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Argonne National Laboratory

South Dakota

Argonne Impacts State by State

Argonne’s collaborations in South Dakota and across the United States have led to groundbreaking discoveries and development of new technologies that help meet the nation’s needs for sustainable energy, economic prosperity, and security.

Argonne, South Dakota scientists collaborate on neutrino research at Fermilab

Argonne engineer Bill Jansma works on a cryomodule that helps provide protons that will generate neutrinos for the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE). (Image by Argonne National Laboratory.)

The study of neutral subatomic particles called neutrinos promises to reveal many secrets of fundamental physics. Scientists at the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Batavia, Illinois) are working to understand neutrinos’ role in the universe. Sited at Fermilab but featuring international collaboration, DUNE is the world’s largest neutrino experiment.

Using intense neutrino beams, four massive DUNE far detectors will be assembled deep below the South Dakota soil. Working with researchers in South Dakota, the DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory provided critical support for the successful construction and operation of DUNE’s far detector prototype residing at CERN in Switzerland. Argonne also has supplied the first eight of 116 superconducting cavities, grouped in a single cryomodule, that will be used to accelerate hydrogen ions to create a stream of neutrinos for Fermilab’s accelerator.

South Dakota collaborators include Dakota State University (Madison), South Dakota Mines (Rapid City), the South Dakota Science and Technology Authority (Lead), South Dakota State University (Brookings) and the University of South Dakota (Vermillion).

Argonne research enables South Dakota farmers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

Farmers who switch to sustainable methods might help lower greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new Argonne-led study. (Image by Smileus/Shutterstock.)

Grain farmers in South Dakota could reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by adopting sustainable farming methods, according to pivotal research by Argonne scientists.

Focusing on states in America’s Corn Belt, scientists quantified how the carbon intensity (CI) of corn feedstock is reduced when farmers adopt novel technologies. Using Argonne’s GREET life cycle analysis model, they found that lower-carbon corn feedstock helps reduce the CI of corn-based ethanol, a commodity of which South Dakota is a leading producer.

Grain farming and other agricultural activities account for 10 percent of the nation’s total GHG emissions. Implementing lower CI practices to reduce their carbon footprint (such as adopting conservation tillage, reducing nitrogen fertilizer use and implementing cover crops), farmers could improve farm efficiency and reduce greenhouse gas emissions of bioethanol.

The team’s research focused on the CI of biofuels. Farmers who produce lower-carbon feedstocks earn monetary credits, making it attractive for them to move to sustainable practices and become partners in the burgeoning biofuel industry.