The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page A13

Des Moines Sunday Page 13A ENERGY Thursday, January 14 5OF THE WORST WAYS YOU EXPAND YOUR CARBON FOOTPRINT 1 Fail to switch to more energy-efficient LED bulbs from incandescent ulbs. 2 Ignore energy and money savers like programmable thermostats, tility-sponsored home nergy audit services, a nd incentives for energy-efficient appliances. 3 Wash clothes in hot water. If all U.S. homes washed clothes in cold ater, it would save the nergy comparable to 1 00,000 barrels of oil a day.

4 Buy bottled water. For every 1million bottles of water that are manu- actured and shipped to onsumers, 18.2 tons of arbon dioxide emissions are released into the air. 5 Speed, drive aggressively. Avoid hard accelerations and go easy on the rakes and gas pedal to i mprove energy use. A dequate air in the tires also improves fuel efficiency.

SOURCES: University of Iowa Office of Sustainability, U.S. Environmental Protect ion Agency, U.S. epartment of Agric ulture and Cornell University am Brinton, a 27-year-old bisexual who sports a bright red ohawk, is hard to miss walking the halls of Congress in stilettos, talking about what the nation should do with its nuclear waste. Openness about his personal life has set a standard for his professional life. Brinton focuses on nuclear challenges and opportunities, including whether it should be tapped to create new energy.

know I bring my whole said the senior policy analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington think tank. share the good and the bad. I have nothing to Brinton, a nuclear engineer, wants to answer hard questions and address fears around nuclear energy. talk about what could be scary a nd not ignore it or sweep it under a he said. Brinton sees energy as one of his greatest challenges: the power needs are growing, and so is its need for clean energy.

believe this can be solved with one energy said Brinton, who received his nuclear engineering graduate degree at MIT. be 100 percent nuclear. It be 100 percent renewable. It be 100 percent coal or natural gas. It will take a America needs to meet the technology and policy challenges that lie within each of those energy pieces, he said.

or example, researchers are developing technology to use nuclear waste a public health and environmental hazard to power advanced nuclear reactors. But they run into regulations that were built around older technology. And scientists who want to emonstrate the technology works have no place to ramp it up. build a reactor in the back Brinton said. looking for a test bed or an innovation center or somewhere where these amazing startups can all get together, collaborate, be on their own when they need to, but develop these advanced reactors in real time and in real he said.

redesigning how we do reactors so they can do more than just meet nuclear waste Brinton said. can meet safety challenges. They can be more economical. They can be smaller so they can fit in more ocations. A lot of amazing people are working on believe this can be solved with one energy type.

It be 100 percent nuclear. It be 100 percent renewable. It be 100 percent coal or natural gas. It will take a SAM BRINTON, SENIOR POLICY ANALYST JASPER USA TODAY Sam Brinton is a senior policy analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center. a nuclear engineer who lobbies for advanced nuclear energy.

ENGINEER SEES A POWER SOURCE IN NUCLEAR WASTE DONNELLE ELLER VIDEO: Meet Sam Brinton, who discusses his work with nuclear waste storage, at esMoinesRegister.com hristophe Jospe anted to tackle a big problem, and he found a project that fits the bill: working ith an Arizona State University research team that seeks remove carbon from the air warming the planet. Jospe, 29, said he acts as a bridge, helping to explain the cience being developed at A Center for Negative arbon Emissions. so much science out there that needs to be aid Jospe, the chief trategist, who has a degree from Columbia Univer- ity in environ- ental science and policy. ospe works for Klaus Lackner, the director and an Arizona State physics professor. His researchers are orking to capture carbon in the atmosphere and ind ways to reuse it, closing the carbon loop.

is a waste that just accumulates in the atmosphere. The more we have, the warmer the climate is going to said Jospe, who lives in New York City, working re- otely with the center. Lackner, he said, seeks to the root of the problem. too much CO2 in the atmosphere. pull it For example, the center nvisions its technology would enable a company like Coca- ola to capture carbon from the air near its plants and recy- le it to give soda its fizz.

Or feed captured CO2 to algae used to make fuel for ars and trucks. If the world has a limited amount of carbon that can be eleased, spending our carbon Jospe said. We need to invest in technology to give our children a way to deal with it at a relatively low he said. Not only is the Arizona team developing technology it believes will be a low-cost carbon removal system, but five start up companies are working on similar but different approaches. Jospe is working to pull together a consortium of industry leaders to push the research forward.

And he advocates for more government funding. focus is getting good at removing carbon from the he said. trying to get investment so that we can do is a waste that just accumulates in the atmosphere. The mor we have, the warmer the climate is going to CHRISTOPHE JOSPE, CLIMA TE RESEARCHER FINDING A ALLING IN RANSLATING CARBON REMOVAL DONNELLE ELLER VIDEO: Meet Christophe Jospe, ho translates cutting- edge work to the rest of us, at esMoinesRegister.com Christophe Jospe.