EU China solar panel trade war looms

It is considering imposing an average "anti-dumping" import tariff of 47%, with a decision expected by 5 June.

The EC argues China unfairly subsidises its solar panel firms, putting Europe's manufacturers at a disadvantage.

But some European solar panel makers are warning that such a move would amount to "dangerous protectionism".

"Protective duties are poisonous for the solar industry", said Udo Mohrstedt, chief executive of IBC Solar, a Germany-based global manufacturer.

"These guarding measures will endanger more than 70,000 jobs in medium-sized companies in Germany alone. The Commission must stop this dangerous protectionism."

Wouter Vermeersch, chief executive of the Belgian company Cleantec Trade, agrees.

"The solar business is very price sensitive", he said in a statement issued by the Alliance for Affordable Solar Energy, where Cleantec is a member.

"Solar companies already had to cope with continuously decreasing feed-in tariffs in the past.

"If prices are artificially increased by punitive tariffs, the European solar market would simply come to a standstill with disastrous effects on green jobs."

Trade dispute

Trade officials from all 27 countries in the European Union are expected to be briefed on the proposals at in meeting on 15 May.

The provisional tariffs would be imposed even though the EC's official investigation is only nine months into its 15-month duration.

The EC can do this if it considers there is clear evidence that companies are being harmed.

If the EC believes China has not altered its trade practices after the full 15-month investigation comes to an end in December, the provisional tariffs could be imposed for five years.

The case, involving over 100 Chinese companies exporting photovoltaic and solar panels worth 21bn euros (£17.8bn; £27.7bn) a year, is the EU's largest ever trade dispute.

The Chinese could appeal against the EU's decision to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg and to the World Trade Organisation

Giant gas platform sinks below waves

It will house a giant compressor claimed to be the world’s biggest offshore machine.

The Statoil equipment has been designed to pump some $30bn worth of gas from a depleted gas field.

It’s a technological leap for Statoil to place the compressor on the sea bed instead of on a typical platform perched above the waves.But environmentalists say as a state-owned enterprise, Statoil should concentrate on saving carbon emissions rather than seeking more hydrocarbons.

This megaproject is a gamble. Statoil say for the same price as a compressor on a platform - $2bn - they can retrieve more gas using 30-50% less energy with a compressor on the sea floor, nearer to the gas deposit.

“We are very excited about this,” Margareth Ovrum, who’s overseeing the project, told me at the construction yard in Egersund near Stavangar.

“This is a really major leap in technology. We are very proud of it and we are confident that it’s going to work.”The underwater giant will be serviced by robots. The trickiest part of the operation will be keeping the electrics dry when the compressor’s plugged in.

If it all succeeds, Statoil engineers dream that one day they may dispense with oil and gas platforms altogether and place entire drilling operations on the sea bed.

This would open the possibility of drilling in ever deeper water, and also possibly in the Arctic where icebergs would pass overhead if the water is deep enough.Environmentalists in Norway are angry that Statoil is trying to retrieve more fossil fuels when experts say we can safely burn just a third of what we have already found.

Truls Gulowsen from Greenpeace, Norway, told BBC News: "It may make commercial logic for Statoil to maximise production from this field, but fossil fuel companies and governments are stuck in the mindset that they have to retrieve every last barrel.“Norway has been a leader in clean technology. The (Norwegian) government should insist that it turns its technology investments to renewable energy systems and doesn’t keep pressing ahead with a strategy that will destroy the climate.”

Statoil is actually a leader in developing carbon capture and storage technology that might allow the world to carry on burning fossil fuels, but the project is a poor relation compared with the prestigious adventure under the waves.

A couple of hours drive north of Stavanger lies the experimental Mongstat technology centre where a consortium of firms led by Statoil is testing two types of carbon capture equipment on two types of exhaust.

The units use amine and ammonia on exhausts from a gas-fired power station and an oil refinery (which has a similar composition to exhaust from a coal-fired power station).Frank Ellingsen, who runs the centre, says it needs much more investment in different types of technology from different companies to bring the costs down.He told me: “We know we can capture 90% of the CO2 (from the exhausts) but it’s far too expensive. If governments really want this technology to work they will have to put policies in place to make it work.”

But there appears little international will to force carbon capture into the mainstream and the technology is years behind schedule.

One of Frank’s colleagues at the technology centre put it in a nutshell: “There’s a clear commercial logic to the underwater compressor,” he told me. “We can make tens of billions of dollars."

“We’re an oil and gas company – of course people are excited by a massive operation like that on the sea bed. Do you see that level of excitement about capturing the CO2 that’s emitted? Of course you don’t.”

New Laser-Based Tool Could Dramatically Improve the Accuracy of Brain Tumor Surgery

A new laser-based technology may make brain tumor surgery much more accurate, allowing surgeons to tell cancer tissue from normal brain at the microscopic level while they are operating, and avoid leaving behind cells that could spawn a new tumor.

In a new paper, featured on the cover of the journal Science Translational Medicine, a team of University of Michigan Medical School and Harvard University researchers describes how the technique allows them to "see" the tiniest areas of tumor cells in brain tissue.

They used this technique to distinguish tumor from healthy tissue in the brains of living mice -- and then showed that the same was possible in tissue removed from a patient with glioblastoma multiforme, one of the most deadly brain tumors.

Now, the team is working to develop the approach, called SRS microscopy, for use during an operation to guide them in removing tissue, and test it in a clinical trial at U-M. The work was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

A need for improvement in tumor removal

On average, patients diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme live only 18 months after diagnosis. Surgery is one of the most effective treatments for such tumors, but less than a quarter of patients' operations achieve the best possible results, according to a study published last fall in the Journal of Neurosurgery.

"Though brain tumor surgery has advanced in many ways, survival for many patients is still poor, in part because surgeons can't be sure that they've removed all tumor tissue before the operation is over," says co-lead author Daniel Orringer, M.D., a lecturer in the U-M Department of Neurosurgery who has worked with the Harvard team since a chance meeting with a team member during his U-M residency.

"We need better tools for visualizing tumor during surgery, and SRS microscopy is highly promising," he continues. "With SRS we can see something that's invisible through conventional surgical microscopy."

The SRS in the technique's name stands for stimulated Raman scattering. Named for C.V. Raman, one of the Indian scientists who co-discovered the effect and shared a 1930 Nobel Prize in physics for it, Raman scattering involves allows researchers to measure the unique chemical signature of materials.

In the SRS technique, they can detect a weak light signal that comes out of a material after it's hit with light from a non-invasive laser. By carefully analyzing the spectrum of colors in the light signal, the researchers can tell a lot about the chemical makeup of the sample.

Over the past 15 years, Sunney Xie, Ph.D., of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University -- the senior author of the new paper -- has advanced the technique for high-speed chemical imaging. By amplifying the weak Raman signal by more than 10,000 times, it is now possible to make multicolor SRS images of living tissue or other materials. The team can even make 30 new images every second -- the rate needed to create videos of the tissue in real time.

Seeing the brain's microscopic architecture

A multidisciplinary team of chemists, neurosurgeons, pathologists and others worked to develop and test the tool. The new paper is the first time SRS microscopy has been used in a living organism to see the "margin" of a tumor -- the boundary area where tumor cells infiltrate among normal cells. That's the hardest area for a surgeon to operate -- especially when a tumor has invaded a region with an important function.

As the images in the paper show, the technique can distinguish brain tumor from normal tissue with remarkable accuracy, by detecting the difference between the signal given off by the dense cellular structure of tumor tissue, and the normal healthy grey and white matter.

The authors suggest that SRS microscopy may be as accurate for detecting tumor as the approach currently used in brain tumor diagnosis -- called H&E staining.

The paper contains data from a test that pitted H&E staining directly against SRS microscopy. Three surgical pathologists, trained in studying brain tissue and spotting tumor cells, had nearly the same level of accuracy no matter which images they studied. But unlike H&E staining, SRS microscopy can be done in real time, and without dyeing, removing or processing the tissue.

Next steps: A smaller laser, a clinical trial

The current SRS microscopy system is not yet small or stable enough to use in an operating room. The team is collaborating with a start-up company formed by members of Xie's group, called Invenio Imaging Inc., which is developing a laser to perform SRS through inexpensive fiber-optic components. The team is also working with AdvancedMEMS Inc. to reduce the size of the probe that makes the images possible.

A validation study, to examine tissue removed from consenting U-M brain tumor patients, may begin as soon as next year.

Biologists Uncover Surprising Connection Between Breast Cancer Cells and Surrounding Tissue

 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Biologist Lee Ligon has found a previously unknown connection between breast cancer tumor cells and the surrounding healthy tissue. The results provide new information on the earliest stages of breast cancer metastasis.

The results were published March 7, 2012, in the journal ,PLoS One. Ligon was joined in the research by Rensselaer doctoral student Maria Apostolopoulou. The research was funded by the American Cancer Society.

The research shows that a specialized type of molecule called Cadherin-23 can be found in and around breast cancer tumors. The molecule, which had never been associated with breast tissue or cancer, helps connect cancerous tumor cells to its neighboring healthy tissue, called the stroma.

"Something happens once cancerous cells enter the stroma and the cancer can very quickly become invasive," Ligon said. "Pathologists studying cancerous tissues have often noted that tumor cells make contact with the cells in the stroma, but they assumed the connections were unimportant."

Ligon and her team sought to uncover exactly what molecules were involved in attaching the tumor cells to the surrounding tissue to determine if those initial points of contact play a role in the progression of cancer through the body.

In the human breast, tumors most often originate in what are known as epithelial tissues. These tissues are made up of a specialized type of cell called epithelial cells. Epithelial cells line the interior of many structures and organs within the human body. In the breast, they line the interior of milk ducts. When epithelial cells start to divide uncontrollably, they eventually break out of the duct and literally spill into the surround tissue or stroma. The stroma is composed of cells called fibroblasts and extracellular material such as collagen fibers. In many cases, the invading cancerous epithelial cells will glom onto nearby fibroblasts in the stroma.

Ligon and Apostolopoulou worked to pick apart how the epithelial cells attached themselves to the fibroblasts. One of the primary tools the body uses to glue cells together is a family of molecules called cadherins. In the human genome there are over 80 different cadherin family members. In most cases, cadherins stick two cells of the same type together. In the case of the breast cancer tumor cells and fibroblasts, two very different cells were sticking together. Ligon sought to determine which cadherins were involved in this odd interaction.

At first, their findings were not surprising. They found cadherins associated with epithelial cells as well as cadherins associated with fibroblasts. It was the discovery of the highly specialized and unusual cadherin, Cadherin-23, that really surprised them, according to Ligon.

"Cadherin-23 has never before been associated with cancer," Ligon said. "In fact, it has previously only been shown in the sophisticated inner workings of the ear and retina."

It is still largely unknown what happens once the cells have made a connection, but the appearance of Cadherin-23 in elevated levels in cancerous tissues suggests that it might play a real role in the earliest stages of metastasis, according to Ligon. Cadherin-23 is a new and potentially very important new component in the progression of cancer for scientists to investigate, she said.

Uncovering Cancer's Inner Workings by Capturing Live Images of Growing Tumors

Scientists seeking new ways to fight cancer often try to understand the subtle, often invisible, changes to DNA, proteins, cells, and tissue that alter the body's normal biology and cause disease. Now, to aid in that fight, a team of researchers has developed a sophisticated new optical imaging tool that enables scientists to look deep within tumors and uncover their inner workings. In experiments that will be described at Frontiers in Optics (FiO), The Optical Society's (OSA) Annual Meeting, Dai Fukumura and his colleagues will present new optical imaging techniques to track the movement of molecules, cells, and fluids within tumors; examine abnormalities in the blood vessel network inside them; and observe how the tumors were affected by treatments.

These techniques, created by Fukumura and his long-term collaborators at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, combine two different high-tech optical imaging methods that were custom-built for the research. One is called multiphoton laser-scanning microscopy (MPLSM), which is an advanced fluorescence imaging technology that is now commercially available at the high end of the microscope market. The other is called optical frequency domain imaging (OFDI), which images tissues by their light scattering properties. According to Fukumura, OFDI is gaining popularity in the optical imaging field but has yet to become commercially available.

"MPLSM overcomes many of the limitations from which conventional microscopy and confocal microscopy suffer, and OFDI provides robust large volume imaging data," Fukumura said.

Fukumura will present their research at FiO 2013, taking place Oct. 6-10 in Orlando, Fla. There, he will describe how his unique technique can image tumors inside and out, and show detailed pictures of live tumors -- images that he and colleagues call "astonishing."

He added that while the new combined approach would be too expensive to be used for routine diagnostic purposes, it promises to help researchers better understand the intricate workings of human cancer and aid in drug discovery to treat cancer. "These optical imaging approaches can provide unprecedented insights in the biology and mechanisms of cancer," he said.

Will Cheap Natural Gas Change US Steel Production?

Cheap natural gas unleashed from previously unreachable shale sources could eventually provide a boost to U.S. steel manufacturers, but the benefits have not shown up in their bottom lines just yet.

A recent Credit Suisse Research Institute report, entitled “The Shale Revolution,” said ongoing development of shale natural gas “is set to unleash significant capital spending” that stands to benefit the steel industry and others in the long term. For one thing, steel piping is a key component in the exploration process, as it can take thousands of feet of pipe to reach underground shale rock formations. In addition, any future rebound in domestic manufacturing that occurs as a result of inexpensive, abundant natural gas could also increase demand for steel. Finally, steel companies could benefit in the long run if cheap natural gas lowers the cost of energy inputs.

“In terms of demand, steel will play an important part in both oil and gas infrastructure, including many specialist applications,” the report said. “On the supply side, steelmakers would benefit from using natural gas in the steel-making process, with potential material cost savings and margin enhancement if they can retain them.”

For now, though, the potential remains largely theoretical. An abundance of domestic shale resources has pushed natural gas prices down, and rig counts have actually been declining since late last year. The U.S. continues to import large amounts of steel, and new capacity is coming online domestically, creating oversupply issues that have kept steel prices weak.

Foreign competitors enjoy large steel inventories and low labor costs, making it likely that steel imports will continue. That is among the reasons industry players are cautious about domestic growth projections.

At the same time, large steel companies have made several significant investments in the United States recently. A $750 million plant built by North Carolina-based Nucor Corp is scheduled to start operating later this year in Louisiana. Austrian steelmaker Voestalpine AG plans to build a roughly $700 million plant to make an intermediate material for steel in Texas, and Vallourec SA’s V&M Star spent $650 million on an Ohio plant to supply tubular steel pipes specifically for oil and gas development.

The industry itself is hopeful about the potential natural gas holds.

“Natural gas is a game changer for our industry,” American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) President and CEO Thomas Gibson told The Financialist in an email. “The industry is developing new options and technologies for the production of steel as a result of natural gas availability.”

The steel industry is vulnerable to unforeseen economic pressures, such as rising energy costs, and some manufacturers have opted to explore alternative production methods, such as using natural gas instead of coal. Either energy source can be used to purify, or remove oxygen, from iron ore – a key ingredient in steel. Coal was the industry go-to method, but that’s changing as natural gas from shale sources becomes a cheaper option than coal.

“As an energy-intensive industry, the domestic steel industry’s international competitiveness depends on our ability to capitalize on the discovery and development of North America’s shale resources,” said Gibson, of the AISI. “Our industry consumes large amounts of natural gas and will benefit from the increased supply resulting from shale production, which keeps gas both reliable and available at a low cost.”

For the time being, the U.S. holds a competitive advantage in producing shale gas. The Boston Consulting Group expects U.S. natural gas to be about 50 to 70 percent cheaper than in other large developed economies such as Japan, China and Europe.

“The ability for Europe and China to get mass quantities over the next few years is unlikely, so the U.S. will have the advantage,” said Hal Sirkin, a senior partner in BCG’s Chicago office. Sirkin said it would take “many years” before other countries were able to mass-produce shale gas.

Sirkin said it is too early to anticipate what will happen with steel industry investments, partly because the prices of iron ore remain volatile. One thing, however, seems certain.

“There’s clearly going to be a reduction in steel production costs,” Sirkin said.

Oil Company Exposure to Egypt and Libya

With protests forcing shutdowns at key oil shipping ports in Libya and violent political upheaval roiling Egypt, Credit Suisse energy analysts assessed which oil and gas companies’ operations are most exposed to conditions in the two North African countries.

The energy companies most exposed in terms of value to Egypt and Libya are Vienna-based OMV, Houston-based Apache Corp., Spanish oil giant Repsol, Italian multinational ENI and British natural gas company BG Group, Credit Suisse integrated oil and gas analysts wrote in a note this week entitled “North African Summer: Egypt, Libya and the Companies.” Of the 13 major energy companies Credit Suisse analyzed, the ones that rely on Egypt for the highest percentage of their total oil and natural gas output are Apache and BG Group, which have an estimated 20 percent and 18 percent of total production in the country, respectively. OMV and Repsol have the highest production exposure to Libya, with operations in the country representing 11 percent and 10 percent of their respective total production.

But just because companies source a great deal of production from Egypt and Libya doesn’t mean that operations in those countries account for an equally large chunk of their income. “While the share of production to the group is high, these countries are somewhat lower profit areas for these corporates,” Credit Suisse’s energy analysts wrote. Libya, for example, has very high tax rates that reduce the cash flow to oil companies with operations there, they noted. The ratio between production and cash flow is not equal in Egypt, either. BG only earned 15 percent of its net income from Egypt last year despite the fact that 20 percent of its natural gas production took place in the country, the analysts noted.

Even in net asset value terms, however, Apache has the most exposure to Egypt, with the country accounting for 17 percent of the total estimated net asset value for this year. OMV has the most exposure to Libya, with its operations there accounting for 22 percent of its total estimated net asset value.So far, the biggest impact of the unrest in the region has been on Libyan oil exports. The OPEC member has the largest proven oil reserves in Africa, estimated at roughly 47 billion barrels, according to the United States Energy Information Administration. Production has fallen by 1 million barrels per day to just 600,000 barrels per day since the end of June, when oil workers began striking. The strike has mainly impacted oil export infrastructure in the eastern part of the country, including the area around the Sirte Basin, which contains 75 percent of Libya’s commercial oil reserves, Credit Suisse commodities analysts wrote in a recent note, “Commodities Advantage: Fundamentals in the Driver’s Seat.”

Egypt is the largest non-OPEC oil producer, producing about 720,000 barrels of oil each year. But the country’s role as an energy transit route is more important than its actual production levels, Credit Suisse energy analysts pointed out, as the government operates both the Suez Canal and the Suez-Mediterranean pipeline. Three million barrels per day of oil – about 2.5 percent of the world’s crude oil trade – and 1.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas moved through these transit points in both directions last year. But even the revolution in 2011 that resulted in the overthrow of former President Hosni Mubarak didn’t do much to disrupt operations, and the current unrest hasn’t either. But Credit Suisse oil company analysts pointed out that turmoil does tend to impact things like getting permits approved and customers paying the bills on time. “It is fair to assume that the current uncertainties may somewhat delay payments to oil companies,” analysts wrote.

But Credit Suisse cautioned that the bigger concern when it comes to Egypt is the prospect of unrest there exacerbating problems in Libya and other neighboring countries. “It is worth mentioning the effect that the current unrest in Egypt may have on neighboring Middle East and North African countries, especially Libya, which has already been seeing disruption to oil production amidst oil sector protests,” analysts wrote. “If the conflict continues in Egypt, the number of people trying to cross into Libya may prove another issue for the Libyan government to deal with.” The bank’s commodity analysts went one step further, saying that Libya’s continued instability and proximity to Egypt “present a large upside risk to oil markets,” meaning that the situation threatens to drive oil prices higher.

Brent crude oil prices had already been heading north for reasons other than the Middle East unrest, Credit Suisse commodity analysts said in a recent note entitled “Fundamentals in the Driver’s Seat.” “After disappointing output from the North Sea and strangely low Urals availability in Europe, cuts in Nigeria and Algerian loading schedules have in the last few weeks been compounded by a sharp deterioration of Libya’s supplies.” How long that particular deterioration lasts – and whether or not it will get worse – remains unclear.