Gemini News

The Perils of the Arctic

By Gemini News 2019-09-06 13:53:25

[By Christina Benjaminsen and Åse Dragland] On a light June night in 1989 the Russian cruise ship Maxim Gorkiy glides peacefully along the coast of Svalbard. Suddenly there is a loud impact and alarm bells ring all over the ship. Just like Titanic, the ship carrying 973 German passengers has hit an iceberg. It takes on water and begins to sink immediately. Fortunately a rescue helicopter is stationed on Bjørnøya, and the Norwegian Coast Guard ship Senja is on patrol...

New Experiments Prove the Physics of Ship's Wakes

By Gemini News 2019-08-30 19:30:55

[By Steinar Brandslet] He solved a 127-year-old physics problem on paper and proved that off-centred boat wakes could exist. Five years later, practical experiments proved him right. “Seeing the pictures appear on the computer screen was the best day at work I’ve ever had,” says Simen Ådnøy Ellingsen, an associate professor at NTNU’s Department of Energy and Process Engineering. That was the day that PhD candidate Benjamin Keeler Smeltzer and master’s student Eirik Æsøy had shown in the lab that...

Norwegian Team Discovers Cheaper Way to Make Hydrogen Fuel

By Gemini News 2019-08-23 13:58:48

[By Georg Mathisen] Norwegian scientists have developed a material which can make hydrogen from water vapor, instead of liquid water. It pays off, because heat is cheaper than electricity. The research results were published recently in Nature Materials in an article titled “Mixed proton and electron conducting double perovskite anodes for stable and efficient tubular proton ceramic electrolysers.” Hydrogen can take over when batteries can no longer do the job. When it is important to store large amounts of energy, for...

Giving Ferries Wings to Optimize Wave Power

By Gemini News 2019-07-05 18:56:38

The boat wings started as an unfinished idea in Eirik Bøckmann’s head. Now they’re being mounted on a ferry in the Faroe Islands. Actually, he doesn’t call them boat wings, but wavefoils. Eirik Bøckmann won the regional finals of the NTNU Researchers’ Grand Prix with a lecture on wave-propelled ships in 2013. The wavefoils on the front of the ship enable the waves to contribute to propelling the ship forward. This reduces fuel consumption. At the same time, the foils...

Researchers Look to Efficiency to Cut Ship Emissions

By Gemini News 2019-06-14 16:42:53

[By Håvard Egge] Shipping is the most efficient way of moving goods around the world, in terms of energy consumption per unit transported, but there is still a great deal to be gained by making shipping more environmentally friendly. Emissions from international shipping come to around 1.2 billion tonnes of CO2 a year, which is equal to 2 – 3 per cent of total global emissions. If measures are not taken, these emissions will rise, probably by 50 – 250...

Svalbard's Reindeer Adapt to Climate Change by Eating Seaweed

By Gemini News 2019-05-05 23:30:24

The Arctic archipelago of Svalbard is already experiencing dramatic effects from climate change. A new study shows how these changes can force wild reindeer to graze on seaweed, a strategy that increases their likelihood of survival. The bodies of Svalbard reindeer are extremely well adapted to their arctic home at 79 degrees N latitude. As the northernmost reindeer population on the planet, they are thick and round, which makes it easier for them to tolerate the cold. They’re shorter, smaller...

Researchers Want to Store Swedish CO2 Under the North Sea

By Gemini News 2019-04-19 12:53:09

A Swedish-Norwegian research project will be looking into the possibilities and costs of transporting CO2 captured in Sweden for storage on the Norwegian continental shelf. This is the first project ever to look into this possibility. “This can bring Sweden closer to its target of achieving climate neutrality by 2045," says Research Manager Kristin Jordal at SINTEF. May reduce CO2 emissions by 500,000 tons per year The aim is to investigate the possibilities of establishing a full-scale facility for the...

New Norwegian Drones Check Ships for Cracks and Rust

By Gemini News 2019-04-17 18:32:45

[By Idun Haugan] Inspecting ship tanks and storage spaces underwater is a challenging task for humans. A start-up company that originated at NTNU is manufacturing autonomous drones that can take over the job – and do it more cheaply. The entrepreneurial company Scout, which designs autonomous drones for safer ship inspection, is ranked as one of Trondheim’s most promising technology companies. The company was also named this year’s top newcomer in the annual Impello analysis that does the ranking. The Impello...

First Glimpse Beneath an Ultraslow-Spreading Mid-Ocean Ridge

By Gemini News 2019-03-25 13:59:08

[By Nancy Bazilchuk] For the first time ever, researchers have been able to peek deep into the mantle of the Earth under an ultraslow mid-ocean ridge, where they have been able to observe mantle melting and growth of the Earth’s crust. More than 100 years ago, the German meteorologist and avid balloonist Alfred Wegener remarked in a letter to his future wife Elsa Köppen on an odd pattern he noticed on world maps. “Doesn’t the east coast of...

Mapping Phytoplankton with a Smart AUV

By Gemini News 2019-03-08 13:41:22

Phytoplankton form the base of the marine food chain but are notoriously difficult for scientists to account for — a little like trying to identify and count motes of dust in the air. A truly independent underwater vehicle shows it can do the job. Declining seabird numbers Trygve Olav Fossum watched an orange, torpedo-shaped instrument slide off the R/V Gunnerus and plop into the coastal waters near the island called Runde. It was June 2017 and Fossum, a PhD candidate...