EuroWire March 2016

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human activity, Henry Fountain of the New York Times puts this amount of CO 2 at only a little less than that produced every year by Germany. And, Mr Fountain noted, growth in aircraft emissions shows no signs of slowing. The International Civil Aviation Organisation, the United Nations agency that oversees the industry, forecasts that the worldwide commercial eet will double, to about 40,000 airliners, in the next 15 years. A recent European Commission report holds that, even as countries and other industries rein in their CO 2 emissions, aviation could eventually be responsible for more than one- fth of the global total. Problems invite solutions, and this very big problem has led to a visionary concept known as distributed propulsion. One of several technologies being studied by NASA engineers at Edwards Air Force Base, California, and other research centres, it is believed to hold promise for completely new and far less polluting aircraft designs. (“Rethinking the Airplane, for Climate’s Sake,” 11 th January) In a typical jet turbine engine, a central core burns fuel and air, providing power to turn a fan. That fan draws in more air that bypasses the core and exits out the back, producing more thrust. Engines have become more e cient in part by incorporating larger fans to move more of this “bypass” air; but there is a limit on the size of the fans. As described by Mr Fountain, the idea behind distributed propulsion is to move the engines – complex, heavy devices – from their usual position hanging below the wings and install them elsewhere around the plane. A distributed design simply adds more fans, so long as there is enough electricity – from simple, small electric motors – to run them. “Now you’re not constrained by the size of the engine,” Panagiotis Laskaridis, who researches distributed propulsion at Cran eld University in Britain, told the Times . † The test craft at Edwards uses batteries to power its motors. But Dr Laskaridis and a Cran eld colleague, Devaiah Nalianda, are studying the feasibility of hybrid turbine-electric systems that might use batteries and a single jet engine to generate electricity for the motors. According to Dr Nalianda the technology under development at Edwards is entirely feasible. While acknowledging that much development work lay ahead, he has no doubt that it will eventually be used, perhaps even for large aircraft. “When the jet engine replaced the piston engine in the 1940s and 1950s, it was very disruptive,” he reminded Mr Fountain. “I believe distributed propulsion is a similar kind of disruptive technology.”

enthusiast as an Apple product launch is for a techie. But Ms Tran, who is neither, went on to note that the big annual auto show is also a major event for a metals enthusiast. Last year, it will be recalled, the big newsmaker at the show was the aluminium-bodied Ford F-150, which prompted some car makers to predict aluminium would be key to helping lighter-weight vehicles meet corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards, made tougher by the US Congress in 2007. Further raising the bar for the automakers, President Barack Obama in 2012 tasked them with boosting the average fuel economy of new cars for sale in the USA to 54.5 miles per gallon (mpg) by 2025. “Fuel economy isn’t the only way to go green, though,” wrote Ms Tran, a visitor to the 2016 edition of the auto show. (“Green Targets Drive Demand for New Forms of Auto Steel,” 15 th January) Larry Kavanagh, president of the Steel Market Development Institute (SMDI), warned Platts that any shift away from automotive steel entails environmental consequences. He noted that aluminium production gives o four to ve times more greenhouse gas or CO 2 -equivalent emissions than steel production, as well as requiring seven times the amount of energy. Citing a study by the University of California at Santa Barbara, Mr Kavanagh said it found that primary production of steel and advanced high strength steel emits 2.3-2.7 kilograms (kg) of CO 2 equivalent per kg of material; aluminium production, 13.9-15.5 kg of CO 2 equivalent. The same study found that recycling (secondary production) of steel and advanced high strength steel emits half the CO 2 equivalent as recycling aluminium. And almost all automotive steel is collected and recycled, accounting for more than 80 million tons of repurposed steel per year, according to the SMDI. † Ms Tran gave two examples at the auto show of new grades of formable advanced high strength steel incorporated into vehicles, notably in the chassis: The lower control arm of the 2016 Chevrolet Malibu from General Motors is now made of steel, whereas the versions in model years 2012 through 2015 were of aluminium. A spokesman said GM opted to switch back to steel because it meets company goals for reduction of mass, as well as for its lower materials and processing costs. The lower control arms of the 2016 Buick LaCrosse and all-new Envision also use steel, which according to a Buick spokeswoman a ords comparable, if not better, weight reduction than aluminium. “Steel is really a new technology,” Jody Hall, vice president of the automotive market for SMDI, told Platts . “It’s not the old technology that people think.”

Steel

Telecom

New grades of formable advanced high strength steel for lighter-weight vehicles are winning back some deserters to aluminium Estelle Tran, who covers metals for Platts , observed that the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, held this year from 11 th to 24 th January, is as big an event for a car

This year in telecommunications: pitched battle in US wireless, a return to revenue growth in Europe

The Bloomberg Terminal , a widely used tool for gathering market information from around the world, on 11 th January provided its

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March 2016