Monthly Archives: February 2023

Gaussling’s Epistle to the Bohemians 2/28/23

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>>> A smattering of thoughts each too small for a post. <<<

I’ve been thinking about quantum chemistry lately, or more to the point, my graduate-level single semester experience with it. First let me say that prior to taking the qualifying exams on arrival to the graduate chemistry program, I made sure to bone up on the particle in a one-dimensional box model. And sure enough, it was on the entry p-chem exam. Whew! Dodged that bullet. However, of all 5 exams we took, I didn’t pass the statistical mechanics exam. I would have to repeat the exam and pass it by the end of the year. Instead of taking the undergrad p-chem course I decided to risk it and study on my own and as luck would have it, I managed to pass it. Another monkey off my back.

Back to the quantum chemistry course. Initially I was hoping to gain a bit of qualitative insight into the subject. As it turned out, it was really just a high level math class where the prof spent the whole term deriving all of the key equations. I think this is pretty common for this subject. There were zero interesting applications mentioned. He was either unable or unwilling to render any of it into sentences for context. The guy was a rock star in his area of solid state nuclear magnetic resonance. Once I went in for help during office hours and he told me he was busy and to come back in 2 weeks (!). I was finally convinced that putting scientists on a pedestal was a serious error and that a**holes were truly everywhere. Anyway, I made it through the experience and moved on. Haven’t had to think about Hamiltonians since.

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I was chatting with a toxicologist colleague recently about the big derailment and fire disaster in East Palestine, OH. I had suggested that the decision of the responders to vent and burn the remaining vinyl chloride was probably a good idea. There was some fear that there may be a runaway polymerization of the vinyl chloride. This would likely lead to an explosive rupture of the tank car and a possible BLEVE. This is from the report–

“On February 5, responders mitigated the fire, but five derailed DOT-105 specification tank cars (railcars 28–31 and 55) carrying 115,580 gallons of vinyl chloride continued to concern authorities because the temperature inside one tank car was still rising. This increase in temperature suggested that the vinyl chloride was undergoing a polymerization reaction, which could pose an explosion hazard. Responders scheduled a controlled venting of the five vinyl chloride tank cars to release and burn the vinyl chloride, expanded the evacuation zone to a 1-mile by 2- mile area, and dug ditches to contain released vinyl chloride liquid while it vaporized and burned. The controlled venting began about 4:40 p.m. on February 6 and continued for several hours.”

My colleague said that a fire releases aerosols that are likely to be especially deleterious to the lungs. Burning organic chlorides leads to hydrochloric acid formation with all of the joy that it brings to the dance. The smoke plume, elevated by convection, and probably carrying some amount of unburned chemicals will spread with the aerosols far and wide. This would contaminate a larger patch of environment and expose a more distant population than a simple spill at the crash site would. He wondered to what extent the chemicals shouldn’t have been removed at the site, spill or not, and the land be designated as a Brownfield.

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Elon Musk has been running off at the mouth again, this time seeming to take sides with the Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams who was recently given the death penalty of abandonment by his publishers. Adams used his cartoon to go off on the Black population saying that Whites “should get the hell away from Black people” referring to them as a racist hate group.

Set aside the merits/demerits and morality of Adams’ racial views for a minute. As an adult and businessman he should have known the boundaries of acceptable content in his cartoon strips in the current social environment. He published content that appeared to have alignment with white supremacist ideas. In publishing this content, he made himself radioactive and he was dropped by his publishers who happen to have better business sense. What a dunce. He was playing with a loaded gun and it went off in his face.

So, His Excellency, Elon Musk, has stepped into the fray and condemned the excommunication of Adams from the comic strip pages. Musk said that while Adams’ comments weren’t good, there was an element of truth in them. He accused the media of providing a “false narrative” by giving more attention to Black victims of police violence than to White victims of police violence. This is on top of his general loosening on hate speech on Twitter and the reinstatement of banned accounts such as with #45. Musk is broadcasting that hate speech is as valid as any other speech on his platform. Businesses like Twitter are free to edit content or not as they please. Musk believes in a rough-and-tumble environment where most anything goes. As an owner, he is certainly free to do that. But as owner, he is also responsible for content that drives away business.

Irrespective of your beliefs in this matter or the obvious morality issues, it should be apparent that neither Adams or Musk seem to care about the effect on business of draping yourself in the flag of racism, or even just of allowing the perception of it. Savvy is a kind of vector- it has magnitude and direction. Musk has strong vectors in the technology direction, but not so much in the public relations direction. He doesn’t seem to have full control of his mouth just yet.

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The burnin’ ring of fire

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The Norfolk Southern train derailment and fire in East Palestine, OH, has spread into the political dumpster. By not appearing near the crash site promptly, both Biden and Buttigieg are feeling the heat of the GOP panic machine. The single plank on the GOP platform is to knock down Democrats at every opportunity. While the news organs of the GOP are busy trying to blame the Biden administration for the accident, fire and contamination, citizens are expressing dismay over not knowing what to do going forward. They aren’t receiving much advice or direction from EPA about how much they should be worried about contamination and exposure to the released chemicals. In fact, on the ground it has been hard to see the hand of government anywhere. Their frustration is normal and understandable. I would be frustrated too.

Let’s step back a minute and examine the situation from 50,000 ft. The last thing we want in government is for a proper response to an emergency of this scale to require the president to personally lead the emergency response. The same is true for the Secretary of Transportation. Good leaders delegate responsibility to specialists for situations like this. Good leaders are watchful but stay out of the way of the experts. Good leaders make sure that the people on the ground have the resources they need to do their jobs. Ok, Biden didn’t respond publicly to the situation early enough, but that is not to say that things weren’t happening. But, he has 330,000,000 American back-seat drivers to make happy. That’s his job.

Let’s remind ourselves that Biden and NATO are also busy trying to prevent the start of WWIII.

As with an emergency of any scale, it takes responders some time to understand the situation and then to bring resources to bear. In the mean time, the NTSB was promptly dispatched and has already published preliminary report RRD23MR005 on the event. It is very interesting to see that many of the safety systems worked. The overheated wheel was detected and an emergency braking procedure was put into action just before the derailment occurred.

Ok, Biden and Buttigieg could have been quicker to publicly extend sympathy and the promise of relief. Complaining about this is like accusing grandma of not giving you a kiss while she was trying to put out a fire in the kitchen. But contrast this PR error of omission with the antics of #45 in Puerto Rico after the recent hurricane. Remember how he tossed rolls of paper towels as mock support during an interview down there? MAGA people have no leg to stand on with presidential expressions of sympathy.

From Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dose%E2%80%93response_relationship

As far as what kind of toxic threat there is to humans and what potential environmental insult there will be, the situation has not fully played out yet. This will need to be studied for years. There is acute toxicity and there is chronic toxicity. With most chemicals there will be a clear dose-response relationship with chemical dosing if you choose the right experiment to do. However, that relationship can become quite uncertain with low dosing. The health effects of exposures from the East Palestine derailment cannot be measured with high precision over the long haul. Genuine toxic effects are over-printed on a background of natural disease. Diseased tissues do not have little signs that say “I was caused by vinyl chloride dosing”. Histology can characterize cell types and correlate them with known chemical insult, but only a jury can say if any particular conclusion will hold up in court. With toxicity effects, certainty is not always what you get.

Paracelsus said in 1538 that “All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison“. That observation is still true today.

Hazardous Metaphor On Fire in Ohio

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When I think “train wreck” I usually think of #45’s presidency. But here I refer to the actual Feb 3, 2023, Norfolk Southern train wreck in East Palestine, OH. A very long train carrying, among other things, tankers of hazardous chemicals had a derailment and fire near the small town of East Palestine, OH, along the southwest Pennsylvania border. It was a true calamity releasing hazardous chemicals, some of which caught fire and burned for days. It isn’t clear as yet as to what burned and what didn’t. The extent of pollution will eventually be released by authorities and monitored for years to come.

Early reports have claimed that the accident started with an overheated wheel bearing. It would be interesting learn how this could lead to a derailment. The root cause analysis will be interesting.

According to Wikipedia–

NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy explained that the train in this accident would not have been required to utilize the ECP braking system even if the FAST Act was not repealed, because the term high-hazard flammable train means a single train transporting 20 or more tank cars loaded with a Class 3 flammable liquid. As it had only three such placarded train cars, the derailed train did not meet the qualifications of a “high-hazard flammable” train.

ECP stands for Electronically Controlled Pneumatic brakes. The Wikipedia page describes the pathetic political kerfuffle over these brakes and how certain groups fought the requirements for them.

Photo from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Ohio_train_derailment

The Washington Post released a piece, dated Feb 18, 2023, about it showing some interesting pictures. One aerial shot captures the wreckage along with what the cars were carrying. A security camera caught the train moving along with a large fire blazing under one car minutes before entering town. The video has since been removed.

The burning vinyl chloride (and … ?) produced a toxic plume that by some accounts was also corrosive. I assume this to be due to the burning of an organic chloride releasing hydrochloric acid vapors. According to Wikipedia, of the 150 cars in the train some 38 train cars were derailed.

Substances in cars that were derailed according to the Washington Post-

  • Vinyl chloride
  • Polyethylene
  • Dipropylene and propylene alcohol
  • Semolina (a wheat flour)
  • Polyvinyl chloride (PVC)
  • Ethylhexyl acrylate
  • Petroleum lubricating oil
  • Diethylene glycol
  • Isobutylene
  • Butyl acrylate
  • Benzene

Much was made in the news about burning vinyl chloride and noxious fumes, but I haven’t heard an accounting of what actually burned. Any release of acrylate monomers is especially unfortunate since as a group, they can be nasty lachrymators. This will take years to get through the courts.

Nuclear Dictator Putin

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This essay is written for Americans.

Here we are, it’s 2023 and the US has an old opponent run by a strongman dictator with nuclear weapons who is fond of reminding us about his nuclear arsenal. There is nothing like the Central Committee of the USSR that Putin has to contend with. Putin is not only angry with the US about aiding Ukraine, but he clearly wants to punish the US because of our continuing hegemony and a series of historical slights. He very much wants the US to experience suffering on our own territory like Russia did in WWII. Putin has always been unhappy with the collapse of the USSR and with what happened in the country thereafter. Putin’s theory of the world places Russia at the top of the great empires in history. His would be an authoritarian empire.

There has been a lot of knowledgeable commentary on what Putin may have concluded about western countries leading up to the invasion. I’ll defer to my betters in this.

Much propaganda has been issued by Russian state organs over the Putin years heralding the moral corruption and a disintegrating political structure within the US. He sees a US that is an aging empire in decay. Despite his large intelligence apparatus, he overestimated the capacity of his conventional forces and underestimated the resolve of Ukrainians. He apparently guessed that his invasion would be met with an indecisive NATO dithering away and only able to muster small support for Ukraine. His mistakes have proved to the world that the Russians are not 10 feet tall after all.

My feeling is that the US and NATO must be extremely watchful through this period of history. Putin’s government is unlike any adversary we’ve had before. They have already put effort into sowing confusion in US media and continue to try to influence our elections. They are likely to have SLBM submarines lurking off our coasts in readiness. Even worse, there are many within the current US GOP that seem to be willing to support or tolerate authoritarian regimes.

For as much as Putin is making veiled threats of nuclear conflict, he surely knows that if there are nuclear missiles headed for the US, we will not allow our missile fleet to be destroyed sitting in their silos. Only the first nuclear weapon unleashed with be a difficult decision.

The world has much to lose if it allows a man like Putin to invade his neighbors. Such a Russian empire so established will exert its authoritarian influence around the world much like China is attempting to do presently. The democratic nations of the world must work together to keep a world order that encourages free trade, travel, cultural exchange, open communication and a devotion to the betterment of all mankind.

The US has long been practicing liberal democracy. It has been very successful in raising the standard of living for all Americans, very often in ways that are not fully appreciated. So there is no confusion, liberal democracy doesn’t mean “Democrat democracy”. It is a system of representative democracy operating as defined bv the US Constitution with a separation of powers and many checks and balances. The engine of the nation is a market economy with private property and respect for individual and civil rights.

Our democracy and economic engine has given the US and the world a great many benefits in science, engineering, consumer goods, and medicine. The US has had the most productive economic and scientific engines the world has ever seen. We also built and maintained the most powerful military in history based on discipline, rules and strong moral leadership. The US continues to lead the world in the critical area of aerospace.

Our Government-Industrial-University R&D complex has been the envy of the world since after WWII. Scientific and industrial R&D is a powerful combination for sustaining prosperity. It is this that I most worry about when government comes under the current brand of GOP leaders. This is the goose that layed the golden egg.

Turkey is now Türkiye

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What was formerly the Republic of Turkey has now been registered as Türkiye with the United Nations. According to The Guardian, it is pronounced tur-key-YAY. Evidently this is to bring it into harmony with the Turkish pronunciation and spelling as well as to disassociate the name from the ridiculous bird. Can’t blame ’em, really.

Oil Prices Predicted to Rise in 2nd Half of 2023

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A recent report by Reuters says that global oil supply will exceed demand until mid-2023 when a steep rise in demand is expected, exceeding supply. The IEA’s Oil Market Report, January 2023, predicts record high demand for oil at 101.7 million bpd, an increase of 1.9 million bpd. Almost half of the demand growth for oil will result from China relaxing its regulations on COVID. Jet fuel will be the largest source of growth.

According to IEA, while Russian oil exports to the EU decreased, their diesel exports to EU surged-

Russian oil exports fell by 200 kb/d m-o-m in December to 7.8 mb/d, as crude shipments to the EU declined after the EU crude embargo and G7 price cap came into effect. Russian diesel exports surged to a multi-year high of 1.2 mb/d, of which 720 kb/d was destined for the EU.

From 50,000 ft it appears that the embargo of Russian crude oil into western refineries is somewhat offset by increased Russian diesel exports to EU. The EU is competing with increased imports of Russian diesel.

Hydraulic Fracturing Disclosure Mandates Work!

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The Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago has released a study in January, 2023, titled Internalizing Externalities: Disclosure Regulation for Hydraulic Fracturing, Drilling Activity and Water Quality by Pietro Bonetti, Christian Leuz, and Giovanna Michelon. This rather opaque title refers to a study performed to gauge the efficacy of mandating targeted transparency with hydraulic fracturing (HF).

For the study the authors used 4 ions considered signatures of HF-related activity- chloride, bromide, barium and strontium. These ions were considered the likely mode of detection if and when surface waters were affected. They are usually found in high concentration in flowback and produced water from HF wells and are considered signatures.

Some vocabulary-

Environmental externalities– the negative consequences on nature and biodiversity that result from human activity. (Google)

Internalities– An internality at the organizational level (an “organizational internality”) is the product of organizational practice, which part or all of an organization engages in that produces a cost or benefit within the organization, which is not considered when engaging in that practice.

Produced water– Produced water is composed of formation water, hydrocarbons, and fluids introduced during drilling.

Some Key Findings-

  • “Significant improvements were found in water quality based on signature salts after mandates are introduced.”
  • “After disclosure mandates, operators pollute less per unit of production, use fewer toxic chemicals, and cause fewer spills and leaks of HF fluids and wastewater.”
  • They “… show that disclosure enables public pressure and that this pressure facilitates internalization“.

Barium is injected into oil and gas wells in the form of barite (BaSO4) to densify the drilling fluid although ilmenite (FeTiO3) has been used as well.

The barium we can account for as being from the barite in the drilling fluid. But what about the strontium? A USGS article titled “Use of Strontium Isotopes to Detect Produced-Water Contamination in Surface Water and Groundwater in the Williston Basin, Northeastern Montana“

“Produced waters typically have large ionic strengths including large Sr concentrations compared to surface water and shallow groundwater. If the Sr isotopic compositions of produced waters differ substantially from surface water and groundwater, then the Sr ratios could be a valuable and sensitive indicator of small amounts of contamination from produced water.“

The strontium isotopic ratio (87Sr/86Sr) can be an indicator of produced water contamination in surface water.

New Ethane Cracker for Europe

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INEOS in planning to put a new ethane cracker in the ground in Antwerp, Belgium, called Project One. INEOS has reportedly raised 3.5 billion Euros for the construction. The new plant will have a carbon footprint 3 times lower than the average European steam cracker. The process will use so-called “low carbon hydrogen” to power the cracker. A cursory search of Google didn’t produce a clear definition of low carbon hydrogen. Maybe the reader has an idea. The hydrogen literature has gotten quite complicated with the large variety of hydrogen sources and technologies.

An ethane cracker removes one molecule of hydrogen from each molecule of ethane to produce one molecule of ethylene product. Of course, ethylene is the primary monomer for all of the various grades of polyethylene (a polyolefin). This uptick in capacity is likely driven by optimistic projections for increasing demand for polyolefins. Alternatively, it could be in anticipation of retiring capacity.

Other feedstocks like LPG or naphtha can be cracked to produce a different spread of unsaturated and aromatic products. Olefins produced feed into a variety of large-scale manufacturing streams.

In a cracker the ethane is diluted with steam and briefly heated to ca 850 C for a few milliseconds and then quickly quenched. Steam crackers are constructed to capture waste heat from the process to power refrigeration compressors. Production of ethylene is very energy and carbon intensive. According to Wikipedia, for every 1 tonne (1000 kg) of ethylene there are 1 to 1.6 tonnes of carbon dioxide produced, depending on the feedstock. This plant is designed to reduce carbon output.

Steamcracker II at the BASF site in Ludwigshafen/Germany, Wikipedia.

A vote against ‘Karen’

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It’s become popular to refer to women who go on an angry tirade in public as a ‘Karen’ but men have no analogous name. This has always struck me as a bit misogynistic. We should retire this word in our day-to-day name calling. I would offer that a gender neutral slander like ‘jerk’, ‘sh*t head’ or ‘a**hole’ is more appropriate.

Of course, the age-old word ‘bitch’ has always seemed misogynistic as well. I vote we retire this also in favor of the above replacements. Just a thought. For fun, pick your own words for non-sexist slander.

Whoopee!

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Folks have been applauding the appearance of two black quarterbacks facing off in this year’s Super Bowl. I agree, it’s a good thing, finally. But why did it take so long? Is this a trend or just a minor blip in the baseline? Only the Mandarins who control the mighty NFL can know for sure. If it bumps up the bottom line they’ll see to it. It’s not about fair, it’s about margins. Cynical? Ah, yep.

Oh yeah, I managed to go through the whole season without watching even a minute of NFL football. It was grand. I prefer to watch rugby. Unlike NFL football, something is always happening in rugby. If somebody goes down, they just play around the body. Isn’t that kind of savage? Hell yes. If somebody goes down in NFL football, there is a national day of mourning. Pansies.