Investment risk and return under renewable decarbonization of a power market

How does financial performance risk affect investments in low-carbon electricity-generating technologies to achieve climate policy targets? A detailed risk simulation of price formation in the Great Britain wholesale power market is used to show that the increasing replacement of fossil facilities with wind, ceteris paribus, may cause a deterioration of the financial risk–return performance metrics for incremental investments. Low-carbon investments appear to be high risk, low return, and as such may require a progressively higher level of support over time than envisaged by the conventional degression trajectories. The increasing riskiness of the wholesale market will to some extent offset the benefits of lower capital costs and operational efficiencies if investors need to satisfy cautious debt coverage ratios alongside positive expected returns. This increased risk is additional to the well-known ‘merit order effect’ of low-carbon investments progressively depressing wholesale prices and hence their expected investment returns.

Policy relevance

Policy support for renewable technologies such as wind is usually based upon levelized costs and is expected to reduce over time as capital costs and operational efficiencies improve. However, levelized costs do not take full account of the risk aversion that investors may have in practice. Expected policy support reductions may be moderated to some extent by the increased financial performance risk that intermittent technologies bring to the power market. The annual risk-return profiles for incremental investments deteriorate for all technologies as wind replaces fossil fuels. This extra risk premium will need to be incorporated into evaluating policy incentives for new investments in a decarbonizing power market.     

重庆强对流短临业务评分方法

结合重庆本地实际情况,以区/县为单位对强对流中出现的短历时强降水、阵性大风及雷电进行业务质量定量评估.短历时强降水、阵性大风基于加密站观测资料采用分级的方式来评定,对雷电的评定基于ADTD系统观测到地闪资料并判断所在区/县是否有地闪出现.介绍了重庆本地强对流短临业务评分方法及开发的评分软件.从2011年的评分结果看,该评分方法在重庆本地是比较合理的,在业务应用上是可行的.     

A new lunar absolute control point: established by images from the landing camera on Chang'e-3

The establishment of a lunar control network is one of the core tasks in selenodesy, in which defining an absolute control point on the Moon is the most important step. However, up to now, the number of absolute control points has been very sparse. These absolute control points have mainly been lunar laser ranging retroreflectors, whose geographical location can be observed by observations on Earth and also identified in high resolution lunar satellite images. The Chang'e-3(CE-3) probe successfully landed on the Moon, and its geographical location has been monitored by an observing station on Earth. Since its positional accuracy is expected to reach the meter level, the CE-3 landing site can become a new high precision absolute control point. We use a sequence of images taken from the landing camera, as well as satellite images taken by CE-1 and CE-2, to identify the location of the CE-3 lander. With its geographical location known, the CE-3 landing site can be established as a new absolute control point, which will effectively expand the current area of the lunar absolute control network by 22%, and can greatly facilitate future research in the field of lunar surveying and mapping, as well as selenodesy.     

The Villalbeto de la Peña meteorite fall: II. Determination of atmospheric trajectory and orbit

Abstract— The L6 ordinary chondrite Villalbeto de la Peña fall occurred on January 4, 2004, at 16: 46: 45 ± 2 s UTC. The related daylight fireball was witnessed by thousands of people from Spain, Portugal, and southern France, and was also photographed and videotaped from different locations of León and Palencia provinces in Spain. From accurate astrometric calibrations of these records, we have determined the atmospheric trajectory of the meteoroid. The initial fireball velocity, calculated from measurements of 86 video frames, was 16.9 ± 0.4 km/s. The slope of the trajectory was 29.0 ± 0.6° to the horizontal, the recorded velocity during the main fragmentation at a height of 27.9 ± 0.4 km was 14.2 ± 0.2 km/s, and the fireball terminal height was 22.2 ± 0.2 km. The heliocentric orbit of the meteoroid resided in the ecliptic plane (i = 0.0 ± 0.2°), having a perihelion distance of 0.860 ± 0.007 AU and a semimajor axis of 2.3 ± 0.2 AU. Therefore, the meteorite progenitor body came from the Main Belt, like all previous determined meteorite orbits. The Villalbeto de la Peña fireball analysis has provided the ninth known orbit of a meteorite in the solar system.     

Orbital Elements of 2004 Perseid Meteoroids Perturbed by Jupiter

Jupiter and Saturn produce important gravitational impulses on meteoroids released by comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. The meteoroids from this comet once released follow retrograde orbits that during their periodic approaches to these planets (within 1.6 and 0.9 A.U., respectively) are impulsed gaining orbital energy. This perturbation effect is translated into a net inward shift in the node of the perturbed meteoroids. Such geometry with Jupiter occurred in 2004 over a meteoroid trail ejected by this comet during the 1862 A.D. return of the comet to perihelion. In order to study the predicted outburst produced by one-revolution meteoroids, the Spanish Photographic Meteor Network (SPMN) performed an extensive campaign. As a part of this observational effort here are presented 10 accurate meteoroid orbits. We discuss their origin by comparing them with the theoretical orbital elements of the dust trails intercepting the Earth during the 2004 Perseid return.     

我国恐龙空间分异原因初探

本文讨论了中国境内先后出现的恐龙动物在古地理位置、分布范围上的变化特点，提出引起中国恐龙空间分异的主要原因是占地理环境的巨大变迁，同时也与占气候、占植物的变化有密切关系。并进一步指出，中国恐龙绝灭的原因应该是突发的灾变。     

Seismic scattering and shallow structure of the moon in oceanus procellarum

Long, reverberating trains of seismic waves produced by impacts and moonquakes may be interpreted in terms of scattering in a surface layer overlying a non-scattering elastic medium. Model seismic experiments are used to qualitatively demonstrate the correctness of the interpretation. Three types of seismograms are found, near impact, far impact and moonquake. Only near impact and moonquake seismograms contain independent information. Details are given in the paper of the modelling of the scattering processes by the theory of diffusion.Interpretation of moonquake and artificial impact seismograms in two frequency bands from the Apollo 12 site indicates that the scattering layer is 25 km thick, with a Q of 5000. The mean distance between scatterers is approximately 5 km at 25 km depth and approximately 2 km at 14 km depth; the density of scatterers appears to be high near the surface, decreasing with depth. This may indicate that the scatterers are associated with cratering, or are cracks that anneal with depth. Most of the scattered energy is in the form of scattered surface waves.Communication presented at the Lunar Science Institute Conference on Geophysical and Geochemical Exploration of the Moon and Planets, January 10–12, 1973.     

农田生态系统中重金属的积累积循环

本文通过对北京东郊高碑店地区污染农田的调查研究,探讨了重金属在农田生态系统中的积累和循环,计算出重金属在区域环境中的输入输出量,说明本区仍处于重金属积累状态,为防治农田环境污染,提出了停止施用污水处理厂的晾干污泥,减少灌溉污水中的重金属含量等保护性措施。