(click on the image to go to the registration page)

The Early Bird registration for the WCSJ 2013 conference is still open – for a few days! Hurry up. Please spread the word!

You can, of course, still register for the conference in June, but it will cost you more.

The last day for the Early Bird registration is Friday, 24^th of May.

Also please spread the word, you are welcome to join the conference even when you are not a working journalist. We are not closing non-journalists out. We need discussion between the journalists and the people they are working and communicating with.

This is because there has been false information about the non-journalists not being able to participate.

The program is being  finalized and printed. You find most of the program in the internet now. Come and meet your colleagues from all over the world.

http://abicko.avcr.cz/2013en/04/index.html

http://abicko.avcr.cz/fotogalerie/vybuch-plynu.html

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.431669990262121.1073741826.109956692433454&type=1

Richard Pitt, leading plasma scientist at ITER project. With his fusion goggles. Like Dr Octopus.

Some reflexions about a recent study trip Cadarache (south of France), on the ITER building site. Where the largest international scientific and industrial consortium (European countries, including Switzerland, USA, Russia, Chine, South Korea, Japan and India) is patiently constructing what will be the first tokamak-genre nuclear fusion reactor. It should give up ten times more energy than what will be needed to trigger the burning reaction: from 50 to 500 MW. In 2022, according to the latest schedules.

During one and a half day, thanks to EUSJA, the directors of the ITER project (meaning the way in latin) and some of its chief scientists, plus its media service, have assaulted us with a torrent of datas and infos. According to which, ITER is bloody complicated. A reasonable explanation of its immense costs – around 15 bilion euros. The complex logistics of buildings parts of the reactor in different countries and assembling them afterwards onsite with strict tolerances – of the mm order – in particular was emphasized many times to us. For those who read french, i include a copy of the article I published for my swiss newspaper (24 heures, based in Lausanne).

But one point I’d like to come to is the use of metaphors for describing complex science to a wide audience. Metaphors given by the scientists themselves and which we tend to reproduce. Fusion between atoms is invariably connected with what happens in the stars, eg our sun. And thus, a fusion reactor must reproduce that, ending to be a sun on earth. Which is nice when you have to find a short and striking title for your article.

But as physicist Richard Pitt, from ITER, explained to us, fusion on earth doesn’t work like that. In the sun, and in the stars in general, fusion happens between hydrogen atoms, because of the work of gravity. And because, the ambient being a plasma, there is such an awful lot of neutrons around. “I you want to do that on Earth, first of all, you don’t have a mass the equivalent of the sun, which is fortunate, says same Richard Pitt. And second, without that mass, it would take ages. Many of them.” No sun on earth, then, no sir. We have many other examples of these approximative metaphors, in medicine or robotics.

He’s right, of course. So we have to use two isotopes og Hydrogen, Deuterium and Tritium. With temperature (or velocity, which is the same) much higher than in the sun’s heart. Mind you, as the plasmas used in a tokamak are very undense, would you consider to put one of your arms into it – according to Richard Pitt, who has a british sense of humour – it would only vaporize that arm. Not your entire body nor the whole french Provence region.

But then, why such stringent security measures on the ITER site? with armed guards, and so on? Very easy. Tritium, a fairly radioactive element, plays a key role in what we know as H bombs. Not dangerously radioactive for a long period, with a half-life of 12.6 years. But the combination of “H bomb” and “radioactive” tells you why any visit on the ITER site is very closely monitored. And why the ITER organization had to comply with very strict Tritium handling and stocking guidelines, given by the french nuclear authority, itself among the strictest on earth, we were told. A small but significant part of ITER’s huge budgets.

Thank you for reading along, and enjoy life and fusion! And don’t miss the fusion scene in the film Spiderman II. Mr Pitt tried to imitate Dr Octopus with his goggles.

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EUSJA has got invitation to attend the 8-th biennial congress “Pain in Europe” to be held in Florence, October 9-12 (http://www1.kenes.com/efic/).

This major pain congress in Europe is organized by EFIC – the European Federation of International Association for the Study of Pain. Started in 1993 EFIC has developed into Europe´s most important multi-professional organization in the field of pain medicine, representing 36 constituent national pain societies with over 20.000 scientists, physicians, psychologists, physiotherapists and other healthcare professionals. The meeting in Florence will bring together over 4000 pain specialists for a multidisciplinary forum that will focus on the latest developments in the study and treatment of acute or chronic and recurrent pain. The programme promises to provide new insights into basic science and clinical research. Preliminary scientific information could be found to

http://www1.kenes.com/efic/scientific-information/preliminary-programme/

EUSJA has 10 invitations. The organizer will offer the accommodation and pay for the conference fees, journalists must take care for their travelling.The applications must be sent in respect of our rules via national associations (name, media affiliation, e-mail, mobile). The deadline is July 14.

Like the last year EUSJA journalists were invited to attend the European Health Forum Gastein to be held in a remarkable place Bad Hofgastein in Austria (October 2 – 4). EUSJA members once again are getting a wonderful opportunity to participate to the most important health policy event in European Union and watch very interesting sessions and discussions of the politicians, scientists, policymakers. Moreover, EUSJA was offered a possibility to organize an informal session the days of the Forum and present a journalistic view of the health policy in Europe. The idea of such a kind session was discussed last year during the meeting of EUSJA journalists with newly elected President of the European Health Forum Gastein Dr Helmut Brand.
The motto of this year meeting is “Creating a better future for health in Europe”. First announcement of the programme is to EHFG we page:

http://www.ehfg.org/fileadmin/ehfg/Programm/2013/EHFG_2013_1st_Programme_Announcement.pdf

EUSJA has 10 invitations. The organizers will provide the accommodation for the full conference period (October 2 – 4) with respect to travel arrangements (starting from October 1). The organizers will cover also the conference fees for invited journalists and offer the meal. Journalists must take care for their traveling. The number of press conferences will be organized during the conference, the interviews with scientists and politicians will be organized upon the request of journalists. The applications must be sent as usual only via national associations: name, affiliation with media, e-mail, mobile. The deadline for the applications is July 14.

An international traveling party is always fun. An Italian tells juicy details about the strange behavior of Berlusconi, a Russian girl tells how she evades the tight press regime and an Irishman talks about Irish ghost neighborhoods caused by the real estate crisis. It’s nice to look for differences and similarities between countries. At nuclear fusion project ITER, all these international conversations take place every day. But here it is not only small talk. Tough agreements are made on an international level to build the most complex machine in the world. An almost impossible task.

‘The position of the sun turns bougainvillea into firework.’ It is a phrase in a song about southern France by the Dutch pop band Bløf. I often think about it when I’m in Aix-en-Provence, the city where I studied eight years ago. I still visit regularly because it stole my heart. The sun does something to you here. Not only to tan or burn your legs. The bright and omnipresent sunshine here brings up the most beautiful colors in buildings, streets, flowers and trees.

Sun in a box
It is therefore a very appropriate place to put the sun in a box. Or, as Pierre-Giles de Gennes, Nobel Laureate in Physics, said: ‘We say we are putting the sun in a box. A lovely idea. Too bad we do not know how to make that box.’ At a 45 minutes drive north of Aix, a complex machine that simulates the processes occurring on the sun is being built. This process is called fusion energy. In contrast with nuclear energy, atoms are joined together instead of split. With only a negligible amount of nuclear waste, which remains radioactive for ‘only’ one hundred years. This machine should eventually produce more energy than the 50 megawatts it needs. 500 megawatts of energy should be delivered by the enormous power released during fusion. It is possible, according to the scientists working on this project called ITER. One of the scientists assured us that there are no ‘show stoppers’ anymore. At least on a technical level. The international cooperation and political will required for such a project, that’s a whole other story.

Mistake
As many as seven countries (China, India, Japan, Korea, Russia, USA) and the EU are united in the project. All countries are building – in their own country – a piece of the machine. Ultimately, it all comes together in France. The assembly of all the components (there seem to be more than a million) gives the scientists already many headaches. The tolerances are minimal. When a part is a few millimeters larger than agreed, it no longer fits. And I’m not even mentioning the bizarre temperatures that the materials have to undergo. In the middle of the plasma (in which fusion occurs), the temperature is about one hundred million degrees. The superconducting magnets are -269 degrees and the walls around the plasma may ‘only’ be a few hundred degrees. No wonder the demands for the materials are strict and the manufacturing process is thoroughly monitored. However, mistakes still occur. For example, the Italians suddenly came up with another welding method for the vacuum chamber. And in Japan someone had left a towel on a long coil. When the coil was rolled up, the towel destroyed a part of it.

Chinglish
Communication is essential in order to correct these mistakes. To prevent these errors in an early stage, ITER has set up a video conferencing system that – to my surprise – works really smoothly. We had a conference call with members from all over the world. Five cameos showed fusion researchers from Spain, USA, India, China and Russia. Questions and answers and even a bit of discussion was possible, without any delay or disruption in the connection. It might make such a complex international project a bit easier. But different interpretations and cultures will always remain. For example, the Chinese video caller spoke a strange kind of ‘Chinglish’. Later on, an ITER employee told me that he was regularly frustrated by the Chinese:  ‘They do no effort to speak good English.’ The project will cost billions of dollars and has been considerably delayed. But given the ambitious goal – to put the sun in a box – this is not that surprising. For me it’s already quite something that they can put all participants in a conference call. So I expect a lot from it. Until then I’m going to enjoy the southern French sun. Time to shut down my laptop and settle down with a pastis on a terrace on Place Richelme.

19 science journalists from Germany, Ireland, Italy, Finland, Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland and UK attended the EUSJA study trip to Cadarache in southern France to learn more about the promising international ITER project. During 2 days of 22 and 23 April they have met scientists and engineers, visited the ITER construction site which will dramatically evolve this year since the blanket system of a grandiose experimental machine is now ready to proceed to the manufacturing stage. Here in Cadarache is expected to prove that fusion is an energy source of the Future…

Science journalists no doubt will share their impressions from this very interesting study trip to our web page. EUSJA Board thanks ITER Organization, ITER Division of Communication and External Relations for invitation. As it was said, next time – when first plasma!

The Euroscientist magazine–the first pan-European magazine for scientists and by scientists published by Euroscience — brings citizen journalism to the science community. In its latest Special Issue, the Euroscientist shares testimonies from scientists in Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal confronted to austerity.

The Euroscientist brings an analysis of the impact of such conditions on scientists who stayed and on those who were forced to emigrate. This issue also presents testimonies of researchers sharing their experience of navigating the troubled waters of recession, when it comes to maintaining a seemingly steady research career path.

Problems identified in Spain, Italy, Portugal and Greece underlined the vital need to develop a public debate, beyond Southern European borders.
This is the goal of this special issue: to focus the wider European science community’s attention on how to solve research issues across Europe.

Here is the Table of contents:

• Editorial
  •  An evolutionary tale of short versus long-term research vision, by Sabine Louët and Gilles Mirambeau

• Analysis
  • Southern European scientists become activists as recession bites, by Michele Catanzaro

• Spain
  • Myths and misadventures of Spanish science, by Emilio Muñoz
  • The Government needs to show the world it believes in science, by Carlos Andradas
  • Uninformed wishful thinking as R&D policy shunts public research support, by Amaya Moro-Martín

• Italy
  • Pervasive meritocracy, a must for Italian research, an exclusive interview of Ilaria Capua, Italian MP
  • Italian scientists highly valued, but only abroad, by Enrico Predazzi
  • Reengineering Italian research, by Maria Cristina Pedicchio

• Portugal
  • Science friendly despite relative research immaturity, by António Coutinho
  • Filling up a glass that is already half-full, by Maria Carmo-Fonseca
  • The knowledge capital of an entire generation in the balance, by Maria Mota

• Greece
  • Against adversity, give Greek research breathing space, by Costas Fotakis
  • Academics hired, but not appointed: a new Greek tragedy in the making, by Varvara Trachana
  • Innovation born from austerity, by Nikolaos Nanas

Venice: 17 EUSJA Journalists attended the CO2GeoNet Open Forum 2013 to get answers about carbon capturing and storage (CCS).

Undoubtedly the concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere is increasing. The gas acts like a greenhouse to earth: it keeps the heat coming from the sun. Therefore our planet is getting hotter and hotter. This will harm life badly. Scientists believe that CO2 pollution is largely coming from burning fossil fuels. And action has to be taken urgently. One option is to extract the gas out of the atmosphere and to put it somewhere safely. This technic is called carbon capturing and storage (CCS).

Now from 9th to 10th April 2013 there had been the annual Open Forum of the CO2GeoNet, the European network of excellence on the geological storage of CO2 in Venice. About 140 scientists discussed the issue of storing CO2 geologically – that mean deep underground. They kindly invited journalists from EUSJA to join the meeting. 17 colleagues followed the call.

For me it was a unique opportunity to reflect my prejudice attitude to this technic with the views of experts. Because what I read about CCS and because of some experiences on the communication strategy I experienced e.g. on a workshop on the same subject in Dublin during the ESOF 2012, which was misleadingly called: “What is the impact of sustainable energy technologies?” I had fairly negative feelings about CCS. I had the impression, that strong industrial forces are pushing this technology to keep oil and coal companies in business. Furthermore I feared that these forces are also dominating the EU legislation, which was forcing the member states to make this very controversially discussed technology feasible and so sticking to an energy system which is pointing backwards instead into future. Since the habit of first polluting the environment and then trying to invent a solution to get rid of the rubbish produced had been the strategy of industry for a long time. Modern and more environmental friendly industries nowadays try to avoid trash or try to give their waste to other companies that could use that material as feedstock.

Sergio Persoglia, director International Collaborations of the Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e di Geofisica Sperimentale OGS opened the meeting.

The meeting in Venice started as expected: Instead of a press conference as announced in the invitation, there had been lessons on CO2 storage. Like in Dublin they were called a workshop, which lasted several hours – I feared something like a brainwashing. But the most important thing I learned there was the fact that a lot of storage projects across Europe are struggling or even were cancelled. From about 70 large scale injection projects worldwide less than ten are in operation – non in the EU, two in Norway.

So my impression, that industry and EU are supporting these projects strongly had turned out to be wrong. Actually no project for CCS was confirmed for the first call of the so-called NER300 Programme said Alexandr Jevsejenko from the Directory General Climate Action of the European Commission at the conference. NER300 is a financing instrument managed jointly by the European Commission, European Investment Bank and Member States for subsidising installations of innovative renewable(!) energy technology and carbon capture and storage(!) worth 300 million rights to emit one tonne of carbon dioxide of the New Entrants’ Reserve of the European Emissions Trading Scheme. That is worth more than a billion Euros. (the tight combination of renewables and CCS I would call “remarkable”…)

Strange: The press conference turned out to be a workshop.

Actually by now just a few pilots or demos are running. Not a significant amount of CO2 is stored. So I had to scratch my feeling that “strong forces” are behind that technic.

There is another point I had to correct myself: The talks sounded convincing that storing CO2 not a big technical problem and that it could be done without excessive risks for the environment. The scientists have long-time experiences coming e.g. from buffering gas underground or from drilling for it – as well as for oil. Nevertheless they admit that there is a lot of research to be done to analyse a geological site, if there is explicitly a decision for one. Even if they tap deep saline aquifers there will be no undetected leakages or decontaminations of groundwater assured the scientists. Even better: Because of chemical reactions with the rocks down in the underground some of the CO2 is transformed into solid carbonates, which stabilize the storage site. “The risky time is during injection”, concedes Nick Riley from the British Geological Survey. Although CO2 mixed in water is forming a weak acid “I have never seen any risk because of acidification”, adds Rob Arts from TU Delft and TNO, Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research.

All this sounded convincing. You have got the feeling, that if you provide the scientists an amount of CO2, they would manage to store it savely. And it wouldn’t be too expensive. The gas even could be used for the so called Enhanced Oil (or gas) Recovery (abbreviated EOR). That is pressing it into the well to get more oil or gas out of it.

But there are some big hitches: The scientists estimate that the capacity for storing the emissions in Europe is limited. Within a few decades all possible dumps are filled. At least then new ideas are needed. Therefore the scientists consider CCS just to be a transition technology.

Nice place, hot topic: What are the potentials of CCS?

That’s not all: CCS is a very complex process consisting not only of storing the gas. It includes capturing and transporting it before. Especially capturing CO2 is said to be very expensive. Estimates indicate that it could almost double the price of electricity coming from burning coal. This is because the process of capturing itself needs much energy, in other words: much more coal to burn. Nick Riley sees this like a sportsman: “This could also be a chance for renewables”, he says, because power from coal plants would then for sure be more expensive than power coming from windmills – at least on land.

Furthermore some capturing technics produce more of other kinds of greenhouse gases like nitrogen oxides or sulfur oxides which are even more dangerous for the atmosphere than CO2. And last but not least CCS is just one option to get rid of CO2. The most favourable option is to avoid the production of CO2 e.g. by using more renewables instead of burning fossil fuels. Other possibilities are using CO2 as a feedstock for chemicals, feeding algae or plants with the gas to make bio-fuel out of it or even food and last but not least to foster reforestation or to stop cutting trees so extensively as today. So society has to decide, how their limited Euros are spend best. In my opinion CCS could just be one option – and even after listening to the talks on the forum in Venice probably not the best one.

By Gerhard Samulat