Michael Rosenthal

(1/2023) In spite of the pandemic, Mother Seton School moved ahead and held its annual science fair. I did not attend the fair personally as I have done in the past, but I requested and received the 2022 Winners List. It is clear that the pandemic did not affect the commitment of the students nor the quality of their work. Congratulations as well go to the mentors and to the judges, named below, who came out and supervised, reviewed, and evaluated the projects.

Here is the list of the 2022 winners. HM indicates Honorable Mention.

Sixth Grade winners are as follows. In 1st place was Giovan Nana: Temperature Effect on Balloon Powered Cars; In 2nd place was Brian Bowers: Liquids that prevent or cause rust; In 3rd place was Philip Field: Effect of peroxide concentration on forming foam; HM is Mackenzie Hagar: Making a Geiger counter.

Seventh Grade winners where: In 1st place was Catalina Caretti: Stain Removers; in 2nd place was Noah Riling: Inclined Plane Physics; in 3rd place was Peyton Myles: Efficiency of Homemade Water Filters; Honorable Mention went to Gabriel Valerio for her project entitled: What type of Coal Burns the Hottest. (Gabriel is my next-door neighbor!)

Eighth Grade Winners where In 1st place where Emma and Sarah Simons: Respiratory Distress Monitor for Asthmatic Horses (invention category); In 2nd place was Olivia Jaeger: Calming Dogs With The Right Frequency of Music; In 3rd place was Aidan Burnette: Testing Glow Fuel vs. Kerosene in Model Jet Engines; Honerable Mention went to Lindjie Ulma and Bernadette Forze for their project entitled: Testing Homemade Root Beer Against A&W.

The judges themselves deserve a lot of credit. In previous years when I attended the Fair, I met some of the judges, and others who served as judges I had met in the Emmitsburg community. This year’s judges where:

Ed Hatter, A NASA scientist and his son Edison Hatter, also a NASA scientist; Bernie Buckley, A retired science teacher; Dillon Fitzgerald, a Mother Seton alum who earned PhDs in engineering and wood strength; Jeffrey Crefton, A U. S. Naval Observatory Scientist who is astronomer/geodesist with a background in astronomy; Ron Albaugh, a retired science professor from Hood College; Bill Little; Lisa Simmons; and Mackenzie Orndorff, a Mother Seton alum and current senior at Catoctin School

I am a retired college chemistry teacher with many years of teaching science: 19 years of teaching first year college chemistry plus advanced courses in chemistry and environmental science at Bard College in New York, part-time Science teaching at McDaniel College and Mt. St. Mary’s University and administering college programs as an academic dean, I have the background and experience to appreciate both the commitment of the mentors and the accomplishments of the students.

As I said in a previous year’s review of this program, I owe much of my success as a science professor to the mentorship of my high school chemistry teacher in Youngstown, Ohio, Mr. Gillespie.

Such an opportunity as the Mother Seton Science Fair opens the door for a potential career in science by giving the student a personal opportunity to conduct research and evaluate the results. My most sincere congratulations go to all the involved in this wonderful project, and my special congratulations go to Danielle Kuykendall, Mother Seton science teacher.

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An ongoing issue with no easy solution is the safest way to produce energy.

California is moving forward with a plan to ban plants that burn gas. Their plan, as recently reported, is to ending the construction of new gas-burning power plants. Such a move would cut the demand for fossil fuels, but place the state at greater risk for power blackouts. California has committed to establishing carbon neutrality by 2045. This plan is the most ambitious plan of its kind in the United States.

If this plan is carried out, planet-warming emissions would fall 85 percent below 1990 levels by 2045. Its interim target is to have emissions fall 40% by 2030. The new plan if carried out successfully would achieve a cut of 48% by the end of the decade. The chair of California’s air board, Liane Randolph, recognizes the challenge of meeting that goal, but reasserts that the only way to counter changing climate is to "break forever our dependence on fossil fuels."

The proposal has the support of California Governor Gavin Newsom, and stated: "it will spur an economic transformation akin to the industrial revolution." Others are worried that it is an overambitious goal. Catherine Garoupa White, executive director of the Central Valley Air Quality Coalition, worries that the plan is overly reliant on technological advances to curb emissions and was not as aggressive as she and others hoped it would be, in particular for its not having an enforcement strategy.

California, probably our most progressive states in energy planning, has been frustrated by a continuing threat of rolling blackouts, especially on hot summer nights, and other situations in which solar farms are not producing enough electricity. Anticipating this possibility, California has added giant battery systems to store the daylight energy produced for nighttime use.

A California plan was approved in June to extend the life of the old natural gas power plants and the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant to shore up the electricity grid. The recent action would allow the use of that plan, but would prevent the construction of any new natural gas plants, even those with modern emission-limiting technology. In addition regulators have instituted a ban on new sales of natural gas heaters, water heaters, and furnaces by 2030.

Now here’s a big one! California has banned the sale of gas-burning automobiles by 2035. These and other upcoming regulations will require approximately 6 million heat pumps by 2030 and 20 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2045.

The transition to cleaner energy production will be gradual. Older gas-burning cars and trucks will keep on going, and some industries, such as cement plants, will take longer to break free of fossil fuel use. The state is pursuing new ways technology to capture and store carbon, allowing some continuation of production of greenhouse gas. This part of the plan is not approved by all.

My son, Dr. Nicolas Rosenthal, is a professor of Native American History at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. I will keep in touch with him regarding the energy use changes in daily life that these plans will produce.

Read other articles by Michael Rosenthal