I’m thinking about my father today as it was seventeen years ago that he left this earthly plane. My brother Greg and I were fortunate that we were with him for two weeks of home hospice. This is one of my favorite photos of him with his grand-kids taken the year before he died. Rest in peace, daddy-o.
1.
Australian scientists specializing in aluminum-ion batteries are now working with Brisbane-based Graphene Manufacturing Group to commercialize a technology that could transform energy storage. They are claiming that graphene aluminum-ion battery cells will charge up to 60 times faster than the best lithium-ion cells and hold three time the energy of the best aluminum-based cells.
Jingxu (Kent) Zheng, Ph.D. ’20, currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, recently published a paper and said, “A very interesting feature of this battery is that only two elements are used for the anode and the cathode – aluminum and carbon – both of which are inexpensive and environmentally friendly. They also have a very long cycle life. When we calculate the cost of energy storage, we need to amortize it over the overall energy throughput, meaning that the battery is rechargeable, so we can use it many, many times. So if we have a longer service life, then this cost will be further reduced.”
This is good news for the tree huggers (like me!) and for the transportation and solar technology fields. The upside of aluminum is that it is abundant in the earth’s crust and has a high capacity to store more energy than many other metals.
2.
I recently posted on Facebook an excerpt from William Kent Krueger’s Blood Hollow, his fourth in a mystery series set in the north woods of Minnesota. His protagonist is Cork O’Connor, the former sheriff of Tamarack County and a man of mixed heritage—part Irish and part Ojibwe. Reading his books is how I have come to know a bit about the Anishinaabe Nation of that region.
Johnny Papp’s Pinewood Broiler was an institution in Aurora, a gathering place for locals as far back as Cork would remember. His father, during his tenure as sheriff, often started his day there, rubbing elbows with the loggers and construction crews and merchants and resort owners of Tamarack County. Most of them were descended from the early Voyageurs and the immigrants–Finns, Germans, Slavs, Irish, and a dozen other nationalities who’d come in the old days, lured by the promise of a good life built on the wealth of the great white pines and the rich iron ore deposits of the Mesabi and Vermillion Ranges. Only a very few ended up rich, but most immigrants were able to build good lives, create homes, and establish history. The problem was that as they moved in, they shoved aside an entire group of people who had occupied that land for generations. The white men called them the Chippewa, which was a bastardization of one of the names by which they were known, Ojibwe. They were part of the Anishinaabe Nation whose territory, by the time the white settlers arrived, stretched from the eastern shores of the Great Lakes to the middle of the Great Plains. The Anishinaabeg saw themselves as stewards of the land with no more right or need to possess the earth than the hawks did the air currents that held them aloft. Land ownership was a white man’s concept, and it was accomplished through a series of treaties and underhanded business dealings that robbed the Anishinaabeg blind.
So in keeping with that sentiment, after the Biden administration’s cancellation of the Keystone XL in January, the Line 3 pipeline (Canadian oil giant Enbridge) project is going full steam ahead, which violates treaty rights of the Anishinaabe peoples, which includes the Ojibwe/ Chippewa. An article published in Vox goes on to say that, “If the oil spills, activists worry Enbridge won’t have the ability to clean it up. Most of Alberta’s tar sands oil is trapped beneath the boreal forest, which means trees must be cleared for companies like Enbridge to get access to the oil. Once the forests are cleared, a lot of the tar sands oil requires in situ mining, in which hot steam is pumped underground to help liquefy the tar sands oil so it’s ready for extraction. Once pulled from the ground, the trouble doesn’t end there: Throughout its lifetime, a gallon of gasoline made from tar sands oil emits 15 percent more carbon dioxide than one made from conventional oil, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists.” One report from Oil Change International posted an article stating that it’s a giant step backward and carbon impacts from this expansion.
To fight this project, Taysha Martineau, co-founder of the Indigenous community support group Gitchigumi Scouts, set up a resistance camp on nine acres of land they bought with $30,000 from a GoFundMe campaign. Read more about her work here.
Meanwhile, Tania Aubid, who is Anishinaabe, has been on a hunger strike in opposition to the that same pipeline expansion, claiming it will pose a significant risk of oil spills that could destroy precious water resources, wetlands, and ancestral lands. For the Anishaanabeg, it’s also a matter of legal rights, as the construction would violate a series of treaties with the U.S. government that grant them rights to hunt, fish, and gather food in the region.
One report from Oil Change International posted an article stating that it’s a giant step backward and carbon impacts from this expansion.
There is a Treaty People Gathering planned for June to stand up to the abuse of the land. On the website it states, “There are several lawsuits playing out as multiple tribes and other groups are trying to appeal key Line 3 permits and the Environmental Impact Statement (read more about it here). We are holding out hope for those appeals to go through, but cannot rely on them, especially as construction is happening right now. We need to show political leaders that our movement is powerful, push them to do the right thing, and stop Line 3 immediately.”
3.
Lillian Gibson, left, and Calla Walsh canvassing for a mayoral candidate, Michelle Wu, in Boston.Credit...Philip Keith for The New York Times
An army of progressive 16-year olds? Interesting times. They know social media, they care about progressive policy, especially on the climate, and were a major factor in getting Senator Edward J. Markey elected over Joseph P. Kennedy III, also a democrat. This article in the New York Times suggests that they seemed to have affected long-established voting patterns: In Massachusetts, the turnout among registered voters between 18 to 24 had shot up to 20.9 percent in the 2020 primary from 6.7 percent in 2018, and 2.1 percent in 2016, according to Tufts’ Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement. Some of what the young progressives have done can best be described as opposition research, targeting Democrats whom they consider too far right.
I love that these young folks are getting involved in politics. And it’s possible, since there is a certain naiveté in this age group, that the lack of ‘how things are suppose to work’ might just be what is needed to break through to new and improved paradigms.
4.
Speaking of paradigms that need an upgrade, thank Gawd we have another old white guy who knows what is best for the ‘wee women’ of Texas. On Wednesday, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law a bill that bans abortion the moment a fetal heartbeat has been detected, making it one of the harshest abortion bans in the country. Come on Alabama and Mississippi, you can best this!
At the same time, Mississippi may have ‘trumped’ Texas with the Supreme Court announcing last Monday that it will review a restrictive Mississippi law that provides a clear path to diminish Roe v. Wade’s guarantee of a woman’s right to choose an abortion. With the nasty orange man’s appointees to the court, giving it a 6-3 conservative majority, there is a real possibility that they will roll back abortion rights leading to throwing out the 1992 viability standard and immediately could mean tighter abortion restrictions in a number of states.
According to an NPR report from 2019 a national poll suggests that “A total of 77% say the Supreme Court should uphold Roe, but within that there's a lot of nuance — 26% say they would like to see it remain in place, but with more restrictions added; 21% want to see Roe expanded to establish the right to abortion under any circumstance; 16% want to keep it the way it is; and 14% want to see some of the restrictions allowed under Roe reduced. Just 13% overall say it should be overturned.”
5.
You know by now that the House voted on Wednesday to create an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol assault. McConnell can’t make up his mind about whether he wants to rub up against the former disgraced leader of the ‘free’ world or toss him to the lions. First he said he was open to voting for it, but that might’ve been because he thought all of the House Republicans would vote against it. He was even vocal early on in denouncing the efforts of some of his colleagues to block certification of the election results.
Now he’s complaining the bill is too partisan: "It's not at all clear what new facts or additional investigation yet another commission could actually lay on top of existing efforts by law enforcement and Congress.” Hardy-har-har-har.
Call me a cynic but any efforts to push the orange man into the dustbin of history have just been a public finger-wag. Two impeachments and the Mueller report; crickets. Is there any reason that any of these men of power and money will be brought to any sort of justice? Doubtful.
For a more promising and upbeat take than mine on this issue, read what Heather Cox Richardson had to say on Wednesday.
6.
John Hodgman strikes again!
James writes: I clean our cats’ litter boxes on laundry day, so that I can use the dirty towels to dry the (clean) boxes out before refilling them. My wife thinks it’s gross, but the towels go straight into the wash afterward. She would prefer that we get cheap towels for this dedicated purpose. I think that’s a waste.
Hodgman: Probably you’re right. Probably those towels are clean. But they are dripping with Toxoplasma gondii as far as I am concerned. You must permit this illogic, because bath towels are intimate. They surround our naked, wet bodies at their most vulnerable, and your wife deserves to reach for a towel and not think, Is this a shawl of cat poop? Perhaps soon you will have some houseguests. Try telling them your scheme as you hand them a towel. Or better, have your towels monogrammed: “These were inside a litter box, but I swear they are clean.” I bet not even the cats would touch them.
And now, flip your lid with the rock…
Gary, i pretty much always find your posts interesting and entertaining, I think this one sets the bar for important information content. Thanks!