THE NEW MANHATTAN PROJECT – The Pilot Projects
THE NEW MANHATTAN PROJECT
Pilot Projects
1. Nuclear Power Safety – an Energy Planetary Emergency
Richard Garwin, Robert Budnitz and Carmen Difiglio
The safety of the nuclear power complex of the world is a matter for urgent concern, not only because of the potential for harm resulting from severe accidents to nuclear reactors or to facilities involved in the nuclear fuel cycle, but also because of the economic impact of those accidents and of measures taken to avoid them, including, potentially, the abandonment of nuclear power in various countries, or in toto. In the analysis of safety of existing reactors and that of new design concepts, there is much to be done by such a Centre group.
A Nuclear Power Safety Centre is proposed that could be established in two distinct phases. The initial phase would focus on the establishment of a network of experts and contributors. The products of this initial phase would be one or more reports and conferences produced and organized by a “virtual Centre:” a network of nuclear experts. Phase two would put the Nuclear Safety Centre on a more permanent footing with a small Secretariat to manage future projects and related activities, including promoting the safe development of nuclear power within the several countries that intend to develop nuclear power that, to date, have relatively little experience in building, operating or regulating nuclear power.
The Centre would undertake many different projects over the years. For example, promising projects include:
1. safety culture issues of the current and emerging nuclear industry
2. response of selected countries to the problems revealed at Fukushima
Dai-ichi
3. management and final disposition of used nuclear fuel
4. review of estimates of latent cancer deaths from Chernobyl and
Fukushima Dai-ichi
5. safety of selected breeder reactor concepts
6. vulnerabilities of existing and planned nuclear infrastructure to
terrorism or sabotage.
Initial budget – 270’000 Euro for the first year.
2. Safe and Secure Management of Spent Fuel Management – a Pollution Planetary Emergency
Charles McCombie, Richard Garwin and Lornr Everett
In all developing countries, there is a large and growing demand for energy, and specifically for electricity. In developed countries the demand is also growing for affordable and clean electricity. Renewables such as solar, wind, geothermal and hydropower will not be able to satisfy these needs in the foreseeable future. The facts that increased use of nuclear power cannot alone solve the problem, but that it must be part of the solution are also recognized. The severe reactor accident at Fukushima has led to a few nations proposing to phase out nuclear power. However, in the majority of countries, the argument for carbon free energy and the over-riding global need for secure energy sources have together maintained global interest in expanding nuclear power.
A multiple year project at the Centre for Planetary Emergencies will contribute to ensuring that nuclear power is recognized as a sustainable energy source, whose extensive use can enhance global security and safety. A small team based at the Centre would provide invaluable scientific support and advice to those responsible for radioactive waste management in particular in the large number of developing countries that are intent on introducing nuclear power.
Each country should have a structured national strategy for managing such wastes. The Centre can provide advice and training for national experts, using input from developed nuclear nations. Some countries will decide to implement purely national facilities for managing their wastes. Even if they do so, it is a global concern that these facilities are well engineered and operated in a way to minimized hazards. Experience has shown that nuclear accidents of any kind, in any land – even if the direct consequences are localized - can have a global impact on the acceptability of nuclear power, and hence a global impact on the environment. The expertise available at the Centre would help ensure that national facilities are indeed state-of-the-art. The most promising option that remains open for small and new nuclear power programs is to collaborate with similarly positioned countries in efforts to implement shared, multi-national repositories.
Initial budget – 800’000 Euro for the first year.
3. An Alternative Climate Science Proposal – a Climate Planetary Emergency
Christopher Essex, Anastasios Tsonis
There is a misconception that climate research is purely applied and not fundamental. The atmosphere and oceans constitute a complex system. The field of complex systems is relatively new, and it has roots both in physics and mathematics. Many modern fundamental problems of science are known to arise in connection with and from them. The problems range from basic physical and mathematical ones to ones of a computational nature. The goal of accurate climate forecasting using computers to simulate the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans has been a failure so far.
The nature of long-term change, in the decade to century timescale, is the most compelling research problem in the field of climate. This regime is exactly where computer models are all but blind, while data, including proxy data, is lean to non-existent. What part of change on that timescale is intrinsic and what part is extrinsic?
Unproven conventional wisdom is that it is entirely extrinsic (or “forced”) as computed intrinsic change in that regime is easily mistaken for model instability, and simple stochastic models presume structureless white noise on these scales. However what has not been fully explored is a deterministic, dynamical-systems-like approach for this regime, in contrast with model “states. If it exists, is it chaotic, multiperiodic, or thermodynamics-like? If chaotic, can we understand low frequency shifts through chaotic intermittency? Chaotic bursts in that case have been shown to have a predictable spectrum[i]. If it is either of the latter, there is a chance to make concrete multidecadal forecasts with deterministic time series techniques.
Recent work using network analysis suggests that various decadal oscillations are indeed coupled, implying multiperiodic behaviour on the multidecadal timescales. However it will be necessary to disentangle other properties such as red noise persistence, and extrinsic effects such as solar variations and very short time scale Milankovitch effects, not to mention human influences. While some of these have been regarded as small in the meteorologically based picture, which normally works from a heat energy perspective, in a dynamical systems point of view they can contribute in unexpected ways.
In a dynamical systems picture, small changes in external conditions can cause the system to undergo bifurcations, which imply new and different internal dynamics. In this way the division between intrinsic and extrinsic can become blurred. Naturally this makes the problem much harder, but it also implies a leaden and lifeless response on the part of models that cannot be expected to exhibit the correct bifurcation behaviour in a regime where they are encouraged to produce only white noise.
Specifics:
Create an international research team with expertise in all areas described above with the aim of generating best forecasts in the 5 to 50 year timescales, independently of general circulation models. These areas of expertise include, but are not limited to:
1. Bifurcation climate models
2. Persistence time series analysis
3. Sun-Earth interactions/oceans
4. Deterministic time series modelling
5. Complex systems and statistical physics
Initial budget - The initial phase expected duration is 5 years, for a total of one million Euro.
5
[i]
4. Development, Analysis and Evaluation of Cyber Resilience Strategies – an Information Security Planetary Emergency
Axel Lehmann and Henning Wegener
Permanent and rapid innovations of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are a major enabler of globalization. These technologies have dramatically changed our cultures, public and private life. Further advancements are to be expected – like increased spreading of embedded, invisible computing devices, of sensors and actors. Already now, more than 95% of all computing devices are embedded in so-called cyber-physical systems. This trend leads to ubiquitous and pervasive computing and communication everywhere at any time. While information access and communication offer a lot of benefits, new risks and challenges have to be considered influencing everyday public and private safety, security, or performance.
Besides all benefits of technological advancements in the digital age, mastering of unexpected, emergent system behaviour is becoming more and more a critical requirement for our everyday life. Emergent behaviour of ICTs can be caused by a wide range of vulnerabilities: by design errors, system faults or failures, by unintentional or intentional misuse of computing resources, by attacks or accidents like natural disasters. Therefore, to guarantee permanent secure and safe usage of ICTs and of cyber space, a major challenge is the design of efficient algorithms for state space exploration and analysis of those networked systems
Objectives, Tasks and Expected Results of the Proposed Project:
- Development of efficient concepts and algorithms for state space exploration (e.g. by model checking)
- Identification of major sources of ICT vulnerabilities
- Development of efficient mathematical and logical modeling methods (e.g. Markovian models, reasoning methods) and simulation techniques (e.g. data farming) for vulnerability analysis
- Development of generic ICT resilience methods
- Quantitative analyses and evaluation of resilience strategies
Total duration of the Project – 3 years
Total cost of the Project – 300’000 Euro
5. The WFS Genome Project – a Medicine and Infectious Diseases Planetary Emergency
Franco Buonaguro, Bernardini Ghetti and Stefano Parmigiani
The WFS Genome Project is dedicated to all life of industrialized and developing countries. The project aims will be focused on characterization of susceptibility/resistance to infections and to cancer by identification of host genetic determinants along with identification of yet unknown pathogens in human, animals and vegetables. The genome project will contribute also to characterize etio-pathogenetic mechanisms of diseases, spanning from identification of environmental exposure to chemical/infectious agents, which increases human susceptibility, to recognition of specific genes/pathways to be used as target for innovative, personalized and tailored therapies.
As a “first step” of the pilot Genome Project we would focus on the etiopathogenesis of Hepatitis C virus (HCV)-related Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). It would include the analysis of genes whose expression is altered in such disease and identified by the microarray analysis. Genes of a specific pathway would be analysed within this frame. The Analysis would include next generation nucleotide sequencing, characterization of genetic variants (including SNPs), protein analysis, identification of the pathway-related miRNAs. Biological relevance of the identified gene signatures will be analyzed in histological samples as well as in cell culture systems, where siRNAs will be used for in vitro silencing of the samples and expression vectors for upper-regulation models.
That first step will therefore be focused on a group of “driver” genes including TP53, CTNNB1 and the hTERT promoter of HBV- and HCV-related HCC. Gene mutations will be related to different gene expression levels as well as to cancer stage, therapeutic responsivity and prognosis
Total Duration of Project – 5 years
Total Budget – 1.5 million Euro
First step duration – 2 years
First step budget – 400’000 Euro