Hydrogen has long been touted as a potential wonder gas that could play a significant role in our race to net zero. Now, planning permission has been granted for the UK’s largest production hub of its kind, and one of the most advanced in the world. Located in Cheshire, it bills itself as a vital piece of Northwest England’s mission to help manufacturers in the region decarbonise their processes and support UK jobs. We speak to chemical engineer and the plant’s site manager, Richard Holden, and we also catch up with Mark Miodownik, Professor of Materials and Society at University College London, about hydrogen and our future energy economy.
Almost 25 years ago, Dr Marc Lammers stumbled across a mystery. The humpback whale singing he was recording via an underwater microphone near the shore was quieter during the day than at night. But he wasn’t able to answer why. Many years later, a PhD student, Anke Kuegler, joined his research team and took on the task of uncovering what was really going on. Using multiple ways of listening to and tracking the whales, she found out that the singing humpbacks were moving off-shore during the day, and closer to shore at night. Part of the mystery was solved, but it raised an even bigger question: what is driving this behaviour?
Plus, a recent study has shown that terrestrial hermit crabs around the world are using non-organic materials, like plastic bottle caps, as their homes. Professor Marta Szulkin and her team at the University of Warsaw looked through social media photographs and videos (known as iEcology, or Internet Ecology) to find evidence for this new behaviour. Marta has theories about why the crabs are doing this, but it will take many years of research to uncover the long-term effects on hermit crab populations and their evolutionary trajectory. And, resident materials expert, Mark Miodownik, chats to Viv about what we can, and cannot, solve about the global plastic emergency.
Presenter: Victoria Gill Producers: Florian Bohr, Louise Orchard Editor: Martin Smith Production Co-ordinator: Jana Bennett-Holesworth
BBC Inside Science is produced in collaboration with the Open University.
Science and cyber security, Dinosaur babies, Winston Churchill and level crossings
Measuring human impact on earth, Awards for engineers, Sounds of space junk.
Wildlife trafficking, New quantum computers, Ancient bird beaks, Glassblowing.
Crime, volcanoes, ghosts and how we are influenced by the genes of unrelated others
Antarctic science rescue, Killing cancer with viruses, Measuring wind from space and the Last man on the moon
The perils of explaining science, Living to 500, What's good for your teeth and The future of stargazing
RIP Granny the oldest Orca - Graphene + Silly Putty - Moving a Giant Magnet - Space in 2017
Listeners' Questions
Inuits and Denisovans, Sex and woodlice, Peace through particle physics, Caspar the octopus in peril?
Rock traces of life on Mars, Desert fireball network, Gut microbes and Parkinson's Disease, Science Museum's maths exhibition
Alzheimers research, Lucy in the Scanner, Smart bandages, From supernovae to Hollywood
Predator bacteria therapy, New money for UK science, Stick-on stethoscope, Taming fears in the brain scanner
Does Pluto have an ocean, Antarctica's oldest ice, Meat emissions, Swifts fly ten months non-stop
Climate change questions, Animal computer interaction, Sounds and meaning across world's languages
Italy's quakes, Ebola virus, Accidental rocket fuel, China in space
Making mozzies safe with a microbe, CO2 at 400 ppm, Chixculub crater rocks, Why Mars Lander failed
HFC Ban; Human Cell Atlas; Origin of Hunting with Dogs
Life on Mars? Quantum Gravity. The deep origins of bird song
Microbead impact, Remote animal logging, Royal Society book prize, Surgewatch
Proxima b exoplanet, The Hunt for Vulcan, East Antarctic lakes, Deep sea shark hunting
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