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.

The Three Wheel Revolution

Millions of urban dwellers around the world have adopted the scooter as their primary means of negotiating the crowded streets and limited parking of 21st-century cities. Given the scooter’s popularity everywhere from Rome to Bangkok, it may seem like changing to the vehicle’s design would be a fool’s errand. But three-wheeled scooters first designed in 2006 are finally starting to make headway in the North American market after garnering a dedicated following in Europe. While these three-wheelers may look a bit like a lunar module for the urban set, they combine the nimble steering and fuel economy of standard two-wheelers with the balance and stability of an automobile.

In hindsight, adding a third wheel may seem like an obvious way to give riders better balance. But creating a design that provided more stability without sacrificing a scooter’s capacity to tilt and turn was inherently complicated. Piaggio engineers came up with a patented suspension and steering system that does exactly that, allowing drivers to turn as they would in a standard two-wheeled scooter, but with a reduced chance of tilting too far and losing control. A locking system also kicks in when the scooter is at a full stop, so riders don’t have to bring their feet to the ground to stabilize the vehicle.

The market has been getting more crowded since Piaggio launched the three-wheeled MP3. In 2007, Can-Am, the Canadian manufacturer of recreational vehicles, added its own twist to the three-wheel concept with the Spyder, a motorcycle crossover with a front-end, two-wheel Y-axis powered by a 100-horsepower engine. Italian scooter-maker Quadro Vehicles first entered the fray in 2010, but recently introduced an on- and off-road scooter. In May, French automaker Peugeot released the Metropolis, a three-wheeler powered by a 400 cc engine.

These companies are betting on the same trend as Piaggio ­– namely, that three-wheeled scooters will benefit from a growing demand for a safe and fuel-efficient way to commute in congested cities. According to Piaggio, the U.S. scooter market grew by 8 percent in 2012 to 34,000 vehicles. With more brands introducing three-wheelers into the market, The Financialist highlights the new designs that could reshape urban commutes around the world.

Companies join forces to bring VVER to UK

According to Fortum, the trio of companies are to begin preparatory work towards a Generic Design Assessment (GDA) of a VVER-type power plant and site licensing. First commercial contracts have been signed by the parties.

The agreement is supported by a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the nuclear power industry signed in Moscow by UK energy minister Michael Fallon and Rosatom head Sergei Kiriyenko. At the same time, Rolls-Royce signed a contract with Rosatom which will see the UK company undertake engineering and safety assessment work on Rosatom's VVER technology ahead of its potential entry in the GDA process.

The GDA forms part of the approval process for new reactor projects in the UK, and allows regulators to assess the safety, security and environmental implications of new reactor designs, separately from applications to build them at specific sites. The UK's first GDA process began in 2007, when four designs were submitted for initial consideration by UK regulators. Areva's EPR became the first reactor design to complete the GDA process and receive a Design Acceptance Confirmation and Statement of Design Acceptability in December 2012. Earlier this year, a GDA was begun for Hitachi-GE's Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR).

The companies bring together various experiences and expertise. Rosatom's VVER reactors currently operate in 11 countries. Finnish nuclear utility Fortum brings to the table its experience of construction, operation and maintenance of VVERs at the Loviisa plant, which has operated for over 30 years, while Rolls-Royce contributes expertise as a provider of technology and services to the nuclear industry as well as knowledge of the UK licensing regime and its network of suppliers as a leading engineering company. Rosatom has been working closely with Rolls-Royce since the two companies signed a memorandum of understanding in 2011.

Rosatom has long expressed an interest in the potential new build market offered by the UK, where eight sites have been approved as suitable for new build. EDF has already earmarked two of them - Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C - as potential sites for EPRs, while ABWRs are proposed for Horizon's sites at Oldbury and Wylfa.

Fortum executive vice president Matti Ruotsala said that the UK provided a "really interesting opportunity." although the company emphasised that it has not yet made any investment decisions related to UK new build.

Fallon said that he welcomed the agreements signed by the three companies, adding that all reactor technologies adopted in the UK must meet the "stringent and independent" regulatory standards required in the UK and the EU.

Land of the tomb raiders- Bulgaria is trying to claw back tens of thousands of ancient artefacts plundered from its historic sites in a £25m-a-year export racket

Real-life vampires, giant rock vaginas, ancient sites to rival those of Greece and Rome – Bulgaria’s archaeologists are putting their country on the map of world history, but first they have to stop the mafia stealing its treasures.

The illegal diggers come at night with shovels and sacks, hunting through the places where they know the professionals have been. They’re looking for the tonnes of ancient artefacts that lie hidden in Bulgaria’s soil.

In the past two decades, Bulgarian law enforcement agencies say this plunder has turned into a €30m-a-year industry for local gangs, putting it a close third behind drugs and prostitution. The artefacts – gold Roman coins, ancient Greek silver, Thracian military helmets – wind up with falsified documents in auction houses in Europe and North America, or increasingly with wealthy Arab and Asian collectors.

“You cannot put a value on what is lost because the real loss is information,” says Professor Bozhidar Dimitrov, director of the National Museum of History in Sofia, who has spearheaded efforts to reclaim lost relics. “Even if we recover them, we don’t know where they were originally found, so our understanding of the history is gone.”

Police say there are 300 criminal treasure-hunting gangs in Bulgaria at present, but as many as 50,000 people are thought to be involved in illegal digging in some form. Entire villages have been known to take part in some impoverished corners of Bulgaria.

Belatedly waking up to the scale of the problem, Bulgarian authorities are trying to claw back some of their lost history from around the world.

“The record so far belongs to the Canadians,” said Prof Dimitrov. “A couple of years back, they returned 21,000 artefacts in one go.

“The Italians had so much to return that the minister of culture became worried about the cost of the shipment, so he ordered his entire delegation to carry two extra bags of luggage when they came here. He himself showed up at my office with two huge suitcases full of priceless artefacts.”

Prof Dimitrov’s huge office looks more like a Bond villain’s than that of a historian: wood-panelled walls and a long window staring up at the Vitosha mountains. “It was designed to intimidate guests”, he says between chain-smoked cigarettes – the museum was formerly the residence of Communist dictator Todor Zhivkov, who ruled Bulgaria for 35 years up to 1989.

The Communist legacy is part of the reason why only a quarter of Bulgaria’s treasures are thought to have been discovered so far. Trapped behind the Iron Curtain for half a century, Bulgaria had few tourists, which meant minimal investment in archaeology and preservation.

 This was followed by a decade of political confusion and economic crisis after the fall of Communism, when organised crime groups had almost completely free rein.

“In the Nineties, the police could stop only about 10 per cent of the stuff leaving the country,” estimates Prof Dimitrov. “Things have improved a lot. Now they get about 70 to 80 per cent. The police show up all the time with new hordes they have seized from shops in Sofia.”

As if to prove the point, the professor cuts the meeting short to receive the deputy director of the police, who says he has 2,000 artefacts to hand over, discovered in the basement of a local antiques store.

Historical discoveries have been one of the few bright spots for Bulgaria’s beleaguered economy in recent years, helping to convince the authorities of the need to protect their heritage.

Archaeologist Nikolay Ovcharov – nicknamed “Bulgaria’s Indiana Jones” – has just started the final excavations at Perperikon, a 7,000-year-old sacred site deep in the Rhodope mountains whose highlight is a walk-in vagina.First discovered in the 1980s when ethnographers interviewed local villagers, Perperikon was in ancient times as famous as the oracle at Delphi in Greece, a place of wild bacchanalian rituals to the goddess Dionysus, and, according to legend, the birthplace of the Greek prophet Orpheus, which counted Alexander the Great among its visitors.

“It rivals Machu Picchu,” says Prof Ovcharov. “Bulgarian archaeology has enormous potential. It can change the way people think about this country. It can give us national pride as well as bringing in a lot of wealth.”

 One of the most extraordinary aspects of Perperikon is a nearby fertility shrine – a 10-metre vulva carved in the rock, leading into a womb-like cave. Around midday at the right time of year, a phallus-shaped ray of sunlight reaches an altar deep in the cave.

“It felt very unusual standing in a vagina,” says Prof Ovcharov, remembering the moment he first saw the cave in 2002. “It was so unique. It still makes my hair stand on end.”

The big surprise for Bulgaria’s historians has been the global interest in its vampires.

A grave unearthed in the Black Sea resort of Sozopol last year turned up a skeleton with an iron stake through its rib cage. It belonged to a famous 14th-century pirate named Kirov, whose job was to attack the ships of illegal Venetian traders. He was later made governor of the town.

Locals believed the souls of evil men did not ascend to heaven and instead left their graves at night to drink the blood of the living. Although Kirov was given an aristocrat’s burial, locals evidently thought him a nasty piece of work, and snuck in after the funeral to drive a stake through the body in order to keep his soul from escaping. They pulled out his teeth, too, just to be safe.

The discovery reached the press almost by accident. Prof Dimitrov was sneaking a cigarette outside Sozopol’s town hall just after the grave was found and some journalists came up to tease him about his heavy smoking. He only mentioned the vampire to deflect attention.

“Suddenly, it became a huge international sensation,” he says at his office, lighting another cigarette. “Vampires are very common here – we’ve already found more than a hundred – so we hadn’t thought to publicise it. I didn’t know there was a vampire movie with Brad Pitt and that they were so popular. It was featured in over 1,200 publications. That’s more than covered the fall of our Communist dictator.”

The vampire has proved a great pull for tourists, and drawn further attention to the astounding discoveries being made in Sozopol.

In 2010, a marble box containing a tooth and bits of skull were found on an adjacent island which are said to be relics of St John the Baptist. Foreign experts dated them to the first century AD and said the DNA belonged to a Middle Eastern man, making the claims plausible enough to attract coach-loads of pilgrims.

Another site in the town has uncovered the ruins of Roman baths alongside a Greek temple to the God Poseidon and a medieval church – a rare chance to see the evolution of worship in a single spot.This is not so surprising for Bulgaria, a country whose strategic location at the crossroads of Europe and Asia has made it one of the world’s most sought-after territories throughout the ages. Greeks, Romans, Thracians, Byzantines and Ottomans all fought countless wars to gain control of its fertile lands – a bitter irony given the controversial emigration of young Bulgarians over the past two decades.

Not all are happy with the government’s efforts to control the trade in historical artefacts, however. Bulgaria’s small shopkeepers complain about restrictions on selling any pre-twentieth century objects.

“The police can shut me down for having just one old coin,” says Constantine Georgiev, owner of a small bric-a-brac store in Sofia. “But this just means the trade in antiques is controlled by around 10 very rich guys with political connections. No one goes after the big mafia bosses because they can afford the bribes.”

Efforts to increase sentences for illicit smugglers have started to change attitudes towards a crime that was not taken too seriously in the past.

“Many used to see it as a fun adventure,” says Prof Dimitrov. “The men dig while the women do a barbecue. You had police and even priests taking part.”

Indeed, a 41-year-old priest from the northern city of Vratsa was busted in 2010 after conducting over 1,000 illegal sales of ancient coins and jewellery over the internet.

 But despite these efforts, experts say that widespread corruption and the high demand from overseas means Bulgaria’s treasures will continue to disappear into private collections, while authorities face a relentless challenge trying to protect over 40,000 known archaeological sites across the country.

“We lobbied for an amnesty a few years back so that private owners could declare what they had on the condition it was not sold or exported. That was one of the first laws that was overturned when GERB [a right-wing Bulgarian political party] took power in 2009,” says Prof Ovcharov. “Rich collectors are a powerful lobby.”

Strain of HIV virus found in monkeys is cleared by vaccine

A vaccine designed to tackle SIV, the monkey equivalent of HIV, may have successfully cleared the virus from infected animals, paving the way for research into a HIV vaccine for humans. 

It was previously thought that both the human and simian immunodeficiency viruses could be managed with antiretroviral therapies, but not eradicated.

However, a study published in the science journal Nature showed that of 16 monkeys exposed to the virus who were injected with a vaccine, nine appeared to be able to clear their body of the disease.

US researchers from the Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute at Oregon Health and Science University are now hoping to use a similar approach to test for a vaccine equivalent in humans.

The team examined a strain of the virus called SIVmac239, which is up to 100 times more deadly than HIV.

Researchers first inoculated monkeys with the vaccine and then exposed them to SIV. The virus did not spread in over half of the inoculated monkeys, which usually die within two years of being infected.

The vaccine used a modified version of the cytomegalvirus (CMV), which belongs to the herpes family, to sweep through the monkey body and encourage the immune system to fight off SIV.

After being exposed to the virus, some monkey bodies began to respond by searching out and destroying signs of SIV. They remained clear up to three years after first being inoculated.

Prof. Louis Picker told the BBC: “It's always tough to claim eradication - there could always be a cell which we didn't analyse that has the virus in it. But for the most part, with very stringent criteria... there was no virus left in the body of these monkeys.”

However, he said the team were still trying to determine why the vaccine was only successful in nine monkeys.

“It could be the fact that SIV is so pathogenic that this is the best you are ever going to get", he explained.

“There is a battle going on, and half the time the vaccine wins and half the time it doesn't.”

Now, the team want to examine if the same technique could be developed and made safe enough to be successful in humans. Clinical human trials could start within two years if the vaccine is approved and the team receive permission from regulatory bodies, Prof Picker added.

Double nuclear by 2040 says Exxon

Exxon Mobil's 2013 Outlook for Energy bases its findings on data from 100 countries across the globe, looking at 15 demand centres and 20 fuel types. It also takes into consideration the technology and policy issues underpinning the world's energy situation, Exxon Mobil technology advisor David Khemakhem explained to delegates at the World Nuclear Association's Annual Symposium. Latest figures indicate that, with world population anticipated to be close to 9 billion by 2040, energy demand will continue to increase. Electricity demand will drive that growth.

Exxon's figures suggest that world nuclear capacity could be set to double to help meet that demand, as the cheapest form of low-CO2 electricity generation: other options such as onshore wind and solar photovoltaics have significant knock-on grid costs, Khemakhem remarked.

Exxon Mobil's figures spurred a lively and wide-ranging debate amongst Khemakhem's fellow speakers in a panel discussion on energy and nuclear power. Ron Cameron, head of nuclear development at the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA), led a call for greater transparency over prices across the energy sector. Growth in renewables of the scale seen in recent years had been made possible through subsidies, but the way subsidies had been handled in some countries had been an "economic disaster", he said. Consumers were effectively being asked to pay for the transition into renewables, he said, pleading for the hidden costs of renewables to be made clear, with no disconnect between wholesale cost of electricity and the price. "Affordability is an issue," he remarked.

Nuclear should be seen as complementary to rather than in competition with renewables, the panellists felt. Nuclear could play a vital role in providing affordable baseload power to support the intermittent nature of many renewables, in the absence of a truly effective and affordable means of storing electricity. Energy policy, climate change, and carbon trading expert Bryony Worthington, representing The Weinberg Foundation, urged the nuclear industry not to waste any energy "talking down" renewables, and pointed to the emergence of new third-party advocates opening up the nuclear debate to new audiences.

Also on the panel, moderated by MZ Consulting president Milton Caplan, were Areva UK CEO Robert Davies, UX Consulting Company senior vice president Jonathan Hinze and energy strategist John Licata. All joined in enthusiastically in a lively discussion on the shape the nuclear generation sector may take in the coming decades, from large-capacity reactors to the role of smaller reactors such as SMRs and the need for energy security, with Licata drawing on his own experience and analysis of the effects of "superstorm Sandy", which left large areas of the eastern USA without power in October 2012.

Osborne on EDF nuclear charm offensive

The Chancellor George Osborne has personally written to the board of French energy giant EDF to express his commitment to the UK’s nuclear programme.The letter was in part intended to further negotiations with EDF over the proposed £14bn nuclear plant at Hinkley Point in Somerset.

The Sunday Telegraph understands that the purpose of the letter was to tell the company, led by chairman Henri Proglio, that the proposed Hinkley Point C reactor would be eligible for £10bn of financing guarantees.

The Chancellor’s intervention is said to have been well received by EDF, which had previously been frustrated by what it felt was an unreasonably tough negotiating stance adopted by the Treasury.

The guarantees scheme is key to the future of the project, and will see the Government act as guarantor if EDF were unable to repay its loans, thereby helping reduce risk for creditors, making them more willing to lend money to the project.

EDF remains locked in talks about the so-called “strike price” for electricity that the plant will generate, which will be guaranteed for more than 30 years.Whitehall is thought to be awaiting the next move from EDF. Both sides have described talks as “positive” but an agreement is understood to still be several weeks away. However confirmation of the strike price will not be enough to complete the deal. EDF will also need to attract partners to take up to a 49pc stake in the project.

Energy minister Michael Fallon held talks last month with China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group, which has long been seen as a likely partner for EDF.

Ministers hope that China Guangdong will not only come in as a minority partner for the project but may also in future lead the construction of further UK reactors itself.

New study finds health kick can reverse the ageing process

The results of a study conducted by the University of California suggest that going on a health kick could reverse cell ageing, according to researchers.

The small pilot study, conducted by a team from the Preventative Medicine Research Institute, examined how telomere shortness in human beings acts as a "prognostic marker of ageing, disease and premature morbidity" .

Just as shoelace tips stop fraying, telomeres keep chromosomes stable and prevent mix-ups when cells divide.

But each time a cell divides, its telomeres shorten. In the end they can no longer ensure chromosomal stability and this is when genetic mistakes begin to occur.

Eventually the cell freezes and stops dividing, or destroys itself.

The speed at which telomeres shorten varies in individuals and biological ageing is faster in people who already have rapidly-shortening telomeres.

Short telomere length in white blood cells is especially associated with age-related diseases, including many types of cancer.

But the results of this study showed positive changes to diet and lifestyle encouraged longer telomeres.

Researchers followed 35 men who had suffered low-risk prostate cancer and had chosen to undergo active surveillance.

Twenty-five male participants placed in the "intervention group" underwent a series of lifestyle changes to their diet, activity, stress management, and social support such as counselling. Ten men in the control group did not undertake any life style changes and continued to live as they normally would.  

Blood samples were taken for analysis from both groups five years later.

Men in the intervention group who had switched to a strict vegetarian lifestyle, exercised and practiced yoga showed considerably genetically younger cells. Instead of the length of their telomeres shortening, they increased by ten per cent.

In contrast, the telomeres of men in the control group had shortened in length by 3 per cent.

It has been suggested as a trigger mechanism for the genetic scrambling associated with prostate cancer. Men with short telomeres in prostate cancer-associated cells are much more likely to die from the disease.

Professor Dean Ornish, from the Preventive Medicine Research Institute at the University of California in San Francisco, US, who led the team, said: “The implications of this relatively small pilot study may go beyond men with prostate cancer.

“If validated by large-scale randomised controlled trials, these comprehensive lifestyle changes may significantly reduce the risk of a wide variety of diseases and premature mortality.

“Our genes, and our telomeres, are a predisposition, but they are not necessarily our fate.”

“Our bodies often have a remarkable capacity to begin healing themselves, and much more quickly than we did once realize, if we simply make the lifestyle changes that are really the primary determinants of our health and well-being,” he said.

"It's not the fountain of youth, but it certainly is a step in the right direction. Until now we thought that only telomeres could get shorter. Now we found that they actually can get longer."

Results were published in the Lancet Oncology Journal on Monday. However, some experts are arguing that as the group were only monitored for a five year period, it was too soon to draw definite conclusions from the results.

Biochemist Dr Lynne Cox, from Oxford University, said: "This new study suggests that reducing stress, improving diet and increasing exercise have the effect of not only preventing telomere loss but also of leading to small but significant increases in telomere length, as measured in circulating white blood cells.

"It is perhaps too soon to judge whether this increase in telomere length will correlate with increased longevity or healthspan.

"There are two things to bear in mind here. Firstly, short telomeres that occur as result of chronic stress are highly associated with poor health, and studies in mice have shown improved tissue health when telomeres are restored experimentally. Secondly, by contrast, globally increasing telomere length in cancer-prone mice actually predisposes to more aggressive cancers.

"The small increases in telomere length in this new human study are more likely to correlate with improved health than cancer risk, though it is too early to be definite."

The studies authors also concluded that: "Larger randomised controlled trials are warranted" to confirm their findings. 

Exchange trip for nuclear industry heads

American chief nuclear officers have completed a week-long technical visit to Japan, learning from their counterparts' experiences of the Fukushima accident and recovery.

The trip to Japan was coordinated by the US Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (INPO) and its counterpart the Japan Nuclear Safety Institute (JANSI). Both bodies provide a forum for operators of nuclear power plants to share experience and learn from each other.

Some 24 chief nuclear officers (CNOs) from US power companies took part. With responsibility for nuclear safety, these board-level experts in nuclear operation have a leading role in ensuring the proper technical and cultural conditions are in place for safe operation. In total the group spent over ten hours touring the Fukushima Daiichi plant, the site of the accident two years ago. They also visited Fukushima Daini, which experienced an emergency but was able to avoid an accident, while a sub-group was able to visit the Kashiwazaki Kariwa power plant and see repairs after a 2007 earthquake as well as post-Fukushima improvements to tsunami defence and emergency response.The group heard from Japanese workers such as Takeyugi Inagaki, who was working in the control room of Fukushima Daiichi 1 and later in the plant's emergency response centre during the first 100 hours of the crisis. He and his colleagues remained at the plant site for long periods, unaware of the status of their families or homes and this caused the US delegation to consider the establishment of a protocol to communicate this important family information to US workers in a similar situation. Existing protocols, for example during hurricanes, are not immediately transferable due to the ability to forecast and plan for the event. The families of some Fukushima workers have also suffered harassment and bullying from embittered former neighbours.

On their first day in Japan the CNOs visited Tomioka on the coast about nine kilometres south of Fukushima Daiichi. The evacuated town now experiences annual radiation dose rates of 8-26 milliSieverts per year, compared to previous background levels of about 2 milliSieverts per year. The elevated doses are not high enough to be connected to any effect on people's health, but government rules allow people only to return during daylight hours to maintain their property and not to return on a permanent basis until after a clean-up operation that could take another four years.

John Keeley of trade group the Nuclear Energy Institute was travelling with the CNOs and blogging the groups experiences. He called the town a "sobering wreck of abandonment" and noted that the executives "wanted to see with their own eyes the ultimate consequences of a day gone very wrong at the plant." The NEI's own CNO, Tony Petrangelo, said, "Seeing the devastation in person provides a greater understanding of the significance of the event and its effects on people in the area."

The visit was the idea of Randy Edington, the CNO of Arizona Public Service's Pale Verde nuclear power plant. He said: "We came here to learn, to put eyes on the problem, to learn from each other and increase unity in the US but also to learn and share with our counterparts, the CNOs of Japan."

"The actions that we perform every single day at our plant can have US-wide or even worldwide consequences. I can't say enough about the importance of what we do, how important electricity is to all of our economies, to all our people. As we continue to learn and move forward in this industry, I'd like to re-emphasise our theme, which is: knowledge is fundamental; share it."

International links for African nuclear

African nuclear safety regulators are to step up their cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency as the continent makes increasing use of nuclear energy.

Only one nuclear power plant operates in Africa, at Koeberg in South Africa, but there are eight research reactors across the continent and major uranium mining operations. Radioactive sources are increasingly used for science, agriculture, industry, water management and healthcare.

A group counting 30 national authorities has been assembled by the African Union. Called the Forum of Nuclear Regulatory Bodies in Africa (FNRBA), it has the goal of enabling those countries to improve nuclear regulation, by dealing with outdated practices, gaps in legislation, gaps in compliance and ensuring adequate regulatory independence.

Yesterday at the IAEA General Conference in Vienna the FNRBA signed practical arrangements with the IAEA to step up their cooperation. Both the organisations agreed to "support efforts to enhance and strengthen radiation protection, nuclear safety and security, and regulatory infrastructure... and to harmonize best practices." They will "support capacity building and promotion of knowledge management... as a key to stimulating human resource development and knowledge transfer."The FNRBA is one result of the 1996 Pelidaba Treaty, in which African nations vowed to forego nuclear weapons, but affirmed their determination to "promote regional cooperation for the development and practical application of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes in the interest of sustainable social and economic development."

Speaking late last year at the second conference of the treaty, FNRBA chair Augustin Simo noted "an increased will and political commitment by the African countries to advance the application of nuclear technology for power generation." Leading the continent is South Africa, which already operates two nuclear power reactors and is planning to vastly increase its capacity by up to 9600 MWe by 2030. Its National Nuclear Regulator has a leading role in the FNRBA. Africa's most populous country, Nigeria, is seen as making real progress towards the introduction of nuclear power, having started up its first research reactor at Ahmadu Bello University in 2004.

States that began to develop nuclear plans but have put these on the back-burner include Egypt, Syria, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Libya. Other African nations with rapidly growing power demand and a declared interest in nuclear energy include Kenya, Senegal, Ghana, Sudan and Yemen.

Thorium put to the test as policymakers rethink nuclear

Two years after the Fukushima disaster rocked the nuclear industry, the jury is still out in many countries on the role of atomic fuels.

Just two of Japan's 54 commercial nuclear plants are currently operational, while Germany has abandoned nuclear altogether. The price of uranium has also plummeted, making it unviable to get new mines off the ground.

But in the background, scientists are working on a cleaner, cheaper and safer alternative to uranium. It's even named after a god.

Thorium is more common in the Earth's crust than tin, mercury and silver - and three times more abundant that uranium. In fact, thorium, which is named after Thor, the Norse god of thunder, is so energy-dense that an individual can hold a lifetime's supply of electricity in the palm of their hand.

Around 14pc of the world's electricity is currently generated using nuclear power; in France, the figure is closer to 75pc. But with uncertainty over uranium prices, emissions targets to be met and a need to address post-Fukushima safety concerns, policymakers and the industry have been forced to think again.

There is also the issue of nuclear proliferation. In a traditional light-water reactor, plutonium-239 - a radioactive isotope that can be used to make weapons - is generated as a by-product of uranium-235/238 nuclear reactions. However, using thorium instead of uranium to kick-start nuclear fission produces less long-lived waste such as plutonium, reducing the security issues associated with nuclear plants.

Thorium is not a new discovery, and Britain led the way in the late 1960s and early 70s with tests in the Dragon Reactor in Winfrith, Dorset.

Thorium has huge energy potential but is in technical terms fertile, not fissile, meaning that it needs to be converted into uranium-233, another variant of the element, before it can be used to generate electricity. However, a lack of the vital spare neutrons needed to start this reaction, along with other difficulties, meant thorium was cast aside as a practical nuclear fuel, and instead uranium became the staple diet of reactors.

Today, it is just a by-product of rare earth mining. 3,200 tonnes of it are currently buried in the Nevada desert.

But countries are now waking up to the benefits of thorium, and it is once again being put to the test in Halden, a small Norwegian town with a population of less than 30,000. Thor Energy, with the help of Britain, the US and Germany, is testing thorium for commercial use. The company loaded its first fuel rods into a test reactor in April as part of a five year radiation programme designed to show the rest of the world what the company already knows: thorium is versatile, safe, and more efficient than uranium.

"The thermal conductivity of thorium based pellets is known to be much better to be much better than uranium, says chief executive Øystein Asphjell. "We are now proving that it is this way."

Mr Asphjell believes in what he calls an "evolutionary" approach to thorium - using the material in existing light water reactors to generate electricity.

Together with the UK's National Nuclear Labroratory, it is developing a variety of thorium fuel pellets, some designed to destroy old nuclear waste, others blending uranium and thorium to make a more stable fuel. "Thorium addresses a lot of the accident fallout from uranium because it has a much higher melting point, it cannot be dissolved in water, and there's multiple safety parameters that are inherant in the material properties," says Mr Asphjell.

Politicians are also listening. Michael Fallon, minister for business and enterprise, met with the All-Parliamentary group on Thorium Energy for the first time last month to discuss its benefits.

Kevin Hesketh, senior research fellow at the NNL, says that after years of neglect, the Government is now taking nuclear research more seriously, and believes that a thorium fuel cycle could be established in the UK within 20 years.

"We're discussing things with [the Government] routinely now. At one point we weren't getting any interest in nuclear research.

"They recognise that if you want to achieve an 80pc reduction in carbon emissions by 2050, it's going to require some pretty drastic changes."

Thorium "revolutionists" argue that the benefits could be even greater if it is used in molten salt reactors, which can act as eco-cleaners to burn up old toxic waste. Radioactive fission products can also be re-added to the reactor for successive rounds of power generation, making energy generation cheaper.

Some even argue that these reactors could have prevented the hydrogen explosions seen in Japan. In the event of power-loss, a plug in the base of the reactor melts and the salts flow into a containment vessel to cool down, stopping the reaction and any radiation release.

But in an industry where it costs billions - rather than millions - of pounds to conduct research, Mr Hesketh says Britain is likely to be a follower rather than a leader when it comes to thorium.

China launched a $350m (£223m) thorium-fuelled molten salt reactor Research and Development (R&D) programme in 2011, and plans to build commercially viable plants in the 2030s, while India, which has around 16pc of the world's thorium reserves, hopes to build four new fast breeder reactors by 2020.

Despite all the excitement, safety concerns mean nuclear developments continue to move at a glacial pace. Research takes years, if not decades, and the word "nuclear" still stirs up strong emotions. Earlier this month, politicians exchanged punches in Taiwan's parliament after a debate on the completion of its fourth nuclear power plant escalated.

But for countries such as Japan, an energy solution needs to be found, and quickly. Trade figures this week showed its reliance on LNG and petroleum post-Fukushima meant its trade deficit doubled to more than ¥1 trillion (£6.7bn) in July.

Takashi Kamei is president of Kyoto Neutronics, which is developing an accelerated neutron source to prepare thorium for use in a reactor.

The month after Fukushima, Mr Kamei was rushed into Japan's economy ministry to explain the benefits of molten salt reactors and how it could address Japan's energy needs. With prime minister Shinzo Abe's pledge this month to "take effective measures to tackle the problem" of Japan's nuclear clean-up, the government is more involved in the energy debate than ever.

"I think they have already reported my vision to Mr Abe," says Mr Kamei, though he recognises that the subject remains delicate in a country that is still reeling from the 2011 disaster. "If the prime minister says that Japan is developing molten salt reactors, and that this is quite safe – this implies that existing commercial plants are dangerous."

Mr Asphjell agrees. "This industry is so policy and public opinion driven that by saying we need to introduce thorium, you're by default saying there's something wrong with uranium.

"The existing industry does not want to get the message out there that there is something wrong with uranium. If you go 15 to 20 years back with the gasoline car industry versus electric cars - they didn't want to say that there was something better because they might break the market for the existing product."

Thorium's biggest enemy is often its own supporters, Mr Asphjell adds. "There have been a lot of loud voices in the UK that have taken a very evangelistic perpective on thorium - that it's a green fuel that solves every issue, it's employable tomorrow, there's no waste and absolutely no risk. This evangelistic view is diluting the proper message of thorium in many ways [and] from our perspective is the biggest obstacle for thorium introduction."

Mr Hesketh also sees the value in Britain doing more thorium research, but admits that only "market forces" will drive this forward. "Right now the support you need to get to the summit isn't there," he says."You haven't got the certainty of financial support to know that you're going to get to the summit, that would need to come at a later stage. But if you get yourself to base camp [by conducting research], you're in a much better position later."

For now, the world must look east for thorium developments, though Mr Asphjell is confident that slow and steady wins the race, despite the enormity of the task. "This is an elephant we're trying to eat," he insists. "We have to chew one piece at a time."

The good news- Earth can support life for 1.75 billion years. The bad news- Climate change could wipe us out long before that

The end of the world is coming – but not for a while yet. That’s according to a new study indicating that we have 1.75 billion years left until Mother Earth gives up the ghost.

Researchers from the University of East Anglia’s School of Environmental Sciences analysed other planets outside our galaxy in an attempt to work out how long it will be before our planet becomes uninhabitable.

The study, published today in the journal Astrobiology, examined seven planets, including Earth, to determine how their “habitable zones” will change as their stars get hotter and brighter over time.

The key factors in determining a planet’s habitability are whether it is the correct distance from its star to have liquid surface water and a temperature less than 50C.

“Within around 1.75 billion years conditions for human life will become impossible as the sun grows in size, temperatures soar and the world’s oceans evaporate,” Andrew Rushby, who led the study, told The Independent.

The research didn’t specifically account for man-made climate change or the “possibility that we’ll all be wiped out by an asteroid or a nuclear war”, he said. Climate change may well decimate humanity before the concept of habitable zones become relevant.

“Of course, conditions for humans and other complex life will become impossible much sooner – and this is being accelerated by anthropogenic climate change,” he said.

“Humans would be in trouble with even a small increase in temperature, and near the end only microbes in niche environments would be able to endure the heat.”

Even if some humans did manage to survive for another 1.75 billion years, the end would not come instantly.

“Even if you were alive at 99.9 per cent of the way through our habitable zone, you still wouldn’t have to worry about it,” Mr Rushby said. ”Life isn’t going to be extinguished at the flick of a switch.”

Instead, as the sun gets older, it will get hotter and temperatures on Earth will soar over the course of “perhaps one million years” as we enter a “hot zone” and seas evaporate, leaving the planet lifeless except for some forms of microscopic life.

“The optimist in me hopes we’ll still be around to see this,” said Mr Rushby. “Or that we’ll have migrated to Mars or developed the technology to spread out across the galaxy. But that’s getting into the realms of science fiction.”

The study has also allowed Mr Rushby and his team to make predictions about what stage life might be at in other parts of the galaxy: “There’s no point in studying a planet for signs of life if it’s only been habitable for a million years. That sounds like a long time, but in terms of geology and biology it isn’t. The most interesting planets in the search for alien life are ones that have been habitable for billions of years.

“Anatomically modern humans have only been around for the last 200,000 years – so you can see it takes a really long time for intelligent life to develop.

“Of course, much of evolution is down to luck, so this isn’t concrete, but we know that complex, intelligent species like humans could not emerge after only a few million years because it took us 75 per cent of the entire habitable lifetime of this planet to evolve.

”We think it will probably be a similar story elsewhere.”

In particular, the report points to the examples of Kepler-22b and Gliese-581d which have been habitable  for up to 6 and 54.7 billion years respectively.

“As it stands, we don’t have the technology to explore these planets to discover if there is alien life, but I’d certainly mention Kepler-22b and Gliese-581d as planets that we should keep an eye over the next two or three hundreds years of human existence as our technology develops,” said Mr Rushby.

Robert Fisk in Damascus- In Syria's capital, Assad's troops may be winning this war untouched by Obama's threats

Dispatch from Damascus- The killing fields remain, and truth is as rare as hope And so the war goes on. Missile alerts may be over but the killing fields remain, untouched byObama’s pale threats or Sergei Lavrov’s earnestness. The Syrian army fights on in the rubble and the shells fly over Damascus and the road from Lebanon is still littered with checkpoints. Only when you reach the city do you notice how many people have now built iron guard doors before their homes and iron gates on car parks. The claim that 40-50,000 rebels surround the capital is probably untrue but there are up to 80,000 security men and soldiers inside Damascus and, on this battlefront, they may well be winning.

It’s a campaign that started long before the use of sarin gas on 21 August and continued long afterwards. But on that fateful night, the Syrian army did mount one of its fiercest bombardments of rebel areas. In 12 separate attacks, it tried to put special forces men inside the insurgent enclaves, backed up by artillery fire. These included the suburbs of Harasta, and Arbin.

I was chatting yesterday to an old Syrian friend, a journalist who used to be in the country’s special forces and he – quite by chance – said he was embedded with Syrian government troops on the night of 21 August. These were men of the Fourth Division – in which the President’s brother Maher commands a brigade – and my friend was in the suburb of Moadamiyeh – the site of one of the chemical attacks. He recalls the tremendous artillery bombardment but saw no evidence of gas being used. This was one of the areas from which the army was attempting to insert bridgeheads into rebel territory. What he does remember is the concern of government troops when they saw the first images of gas victims on television – fearing that they themselves would have to fight amid the poisonous fumes.

Frontline Syrian forces do carry gas masks but none was seen wearing any. “The problem,” my friend said, “is that after Libya there are so many Russian weapons and artillery pieces smuggled into Syria that you don’t know what anybody’s got any more. The Libyans can’t produce enough of their oil but they sure can export all Gaddafi’s equipment.” But that doesn’t necessarily include sarin gas. Nor does it let the Syrian government off the hook. The protocols on the use of gas and missiles are said to be very strict in Syria so, of course, we come back to the old question: who ordered those missiles fired during the awful night of 21 August?
Some questions are familiar. Why use gas when so much more lethal weaponry is being flung at rebel forces across the country? If the government wanted to use gas, why not employ it north of Aleppo where not a single government soldier or official exists? Why in Damascus? And why wasn’t gas used on this scale in the previous two years? And why employ such a dreadful weapon when the end result is that Syria – by giving up its stocks of chemical weapons – has effectively lost one of its strategic defences against an Israeli invasion? No wonder, another Syrian friend of mine remarked last night, that the Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem had such a long and shocked face when he made his Moscow announcement. Wasn’t Israel the real winner in all this?Most probably Israel is also the winner inSyria’s civil war, as its once great neighbour is smashed and pulverised by a conflict which may continue for another two years. Syria was never a wealthy nation, but rebuilding its smashed cities and railways and roads is going to take many years. Rumours in Damascus are thicker than the smoke which envelops part of the city. Among the latest is an allegedly secret Western demand that a new Syrian government be formed of 30 ministers – 10 of them regime figures and at least 10 others independents – and that there must be a total restructuring of the army and security services. Since the West no longer has the means of enforcing such ambitious plans, all this sounds unlikely. Unless the Russians are also supporting the idea.North of Damascus, the Jabhat al-Nusra forces are now way back from the ancient, partly Christian town of Maaloula which was recaptured by the Syrian Third Armoured Division. But this poses another question. Why on earth did the Nusra fighters take Maaloula if they had no intention of holding it? Did they think that the Syrian regime would be so distracted by the thought of an American attack that it would lack the will to drive them out? Sadly both sides have ceased to care about the weapons they use or the immorality of using them. When an Islamist fighter can film himself eating the flesh of a dead soldier, all scruples have gone.

And here is one final thought. Not long ago, rebels in Damascus murdered a woman in Harasta. One of her sons is now serving in the Syrian army. He has never touched or fired gas in his life. But as a member of his family said to me, “if he was ordered to, he would not have the slightest hesitation. He would love to revenge himself on those who killed his beloved mother.”