#green hydrogen systems

[little-p-eng-engineering]

Little P.Eng. Engineering for Structural and Piping Design in Hydrogen Pilot Plant for Green Energy

In the race to counteract climate change, green energy solutions are imperative. Hydrogen, known as the universe's most abundant element, offers a promising pathway. Pilot plants are experimental setups designed to understand and optimize large-scale industrial processes. Little P.Eng. Engineering has emerged as a pivotal player in realizing this potential by specializing in the structural and piping design for hydrogen pilot plants.

Hydrogen's Role in Green Energy

Hydrogen is not just another energy source; it's a powerful, clean fuel that, when consumed, emits only water as a byproduct. Green hydrogen, especially, is produced using renewable energy sources, ensuring a low-carbon footprint. As governments and industries realize its potential, pilot plants that can produce, store, and utilize hydrogen efficiently are in demand.

Little P.Eng. Engineering’s Expertise

Little P.Eng. Engineering's team specializes in addressing the unique challenges posed by hydrogen in pilot plants. Their structural and piping designs consider factors such as hydrogen's low density, its propensity to embrittle metals, and the safety requirements necessary when working with the element.

Structural Design Considerations

Hydrogen Embrittlement: Hydrogen can make metals brittle, especially under high-pressure conditions. The structural components must be designed with materials resistant to this phenomenon.

Safety Measures: Hydrogen is flammable. Incorporating explosion-proof structures, safe zones, and preventive measures against accidental leaks is paramount.

Modularity: As pilot plants are often experimental setups, flexibility and modularity in design allow for changes based on the evolving understanding of the process.

Piping Design Considerations

Material Selection: Given hydrogen's small molecule size, it can easily leak through many materials. Piping must be constructed with materials that prevent leakage and are resistant to embrittlement.

Pressure Challenges: Hydrogen storage and transport require high-pressure conditions. The piping system must handle these pressures, ensuring safety and efficiency.

Temperature Factors: Liquid hydrogen storage needs extremely low temperatures. This necessitates designs that can handle thermal stresses and expansion-contraction challenges.

Safety Valves and Monitoring Systems: Real-time monitoring of the hydrogen flow, pressure, and potential leaks are essential. Incorporating advanced monitoring systems and safety valves ensures timely detection and mitigation of any risks.

Applications in Green Energy

Hydrogen pilot plants are not just limited to producing hydrogen. They also focus on:

Storage: Efficiently storing hydrogen is a challenge. Pilot plants explore solutions like high-pressure gas storage or cryogenic liquid storage.

Power Generation: Pilot plants test fuel cells and other means to convert hydrogen back into electricity.

Integration with Other Renewable Sources: Connecting hydrogen production with wind, solar, and hydroelectric power sources ensures a continuous energy supply, even when these sources aren't generating power.

Green Mobility: Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCVs) are on the rise. Pilot plants play a pivotal role in researching and optimizing hydrogen production, storage, and refueling stations for these vehicles.

Advancing the Future

Little P.Eng. Engineering's commitment to green energy is evident in its consistent research and innovation in structural and piping designs. By regularly updating their designs based on feedback from pilot plants, they ensure safety, efficiency, and scalability for large-scale hydrogen production.

The company also collaborates with universities, research institutions, and industries to stay at the forefront of technology. Such partnerships help in the exchange of ideas and the rapid adoption of best practices.

Challenges and Opportunities Ahead

While the potential of hydrogen as a green energy source is immense, there are challenges:

Economic Feasibility: Bringing down the costs associated with hydrogen production, storage, and usage is essential for its mainstream adoption.

Scalability: While pilot plants offer invaluable insights, scaling these solutions to meet global energy demands requires further research and innovations.

Public Awareness and Acceptance: For hydrogen to be widely adopted, both as an energy storage medium and a fuel, public understanding and acceptance of its benefits and safety are crucial.

Little P.Eng. Engineering, with its expertise and dedication, is poised to address these challenges, turning them into opportunities for a greener future.

Conclusion

As we grapple with the urgency of transitioning to green energy solutions, hydrogen emerges as a beacon of hope. With its abundant availability and potential for clean energy generation, it can revolutionize the energy landscape. Companies like Little P.Eng. Engineering, through their specialized structural and piping designs, play a pivotal role in this transition. As the world moves towards a sustainable future, the role of such innovators becomes even more significant.

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Meena Rezkallah

Little P.Eng. Engineering

Structural design

Energy efficiency

Engineering expertise

Hydrogen pilot plant

Green energy

Piping design

Sustainable energy sources

Hydrogen storage

Hydrogen transportation

Structural stability

Pressure-relief systems

Safety mechanisms

Hydrogen production

Electrolysis

Advanced simulations

Material embrittlement

Leak prevention

Optimal hydrogen flow

Seismic resilience

Weather-resistant structures

Modular designs

Renewable energy

Zero carbon emissions

Advanced safety

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Engineering Services

Structural Engineering Consultancy

Located in Calgary, Alberta; Vancouver, BC; Toronto, Ontario; Edmonton, Alberta; Houston Texas; Torrance, California; El Segundo, CA; Manhattan Beach, CA; Concord, CA; We offer our engineering consultancy services across Canada and United States. Meena Rezkallah.

[coldpenguintaco]

Investing in Hydrogen: Trends in Technology, Infrastructure, and Policy

As the world races to combat climate change and transition towards cleaner energy sources, hydrogen has emerged as a promising contender in reshaping the energy landscape. The concept of a hydrogen economy, driven by the production and utilization of hydrogen gas, has gained momentum, with a focus on both its potential benefits and the challenges that lie ahead. This article delves into various…

[reportwire]

Klean Industries Partners With H2Core Systems for the Rollout of Containerized Hydrogen Production Facilities

Klean Industries Partners With H2Core Systems for the Rollout of Containerized Hydrogen Production Facilities

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, November 7, 2022 (Newswire.com) – Klean Industries Inc (“Klean”), a leading equipment manufacturer that owns a commercialized portfolio of intellectual properties and know-how focusing on the recovery of clean energy and resources from waste, is pleased to announce that it has signed a partnership agreement with H2 Core Systems (“H2 Core”) to distribute and build…

[indiaenergystoragealliance]

A Decade in E-Mobility- IESA

As we enter the new decade, I anticipate it will be remembered as the decade in which e-mobility became mainstream. 

Many industry veterans may question this statement and claim that e-mobility is still a niche and that we need at least two-to-three decades more for e-mobility to challenge the era of ICE vehicles. Only time will tell who is right.

As I write this welcome note, I can see that within the next three years consumers are going to have lot more choices in e-mobility, not just in terms of road transport but also for other modes of travel including electric planes and boats.

The last decade saw the amazing rise of smartphones in India. At the beginning of 2010, less than five percent of Indian consumers used smartphones and within this decade smartphone adoption has seen more than 10X growth. 

No one made a strategy for increasing the adoption of smartphones in India, in fact, many industry leaders questioned if Indian consumers needed smartphones or high-speed internet. 

But the consumers decided that with the falling data rates and additional features available with smartphones, they do provide value for money and made the switch. I am anticipating a similar transition to take place in the next five-to-ten years in the automotive sector in India. 

With the decreasing cost and improved performance of batteries, EVs are expected to reach cost parity with ICE vehicles by 2023. Also, with the falling renewable energy prices, consumers can also benefit from cleaner energy sources and cheaper operating costs. 

This time, even the government is focusing on supporting this transition as there are many social benefits that India can gain from it, such as lesser fiscal burden by reduced oil imports, and improved air quality by addressing the tailpipe emissions from ICE vehicles.

In the past couple of years, we have seen the emergence of aggregators who are switching to electric cars due to the sheer economics of EVs. The only factors that have limited their pace of growth were the availability of EVs that meet their requirements, limited charging infrastructure, and financing options. 

This is all changing fast, in 2020, we are anticipating more than 10 new EVs to be introduced with features that can compete with the popular ICE vehicles. Department of Heavy Industries has allocated money for deploying over 1000 fast chargers and various states are looping to adopt 5000+ e-buses in the next 12-18 months under FAME-II.

The only question remaining is if Indian OEMs and industry can adapt fast enough to maintain leadership in the automotive market. To some extent, Indian OEMs have got themselves trapped in looking for cheaper EV, rather than focusing on bringing an EV that most consumers are waiting for. 

The competition is growing fast and we have already witnessed aggressive announcements and plans from international companies such as Hyundai and MG shaking the market. 

For instance, MG claims to have received more registrations for their ZS EV in the past month alone, than the sales of its other EVs during 2019. Tata Motors is stepping up with the introduction of Nexon EV and we are looking forward to doing a test drive soon.

NITI Aayog is anticipating the launch of the Giga factory mission with the approval of the cabinet, anticipated to come sometime this month. This could address the last hurdle for the rapid growth of EVs in India by setting up a 50GWh annual cell manufacturing capacity in the country by 2023. 

This decade, therefore, marks an opportunity for the Indian auto industry to benefit from the imminent transition. With an entrepreneurial spirit and understanding of consumer needs, I am sure that we are poised to witness an amazing journey.

Make energy storage and green hydrogen a part of your e-mobility strategy by joining the India Energy Storage Alliance. Become a member today.

[nasa]

NASA Photographers Share Their Favorite Photos of the SLS Moon Rocket

NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket is on the launch pad at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida and in final preparations for the Artemis I mission to the Moon. Now that our Moon rocket is almost ready for its debut flight, we wanted to take a look back at some of the most liked photographs of our SLS rocket coming together over the years.

We asked NASA photographers to share their favorite photos of the SLS rocket for Artemis I at different phases of testing, manufacturing, and assembly. Here are their stories behind the photos:

“On this day in March 2018, crews at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, transported the intertank structural test article off NASA’s Pegasus barge to the Load Test Annex test facility for qualification testing.” —Emmett Given, photographer, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center

“This is the liquid oxygen tank structural test article as it was moved from the Pegasus barge to the West Test Area at our Marshall Space Flight Center on July 9, 2019. The tank, which is structurally identical to its flight version, was subsequently placed in the test stand for structural testing several days later. I remember it being a blazing hot day!” —Fred Deaton, photographer, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center

“The large components of the SLS rocket’s core stage can make you forget that there are many hands-on tasks required to assemble a rocket, too. During the mating of the liquid hydrogen tank to the forward section of the rocket’s 212-foot-tall core stage in May 2019, technicians fastened 360 bolts to the circumference of the rocket. Images like this remind me of all the small parts that have to be installed with care, expertise, and precision to create one huge Moon rocket. Getting in close to capture the teammates that work tirelessly to make Artemis a success is one of the best parts of my job.” —Eric Bordelon, photographer, NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility

“An incredible amount of precision goes into building a rocket, including making sure that each of our SLS rocket’s four RS-25 engines is aligned and integrated into the core stage correctly. In this image from October 2019, I attempted to illustrate the teamwork and communication happening as technicians at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans do their part to help land the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon through the Artemis missions. It’s rare to see the inside of a rocket – not as much for the NASA and Boeing engineers who manufacture and assemble a rocket stage!” —Jared Lyons, photographer, NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility

“When the fully assembled and completed core stage left the Michoud factory in January 2020, employees took a “family photo” to mark the moment. Crews transported the flight hardware to NASA’s Pegasus barge on Jan. 8 in preparation for the core stage Green Run test series at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. When I look at this photo, I am reminded of all of the hard work and countless hours the Michoud team put forth to build this next-generation Moon rocket. I am honored to be part of this family and to photograph historic moments like this for the Artemis program.” —Steven Seipel, MAF multimedia team lead, NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility

“This photo shows workers at Stennis prepare to lift the SLS core stage into the B-2 Test Stand for the SLS Green Run test series in the early morning hours of Jan. 22, 2020. I started shooting the lift operation around midnight. During a break in the action at about 5:30 a.m., I was driving my government vehicle to the SSC gas station to fuel up, when I saw the first light breaking in the East and knew it was going to be a nice sunrise. I turned around and hurried back to the test stand, sweating that I might run out of gas. Luckily, I didn’t run out and was lucky enough to catch a beautiful Mississippi sunrise in the background, too.” —Danny Nowlin, photographer, NASA’s Stennis Space Center

“I like the symmetry in the video as it pushes toward the launch vehicle stage adapter. Teams at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, loaded the cone-shaped piece of flight hardware onto our Pegasus barge in July 2020 for delivery to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The one-point perspective puts the launch vehicle stage adapter at the center of attention, but, if you pay attention to the edges, you can see people working. It gives a sense of scale. This was the first time I got to walk around Pegasus and meet the crew that transport the deep space rocket hardware, too.” —Sam Lott, videographer, SLS Program at Marshall Space Flight Center

“This was my first time photographing a test at our Stennis Space Center, and I wasn't sure what to expect. I have photographed big events like professional football games, but I wasn't prepared for the awesome power unleashed by the Space Launch System’s core stage and four RS-25 engines during the Green Run hot fire test. Watching the sound wave ripple across the tall grass toward us, feeling the shock wave of ignition throughout my whole body, seeing the smoke curling up into the blue sky with rainbows hanging from the plume; all of it was as unforgettable as watching a football player hoist a trophy into the air.” —Michael DeMocker, photographer, NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility

“When our SLS Moon rocket launches the agency’s Artemis I mission to the Moon, 10 CubeSats, or small satellites, are hitching a ride inside the rocket’s Orion stage adapter (OSA). BioSentinel is one of those CubeSats. BioSentinel’s microfluidics card, designed at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, will be used to study the impact of interplanetary space radiation on yeast. To me, this photo is a great combination of the scientific importance of Artemis I and the human touch of more than 100 engineers and scientists who have dedicated themselves to the mission over the years.” —Dominic Hart, photographer, NASA’s Ames Research Center

“I was in the employee viewing area at Kennedy when the integrated SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft was rolled out to the launchpad for its wet dress rehearsal in March 2022. I really like this photo because the sun is shining on Artemis I like a spotlight. The giant doors of the Vehicle Assembly Building are the red curtain that opened up the stage -- and the spotlight is striking the SLS because it’s the star of the show making its way to the launchpad. I remember thinking how cool that NASA Worm logo looked as well, so I wanted to capture that. It was so big that I had to turn my camera sideways because the lens I had wasn’t big enough to capture the whole thing.” —Brandon Hancock, videographer, SLS Program at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center

“I made this image while SLS and Orion atop the mobile launcher were nearing the end of their four-mile trek to the pad on crawler-transporter 2 ahead of launch. Small groups of employees were filtering in and out of the parking lot by the pad gate to take in the sight of the rocket’s arrival. The “We Are Going!” banner affixed to the gate in the foreground bears the handwritten names of agency employees and contractors who have worked to get the rocket and spacecraft ready for the Artemis I flight test. As we enter the final days before launch, I am proud to have made my small contribution to documenting the historic rollout for this launch to the Moon.” —Joel Kowsky, photographer, NASA Headquarters

More Photo-worthy Moments to Come!

NASA photographers will be on the ground covering the Artemis I launch. As they do, we’ll continue to share their photos on our official NASA channels.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[songonthewind]

Big Glass Onion Knives Out spoilers below, do not read if you haven't seen the movie!

Analyzing *that scene* at the end of Glass Onion

Someone has probably already talked about this, but the glass smashing scene! I cannot stop thinking about that scene because of how it DIRECTLY parallels Miles's speech about being a disruptor.

"If you want to shake things up, you start with something small. You break a norm, or an idea, or a convention, some little business model. But you go with things that people are kind of tired of anyway."

Miles has a giant room full of glass statues. Hell, his big fancy dome is called the Glass Onion, so easly breakable with all of its glass panes. He has a lot of it and it would all be so easy to knock over and destroy with one wrong step, and we see Peg almost do just that very early on.

And when Helen starts grabbing them and smashing them? Miles laughs. To him, she is a small, insignificant person who thinks she can get back at him by smashing some (probably very expensive) sculptures. But they don't actually matter - he can always buy more. They will always be replaceable. But she doesn't stop.

"Everybody gets excited because you're busting up something that everyone wanted broken in the first place. That's the infraction point."

The others start to cheer her on. They want these broken too. They wanna do something that makes them feel a little better, like they've gotten back at Miles a little bit. So they cheer her on and then they join in. They smash glass and cheer and you can tell that they're having a lot of fun with it.

Does it help anything? No. Does it change the fact that they've turned their back on Andi and Helen? No. Does it actually do anything to screw over Miles or reject the conditions of his monetary support? Nope.

It's just a bit of fun for them to take the edge off.

"That's the place where you have to look within yourself and ask, 'Am I the kind of person who will keep going?' Will you break more things? Break bigger things?"

They've had their fun, hell, even Miles partook and smashed the cup he was holding because none of it fucking matters.

But Helen keeps going. She doesn't stop at the statues. She pushes.

"Are you willing to break the thing that nobody wants you to break? Because at that point, people are not gonna be on your side. They're gonna call you crazy. They're gonna say you're a bully. They're gonna tell you to stop."

They tell Helen to go easy, to calm down.

She smashes the piano and you can see they're all concerned. Birdie comments that she thinks the piano belonged to Liberace. The glass statues were fun, but this piano is important and how dare you break it.

She smashes the bar cart and everyone is getting more worried. Miles is getting mad. He tries to bargain with her, asks her what she wants because now he's upset, Helen has taken things farther than she was supposed to.

And then she takes the lighter and sets it ablaze.

They tell Helen to stop, to wait. They tell her enough, that she needs to be done now because they're uncomfortable. They had their fun and didn't sign up for anything meaningful to actually happen.

Even your partner will say, 'You need to stop.'

The line about your partner is the only one that doesn't hold true.

Blanc was Helen's partner in all of this and he was the one who told her to keep going, he was the one who handed her the solid hydrogen, who told her to remember why her sister walked away, and by doing so gave her the green light (even though she didn't need his permission) to burn it all down.

"Because as it turns out, nobody wants you to break the system itself. But that is what true disruption is. And that is what unites all of us. We all got to that line and crossed it."

Helen finds the line - she throws the Klean fuel and everything explodes in their faces.

And then the ultimate crossing of the line, their horrified faces as they realize what she is about to do as she lunges for the Mona Lisa and it goes up in flames. Nobody wants you to break the system and everyone is terrified when you do.

Helen crosses the line, burns Miles's whole empire down in the process.

All of Andi's friends just reshaped the systems to serve themselves.

Helen is the only one of them who ever crossed a meaningful line.

[livingforstars]

Supernova Remnant: Cooking Elements In The LMC - May 9th, 1996.

"Massive stars cook elements in their cores through nuclear fusion. Starting with the light elements of hydrogen and helium, their central temperatures and pressures produce progressively heavier elements, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, etc, up through to iron. At the end of their lives, they explode in a spectacular supernova, scattering these elements into space, contributing material to the formation of other stars and star systems. In fact, the elements making up life on Earth were baked in such a stellar oven! This Hubble Space Telescope image of a supernova remnant, known as N132D in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), allows astronomers to explore the details of this nuclear processing and mixing. It reveals luminous clouds of cooked supernova debris energised by shocks - singly ionised sulfur appears red, doubly ionised oxygen, green, and singly ionised oxygen, blue. The region shown above is about 50 light-years across."

[trainalt22]

Tidbits and bobs#1

Essentially my version of a lore dump

- All sentient machines, regardless of where they are built or their origin, believe in a singular deity named Lady. She is the station pilot for the Grand Terminus, the last stop for all sentient machines. Lady is seen as equal parts God and grim reaper and can appear in a multitude of forms, from locomotive to tug boat. She claims all sentient machines as her children and is believed to be very kind and gentle. This belief system has aspects of reincarnation, as it is believed that the soul of the machines shall be forged anew and come to incarnate a new form of vehicle or machine.

- Lady may choose a "guardian" to help with more earthly affairs on her behalf. It is unclear what they stand guard over, however.

- It is believed that Lady watches over the Isle of Sodor, as machinery built there seems to have a higher chance of sentience. However, this is both unproven and unconfirmed.

Ok enough lady stuff I just wanted to talk about her (she's neat)

- Thomas's route takes him all the way to Tidmouth and he often brings the townsfolk to their big city jobs.

- The official NWR freight engine livery is the green and red stripes, as worn by Henry and Percy.

- Percy has been requested as a guest of honor for at least 52 weddings and he has attended 34.

- The original Ulfstead Castle was destroyed in a landslide in 1991. The new Ulfstead Castle was built in 2000 and is part estate, railway, and museum, all orchestrated by the Earl of Sodor, Sir Robert Norramby.

- May 11th is Sodor Day, which marks the end of a week-long festival for all things Sudrian. Also, May 11th and Christmas Day are the only times the NWR intentionally reduces its services.

- In 2000, Sodor's Council passed a law allowing the marriage of sentient machines.

- The volunteers on the Talyllyn railway often send gag jokes or pranks to the workers of the SKR. The biggest prank yet was when they swapped Sir Handel with Sir Haydn (with permission from both the Thin Controller and the Talyllyn Preservation Society) and waited to see how long it would take someone to notice. Sir Haydn was on Sodor for 2 weeks and was found out by Duncan, who was suspicious as to why "Handel" was being so polite to him.

- Out of all the famous eight engines, Gordon is the one who dislikes his TV theme song the most. He claims that "it wasn't grand enough."

- Thomas's favorite TV episode is "Thomas and the Jet Engine." On multiple occasions, he has begged the Fat Controller to let him recreate the episode, just so he can say he is the fastest engine on Sodor.

- Edward is the unofficial father of Thomas, Bill, Ben, Rosie, Philip, and Ryan.

- Gordon is surprisingly good at giving advice. He has even given Edward some kind words.

- Boco is the official secondary for the Wild Nor'wester.

- Sodor is a sanctuary for sentient machines, and as such, Crovan's Gate Works can fix just about any type of machine in the world, whether it's diesel, steam, electric, gasoline, kerosene, or hydrogen. Bring them any type of motive power, and they can fix it in no time flat.

- During the purge of steam, Henry and later Murdoch often smuggled engines onto Sodor, attached to the ends of their freight trains.

[whirligig-girl]

2379 March 19th

The air had a distinct chill to it by now, and Guz looked all around her as the sky took on an almost silvery cast. Gaps in the trees at the edge of the clearing acted as pinhole cameras, producing hundreds of little bright crescents onto the ground and onto the shuttlepod.

"I told you we'd be in the path of totality," Marta said, nudging Guz on the arm and pointing up at the sky. She tapped a button on her clear glass visor, and it suddenly became reflective and metallic. "Look at that. Any minute now." The Sun was now just a slim crescent, the Moon covering nearly all of it.

“Augh…” Guz said, rubbing her arms, “sorry I questioned your navigation skills.”

“Good,” Marta said.

"We have precisely three minutes and twelve seconds, by my count," Dyani said.

Guz had her telescope, a 5" catadioptric astrograph, set up on an equatorial mount, with a tunable Herschellian Wedge serving as a solar filter and heat rejection system. She was used to handholding her telescope, but with only three minutes of totality, she didn't want to take any chances. The holographic eyepiece she'd been using had dutifully captured full spectrum imagery of Sol and before the partial eclipse began she had tuned through the different visible wavelengths in the passthrough lens, allowing her, Marta, and Dyani to see prominences and filaments in Sol’s chromosphere, as well as detailed sunspots in its photosphere. Marta, having evolved around this especially hot star, could even make out the magnetically active plages in the deep-violet Calcium-K line, but Guz's eye lenses had a slight green-yellow tint which blocked far-violet, and Dyani's Vulcan eyes could barely even see blue--though she reported detail in the deep-red Hydrogen-Alpha view which astounded Marta and Guz. No matter--once the eclipse was over Guz would be able to process all of the spectral bands and find more appropriate wavelengths to display them in.

Guz was anxious, and she paced back and forth, shaking her wrists. They made an almost cartoonish literal slapping and sticking sound and she went, which was nice, because it was both tactile and auditory. She went back to the telescope, but she tripped on the tripod.

Guz emitted a gargling warbling sound which Marta was pretty sure was a mellanoid curse word, and she scrambled to fix the telescope’s alignment.

“AUGH!” she said “I messed up the polar alignment! It won’t track now…”

Marta stood up from her chair, and grabbed her canes. She walked up to Guz and put an arm on her shoulder. “Hey, Eaurp, don’t worry. The important thing isn’t the holos.”

“Actually the holos are incredibly important! I know you and Dyani are just here for fun, but I’m doing this for my Astro-251 class. I have to get these images!”

“Eaurp,” Dyani said. “It is unnecessary to fret. Professor Frederick made it clear that terrans have a long history of ‘eclipse madness’--”

“But I’m not a terran!”

“It is not a matter of the species, so much as the circumstance. As you are always so quick to remind us, Earth is the only known inhabited planet with a natural satellite that appears the same size as its parent star. The eclipses are rare and last only minutes,” Dyani said.

“Yeah girlie, you got the eclipse madness,” Marta said, “Just calm down for a minute. You’ll find a way to make up your project.”

Guz put her face in her hands, then looked up and began fiddling with her PADD to try and fix the alignment.

Guz tapped her combadge. "Cadet Guz's log, stardate 56212, continued. Terrans call it March 19th 2379. Local time is… 12:32. We are here in the Italian countryside, a minute away from totality, and I just bumped my telescope off of Sol. I have missed all three total eclipses that have occurred on Earth during my time here. This is my last year, and so my last shot. Everything has to go just right.”

“Forty seven seconds,” Dyani reported. Guz checked her chronometer. Dyani’s mental timing was ‘only’ two seconds off.

“Stop fiddling with that thing and just relax!” Marta said.

“NO! I HAVE TO SEE THE CORONA UP CLOSE!” Guz shouted, and she buried her eye into the holograph’s pass-through. “Ok! I see Sol and Luna!” Guz said. “This alignment will have to do…”

Guz watched as the last slivers of white sunlight disappeared. She looked up, and during that last moment, the entire world changed around her. She was standing in twilight, but with the sky orange all around her. She looked around. The animals were reacting wildly, with twitters and chirps and ribbiting from the local fauna, likely confused as to why the Sun went out in the middle of the day.

When Guz had first set foot on Earth, it was very literally an alien planet. But it still had blue skies, white clouds, deep blue seas, and green foliage (albeit much dryer and less sticky than she had been accustomed to).

The planet Guz was standing on right now was not Mellanus, not Italian Earth, and certainly not Luna--it was an entirely unique world, one which only existed for minutes at a time. Guz was standing on Planet Eclipse.

Guz looked up and shouted. “Hah! LOOK! LOOK AT THAT! THE CORONA!” 

Nothing could have prepared her for it. The corona was a silvery halo that extended from the apparent black hole in the sky in all directions, with concentrated hairlike filaments stringing out from reddish pink spots on the black circle’s limb. 

Before the eclipse, Sol had been white with a few dark specks and surrounded by darkness, but this thing was nearly its inverse: black, with a few tiny starlike dots inside of it, surrounded by a pale ghostly light. The Sun had disappeared, and something completely alien took its place. Intellectually, Guz knew that all stars--even Zwo-nmu--had coronae, but this was the first time she’d seen the corona with her own two eyes. She supposed it wouldn’t have to be the last--maybe next time she was in space she’d try to blot out the sun with her finger.

Guz could make out four starlike points, one to the left of the Sun, and three to the right. “Look! Look! There’s the other planets! The bright ones are Jupiter and Venus!”

She looked down and around again to see Marta sitting in the grass just staring up at the thing, her visor completely transparent. Dyani had taken her visor off entirely and stared, silently.

“WAIT! NO! The uh! The filter!” Guz said. She hadn’t remembered to remove the filter from her telescope. She scrambled back to the telescope, and twisted a dial on the Herschellian Wedge. The view through the passthrough eyepiece brightened up by 100,000 times and Guz actually saw the corona, magnified 50 times, in unfiltered, uncompressed detail. The detail was so delicate and intricate. Guz could now see the row of cilia-like prominences to the left, which Dyani had seen so easily before but which she and Marta had been unable to detect. In true color, Sol’s chromosphere was magenta, not the spectral red she had seen before in the H-alpha. As Guz’s eyes adjusted, she could even make out Luna’s city lights. She recognized Tycho City, and New Berlin immediately.

“Dyani, how much time do we have left?” Guz said.

After a moment, Dyani replied. “We should have another two minutes of totality left.”

Guz looked away from the eyepiece to get another look at the gaping hole in the sky where the Sun should be.

And then, in an instant, the corona disappeared entirely. A bead of intense white light bore into Guz’s retina, and she immediately flipped her visor down.

Guz’s hands shook. Then she slowly began to smile. “THAT WAS THE COOLEST THING I HAVE SEEN IN MY LIFE!” she shouted, and she began to jump up and down. Her hair went jiggly. Dyani looked at her with a blank stare, and Guz felt a little shy and stopped her celebrations. “I just can’t believe Mellanoids were robbed of this.”

“It is a remarkable celestial coincidence. The diurnal stellar eclipses visible on the T’khut-facing hemisphere of Vulcan do not capture the character of 40 Eridani A’s corona so completely, nor do they produce an atmosphere of such… eerie character.”

“Marta! Marta! Was it different to a Solar Eclipse on Luna?” Guz said, turning around.

Marta was still on the floor, rubbing her eyes, sobbing quietly to herself.

“Marta?” Guz said.

Marta reached out for a hand. Guz gave her a hand and pulled her up. Marta sniffled.

“Are you okay?” Guz said.

Marta just nodded. She didn’t look ok. Guz looked at Dyani, who just shrugged. Marta wiped her eyes again. Guz picked up Marta’s canes, and she walked back to her chair to take a seat.

Guz returned to her telescope. The herschel wedge had not been re-enabled. The holographic eyepiece was fried.

Guz stuttered a little. “Oh. Uh. Dyani. Um. There weren’t two minutes left.”

“What.”

“It was probably more like. Um. Two seconds. So the uh. The holograph is ruined.”

“Damn,” Dyani said.

“Haha. Yeah. Um. That coulda been my eye, haha…”

“Then it is fortunate you were not looking through the eyepiece at the end of totality.”

Guz checked her PADD to make sure the data was streamed properly to her recorder. When she was convinced that it was, she turned off the telescope and began packing it back up into the Class 2 Shuttlepod. By the time she finished, the sky had grown brighter; the air warmer. 

When she was done, she sat down on the grass next to Marta’s chair, and put her visor back on. Luna no longer covered so much of Sol.

“It was… I don’t even know how to describe it…” Marta said. “I mean I’ve… I’ve seen solar eclipses before. And they’re beautiful from Luna, don’t get me wrong. But it’s all so different when you’re on Earth.”

“It’s a shame I won’t ever have the chance to see a solar eclipse on the Moon,” Guz said. “Well, I mean, I have seen one, it’s just, when you’re on Earth, we call it a Lunar Eclipse.”

“I’ve even seen terran eclipses before,” Marta said. “They don’t look like anything special from all the way up there. Just a little dark spot going across Earth. When I was younger, I wondered what terrans were so hyped up about, you know? But I get it.”

“And! And!” Guz said. “IT’S SO COOL! THAT YOU GET TO SEE ECLIPSES HAPPEN AT ALL ON LUNA AND VULCAN!”

“Indeed,” Dyani said, “the air temperature does drop noticeably during stellar eclipses due to the reduction in insolation. It is cool shit.”

“Omen doesn’t do that! When Omen got close to Mellanus, it was a lot like Luna--but a lot brighter. But it never goes in front of Zwo-nmu!”

“Why?” Marta said.

“It is a simple consequence of Mellanus’ coorbital trajectory,” Dyani said.

“Closest thing we get to eclipses is when Cold Ember transits Zwo-nmu and if you have really good vision you can see it with just a dark visor as a little dot.”

“I remember going out in my EV suit after finishing an early morning delivery in Oceanus Procellarum one time when I was 13,” Marta said. “The Sun hadn’t risen, but off to the east I could see this faint gray glow. I turned off my suit lights and just stared at the glow, with everything else almost black, just lit a little by the crescent Earth. The milky way was out, but this gray glow was even brighter than it. I kept watching it, even as my suit began to get freezing cold, I sat down on a little boulder a few meters from my shuttle. As I waited; it must have been almost an hour, I saw just about a quarter of a silvery circular halo. I saw a tiny hint of magenta come over the mountain in the distance, and before I knew it, the world exploded into light as the Sun came up. I had the ghost image in my eye for an hour after that. Made getting home a little harder.”

“Wow,” Guz said.

“In principle, what we have just witnessed was a sunset and a sunrise on Luna, just much farther away,” Dyani said.

“A couple years later I saw my first solar eclipse--what Terrans call a Lunar eclipse--and I realized what that ghostly glow was. But even then, I couldn’t see the corona all at once. Earth blocked half of it at a time,” Marta said. “But still I figured that the whole landscape around you turning orange-red from all of Earth’s sunrises and sunsets shining on the Moon more than made up for seeing the corona all at once.”

“Does it?” Dyani asked.

“It’s different when you’re standing out in the open without a space suit. You’re not in this temperature-controlled little box. It all feels… so much more real. The Sun shining right on my face, the air gets real chilly…”

“Is that why you were having an emotional reaction?” Dyani said.

“What? No. Not quite,” Marta said. “I dunno. Maybe. But I just realized, during totality, that that wasn’t just a big bite taken out of the Sun. That’s my home up there. I’ve seen it from space hundreds of times. But never like that.”

“Yeah…” Guz said.

“The Nevasan eclipses visible on Vulcan are similar to a Solar eclipse as viewed from Luna,” Dyani said. “Except the partial phase lasts minutes and the total phase lasts over an hour. It is essentially a brief second night time. 40 Eridani A’s corona is not visible for much of the eclipse.”

“My only other chance to see any eclipses was when I was doing survival training on Andoria, but they had us on Andoria’s far side and the one solar eclipse we would have seen due to an occultation by an outer moon, we were stuck inside the ice caves. Apparently Andorians don’t consider solar eclipses worth interrupting work for. Plus, 40 Eridani B is a white dwarf, so it’s not like its corona is actually visible. Also--you know how our shadows got weirdly sharp in the last minutes before totality? It’s like that all the time on Andoria. So at least there’s that.”

Guz looked down at the ground, then back up at the slowly brightening crescent Sun, and then at the dirt below her feet. The leaves of the trees still projected crescent-shaped images on the ground. Guz held her hair out, and bubbled it up, wondering if the green-tinted caustics cast on the ground would behave similarly.

“It was certainly one hell of an expedition to close out our senior years,” Dyani said.

“There she goes with the colorful language again,” Marta muttered.

“Perhaps you should speak up so Eaurp can hear you,” Dyani said.

They were arguing again. Guz didn’t think Dyani liked her very much, but she definitely didn’t seem to get along with Marta. “Thanks for coming out to Italy with me for this,” Guz said.

“Yeah,” Marta said. “It was… an adventure.”

“The Italian peninsula is home to many interesting historical sites. Perhaps we should visit some of them,” Dyani said. “For example, the fallen tower of Pisa.”

“Touristy nonsense, it’s just a field full of a bunch of people pretending to try to lift it back upright,” Marta said.

“I wanted to see it. Anyway we should probably start with finding any town, since our shuttlepod isn’t flying any time soon,” Guz said.

Marta gave Dyani some side-eye.

“That was not my fault,” Dyani said.

--------------

And yes, there really will be a total solar eclipse visible in Afroeurasia on March 19th, 2379 (at about 12:30 in Italy.)

Marta Martinez and Dyani were two of Guz's classmates at Starfleet Academy. In fact, Dyani was Guz's roommate. Dyani is @raydrawsdaly's OC. Marta and Guz are my OCs.

[mysticstronomy]

WHAT IS THE DARK NEBULA??

Blog#294

Saturday, May 6th, 2023

Welcome back,

In “What is a Nebula”, we considered emission nebulae, now we are going to look at nebulae where the opposite process absorption happens.

Anyway, let’s start from a larger scale: the interstellar medium (ISM) is, as the name suggests, the matter that lies between the stars and star systems of a galaxy. It’s mainly composed of dust particles and atomic, ionic or molecular gas.

An interstellar cloud is a place where this gas and dust accumulate, meaning the region is denser than the surrounding ISM. Again, the gas can come it the three forms mentioned just before, and since the most abundant element of the ISM (and indeed of the Universe overall) is Hydrogen, the clouds are referred to as H I region, H II region or molecular (H2) cloud respectively.

The special type of interstellar molecular cloud we are considering here is called “dark” because it is dense enough to block background light – at least in the visible wavelengths, since objects behind dark nebulae may be observed in (notably) radio observations.

More precisely, the opacity is due to the dust grains the nebula contains, because those have the capacity to absorb the light. Recall that emission was the process of releasing a photon, by analogy we can see that absorption is an atom taking in a photon. Added to that, there is the process of extinction, which is absorption followed by scattering of the light; this can give information about the composition of these dust grains. This is similar to a “normal” cloud on Earth which blocks sunlight (and starlight, which is a pain for astrophotographers – check out ours tips on how to make the most of your observations here).

Since light is prevented from entering the nebula, its centre will cool. Dust grains emit infrared radiation, which further removes energy. At the same time, the pressure of gravity makes the cloud contract, until it dominates, and the matter condenses together. This is the formation of a protostar. The collapse is rather rapid, as the matter undergoes a free fall to that centre of gravity. Due to the irregular shapes that molecular clouds can have, protostars may form in different parts of it where the density is higher.

Moreover, leftover material can accrete into protoplanets, orbiting the protostar.

As opposed to what’s recommended for the other types of nebulae, you don’t have to use narrowband filters to observe a dark nebula, since what you’re trying to observe is the dark part. The image above was taken with the Luminance, Red, Green and Blue (LRGB) filters, which creates a beautiful background by an emission nebula behind the Horsehead Nebula.

Note that it has another name, Barnard 33; the Barnard Catalogue is the place to look for your Dark Nebula target, as Edward Barnard identified about 370 of these objects.

Originally published on telescope.live

COMING UP!!

(Wednesday, May 10th, 2023)

"WHAT IS THE KARDASHEV SCALE??"

[purple-ant]

thank you for tagging @bolithesenate 💜

The rules: post snippets from at least one WIP you have abandoned! 

i have a lot of abandoned WIPs, mostly ideas that i didn't feel the energy to pursue before losing interest and right now i'm writing on syku and beautiful comments energy so i don't think i'll be going back to them anytime soon or ever. the language in some of them is very... meh

but i really like this one! 

Title: galaxy in veins

Description:

The Force binds everything, it is in the stars and their dust that forms the bones of sentients throughout the galaxy. The Jedi, connected to and drawn to the Force, carried more starlight within them than was normal in the eyes of the rest of the galaxy.

They say that even the stars go out, but how can one live in a galaxy where they are extinguished?

———

Bail knows how stars are born. How huge molecular clouds, disturbed by the surrounding space, shift and hydrogen particles press together like starved lovers. Closer and larger, until they reach collapse and begin to fall apart under their own heat. From decay comes heat, from which life is born. Not at its epicenter, but somewhere outside, not close enough to harm, not so far away as to remain indifferent.

Bail sees the birth of two, and that is all he knew and nothing else.

Padmé is a friend, ally, leader. Stellar nursery. Her heavy breathing and screams hit the walls of the room, are scattered across parsecs of space, and the asteroid rings shake as the medical droid methodically carries out its work. And now, light years later, the universe exhales, two stars illuminate the cold vacuum. Their first cries are solar flares, causing the devices to stutter. Bail can hear them even through the glass, but Obi-Wan on the other side doesn't flinch.

Padme gave all of herself to the galaxy and her last gift was a binary system. Luke and Leia.

Bail walks like a moth into the light and finds Obi-Wan. He sits hunched against the wall, in his arms there are three hundred stellar masses, no more than six kilograms. Sparkling and shimmering wings, like in a kaleidoscope, fill the room, and shadows fearfully gather outside. Nebulae pour from too many eyes, and Obi-Wan swaddles the children in them. 

“We need to hide, kids,” Obi-Wan says. His voice pulses, lost in Bail's consciousness, but Luke and Leia watch, caught in the attraction. Again, too many eyes. “They are looking for light, and you are so bright,” and he hides them behind interstellar clouds, green and orange silks, too expensive to buy. “Close your eyes, like this.”

And the piercing lights dissolve like fog, the light of the wings is absorbed into the skin, hiding in the constellations of freckles. Obi-Wan exhales, turns his gaze to the children, who are too small, gods, they were just born. But maybe it’s the Force, maybe the reality of the danger that awaits beyond the hands of the Jedi, but gradually, like lanterns in the morning, the brown whirlpools disappear, the blue ones follow them.

“These too, young lady,” Obi-Wan says sternly, with a ghost of a smile, running his calloused fingers over her soft cheek. A second passes, the worlds go out. “Well done, great job, lights.”

The galaxy is spinning, the moment is passing, the children are screaming. Obi-Wan, very tired, very human, throws his head back.

“Let me save you,” Bail unfreezes and approaches the Jedi.

“Please, Bail,” Obi-Wan’s voice is hoarse, but he is in no hurry to part with either twin.

Okay, Bail can do it. He kneels in front of the Jedi, reaching for the two screaming packages.

“Your crude matter needs rest,” Bail says softly.

His friend's mind would not be at peace now. But one day, in a year or twenty, it will happen. Bail knows because he knows Obi-Wan. Not ten years, not even five, but he was there at the most desperate moment, when even the emptiness of space receded in the face of darkness, and Obi-Wan's light shrunk to a single candle. But he burned, stubbornly and against all odds. It was then, on Zigula, that Bail was pulled into his orbit.

Obi-Wan looks at Bail's hands, then at the twins. He doesn't even have the strength for consolation - the latter was laid on the obstetric table by Padme, and he is so tired of fighting with his friends. Obi-Wan slowly hands Leia and Luke over to him like crystal, and Bail accepts them like treasure. The warm supernovae in his hands continue to attack his eardrums. Perhaps the constant bickering in the Senate has made him a little less sensitive to such frequencies.

Bail leaves the room, the meddroid has prepared milk mixtures - hydrogen for the combustion of tiny blue stars, but lingers in the doorway. Turns around. The shadows return to the room, breaking through the flimsy defenses of the electric lamps, and Obi-Wan appears among them as part of the equipment. Another device that has served its purpose and is now hidden under the tarpaulin of the cloak.

“On your way, continue, senator,” it sounds next to him, and Bail doesn’t jump. His burden is too important for him to afford.

“Master Yoda,” he greets the Grand Master of the destroyed order, but his gaze is still focused on Obi-Wan.

“Care of young Obi-Wan, I will take. The younglings need your attention now.”

Bail wouldn't call his friend young. Too old for his years? Maybe. A red giant from which the outer shell was torn off, like armor, leaving it as a white dwarf. An eternity of dim light.

Bail turns his gaze to Master Yoda. He looks as old as ever. Like the one who saw the birth of the universe, held young galaxies, and then, at one moment, only planetary nebulae from dead stars remained on his old wrinkled hands.

“You are right, Jedi Master. Thank you.”

Bail walks away slowly enough to see Master Yoda approach Obi-Wan, brushing off the settled cosmic dust, and the ruined bastion shifts, gnarled fingers reaching across light years to touch another survivor.

Despite everything, there is still light in the galaxy.

———

no pressure tags: @man-i-dunno @calcedon79

[little-p-eng-engineering]

Leading the Future with Structural and Piping Design for Hydrogen Pilot Plants in the Green Energy

As the world gradually transitions towards sustainable energy sources, hydrogen stands out as a beacon of hope in the quest for green energy. The intricacies involved in harnessing hydrogen's power necessitate advanced pilot plants equipped with state-of-the-art designs. Enter Little P.Eng. Engineering, the torchbearer of structural and piping design for hydrogen pilot plants, pushing the boundaries of innovation and safety in North America.

The Growing Importance of Hydrogen in Green Energy

With zero carbon emissions when burned, hydrogen promises a cleaner future, especially when produced through green methods like electrolysis of water using renewable energy. The challenge lies in efficiently storing and transporting hydrogen, which requires meticulously designed infrastructure. This is where pilot plants come into play, acting as the testing grounds for groundbreaking technologies and methodologies.

Understanding the Role of Structural and Piping Design

In any hydrogen pilot plant, the importance of structural and piping design cannot be overstated:

Structural Design: Ensures the physical stability and safety of the plant. With hydrogen's volatile nature, the infrastructure must be robust enough to withstand pressures, prevent leaks, and guarantee longevity.

Piping Design: Deals with the intricate network of tubes and pipes that transport hydrogen and other fluids within the plant. An optimized piping system reduces losses, increases efficiency, and ensures the safe transportation of hydrogen.

Little P.Eng. Engineering's Expertise in Action

1. Customization: Every pilot plant has unique needs. Little P.Eng. Engineering’s team initiates a thorough groundwork phase, understanding the plant's specific requirements, and then tailoring designs to fit those needs perfectly.

2. Advanced Simulations: Before any design is finalized, it undergoes rigorous simulations to test its viability, strength, and efficiency. This ensures that any potential issues are addressed long before implementation.

3. Safety Above All: Given hydrogen's highly flammable nature, safety is paramount. Designs incorporate advanced safety mechanisms, pressure-relief systems, and fail-safes, ensuring the utmost protection for both the workers and the environment.

4. Seamless Integration: Little P.Eng. Engineering’s designs aren’t just about functionality – they're about integration. The designs ensure that all components of the pilot plant work in harmony, enhancing the overall operational efficiency.

A Look at Piping in Detail

Hydrogen, with its low viscosity and high diffusivity, poses unique challenges:

Material Selection: Hydrogen can lead to material embrittlement. Little P.Eng. chooses materials that resist this phenomenon, ensuring the pipes remain durable even under intense hydrogen flow.

Leak Prevention: With advanced sealing technologies and meticulous design, the piping systems are virtually leak-proof, preventing hydrogen wastage and potential hazards.

Optimal Flow: The piping designs ensure that hydrogen flows at optimal rates, reducing energy consumption and maximizing efficiency.

The Structural Marvels of Little P.Eng. Engineering

When it comes to structural design, it's a balance of strength, flexibility, and longevity:

Earthquake Resilience: Many areas in North America are prone to seismic activities. Designs from Little P.Eng. factor in these challenges, ensuring that structures can withstand tremors without sustaining damage.

Weather Resistance: Whether it's the freezing Canadian winters or the blistering heat of the southern USA, the structures are built to weather it all, quite literally.

Modularity: As the hydrogen industry evolves, pilot plants might need upgrades. Little P.Eng.'s modular designs ensure that expansions and modifications can be made without major overhauls.

Conclusion

The green energy revolution is upon us, and hydrogen is at its forefront. As pilot plants become the crucibles of innovation in this sector, having the right structural and piping design is crucial. Little P.Eng. Engineering, with its blend of expertise, innovation, and commitment to sustainability, is not just a participant but a leader in this transition towards a cleaner future. Their designs for hydrogen pilot plants stand as testaments to what is possible when engineering prowess meets environmental consciousness.

Tags:

Little P.Eng. Engineering

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Piping design

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Located in Calgary, Alberta; Vancouver, BC; Toronto, Ontario; Edmonton, Alberta; Houston Texas; Torrance, California; El Segundo, CA; Manhattan Beach, CA; Concord, CA; We offer our engineering consultancy services across Canada and United States. Meena Rezkallah.

[oliviabutsmart]

Physics Friday #7: It's getting hot in here! - An explanation of Temperature, Entropy, and Heat

THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN. This one was decided by poll. The E = mc^2 post will happen sometime later in the future

Preamble: Thermodynamic Systems

Education level: High School (Y11/12)

Topic: Statistical Mechanics, Thermodynamics (Physics)

You'll hear the word system being used a lot ... what does that mean? Basically a thermodynamic system is a collection of things that we think affect each other.

A container of gas is a system as the particles of gas all interact with each other.

The planet is a system because we, and all life/particles on earth all interact together.

Often, when dealing with thermodynamic systems we differentiate between open, closed, and isolated systems.

An open system is where both the particles and energy contained inside the system interact outside the system. Closed systems only allow energy to enter and exit the system (usually via a "reservoir").

We will focus mainly on isolated systems, where nothing enters or exits the system at all. Unless if we physically change what counts as the "system".

Now imagine we have a system, say, a container of gas. This container will have a temperature, pressure, volume, density, etc.

Let's make an identical copy of this container and then combine it with it's duplicate.

What happens to the temperature? Well it stays the same. Whenever you combine two objects of the same temperature they stay the same. If you pour a pot of 20 C water into another pot of 20 C water, no temperature change occurs.

The same occurs with pressure and density. While there are physically more particles in the system, the volume has also increased.

This makes things like Temperature, Pressure, and Density intensive properties of a system - they don't change when you combine systems with copies of itself. They act more like averages.

However, duplicating a system and combining it with itself causes the volume to double, it also doubles the amount of 'stuff' inside the system.

Thus things like volume are called intensive, as they appear to be altered by count and size, they act more like proportional values.

This is important in both understanding heat and temperature. The energy of a system is an intensive property, whereas temperature is intensive.

Temperature appears to be a sort of average of thermal energy, which is how we can analyse it - but this only works in the case of gasses, which isn't universal. It's useful to use a more abstract definition of temperature.

Heat, on the other hand, is much more real. It is concerned with the amount of energy transferred cased by a change in temperature. This change is driven by the second law of thermodynamics, which requires a maximisation of entropy.

But instead of tackling this from a high-end perspective, let's jump into the nitty-gritty ...

Microstates and Macrostates

The best way we can demonstrate the concept of Entropy is via the analogy of a messy room:

We can create a macrostate of the room by describing the room:

There's a shirt on the floor

The bed is unmade

There is a heater in the centre

The heater is broken

Note how in this macrostate, we can have several possible arrangements that describe the same macrostate. For example, the shirt on the floor could be red, blue, black, green.

A microstate of the room is a specific arrangement of items, to the maximum specificity we require.

For example the shirt must be green, the right heater leg is broken. If we care about even more specificity we could say a microstate of the system is:

Atom 1 is Hydrogen in position (0, 0, 0)

Atom 2 is Carbon in position (1, 0, 0)

etc.

Effectively, a macrostate is a more general description of a system, while a microstate is a specific iteration of a system.

A microstate is considered attached to a macrostate if the conditions of the macrostate are required. "Dave is wearing a shirt" and "Dave is wearing a red shirt" can both be true, but it's clear that if Dave is wearing a red shirt, he is also wearing a shirt.

What Entropy Actually is (by Definition)

The multiplicity of a microstate is the total amount of microstates attached to it. It is basically a "count" of the total permutations given the restrictions.

We give the multiplicity an algebraic number Ω.

What we define entropy as is the natural logarithm of Ω.

S = k ln Ω

Where k is Boltzmann's constant, to give the entropy units. The reason why we take the logarithm is:

Combinatorics often involve factorials and exponents a.k.a. big numbers, so we use the log function to cut it down to size

When you combine a system with a macrostate of Ω=X with a macrostate of Ω=Y, the total multiplicity is X × Y. So this logarithm makes Entropy extensive

So that's what Entropy is, a measure of the amount of possible rearrangements of a system given a set of preconditions.

Order and Chaos

So how do we end up with the popular notion that Entropy is a measure of chaos, well, consider a sand castle,

Image Credit: Wall Street Journal

A sand castle, compared the surrounding beach, is a very specific structure. It requires specific arrangements of sand particles in order to form a proper structure.

This is opposed to the beach, where any loose arrangement of sand particles can be considered a 'beach'.

In this scenario, the castle has a very low multiplicity, because the macrostate of 'sandcastle' requires a very restrictive set of microstates. Whereas a sand dune has a very large set of possible microstates.

In this way, we can see how the 'order' and 'structure' of the sand castle results in a low-entropy system.

However this doesn't explain how we can get such complex systems if energy is always meant to increase. Like how can life exist if the universe intends to make things a mess of particles, AND the universe started as a mess of particles.

The consideration to make, as we'll see, is that chaos is not the full picture, large amounts of energy can be turned into making entropy lower.

Energy Macrostates

There's still a problem with our definition. Consider two macrostates:

The room exists

Atom 1 is Hydrogen in position (0, 0, 0), Atom 2 is Carbon in position (1, 0, 0), etc.

Macrostate one has a multiplicity so large it might as well be infinite, and is so general it encapsulates all possible states of the system.

Macrostate two is so specific that it only has a multiplicity of one.

Clearly we need some standard to set macrostates to.

What we do is that we define a macrostate by one single parameter: the amount of thermal energy in the system. We can also include things like volume or the amount of particles etc. But for now, a macrostate corresponds to a specific energy of the system.

This means that the multiplicity becomes a function of thermal energy, U.

S(U) = k ln Ω(U)

The Second Law of Thermodynamics

Let's consider a system which is determined by a bunch of flipped coins, say, 10 flipped coins.

H T H T H H H T T H

This may seem like a weird example, but there is a genuine usefulness to this. For example, consider atoms aligned in a magnetic field.

We can define the energy of the system as being a function of the amount of heads we see. Thus an energy macrostate would be "X coins are heads".

Let's now say that every minute, we reset the system. i.e. we flip the coins again and use the new result.

Consider the probability of ending up a certain macrostate every minute. We can use the binomial theorem to calculate this probability:

Here, the column notation gives the choose function, which accounts for duplicates, as we are not concerned with the order in which we get any two tails or heads.

The p to the power of k is the probability of landing a head (50%) to the power of the number of heads we get (k). n-k becomes the number of tails obtained.

The choose function is symmetric, so we end up with equal probabilities with k heads as with k tails.

Let's come up with some scenarios:

There are an equal amount of heads and tails flipped

There is exactly two more heads than tails (i.e. 6-4)

All coins are heads except for one

All coins are heads

And let's see these probabilities:

Clearly, it is more likely that we find an equal amount of coins, but all coins being heads is not too unlikely. Also notice that the entropy correlates with probability here. A large entropy is more likely to occur.

Let's now increase the number of coin flips to 1000:

Well, now we can see this probability difference much more clearly. The "all coins are heads" microstate is vanishingly unlikely, and microstates close to maximum entropy are very likely comparatively.

If we keep expanding the amount of flips, we end up pushing the limits of this relationship. And thus we get the tendency for this system to maximise the entropy, simply because it's most likely.

In real life, systems don't suddenly reset and restart. Instead we want to consider a system where every minute, one random coin is selected and then flipped.

Consider a state in maximum entropy undergoing this change. It's going to take an incredibly long amount of time to perform something incredibly unlikely.

But for a state in minimum entropy, any deviation from the norm brings the entropy higher.

Thus the system has the tendency to end up being "trapped" in the higher entropy states.

This is the second law of thermodynamics. It doesn't actually make a statement about a particularly small system. But for small systems we deal with statistics differently. For large systems, we end up ALWAYS seeing a global increase in entropy.

How we get temperature

Temperature is usually defined as the capacity to transfer thermal energy. It sort of acts like a "heat potential" in the same way we have a "gravitational potential" or "electrical potential".

Temperature and Thermal Energy

What is the mathematical meaning of temperature?

Temperature is defined as a rate of change, specifically:

(Apologies for the fucked image formatting)

(Reminder this assumes Entropy is exclusively a function of energy)

The reason we define it as a derivative of entropy as entropy is an emergent property of a system. But thermal energy is something we can personally change.

What this rule means is that a system with a very low temperature will react greatly to minor inputs in energy. A low temperature system thus is really good at drawing energy from outside.

Alternatively, a system with very high temperature will react very slightly to minor inputs in energy.

At the extremes, absolute zero is where any change to the internal energy of the system will cause the system to escape absolute zero. According to the third law of thermodynamics this is where entropy reaches a constant value, because it can't be changed any more after being changed by an infinite amount.

Infinite temperature is where it's effectively impossible to pump more heat into the system, because the system is so resistant to accepting new energy.

Negative Temperature???

Considering our coin-flipping example, let's try and define some numbers. Let's say that the thermal energy of the system is equal to the amount of heads flipped.

This gives us an entropy of:

S ≈ U ln[n/U - 1] + n ln[1 - U/n]

(hopefully this is correct)

The derivative of this is:

dS/dU = ln[n/U - 1] - 2n/(n-U)

Note how this value becomes negative if n is large enough. Implying a negative temperature!

But how is this possible? What does this mean?

Negative temperatures are nothing out of the ordinary actually, they just mean that inputting energy decreases entropy and removing energy increases entropy.

What this means is that a system at a negative temperature, when put in contact with another system, will spontaneously try to dump energy out of itself as it aims to increase entropy.

This actually means that negative temperature is beyond infinite temperature. A fully expanded temperature scale looks like this:

[The Planck temperature is the largest possible temperature that won't create a black hole at 1.4 × 10³² Kelvin]

[Note that 0 K = -273.15 C = -459.67 F and 273.15 K = 0 C = 32 F]

This implies that -0 is sort of the 'absolute hot'. A temperature so hot that the system will desperately try to bleed energy much like the absolute zero system tries to suck in energy.

Heat and the First Law of Thermodynamics

So, what do we do with this information then? How do we actually convert this into something meaningful?

Here, we start to pull in the first law of thermodynamics, which originates with the thermodynamic identity:

dU = T dS - P dV

Note that these dx parts just mean a 'tiny change' in that variable. Here, U is expanded to include situations where the thermal energy of the system has to include things like compression/expansion work done to the system.

This identity gives us the first law:

dU = Q - W

Where Q, the heat energy of the system is re-defined as being dS/dQ = 1/T.

And W, the work (mechanical) energy of the system is defined as being dU/dV.

Both heat and work describe the changes to the energy of the system. Heating a system means you are inputting an energy Q.

If no energy is entering or exiting the system, then we know that any work that is being applied must be matched by an equal change in heat energy.

Since we managed to phrase temperature as a function of thermal energy, we can now develop what's known as an equation of state of the system.

For an ideal gas made of only hydrogen, we have an energy:

U = 3/2 NkT

Where N is the number of particles and k is the boltzmann constant.

We can also define another equation of state for an ideal gas:

PV = NkT

Which is the ideal gas law.

So what is heat then?

Q is the change of heat energy in a system, whereas U is the total thermal energy.

From the ideal gas equation of state, the thermal energy is proportional to temperature. In most cases, we can often express thermal energy as being temperature scaled to size.

Thermal energy is strange. Unlike other classical forms of energy, it can be difficult to classify it as potential or kinetic.

It's a form of kinetic energy as U relies on the movement of particles and packets within the system.

It's a form of potential energy, as it has the potential to transfer it's energy to others.

Generally, the idea that thermal energy is related to temperature is related to the 'speed' at which particles move is not too far off. In fact, we often relate:

1/2 m v^2 = 3/2 N k T

When performing calculations, as it's generally useful.

Of course, temperature, as aforementioned, is a sort of potential describing the potential energy (that can be transferred) per particle.

Heat, then effectively, is the transfer of thermal energy caused by differences in temperature. Generally, we quantify the ability for a system to give off heat using it's heat capacity - note that this is different from temperature.

Temperature is about how much the system wants to give off energy, whereas heat capacity is how well it's able to do that. Heat aims to account for both.

Conclusion

This post honestly was a much nicer write-up. And I'd say the same about E = mc^2. The main reason why is because I already know about this stuff, I was taught about it all 1-4 years ago in high school or university.

My computer is busted, so I'm using a different device to work on this. And because of that I do not have access to my notes. So I don't actually know what I have planned for next week. I think I might decide to override it anyways with something else. Maybe the E = mc^2 one.

As always, feedback is very welcome. Especially because this topic is one I should be knowledgeable about at this point.

Don't forget to SMASH that subscribe button so I can continue to LARP as a youtuber. It's actually strangely fun saying "smash the like button" - but I digress. It doesn't ultimately matter if you wanna follow idc, some people just don't like this stuff weekly.

[tatmanblue]

Euclid’s view of the Horsehead Nebula by European Space Agency Via Flickr: Euclid shows us a spectacularly panoramic and detailed view of the Horsehead Nebula, also known as Barnard 33 and part of the constellation Orion. At approximately 1375 light-years away, the Horsehead – visible as a dark cloud shaped like a horse’s head – is the closest giant star-forming region to Earth. It sits just to the south of star Alnitak, the easternmost of Orion’s famous three-star belt, and is part of the vast Orion molecular cloud. Many other telescopes have taken images of the Horsehead Nebula, but none of them are able to create such a sharp and wide view as Euclid can with just one observation. Euclid captured this image of the Horsehead in about one hour, which showcases the mission's ability to very quickly image an unprecedented area of the sky in high detail. In Euclid’s new observation of this stellar nursery, scientists hope to find many dim and previously unseen Jupiter-mass planets in their celestial infancy, as well as young brown dwarfs and baby stars. “We are particularly interested in this region, because star formation is taking place in very special conditions,” explains Eduardo Martin Guerrero de Escalante of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias in Tenerife and a legacy scientist for Euclid. These special conditions are caused by radiation coming from the very bright star Sigma Orionis, which is located above the Horsehead, just outside Euclid’s field-of-view (the star is so bright that the telescope would see nothing else if it pointed directly towards it). Ultraviolet radiation from Sigma Orionis causes the clouds behind the Horsehead to glow, while the thick clouds of the Horsehead itself block light from directly behind it; this makes the head look dark. The nebula itself is made up largely of cold molecular hydrogen, which gives off very little heat and no light. Astronomers study the differences in the conditions for star formation between the dark and bright clouds. The star Sigma Orionis itself belongs to a group of more than a hundred stars, called an open cluster. However, astronomers don’t have the full picture of all the stars belonging to the cluster. “Gaia has revealed many new members, but we already see new candidate stars, brown dwarfs and planetary-mass objects in this Euclid image, so we hope that Euclid will give us a more complete picture,” adds Eduardo. The data in this image were taken in about one hour of observation. This colour image was obtained by combining VIS data and NISP photometry in Y and H bands; its size is 8800 x 8800 pixels. VIS and NISP enable observing astronomical sources in four different wavelength ranges. Aesthetics choices led to the selection of three out of these four bands to be cast onto the traditional Red-Green-Blue colour channels used to represent images on our digital screens (RGB). The blue, green, red channels capture the Universe seen by Euclid around the wavelength 0.7, 1.1, and 1.7 micron respectively. This gives Euclid a distinctive colour palette: hot stars have a white-blue hue, excited hydrogen gas appears in the blue channel, and regions rich in dust and molecular gas have a clear red hue. Distant redshifted background galaxies appear very red. In the image, the stars have six prominent spikes due to how light interacts with the optical system of the telescope in the process of diffraction. Another signature of Euclid special optics is the presence of a few, very faint and small round regions of a fuzzy blue colour. These are normal artefacts of complex optical systems, so-called ‘optical ghost’; easily identifiable during data analysis, they do not cause any problem for the science goals. The cutout from the full view of the Horsehead Nebula is at the high resolution of the VIS instrument. This is nine times better than the definition of NISP that was selected for the full view; this was done for the practical reason of limiting the format of the full image to a manageable size for downloading. The cutout fully showcases the power of Euclid in obtaining extremely sharp images over a large region of the sky in one single pointing. Although this image represents only a small part of the entire colour view, the same quality as shown here is available over the full field. The full view of the Horsehead Nebula at the highest definition can be explored on ESASky. [Image description] This square astronomical image is divided horizontally by a waving line between a white-orange cloudscape forming a nebula along the bottom portion and a comparatively blue-purple-pink upper portion. From the nebula in the bottom half of the image, an orange cloud shaped like a horsehead sticks out. In the bottom left of the image, a white round glow is visible. The clouds from the bottom half of the image shine purple/blue light into the upper half. The top of the image shows the black expanse of space. Speckled across both portions is a starfield, showing stars of varying sizes and colours. Blue stars are younger and red stars are older. Credits: ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre (CEA Paris-Saclay), G. Anselmi; CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

[sourcreammachine]

so the party manifestos won’t be published for a few weeks prolly, but the Labour Party policymaking system means they have an internal “policy platform” agreed by the partisan structure that kinda dictates what goes in the manifesto, and a similar partisan structure has the final say on the manifesto itself. the platform is private and internal, but it’s been “seen and summarised”. so heres a couple of interesting bits:

nationalise the rail; allow greater municipal ownership of bus networks; more ev charging stations and increased ev subsidies

“fundamentally reform our system of energy supply, generation and transmission” via public ownership, but without stating whether or not this includes consumer services or if the private wholesale system will continue

abolish the Lords; votes at 16; NO commitment to abolishing FPTP

“support the recognition of” palestine (note wording, and note the fact this was written before 7 october)

ban conversion therapy including for trans people; “modernise the process of gender recognition to remove indignities for trans people, while upholding the Equality Act, its protected characteristics and its provision for single-sex exemptions” (obviously using terf dogwhistles to get out of meaningfully reforming the law, without clarifying their plans)

sewage monitoring and fines for sewage leaks by water companies – water remains private

“land-use framework” to organise farmland with the goal of biodiversity, close hunting loopholes

intellectual property reform, maybe? they’re very vague about that one

one-month waiting time for mental health services

“reform broken tuition fees system” – NO commitment to abolition and debt forgiveness, only this squirmy line

“robust regulation to protect people from online harms” – basically equivocating to allow any possible passage of a bad internet bill :/

£28B green energy investment; double onshore wind, quadruple offshore wind; reinstate fracking ban and stop new oil/gas; “green energy by 2030”, whatever that means. weirdly fetishistic about hydrogen power

VERY, VERY little mention of City oversight and reform. City to remain extremely independent, capital to continue flowing

abolish leaseholds; end ‘arcane’ land laws; end no-fault evictions

football regulator; reform gambling laws

end fire-rehire; more regulation for two-tier employee/contractor workplace inequalities; more statutory workers’ rights; ban zerohours with more than 12h/week, “right to a contract”; change the minimum wage quango to account for cost of living, potentially hiking the minimum wage by several pounds

repeal a number of union-busting acts; regulate gig economies to statutorily allow the right to unionise; increase rights for unions to organise and manage themselves

ethics quango to enforce the ministerial code for the first time in its history; ban second jobs for MPs with very limited exceptions for professionals; ban former ministers from lobbying for five years; political finance reforms to restrict financing by shell companies

certain devolutionary powers for english local authorities on request; shrink whitehall, let the civil service go elsewhere

“respect orders”, ASBOs 2; domestic abuse register; misogyny as a hatecrime; ‘protect the right to protest’, explicitly opposing the public order bill without committing to overturn it

but yeah, the starmer leadership may leave some things on the cutting room floor, and the starmer government may act totally different when it doesn’t have the partisan oversight. in the end, we have to wait until the proper manifesto releases to make real judgements, but looking through this list can set the tone of our expectations: third-way, boring and pathetic