ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — For Justin LaPierre, helping maintain an atmospheric research station at the northern tip of Alaska is “eerily reminiscent” of being deployed in the deserts of Afghanistan — just much colder. A U.S. Marine Corps veteran, LaPierre has worked as an observer at Oliktok Point for two years. The site is the third […]
Category Archives: Climate Change
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Hate to wait? Sandia looks to speed up climate research
October 17, 2019 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Presumably, Leonardo da Vinci could have saved a lot of time on his “Mona Lisa” if he had just slapped on two dots and a swoosh for a smiley face. But details take time. The same goes for running computer models and simulations. If you want oceans of calculations to study something […]
Water use cut in half at federal lab in Colorado, thanks in part to Sandia
October 19, 2018 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A Sandia National Laboratories engineer has won a Department of Energy environmental award for helping halve the amount of water used to cool a high-performance computer data center in 2017 at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado. David J. Martinez, engineering project lead for Sandia’s infrastructure computing services, received the […]
Researchers discover new source of formic acid over Pacific, Indian oceans
September 5, 2018 – 5:00 am
LIVERMORE, Calif. — Insights from experiments at Sandia National Laboratories designed to push chemical systems far from equilibrium allowed an international group of researchers to discover a new major source of formic acid over the Pacific and Indian oceans. The discovery was published in the July 3 issue of Nature Communications and featured on the […]
Exascale Earth-modeling system is ready to make high-fidelity predictions for energy
April 27, 2018 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — An Earth modeling system developed over the last four years and unveiled Monday is expected to have one of the finest resolutions ever achieved by supercomputers simulating aspects of the planet’s climate, said Sandia National Laboratories researcher Mark Taylor, the project’s chief computational scientist. The Energy Exascale Earth System Model, E3SM, is […]
Exploring Arctic clues to secure future with new Sandia, university partnership
April 23, 2018 – 8:36 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Arctic is undergoing rapid change, with sea ice melting and temperatures rising at a faster pace than anywhere else in the world. Its changing environment affects global security, politics, the economy and the climate. Understanding these changes is crucial for shaping and safeguarding U.S. security in the future, Sandia scientists say. […]
Effects of climate change on communally managed water systems softened by shared effort
April 16, 2018 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Shared fates and experiences in a community can help it withstand changes to water availability due to climate change, a recent study by Sandia National Laboratories researchers found. “During our research, a community’s ability to withstand natural and social pressures was routinely pinpointed to the fact that the people who live there […]
Biologically inspired membrane purges coal-fired smoke of greenhouse gases
April 11, 2018 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A biologically inspired membrane intended to cleanse carbon dioxide almost completely from the smoke of coal-fired power plants has been developed by scientists at Sandia National Laboratories and the University of New Mexico. The patented work, reported recently in Nature Communications, has interested power and energy companies that would like to significantly […]
The destructive effects of supercooled liquid water on airplane safety and climate models
November 3, 2016 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Supercooled water sounds smooth enough to be served at espresso bars, but instead it hangs out in Earth’s atmosphere, unpredictably freezing on airplane wings and hampering the simulations of climate theorists. To learn more about this unusual state of matter, Sandia National Laboratories atmospheric scientist Darielle Dexheimer and colleagues have organized an expedition to fly huge tethered balloons in […]
City resilience: Sandia analyzes effects of rising sea levels in Norfolk
March 28, 2016 – 5:00 am
Analysis method available to cities that want to become more resilient ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — In Norfolk, Virginia, an East Coast city that’s home to the world’s largest naval station and important seaports, catastrophic flooding could damage more than homes and roads. A new study from Sandia National Laboratories assesses how much the city, its region […]
Ice sheet modeling of Greenland, Antarctica helps predict sea-level rise
February 11, 2016 – 5:00 am
Sandia Labs research part of five-year multi-partner project titled Predicting Ice Sheet and Climate Evolution at Extreme Scales (PISCEES) LIVERMORE, Calif. — The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets will make a dominant contribution to 21st century sea-level rise if current climate trends continue. However, predicting the expected loss of ice sheet mass is difficult due […]
Warning Area in Arctic airspace to aid research and exploration
August 6, 2015 – 10:20 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A 700-mile-long airspace that stretches north from Oliktok Point — the northernmost point of Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay — to about 400 miles short of the North Pole has been put under the stewardship of Sandia National Laboratories by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Oliktok Point […]
Sandia researcher Mark Taylor receives highest award from DOE Secretary
May 21, 2015 – 5:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories researcher Mark Taylor has received the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) 2014 Secretary’s Honor Award — the department’s highest non-monetary employee recognition — for his work as chief computational scientist for DOE’s Accelerated Climate Modeling for Energy (ACME) executive council team. The award recognizes the team’s work to unify […]
New project is the ACME of computer science to address climate change
August 20, 2014 – 3:05 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — High performance computing researchers at Sandia National Laboratories are working with the Department of Energy (DOE) and other national laboratories and institutions to develop and apply the most complete climate and Earth system model, to address the most challenging and demanding climate change issues. Accelerated Climate Modeling for Energy, or ACME, is […]
Hard cold work and unsung science heroes
October 21, 2013 – 4:10 am
Data for climate simulations doesn’t come easy ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. —The Sierra went down over the Arctic Ocean, about 60 miles from the northernmost tip of North America. One moment the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with its 20-foot wingspan was up in the sky, gathering “hard” data over frozen terrain to help climate scientists in comfortable offices […]