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SECURE TRANSPORTATIONNext-Level Test for Secure Transportation Vehicle
A semitrailer loaded with mock nuclear weapons slammed into a barrier. The tests are designed to demonstrate that, if a trailer were ever involved in an accident on a public road, the cargo inside would remain secure and pose no danger to nearby communities.
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HAZARDOUS DUSTWhen the Dust Settles: Researchers Measure How Everyday Activity Spreads Hazardous Dust
Argonne researchers study the movement of dust particles from concrete surfaces during a simulated radiological contamination scenario, measuring how pedestrians and moving cars affect the spread of the particles.
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WILDFIRESAmerica Is Losing Its War Against Wildfire
Over the past decade, so-called megafires — characterized not only by their size, often bigger than 100,000 acres, but by their severity, speed, and impact — have become more common. Wildland firefighting is increasingly facing an intractable reality: We’re stuck in a vicious cycle. A doom loop.
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COASTAL CHALLENGESManhattan’s Flood Walls Are Almost Done. What Sill Mamdani Do Next?
New York City has more than 500 miles of coastline. The new mayor wants to invest in coastal resilience, but he will have to decide which areas of the city to protect.
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HURRUCANESResearch Uncovers Hidden Patterns in Hurricane Storm Surge
When a hurricane roars toward land, forecasters try to predict how high sea levels will rise to help coastal communities prepare for the worst impacts. But storm surge peak isn’t always the biggest problem
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POWER-GRID RESILIENCETrump Is Blocking Billions of Dollars of Grants That Would Fix the Grid
The Department of Energy has canceled or stalled funding for thousands of projects that would improve the country’s stressed grid — and not just in blue states.
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INFRASTRUCTURE PROTECTIONHow Hackers Attack Municipal Water Systems – and Why the Utilities Are So Vulnerable
There are about 152,000 public drinking water systems in the United States. Many utilities operate with small staffs, so remote connections allow an employee to monitor a distant pump or tank, receive an alarm after hours or let a vendor diagnose equipment without traveling to every site. Remote control reduces site-management cost, but increases vulnerability to hacking.
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NATURAL DISASTERSFeds Increasingly Leave Local Governments Hanging When Climate Disasters Hit: Report
Communities that ask for federal assistance when climate disasters hit can’t count on that help to arrive.
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DISASTER RECOVERYWhen Disaster Recovery Becomes a Way of Life: Community Disaster Fatigue Is on the Rise with More Frequent Floods
Flash flooding has been tearing up communities across the U.S., with heavy downpours sending creeks and rivers rushing over their banks. If this feels like déjà vu after two summers of flash flooding across America, imagine being a community that has had to live through flooding like this again and again.
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COASTAL CHALLENGESSea-Level Rise Has Increased Frequency of Extreme Coastal Flooding Worldwide: Study
Human-caused sea-level rise has significantly increased the frequency of extreme coastal flooding worldwide. New research found that coastal flooding events expected only once every 100 years are now, on average, about 12 times more likely to occur.
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CLIMATE-CHANGE CHALLENGESAcross Europe, Heat Adaptation Plans Are Being Put to a Brutal Test
As global warming relentlessly continues to push temperatures upward, cities across Europe rehearsing what it might be like to live in the future when temperatures are projected to hit 122 degrees Fahrenheit. Those strategies are now being put to one of their biggest tests.
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POWER-GRID SECURITYORNL-Developed Cybersecurity Framework Graduates from Lab to Electric Grid
A grid cybersecurity and verification framework developed at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been licensed by GridForge Energy Solutions. The startup plans to explore ways the technology could boost real-time visibility of grid behavior for energy projects, grid management companies and utilities.
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INFRASTRUCTUREQuantum Sensors Could Spot Hidden Damage in the Thousands of U.S. Bridges Rated “Structurally Deficient”
Damaged bridges is a national problem. The United States has more than 624,000 highway bridges. About 220,000 need major repair or replacement, and 41,677 are rated poor, also called structurally deficient.
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UNDERSEA SENSORSGoing Dark: Why Dismantling America’s Ocean Sensors Is a Security Risk
Starting this month, the National Science Foundation (NSF) began pulling more than 900 deep-sea instruments out of the water, dismantling most of the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI), a network of moorings and seafloor sensors that streams continuous, real-time data on the physical, chemical, and biological state of the Atlantic and Pacific. The network was built to run for 25 years. It will not make it to ten. This is a national security story as much as a science story.
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POWER-GRID RESILIENCEA Simple — Yet Expensive — Way to Climate-Proof the Grid: Bury the Power Lines
Underground power lines are far less vulnerable to extreme weather, but burying them doesn’t come cheap. After a historic ice storm in northern Michigan, utilities there are reconsidering the cost.
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The long view
WILDFIRESAmerica Is Losing Its War Against Wildfire
Over the past decade, so-called megafires — characterized not only by their size, often bigger than 100,000 acres, but by their severity, speed, and impact — have become more common. Wildland firefighting is increasingly facing an intractable reality: We’re stuck in a vicious cycle. A doom loop.