger in the Timbavati reserve. It is here that Lucas Mathonsi was taught about the animals in the reserve and how to track them.

Over the next 47 years, Lucas honed his skills working as a tracker in the Timbavati and Balule reserves, before joining Lion Sands in 2006 as a Senior Tracker. Lucas is renowned for his particular penchant for tracking the elusive Leopard.

The story now:

In 2013, under the tutelage and mentorships of Louis Liebenberg, Juan Pinto and Wilson Masia, Lucas achieved the much coveted Master Tracker qualification, becoming one of four existing Master Trackers in the world, and only the second tracker to be awarded this prestigious qualification in the Lowveld since 1994.

What it takes to be a qualified tracker:

The Cybertracker qualification is an assessment that was created by Louis Liebenberg after realising that the art of tracking is a skill and talent that needs to be recognised and validated. An assessment system has been created and revolves around the identification of tracks as well as following animal tracks and trails in order to find the animal. For detailed info, click here.

With hard work comes great reward:

In celebration of this remarkable life achievement, the Lion Sands Game Reserve will be naming the link road between Lion Sands Sabi Sand and Lion Sands Kruger National Park the “The Mathonsi Link”.

BACKWARD COMPATIBLE

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CyberTracker fuses ancient knowledge with cutting-edge technology

By Nancy Bazilchuk

July 2008, Conservation Magazine

In 2003, trained trackers combing the rich jungles in the Republic of Congo’s Lossi Sanctuary for gorillas and chimpanzees stumbled upon a disturbing trend. Duikers, dog-sized antelopes that weave and dive through the jungle’s dense undergrowth, were dying at an astounding rate—local indices dropped 50 percent compared to a 2000 census. Gorillas and chimpanzees were dying at similar rates. Blood tests confirmed the culprit was the deadly virus Ebola. The surprise was that no one had previously known that Ebola killed antelopes.

Yet there was no doubt the terrible data were real. The findings were based on hundreds of observations precisely mapped with CyberTracker software. CyberTracker allows hand-held computers to use stylized images instead of text for data entry. Its heart is a menu of icons that depict whatever elements researchers choose. Trackers need only select a pre-programmed image that matches what they see—a grazing antelope, a carabid beetle—and with one tap, the observation is recorded and paired with geographic coordinates via a Global Positioning System (GPS) link. Trackers hardly have to break stride as they work, which allows enormous numbers of data points to be amassed with little effort. The information can be downloaded to a computer and immediately mapped, thus enabling scientists to make real-time observations about trends, such as the ones from Lossi Sanctuary that showed duiker declines.

The program’s greatest strength, and the feature that sets it apart from its competitors, is its ability to transcend language and culture because of its reliance on images, not words, for data entry.

CyberTracker creator Louis Liebenberg, a South African scientist and author, first came up with the idea in 1996 while tracking with a group of Kalahari Bushmen. Liebenberg realized that he could help save the Bushmen’s rapidly disappearing knowledge if he could find a way to help trackers, who could neither read nor write, record their observations. Thus CyberTracker was born.

CyberTracker’s biggest impact has been in South Africa’s national park system. Kruger National Park official Judith Kruger says that rangers use 110 hand-held computers daily to record sightings on patrol—everything from broken fences to elephant-damaged trees to invertebrates. Liebenberg and two rangers from South Africa’s Karoo National Park used it to document seasonal shifts in black rhino feeding behavior. And CyberTracker is being used to record garbage found littering beaches in Gabon as a way to persuade source nations to help clean up. The program allows for remarkable precision: one 500-m-long section of shoreline in Loango National Park was covered with 535 plastic water bottles and 560 flip-flops among more than 3,000 bits of trash.

The software is free and has been downloaded by more than 6,000 people since it was first made available on the Internet in 2000. About 500 users from 30 countries have registered the software—from the entire Spanish National Park Service to a multinational research group in the Arctic to individual trackers in the U.S. With the help of a 2-million-Euro (approximately US$2 million) grant from the European Commission and Conservation International, Liebenberg is developing the next generation of Cyber-Tracker. Three versions will offer increasingly complex programming features along with conservation-specific analysis tools to allow the calculation of standard measures such as Patrol Effort or Index of Abundance.

Liebenberg says the biggest benefit has been to give an authoritative, scientific “voice” to skilled trackers in Africa who can’t otherwise share their knowledge because they can’t write. Karel Benadie is a ranger and expert rhino tracker who worked with Lieben-berg in Karoo National Park. He told Liebenberg that his inability to write down his rhino observations meant “the PhDs would never listen to him before,” Liebenberg said. With Cyber-Tracker, “Now they do.”

More on the Tracker: www.cybertracker.co.za

Liebenberg, L. et al. 1999. Rhino tracking with the CyberTracker field computer. Pachyderm 27:59-61.

Leroy, E. et al. 2004. Multiple Ebola virus transmission events and rapid decline of Central African wildlife. Science 303:387-390.

About the Author
Nancy Bazilchuk is a freelance writer based in Trondheim, Norway.

The Australian Marine Debris Initiative

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The Australian Marine Debris Initiative is a way that everyone can become involved in both the removal of marine debris and finding solutions to stop the flow of rubbish into our oceans.

Tangaroa Blue Foundation is an Australian registered charity focused on the health of our marine environment, and coordinates the Australian Marine Debris Initiative, an on-ground network of volunteers, communities, organisations and agencies around the country monitoring the impacts of marine debris along their stretch of coastline.

Since the program started in 2004, more than 1.2 million pieces of marine debris have been removed from the Australian coastline and data on this debris collated and inputted into the Australian Marine Debris Database.

The database is used to firstly identify what is impacting different sections of the coast, and then to track wherever possible where those items are coming from. Lastly stakeholders are then brought together to work on practical solutions and create source reduction plans to stop marine debris from entering our oceans in the first place. The database has open access to all contributors who are also recognised when data is used, and has been used by the CSIRO, James Cook University, all levels of government and communities.

While an estimated 18,000 pieces of plastic float in every square kilometre of ocean, it is only when it washes ashore that most people get an idea of how much rubbish must actually be out in our oceans and the impacts that this has on marine life and seabirds. This is also our best opportunity to remove it from the environment before the next tide washes it back out to sea again.

Volunteers, organisations and communities from around the country are invited to join forces in the Australian Marine Debris Initiative to find practical solutions in reducing ocean pollution.

The AMDI CyberTracker Sequence was designed using the CyberTracker software and a handheld PDA device to collect data in the field.

Audubon Magazine: Off the Beaten Track

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ImageBY VICTORIA SCHLESINGER

Wildlife tracking is making a comeback, attracting outdoor enthusiasts and biologists alike. For some it’s an engrossing hobby; for others it’s a critical contribution to conservation.

Even as tracking has captured the public’s interest, there has been a decline in natural history courses offered at universities. Across the country, schools have eliminated classes in basic taxonomy, ornithology, mammalogy, herpetology–the list goes on–causing a flurry of journal papers expressing concern about the future of organismal science and the next generation. “It is not trendy, it doesn’t bring in the big grants, or those kinds of subjects are considered to be old fashioned,” says Reed Noss, an ecologist at the University of Central Florida and author of essays on the decline. (Today many conservation biology students devote themselves to statistical modeling and DNA analysis.) “So very few people are coming out of graduate school even trained and able to teach those kinds of courses.”

“We lose a basic connection to nature when we don’t immerse ourselves in natural history and only deal with mathematical abstractions and theory,” says Noss, who laments changes in environmental education since the 1970s. “There was already a shift away from classification and toward experiential education where basically you played games with the kid. No one ever wanted to name anything because ‘No, that’ll turn kids off to nature if they make it hard work.’ ” The danger of these two extremes is that by “losing specialists equipped to identify organisms, we’re not able to track the extinction crisis nearly as adequately as in the past.”

Read the full article here…

Betting on Black Swans: The Potential Implications of New Energy Solutions for Climate Change and Biodiversity

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ImageLouis Liebenberg

14 January 2014

Revolutionary new energy sources may result in the most disruptive changes in human history. Any one of these potential energy sources may become a Black Swan event. This may have both positive as well as unintended consequences for climate change and biodiversity conservation. While the implications for climate change would be positive, severe disruptions in land-use patterns will require intensive monitoring of biodiversity and proactive conservation management.

Accelerated fossil fuel use could conceivably push the Earth’s climate past a dangerous tipping point resulting in runaway global warming. James Hansen warns that we are on the verge of crossing a tipping point into catastrophic climate change. More and more evidence suggest that we could potentially face runaway climate change at a much faster rate than anticipated. While we need to actively pursue all alternative energy options, including energy conservation, novel energy solutions may be essential. We need to provide the growing energy needs of a growing world economy, both in terms of population growth as well as increasing consumption due to growing wealth required to eliminate poverty of the growing population.

Fusion Energy

Since the German physicist Hans Bethe first explained how nuclear fusion powers the stars in 1939, there have been many attempts to harness fusion on Earth with mixed success.

The largest government-sponsored fusion projects include ITER in France and the NIF in the USA. In 2007 construction work started on ITER in Cadarache, France. And in 2009 the US National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California, opened. NIF uses powerful lasers to compress and heat hydrogen fuel and so initiate fusion for military and astrophysical research. These large research programmes, however, may take decades to become economically viable.

An interesting potential Black Swan is the independent, privately funded project that was initiated in 2002 when Dr. Michel Laberge founded General Fusion to develop economically viable fusion energy. His key insight was realizing that Magnetized Target Fusion, with the aid of modern electronics, materials, and advances in plasma physics, could provide a faster, lower cost, and more practical path to fusion power.

General Fusion’s Magnetized Target Fusion system uses a sphere, filled with molten lead-lithium that is pumped to form a vortex.  On each pulse, magnetically-confined plasma is injected into the vortex. Around the sphere, an array of pistons impact and drive a pressure wave into the centre of the sphere, compressing the plasma to fusion conditions.

Novel Forms of Energy

Perhaps the most surprising Black Swans may come in the form of novel solutions that may be found in nuclear processes that have not yet been harnessed, which could result in an unexpected energy revolution.

As a student in 1984 at the University of Cape Town I studied physics under Prof Jan Rafelski (now at The University of Arizona). At the time one of his fields of research was the physics of table top Muon-catalyzed fusion (Rafelski and Jones, 1987). Since then I had a life-long interest in the possibility of clean fusion energy.

One of the most exciting recent developments in physics is in the field of Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR). At present it is not clear when LENR could replace fossil fuels. But if successful, LENR may result in the most disruptive energy revolution in history. It provides the potential for limitless, cheap, safe, distributed, clean energy that can be used on a small scale to provide energy for a single home or scaled up for industrial uses.

In a video released on January 16, 2014 at Serious Science, MIT Associate Prof. Peter Hagelstein talks about the Problem of Cold Fusion and the Fleischmann and Pons experiment, condensed matter physics, and the laws of conservation of energy in momentum.

In 2009 Scott Pelley of the CBS News TV programme “60 Minutes” did a story on “Cold Fusion Hot Again.” A video was released by Joe Zawodny (2012) of NASA and in 2013 Forbes reported on research conducted by NASA on LENR. An “Overview of Theoretical and Experimental Progress in Low Energy Nuclear Reactions” was presented by Francesco Celani (2012) and Yogendra Srivastava (2012) at a CERN Colloquium in March 2012 in Geneva, Switzerland. Robert Godes (2012) maintains that Brillion Energy Corporation will be able to generate power at a fourth of the cost of coal or natural gas power.

Two physicists, Giuliano Preparata (Univ. Statute di Milano) and Allan Widom (Northeastern University, Boston), have proposed a theoretical model of the physics of LENR (Srivastava, 2012). While various chemical elements may be involved, one version of LENR involves Nickel (one of the most abundant elements on Earth) and Hydrogen, which would provide a limitless supply of cheap energy. The by-products would be the transmutation of Nickel into Copper, with no radioactive waste, greenhouse gases or any other form of dangerous pollution (Srivastava, Widom and Larsen, 2010).

In May 2013 an independent report has been published on the “Indication of anomalous heat energy production in a reactor device containing hydrogen loaded nickel powder” (Levi, et. Al. 2013). The authors report that: “Even by the most conservative assumptions as to the errors in the measurements, the result is still one order of magnitude greater than conventional energy sources.” News reports have been featured in Forbes (Gibbs, 2013) and Wired (Hambling, 2013).

The inventor Andrea Rossi aims to bring a commercial product to the market within the next few years. On January 24, 2014, it was announced that Industrial Heat has acquired Rossi’s E-Cat Technology. “The world needs a new, clean and efficient energy source. Such a technology would raise the standard of living in developing countries and reduce the environmental impact of producing energy… Even by the most conservative assumptions as to the errors in the measurements, the result is still one order of magnitude greater than conventional energy sources”

In competition with Rossi, companies like Defklaion Green Technologies, Nichenergy, Brillouin Energy Corporation, Lattice Energy LLC as well as high-profile companies like Mitsubishi and Toyota are also working on commercializing energy generation based on LENR.

An update in Wired magazine, “Cold fusion continues to progress stealthily into the mainstream,” suggests that 2014 is set to be a very interesting year for Low Energy Nuclear Reactions.

Implications for Climate Change and Biodiversity

If any one of these potential energy solutions can successfully be brought to the market, it will be a true Black Swan event that may have profound implications for climate change and the conservation of biodiversity.

Climate Change: It may completely replace fossil fuels, halting the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Furthermore, inexpensive clean energy may make it possible to extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to bring it back to pre-industrial levels, thereby stabilizing the climate. However, even if we stopped using fossil fuels, we may still experience disruptive climate over the next 100 years.

Water and Food Production: It may become viable to desalinate sea water on a large scale, minimizing the need to extract fresh water from rivers. Vertical farming (Despommier, 2009) may become more efficient than conventional farming. Large areas of farm land may revert back to wilderness. While this may increase the area of land available for biodiversity, it is not clear what the unintended impacts may be of the uncontrolled spread of alien species on abandoned farmland.

Social and Economic Disruptions: Accelerated urbanization and depopulation of rural areas. Inexpensive energy may accelerate the automation of industry resulting in large-scale unemployment. This may require a fundamental restructuring of the economy.

Biodiversity: An irregular climate and the disruptive impacts on land-use patterns may require intensive monitoring of biodiversity to manage the spread of alien species and the influx of indigenous species onto abandoned farm land.

CyberTracker’s Vision: In the future millions of citizen scientists worldwide may use their smartphones to monitor the entire global ecosystem in real time. Large-scale unemployment may provide an opportunity to create “Green jobs” to stimulate the economy and provide the manpower needed for conservation management. Intensive monitoring may reveal new data on the complexities of ecosystems evolving over time in response to disruptions in land-use patterns. Intelligent computers may be used to analyse huge quantities of complex data and predict future trends.

References

Celani, F. 2012. “Overview of Theoretical and Experimental Progress in Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR).” CERN Colloquium Thursday March 22, 2012, Geneva, Switzerland.

Despommier, D. 2009. “The Rise of Vertical Farms.” Scientific American, Vol. 301. No. 5.

Gibs, M. 2013. “Finally! Independent Testing Of Rossi’s E-Cat Cold Fusion Device: Maybe The World Will Change After All.” Forbes.

Godes, R. 2012. Interview with Robert Godes, inventor of the controlled electron capture reaction (CECR) being commercialized by Brillion Energy Corporation of Berkeley.

Hambling, D. 2013. “Cold Fusion gets red hot and aims for EU” Wired.

Hansen, J. 2009. Storms of my Grandchildren. The Truth about the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save humanity. London: Bloomsbury

Levi, G, E. Foschi, T. Hartman, B. Hӧistad, R. Pettersson, L. Tegnér and H. Essén. 2013. Indication of anomalous heat energy production in a reactor device containing hydrogen loaded nickel powder.

Pelley, S. 2009. “Cold Fusion Hot Again.” CBS News TV programme “60 Minutes.”

Rafelski, J. and S. E. Jones. 1987. “Cold Nuclear Fusion.” Scientific American, Vol. 257, No. 7.

Srivastava, Y. N., A. Widom and L. Larsen. 2010. “A primer for electroweak induced low-energy nuclear reactions.”

Srivastava, Y. N. 2012. “Overview of LENT Theory Low Energy Nuclear Transmutations.” CERN Colloquium Thursday March 22, 2012, Geneva, Switzerland.

Zawodny, J. 2012. “Method for Enhancement of Surface Plasmon Polaritons to Initiate & Sustain LENR.”