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UAE to help build lunar-orbiting station

The UAE’s deal to contribute the airlock for the planned lunar-orbiting Gateway station marks a significant milestone for the nation, a Khalifa University expert on the space sector says.

“The Gateway project is a fundamental part of the Artemis program and sets up the stage for further exploring the moon by developing and maintaining a manned space station in lunar orbit. The UAE’s recent partnership with NASA on this project highlights the country’s dedication to becoming a major player in the space sector in the coming years,” Mohamed Ramy El-Maarry, director of the Space and Planetary Science Center at Khalifa University, tells KUST Review.

Gateway, the space station expected to orbit the moon, will serve as a science lab and temporary lodging as astronauts explore the moon and test its materials. The Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre will provide the airlock that will allow people and supplies to enter and exit the station. The deal also includes the potential for UAE astronauts to participate in future moon missions.

President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Jan. 7 announced the project on X, formerly Twitter: “I was pleased to attend with my brother Mohammed bin Rashid the launch of the UAE’s contributions to the historic lunar Gateway, which will serve as humanity’s first space station around the moon.

“Through our long-term investment in space exploration and scientific innovation, the UAE is determined to work alongside its international partners to enable collective progress for all.”

The project is part of NASA’s Artemis program aimed at returning astronauts to the moon by 2024 and the next frontier — an eventual human mission to Mars.

IMAGE: Pixabay

The UAE’s Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center is the latest member to join the international partnership of the lunar Gateway project consisting of the European Space Agency, the Canadian Space Agency and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Gateway is expected to serve as a layover for future missions deeper into the cosmos with a docking port, part of the airlock to be provided by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre, for those deep-space missions.

The agreement reinforces scientific ties between the UAE and the United States.

“By combining our resources, scientific capacity and technical skill, the U.S. and UAE will further our collective vision for space and ensure it presents extraordinary opportunities for everyone here on Earth,” U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, who also chairs the U.S. National Space Council, said in a press release.

The UAE’s space program has moved at a rapid pace since its launch in 2017. Accomplishments include sending its first two UAE astronauts to the ISS and its first spacewalk.

In conjunction with NASA, Hazza al Mansoori completed an eight-day stay on the ISS in 2019. Sultan al Neyadi in 2023 completed six months on the ISS, numerous scientific experiments and the first space walk by an Arab.

It has been over five decades since a human walked on the moon but the UAE space program has its sights set on being there for a lunar-exploration revival.

Along with the crew airlock and ongoing engineering services to the ISS, the agreement with NASA includes UAE access to the space station and the opportunity for its own astronauts to embark on lunar missions.

NASA has scheduled a Jan. 31 town hall meeting about the Gateway project with presentations and panels.

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A fair wind

Offshore wind farms could potentially produce more energy than the world currently consumes, but procedures, permits and regulatory administration present challenges. A 2019 report by the International Energy Agency estimates that the offshore wind potential is equivalent to approximately 18 times the global energy expenditure.

And this industry is growing: Many countries around the world are developing offshore wind farms and investing in the sector. By 2030, an estimated 35 countries will have offshore wind turbines — nearly double the number of countries participating today.

Global Market Insights reports the “offshore wind energy market passed U.S.$47.5 billion in 2022,” and estimates a compound annual growth rate in excess of 16.2 percent between 2023-2032.

Rebecca Williams, global head of offshore wind at the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC), believes offshore wind will be at the heart of the world’s energy system by 2050.

And for good reason. First, they are emissions-free. No wildlife is displaced as wind farms don’t need large land masses, and there are no neighbors to bother with noise pollution. Plus, being offshore, they aren’t subject to the dying winds that plague land turbines. Higher wind force and consistent movement means more electricity.

Environmental perks aren’t the only benefits offshore wind farms provide. Experts see potential for economic growth in this sector, possibly creating millions of jobs globally.

CAPTION: Dec, 2015, 196 countries adopt the Paris Agreement IMAGE: Arnaud Bouissou

However, in order to achieve the 1.5-degree global temperature increase limit set out by the 2015 Paris Agreement, offshore wind turbine production would have to quadruple, according to the energy council.

“Offshore wind is at the very center of global ambitions to deliver a fossil-fuel free future that limits global heating to 1.5C,” the council’s Williams says. “However, to achieve this, “global capacity should exceed 365 GW by 2030.”

The International Renewable Energy Agency agrees, requiring a further growth to an estimated 2 terawatts by 2050 to meet the 1.5C goal. However, current pace of development suggests global production will achieve only 66 percent of this target by 2030.

Even countries rich in other resources are looking into offshore wind’s potential. In the UAE, the government’s renewable-energy company Masdar and the National Petroleum Construction Co. in 2022 entered into an agreement to investigate the technology.

By leveraging each other’s world-class expertise in our respective fields, our combined efforts could play a vital role in achieving the UAE’s clean energy objectives and support our nation’s net-zero commitment,says Mohamed Jameel Al Ramahi, Masdar CEO in Offshorewind.biz.

Masdar also has a stake in the Hywind Scotland offshore wind farm and in 2022 signed an agreement with Cosmo Energy Holdings Co. to explore offshore wind projects in Japan. Hywind is the world’s first floating wind farm.

Offshore wind energy faces obstacles, however.

IMAGE: Shutterstock

The farms are difficult to build in deep waters. They are expensive, hard to maintain and risk damage from high waves and winds during storms.

Hitting the 2 terawatt target would translate to roughly U.S.$500 billion in capital expenditure this decade, and U.S.$3 trillion by 2050, according to Williams.

Currently, two types of offshore turbines are in use — those that are fixed to the ocean floor and those, like Hywind, that float.

The deepest fixed-bottom turbine currently reaches a depth of 57.4 meters. This means they need to be closer to shore in shallower waters.

Floating turbines, however, can be built in much deeper water. Turbines in deeper water and farther offshore generate significantly more power, utilizing high, consistent winds and have no barriers nearby to block them.

Because so much more power can be generated from these deep-water titans (some stand over 490 feet tall), a lot of time is spent minimizing the challenges they face. One such challenge is hurricanes.

In search of a possible way to mitigate this risk, a team of researchers at the University of Colorado recently collaborated on a new blade design inspired by something that handles strong storms well — the palm tree.

The design uses lighter materials, which could bring down the cost and leave the structure less vulnerable to damage in high winds. It could also make it possible to have one big turbine as opposed to many smaller ones. This would reduce installation and material costs.

The team also hopes that its design will outlast current turbines, which have a lifespan of approximately 20 years.

While protecting turbines is a priority for some, other countries battle to get projects off the ground due to governmental regulations.

A country like Vietnam, for example, with a lengthy coastline of over 3,000 kilometers and winds that can reach up to 10 meters per second, has the potential to be the leader in offshore wind in Southeast Asia. But a 2022 study by the International Renewable Energy Agency estimates the process to get from the beginning phase of a project to actual operation is approximately seven years — the first five years of which is simply project development.

“Many markets need to build a sector from the very beginning,” Williams tells KUST Review.

One of the major hindrances to acquiring approvals is uncertainty about the effects on marine life. Development in offshore wind energy may offer a limitless supply of energy but protecting the oceans’ ecosystems is also important

Currently, information about the impacts of offshore wind farms on marine life is sparse or conflicting. A 2022 study by a team at Basque Research and Technology Alliance suggests that more data is needed. The team proposes the full impact will be known only when more studies are done across greater-sized areas — currently most publications are based on studies on small areas, quite close to the shore, and farms with few turbines. It also recommends monitoring specific and protected ecosystems.

IMAGE: Shutterstock

One organization that is working to ensure the protection of marine life from offshore wind development is U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It works to provide wind developers with research on marine-life impact that can assist with decisions on where to build, the construction process, and functionality once the farm is up and running.

Overall, Williams is positive for the future of offshore wind farms, both floating and fixed: “There are challenges in delivering on this huge potential, but the sector is also a beacon of hope for international collaboration that delivers climate action. Initiatives like the Global Offshore Wind Alliance, which was founded by GWEC, (the International Renewable Energy Agency) and the government of Denmark, are bringing together countries all over the world, with big and small offshore markets, to share expertise and knowledge that will help make potential clean energy into actual clean energy,” she tells KUST Review

High, consistent winds in deep water help turbines generate more power than those on land or close to the shoreline.

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Out-of-this-world guests visit
Khalifa University

Emirati Sultan Al Neyadi and three other members of Expedition 69 recently joined a packed room of engineers, scientists and students at Khalifa University to talk about their stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

The astronauts fielded questions, comments and a lot of gratitude about the 200-plus experiments the team completed in microgravity for scientists who guided the processes from Earth.

Al Neyadi, the first Emirati and Arab to complete a long mission in space and a spacewalk, said it was a difficult endeavor. The engineer and now national hero felt the pressure of conducting research for scientists in space, knowing the importance of his tasks.

But first, the astronaut had to get used to the challenges of working in microgravity.

It was difficult the first few times — we have items secured to the table with Velcro but out of habit you put something on a table and it’s suddenly floating away.

He also said performing complicated tasks like inserting a needle into tissue while speaking to Earth-bound scientists over a headset was intense. “It’s an experiment that could be ruined and I don’t want to make it a failure,” he said. “But I took it slowly and methodically and by the end had mastered it with no issue.”

Experiments, according to the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center, included fluid science and how fluids behave in microgravity; immune system research; epigenetics; and technology that may contribute to future deep-space exploration.

Al Neyadi was accompanied by crewmates NASA astronaut Warren “Woody” Hoburg, commander Sergey Prokopyev and flight engineer Sergey Prokopyev. Cosmonauts Prokopyev and Petelin were stranded on the space station for just over a year. A suspected piece of space junk damaged their return capsule three months into what was a planned six-month stay on the ISS; their 371-day tour on the ISS along with American Frank Rubio was the third-longest space mission in history.

In addition to speaking about their experiences, the astronauts visited Khalifa University labs.

The cosmonauts joked about how nice it was to see new faces when the others arrived for their half-year stay, but were serious about what the ISS represents to them. “The International Space Station is a project for all mankind and is an amazing example of international cooperation,” Prokopyev said.

CAPTION: Khalifa University panel introduction IMAGE: Khalifa University

A video of daily activities on the ISS played in the background during the panel discussion. Among the images: footage of what appeared to be an intense fitness regimen. Extended time in microgravity can result in muscle mass loss and, consequently, a reduction in bone density. Exercise mitigates health problems.

Al Neyadi says the crew exercised for two and a half hours daily. This included cardiovascular training (to keep blood pumping to the lower extremities) and resistance training. “When we returned,” he said, “we did have the muscle mass, but unfortunately we lacked the stability to exercise again on the ground and to help recover quickly after landing.”

Between scientific research projects and fitness maintenance, there was time for fun and connection.

Al Neyadi tells KUST Review that Hoburg and Prokopyev enjoyed playing chess and even 3D printed a giant piece when one team’s king floated away, never to be found again.

The crew members agreed that the biggest takeaway from the expedition is enduring friendships. “Truly, (Al Neyadi) is a brother and a life-long friend,” Hoburg said.

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The united colors of hydrogen

Hydrogen is an invisible gas, yes. But different forms are given color codenames to help distinguish among them, essentially based on the molecule used to produce hydrogen and the source of energy. There is no universal agreement on what the colors mean, so definitions may change over time or between countries. Here’s our guide to the generally understood hydrogen rainbow:

GRAY
The most common form of hydrogen production – roughly 95 percent – is produced today from the main component of natural gas (methane) through a steam reforming process. In this case natural gas reacts with steam at high temperatures and pressures producing hydrogen gas and carbon dioxide (CO2). CO2 is released into the air, accounting for 2 percent of the world’s CO2 emissions.

BLUE

Blue hydrogen is produced by the same steam reforming process as the gray hydrogen. In this case, carbon capture and storage (CSS) is added in its production to avoid the CO2 emissions.

BLACK and BROWN
These are the most environmentally damaging forms of hydrogen because they’re created using bituminous coal (“black”) or lignite (“brown”). Gasification byproducts CO2 and carbon monoxide are released into the atmosphere.

IMAGE: Unsplash

GREEN
Made with surplus energy from renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power to split water, green hydrogen produces no harmful greenhouse-gas emissions, just hydrogen and oxygen.

PINK , PURPLE or RED
These colors denote hydrogen that is produced using nuclear power as the energy source to break the water molecule into hydrogen and oxygen.

TURQUOISE
The newest color is produced by a process called methane pyrolysis, which creates hydrogen and solid carbon. It is still experimental. If the process is powered by renewable energy and the carbon is used or permanently stored, turquoise is potentially a valuable low- or zero-emission hydrogen.

IMAGE: Unsplash

YELLOW
Yellow hydrogen is a new term to define hydrogen produced from the electrolysis of water using solely solar power as the energy source. It is a particular case of green hydrogen.

WHITE
This form of hydrogen, not very common, is naturally occurring in geological deposits, generated by the interaction of water with some metals of the rocks at high temperatures and pressures. It can be released by a process named fracking. The same name is given to the hydrogen produced as a byproduct in industrial processes.

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What’s the ETA on EVs?

In July 2022, Bloomberg analysts reported that the U.S. has now reached the “tipping point” for mass adoption of electric vehicles. According to the report, the nation has reached the magic number that signals a period when “technological preferences rapidly flip.” That magic number is just 5 percent — and 5 percent of new car sales in 2022 were electric vehicles.

IMAGE: Shutterstock
The Middle East brings its own challenges to EV adoption

Although consumer interest is high in the region — local company M Glory Holding Group in the UAE opened its electric vehicle manufacturing plant in 2022 with plans to produce 55,000 electric cars annually to meet a rising demand for green mobility — there are still numerous obstacles hindering the widespread adoption of EVs. The limited availability of EV charging stations is one concern, but more pressing is the new demand placed on power grids by at-home charging stations. Traditional power-distribution grids are not designed to handle a significant number of EVs charging in the evenings when their owners return home from work. Utilities providers will need to predict and account for this surge in demand. Read more›››

EV manufacturers also face the challenge of keeping up with demand, not just for EVs themselves but for their constituent parts. Replacement parts are expensive relative to components needed for internal combustion vehicles, especially when supply chains are not fully developed and hampered by the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic on logistics around the world. Localized procurement is the answer for the future, but companies and suppliers need time and investment to set up and serve the local market. In a relatively nascent industry, this is not a short-term solution.

Included in those replacement parts are batteries and tires. Saudi Arabia announced a U.S.$6 billion investment in a steel plate mill complex and electric vehicle battery plant in 2022 to take advantage of its geographical location at the crossroads of the producers of the necessary minerals: lithium, cobalt, manganese, nickel and graphite. But this investment also foresees the need for more batteries in the Middle Eastern EV market than anywhere else. Put simply: The sun and car batteries don’t mix well. Hot weather means higher temperatures under the hood, which accelerates corrosion inside the battery. In an electric vehicle, full of batteries, this is naturally an exponentially larger concern.

Beyond damaging them, heat also drains batteries, meaning less range available for drivers. A 2019 study by the American Automobile Association found the driving range of an EV could reduce by up to 17 percent if the temperature is constantly above 35C — which it is for almost half the year in the Gulf.

Charging the EV only adds to the heat experienced by the battery. Charging in the evening makes it easier on the cooling systems but that puts a strain on the power grids.

It’s all connected!‹‹‹ Read less

Sales for electric vehicles, commonly called EVs, are on track to double every couple of years, says Loren McDonald of EVAdoption. The industry analysis group predicts 40 million EVs on U.S. roads by 2030. In 2020, some 276 million vehicles were registered.

The industry certainly seems to believe in the proliferation of electric vehicles: Vojay Chandler, investment strategist at Morgan Stanley, says EV’s share of global auto sales is likely to grow from about 7 percent today to nearly 90 percent by 2050.

There are plenty of reasons for this. Climate change and its consequences are forcing people to consider their environmental impact. Governments across the globe are developing policies to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increasing energy efficiency wherever possible. Fuel prices are at the mercy of political instability, particularly in Europe, and governments are hesitant to introduce e-fuels.

As Nasir Salari, marketing expert at Bath Spa University, points out, despite the sluggish growth rate of electric cars, the latest report by the International Energy Agency in 2020 illustrates promising figures in major markets. The global electric car stock hit the 10 million mark, a 43 percent increase over 2019. And while China has the largest fleet with 4.5 million, Europe had the largest annual increase to reach 3.2 million. In the United Kingdom, 67,100 passenger electric cars were registered in 2020. This is promising, Salari says, but the adoption curve is still at the early stage.

IMAGE: Abjad

Salari conducted research in the U.K. looking at the factors contributing to the “sluggish growth rate.” He interviewed 336 individuals in the U.K. to assess their willingness to buy an EV. Like most analysts, he predicts a boom in the coming years, particularly with the U.K. government reaffirming its commitment to ban new petrol and diesel cars in 2030. With pressures like these, new cars will be electric, but people currently seem reluctant to dive into the electric future.

Credit: Abjad

“There are various reasons for this,” Salari tells KUST Review. “This has always been the case for new revolutionary products: the first color TV, smartphone, cameras, for example.

There have always been early adopters and then majority adopters and the people open to embracing technology in general will also be more willing to adopt an electric car. The TRI is a good indicator of this.”

Developed in 2000, the TRI (Technology Readiness Index) is a widely used scale in understanding technology adoption behavior and a powerful tool to predict the adoption of incremental and revolutionary technologies.

“Our data shows no difference between men and women in their willingness to purchase an EV or pay a higher price for the product,” Salari says. “However, the overall TRI is higher amongst men than women, and this difference is statistically significant. This shows that overall, men are more willing to embrace new technology and possess new and unique items in general. There was also no significance between age groups for their willingness to purchase, but I was surprised to see a significant difference in how much environmentalism played a part: The 50-plus age group expressed higher levels of green values than the 20-29 group.”

IMAGE: Unsplash
Bringing down charging times

One of the issues with electric vehicles is the charging time. But a team at Khalifa University is working on cutting that time down. Read more›››

On-board EV charging is generally done through two stages, says Vinod Khadkikar, who leads the project funded by Abu Dhabi’s ASPIRE. In the first stage, AC voltage is converted into DC voltage. But this DC voltage is generally higher than the EV battery voltage, so an additional DC-DC converter is needed to charge the battery. Most current commercial on-board chargers use a full-power processing converter at the DC-DC stage, which requires higher voltage and current rating of switches and diodes. This restricts the charging speed. The size, cost and efficiency of any EV charger also largely depends on the device rating and number of power processing stages.

The KU team proposes partial power processing-based topographies at the DC-DC stage that use a fraction of the power.

“Therefore, the DC-DC converter size is reduced and the charger efficiency is high (97-99 percent with hard switching). The semiconductor device rating is reduced significantly, which helps to achieve higher power density (smaller footprint/compact size). This lets the user use the same footprint size to design the charger for higher power,” Khadkikar says.‹‹‹ Read less

Interestingly, Salari found that most consumers were more concerned by the economic impact of their purchase, rather than the environmentalism aspect: They cared more about their investment than how green they were being.

“Electric vehicles are advertised as environmentally friendly and they are! And people know this, but this isn’t necessarily encouraging people to purchase them,” Salari says. “Environmentalism does not have an impact on purchasing an electric car; its functionality is more important.”

Like Salari, experts believe that demand for electric vehicles will increase as they become more affordable. Morgan Stanley predicts that continued performance improvements and reductions in the cost of batteries (which account for about 35 percent of an EV’s total cost) could lower the average EV price to $18,000 by 2025.

Salari says it also depends on consumer incentives: “People aren’t running out to buy electric vehicles because they’re good for the environment. They’re hesitating because they’re expensive but they’re in favor because their running costs are much cheaper. Regular drivers are more open to adopting EVs because of fuel costs, so it all depends on how you market your product. Enviro isn’t doing it: Shift your marketing to the economic benefits.

Prices will be lower in the future — that’s how innovation works. The first time a product launches, it’s not a cheap product, but as it becomes a mainstream offering, it will become more affordable. The market is still in its infancy. To grow it, we need more early adopters and government incentives are one way to drive adoption.

– Nasir Salari, Marketing Expert at Bath Spa University

Tax credits and improved infrastructure are the way forward then. The U.K. is certainly investing in its electric vehicle readiness: Lampposts across London are being fitted with sensors and EV charging points to reduce emissions and cut congestion, and parking is even free in the capital for EV drivers. New-build houses come with electric vehicle charging stations as standard and many are fitted with solar panels to power this.

As charging infrastructure gets more support, subsidies and incentives become more robust, and governments enforce more petrol-banning policies, electric car sales will continue to rise.

“It’s happening,” Salari tells KUST Review. “It may not be where we expected it to be by now, but it’s happening.”