Monthly Archives: December 2011

“the director of the Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center, sent a letter to Twitter on Thursday asserting that the company is violating U.S. law by allowing groups such as Hezbollah and al Qaeda affiliate al-Shabaab to use its popular online network. … In her letter, Darshan-Leitner noted that Hezbollah and al-Shabaab are officially designated as terrorist...
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One of the nation’s most widely planted crops — a genetically engineered corn plant that makes its own insecticide — may be losing its effectiveness because a major pest appears to be developing resistance more quickly than scientists expected. Please read more from:  http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45807933/ns/business-retail/#.Tv9mFG95mSM
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Teach4Real- Have you ever met a poor person?  Seriously. They don’t have s*%t. My students have four outfits they wear to school every week, which means they have to wear one outfit twice. In order to space it out you can bet they wear it Monday and Friday hoping nobody will notice. Our school...
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http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php
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Science News - Groundwater levels have dropped in many places across the globe over the past nine years, a pair of gravity-monitoring satellites finds. This trend raises concerns that farmers are pumping too much water out of the ground in dry regions. Water has been disappearing beneath southern Argentina, western Australia and stretches of the...
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BrandChannel- A revolutionary model for corporations to “do good” better was recently signed into law by California Governor Jerry Brown. Assembly Bill 361 creates two new classes of corporations that are legally required to pursue a positive impact on society and the environment: Benefit Corporations and Flexible Purpose Corporations. The new legal structures widen traditional corporate shareholder value...
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USATODAY.com - The congressionally mandated efficiency standards gradually phase out Thomas Edison’s 131-year-old creation in favor of other light bulbs that use at least 25% less energy. The first to go, beginning Sunday, is the traditional 100-watt, followed in January 2013 with the 75-watt version and in January 2014 with the 40-watt and 60-watt bulbs....
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So, to reiterate: • We’re highly dependent on a finite fuel source controlled by crazy people who hate us • We’ve done next to nothing about this problem for four decades Please read more from:  http://www.businessinsider.com/middle-eastern-oil-addiction-2011-12
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With Iran’s current threat to close the Strait of Hormuz in response to sanctions as a backdrop, the US Energy Information Agency issued an update to its “World Oil Transit Chokepoint” brief (earlier post), noting that “Hormuz is the world’s most important oil chokepoint due to its daily oil flow of almost 17 million...
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… California as a whole has no active coal mines and only a handful of small coal-fired power plants. L.A.’s infamous smog isn’t generated from dirty coal plants nearby, nor is the pollution that hugs up against the San Gabriel Mountains the result of burning coal. Nonetheless, a large percentage of the power Angelenos...
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Haase – 2012 is expected to bring continued hard conditions…2011 brought the most billion-dollar climate disasters to the United States ever, piling history-making events on top of each other to catastrophic results…Nationwide, more than 6,000 heat records were broken this year. On average, the U.S. has three or four events every year that are...
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© NASA It’s coming this way: The CME, seen by Nasa’s STEREO-B spacecraft, can be seen blasting out from the Sun on the right-hand side (circled) Skywatchers will be hoping for clear skies from today because particles from a recent solar storm will slam into Earth and produce amazing Northern Lights, or auroras.  On...
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scientificamerican.com…Our meat consumption habits take a serious toll on the environment… the production, processing and distribution of meat requires huge outlays of pesticides, fertilizer, fuel, feed and water while releasing greenhouse gases, manure and a range of toxic chemicals into our air and water. A lifecycle analysis conducted by EWG that took into account the production...
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.. even as more Americans buy foods with the organic label, the products are increasingly removed from the traditional organic ideal: produce that is not only free of chemicals and pesticides but also grown locally on small farms in a way that protects the environment. The explosive growth in the commercial cultivation of organic tomatoes here,...
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…the number one catastrophic event that Americans worry about is actually “economic collapse”.  At least that is what a recent survey conducted by Leiflin Inc. for the EcoHealth Alliance found.  But this goes along with what so many other polls have found over the past few years.  Over and over again, opinion polls have found that the...
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Researchers at the Energy & Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota once worked on technology to convert waste from a space station and future Martian bases into heat and power. Now they’re testing their tech on more earthly applications. Like turning coffee waste into power. The project will use a mostly renewable and bio-based...
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The NY Times recently reviewed two books that go on at length that the U.S Southwest is an unsustainable hellhole that will soon suffer greatly because of climate change and drought.  What is striking about the article is that it never mentions the price of water in Phoenix, Las Vegas or other Southwest cities.  The Econ...
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Greg Mankiw – Paul Krugman has several posts discussing the burden of the national debt.  Some readers have asked me for my take on the topic.  Let me refer them to this old paper Greg Mankiw wrote with Larry Ball.  It provides a nontechnical overview.  Even though it is 16 years old, I think it holds up pretty well. http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2011/12/burden-of-debt.html
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As island nations around the world look for solutions to stem rising sea levels due to climate change, a new land mass has spontaneously popped out of the Red Sea. The smoking hot island is acting as a real-time geographical lesson in how volcanic oceanic islands are formed — it is bubbling above the...
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… this month in Berlin, officials unveiled a prototype of a self-sustaining, energy-efficient home, built from recycled materials and complete with electric vehicles that can be charged in its garage. The aim of the prototype home is to produce twice as much energy as is used by a family of four — chosen from...
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Haase: short answer “yes”,  Long answer “no”… comparably modest estimate of 11 years’ supply may be optimistic SLATE - The recent press about the potential of shale gas would have you believe that America is now sitting on a 100-year supply of natural gas. It’s a “game-changer.” A “golden age of gas” awaits, one in which...
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State regulators approved a controversial Dominion Virginia Power plan on Wednesday that adds a charge for larger home users of solar energy. Dominion plans to impose a monthly “standby” charge, starting in April, on residential customers with solar systems that generate between 10 and 20 kilowatts. Today, that fee would apply to only one...
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“Sun-Believable” is what the Notre Dame chemists call their invention. What they’ve made is a paste consisting of quantum dots – nano-particles of semiconductors – of titanium dioxide coated in either cadmium sulfide or cadmium selenide and suspended in a water-alcohol mixture. Brushed onto a transparent conducting material and exposed to light, this stuff produced electricity....
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A123 Systems, a Massachusetts-based developer and manufacturer of advanced lithium-ion batteries, has announced that it will supply a 11-megawatt (MW) Grid Battery System to Sempra Generation for use at its Auwahi Wind project in Maui, Hawaii. Power from the 21-megawatt (MW) Auwahi Wind project will be purchased by Maui Electric Company under a 20-year power purchase agreement. The energy storage solution, which is capable of delivering up...
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After nine long years, the war in Iraq is finally drawing to a close. As the last U.S. troops leave Iraq, we’ve learned a lot of lessons — and one of them is how important it is to reduce our dependence on oil and other fossil fuels. But here’s some other important news: The U.S....
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More Images » India ranks as the world’s largest importer of asbestos, most of which goes into making corrugated roofing sheets for slum dwellings, like these in Mumbai. Photograph by: Adeel Halim, Bloomberg News montrealgazette.com…..asbestos has become Canada’s new sin, tarred as an evil at home and abroad. In just three years, asbestos went from...
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Prediction using unique calculator challenges view that sustainable energy means higher costs… Prof David MacKay, who developed the 2050 pathways calculator, said the tool could play a major role in assessing the feasibility of different energy choices. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian Every person in Britain will need to pay about £5,000 a...
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Debris from the tsunami that devastated Japan in March could reach the United States as early as this winter, according to predictions by NOAA scientists. However, they warn there is still a large amount of uncertainty over exactly what is still floating, where it’s located, where it will go, and when it will arrive. Responders...
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U.S. prosecutors are preparing what would be the first criminal charges against BP PLC employees stemming from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon accident, which killed 11 workers and caused the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, said people familiar with the matter. Prosecutors are focused on several Houston-based engineers and at least one of...
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http://www.usatoday.com/weather/story/2011-12-29/alaska-volcano-travel/52274100/1 Excerpt – The Alaska Volcano Observatory said satellite images showed Cleveland Volcano had spewed ash 15,000 feet (4,572 meters) into the air in a cloud that moved east-southeast. U.S. Geological Survey scientist-in-chargeJohn Power called it a small explosion. “It’s not expected to cause a disruption to big international air carriers,” he said. But the event drew strong interest...
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What would it be like to invest in—not just eat from—the veggie farmers, cheese artisans and ranchers at the local farmers’ market? When Woody Tasch published his book, Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money: Investing as if Food, Farms and Fertility Mattered, and launched Slow Money (http://www.slowmoney.org) to catalyze the flow of capital to...
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AP – A federal judge moved Thursday to block California from enforcing its first-in-the-nation mandate for cleaner, low-carbon fuels, saying the rules favor biofuels produced in the state. The lawsuit challenging the state regulations, which were adopted as part of the state’s landmark 2006 global warming law, was filed in federal court last year...
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In 2010, several countries invested in fuel cells and hydrogen. The United Kingdom and the United States topped the list, with the U.K. investing $15.3 million and the U.S. investing $13.7 million, according to the U.S. Department of Energy (PDF). A report from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (PDF) earlier this year found that government support for fuel cells...
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The head of a large nonprofit that has been serving children and families since the 19th century and that gets most of its funding from state and local government recently told us: “We have never had the chance to sit down across the table from government and discuss line-by-line what it takes to do...
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We are all affected by government regulations. The fire service is no exception. There are a number of regulations from both the federal government and state governments that affect firefighter personal protective equipment. Included in these regulations are general requirements for fire departments (employers) to provide PPE for their firefighter employees. These requirements extend...
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Wisconsin State Journal: Developers have applied to the Public Service Commission for a permit to build a large wind farm in western Wisconsin, the first application of its kind in more than two years. Emerging Energies applied this month to build Highland Wind Farm, a 41-turbine, 102.5-megawatt project in the St. Croix County towns...
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Associated Press: Entergy Corp.’s Pilgrim nuclear power plant in Plymouth, Mass. has been shut down after what officials said was a small leak of radioactive steam in a safety relief valve. Entergy spokesman Rob Williams said the leak discovered on Monday was contained within the plant’s piping and was never a threat to workers...
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The oceans and their beaches are now home to vast numbers of tiny pieces of plastic – and the source may be your washing machine, researchers say. Mark Anthony Browne of the University College Dublin says that so-called microplastic – bits of polyester and acrylic smaller than the head of a pin - contain potentially harmful...
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Once released into the environment from industrial sources, trace amounts of heavy metals can remain present in waterways for decades, or even centuries, in concentrations that are still high enough to pose a health risk. While processes do exist for removing larger amounts of heavy metals from water, these do not work on smaller...
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Bloomberg reports that Bank of America (BAC) has shifted about $22 trillion worth of derivative obligations from Merrill Lynch and the BAC holding company to the FDIC insured retail deposit division. Along with this information came the revelation that the FDIC insured unit was already stuffed with $53 trillion worth of these potentially toxic obligations,...
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More than 1.6 million children or one in 45 are homeless annually in America—according to a new report released today by The National Center on Family Homelessness. This represents an increase of 38% during the years impacted by the economic recession (2007 to 2010). The 124- page report, America’s Youngest Outcasts 2010, ranks the...
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“Although global demand for solar power is still growing — about 8% more solar panels will be installed this year compared with 2010 — bankruptcies, plummeting stock prices and crushing debt loads are calling into question the viability of the solar energy industry that since the 1970s has been counted on to advance the world into...
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Four decades of energy policy gone wrong in the United States is largely explained by Congress elevating short-term political and parochial regional advantages over our nation’s well-being. Although our government has enacted thousands of pages of energy legislation since the 1970s, it has never demanded that Americans pay a price that reflects the full...
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“We’ve saved the American taxpayer about 17 hours of spending. That’s it,” he said. “When you just really stop and think about it, we’ve made very little progress.” Politicians… went home for the holidays with little to show for all the political drama. The debt stood at $15.1 trillion, $1 trillion more than when he got to town. By...
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Apple has filed a number of patents for fuel cells that can be inserted into portable devices, such as laptops, without adding much weight. One patent application, titled Fuel Cell System to Power a Portable Computing Device, says that due to environmental and geopolitical concerns there is an “increasing awareness and desire” for consumers….Please...
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The EPA finalized the Renewable Fuel Standard program (RFS2) 2012 percentage standards for four fuel categories as part of the annual renewable fuel volume targets intended to achieve an overall level of 36 billion gallons in 2022. The 2012 overall volumes and standards are: biomass-based diesel (1.0 billion gallons; 0.91 percent); advanced biofuels (2.0...
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The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Economic Research Service (ERS) recently released its Major Land Uses (MLU) study for the US for 2007. The MLU series is the only accounting of all major uses of public and private land in all 50 States. The US land area totals nearly 2.3 billion acres. According to the report… Cropland: Between 2002...
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Microturbine company Capstone Turbine’s (earlier post) sales to the oil and gas industry worldwide are at a record pace, according to Jim Crouse, Capstone’s Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing. Over the last few weeks the company has announced deals from new and existing customers that will use the microturbines in the Marcellus and Eagle Ford Shale...
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Ethanol policies have helped shift millions of tons of corn from the dinner table to the gas tank…. That is about to change. Washington —The United States has ended a 30-year tax subsidy for corn-based ethanol that cost taxpayers $6 billion annually, and ended a tariff on imported Brazilian ethanol. Congress adjourned for the...
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Five US States Now Get 20% of Their Electricity From Wind Power, with Iowa and South Dakota the latest members of that club. I don’t know if objectively, and in light of the needed goal of all our electricity coming from renewables, you can state that 20% of electricity from wind power is, as...
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Bad news for the Gulf of Mexico: a study released this week sheds new light on the toxicity of oil in aquatic environments, and shows that environmental impact studies currently in use may be inadequate. The report is to be published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. …This is another big jump...
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TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — Twice in recent summers, visitors to parts of Michigan’s western coast were greeted by mounds of garbage strewn along miles of sandy beach: plastic bottles, eating utensils, food wrappers, even hypodermic syringes. At least some of the rubbish had drifted across Lake Michigan from Milwaukee, a vivid reminder that...
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With over $14 billion in annual sales, antipsychotics remain the top-selling therapeutic class of prescription drugs in the US. Dr. Harriet Fraad believes Big Pharma has manufactured a climate of insanity by manipulating and even creating illness for capital gain. “One of the things that drives Big Pharma is to find a diagnosis that...
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Marines, especially infantry battalions that are far forward in the field, face a slew of logistical challenges. The most critical — and coincidentally, often the most challenging and expensive — is ensuring they have a reliable power source. The Office of Naval Research has developed and deployed a portable power device that aims to end the hassle and expense...
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Scientific American: Environmentalism, like politics in general, is depressingly polarized these days. On one side, alarmists like the activist Bill McKibben, climatologist James Hansen and blogger Joe Romm warn that if we don`t cut way back on fossil fuels–now!–civilization may collapse. On the other side, deniers, including most of the current GOP candidates for...
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TOKYO (Reuters) – Tokyo Electric Power Co asked a government-backed bailout body on Tuesday for an additional 690 billion yen ($8.8 billion) to help compensate victims of the nuclear crisis at its Fukushima Daiichi power plant…Please read more from: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/27/us-tepco-compensation-idUSTRE7BQ02Q…
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MOSCOW, Dec. 26 (UPI) — There are as many as 25,000 hazardous underwater objects containing radioactive waste in Russia, emergency ministry officials said Monday…Please contiune reading at: http://m.upi.com/m/story/UPI-95031324938500/
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Scrappy George Whitesides and Una Ryan’s fast and cheap diagnostic device could save millions of lives every year Webb Chappell How a chemist and a doctor found a much cheaper way to diagnose disease Twenty years ago, the Pentagon asked George M. Whitesides, a chemist at Harvard University, to invent a way to quickly...
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Been wondering where a bunch of your money went this year? For the average American family, a higher percentage of the budget was spent on gas in 2011 than at any point since 1981. According to the AP, gas cost most Americans $4,155, or 8.4 percent of the median household income, in 2011. In...
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Cheap labor and abundant natural resources trump technology and manufacturing expertise. Please contiune reading at: http://www.treehugger.com/corporate-responsibility/another-us-job-future-lost-worlds-largest-li-ion-battery-plant-opened-russia.html
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Published by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences, the exhaustive analysis found that medical radiation, particularly the large radiation dose delivered by CT scans, is the foremost identifiable cause of breast cancer. Almost 230,480 new cases of breast cancer will be diagnosed this year in the...
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foxnews - ”It is not viable. It is not the best use of tax dollars, especially when you’re borrowing the money to do it,” said California Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy, who originally supported the project as a member of the state legislature.  Since the project was first unveiled in 2008, officials tripled its projected cost, delayed its...
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picture-alliance/ dpa US airlines have suffered a defeat in the EU’s highest court, which upheld a law on Wednesday that will require airlines to pay for carbon emissions on flights to and from Europe. The new rule goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2012. US officials have warned that the move will have repercussions. Please contiune...
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Slashdot- “Congress has recently authorized the use of offensive military action in cyberspace. From the December 12th conference on the National Defense Authorization Act, it states, ‘Congress affirms that the Department of Defense has the capability, and upon direction by the President may conduct offensive operations in cyberspace to defend our Nation, Allies and interests, subject...
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“One of my favorite facts of this past year was the proof that China makes almost nothing out of assembling Apple’s iPads and iPhones. From the article: ‘If you want lots of jobs and lots of high paying jobs then you’re not going to find them in manufacturing. They’re where the money is, in the...
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Associated Press: For more than 90 years, the coal-fired power plant in Glen Lyn, Va., has been churning out electricity and contributing to local prosperity. Of late, it has generated nearly a quarter of the revenue for the $1 million budget of the town. Yet when the plant shuts down to comply with new...
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ScienceDaily — Approximately 80,000 industrial chemicals are in use and about 700 new chemicals are introduced to commerce each year in the United States, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. To assess human health risks from exposure to harmful substances, James Englehardt, professor in the College of Engineering at the University of Miami,...
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This all-electric drive vehicle supplements its battery capacity with a silent fuel-burning microturbine. While this runs on diesel, turbines are capable of burning practically anything, meaning if cheap renewable methane natural gas proliferates, one could fuel a vehicle from home using the existing gasline infrastructure; and if it’s feasible, one could even generate electricity at home when...
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HyperSolar is developing a solar-powered nanoparticle system that mimics photosynthesis to separate hydrogen from water. The hydrogen is then reacted with carbon dioxide to produce the methane, which is the primary component of natural gas. Hypersolar said that the resulting methane gas can be used as a direct replacement within existing systems that use...
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Duke University helped a North Carolina farm turn tons of manure into electricity and fertilizer in what it says is one of the the cleanest waste-to-energy systems in existence. The farmer saves money and gets a cleaner farm. Duke and Google, which helped fund the project, get carbon offsets. Please contiune reading at: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hogs-waste-20111225,0,5938580.story
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New results from a study of an antimicrobial- triclocarban – widely used in many consumer products reveal that the compound strongly enhances the effect of estrogen on a gene that is active in the brains of developing zebrafish embryos. Please read more from:  http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/relative-risk-one-result-at-a-time
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Happy holidays to my Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, agnostic, native … and all other readers. Peace be with you. Cartoon from one of my favorite Gary Varvels’ http://blogs.indystar.com/varvelblog/
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Chicagoland residents, rejoice — if you buy produce distributed by Testa Produce, it now comes with an (officially) lower carbon footprint, as per recent LEED Platinum certification for the company’s distribution center in the Chicago Stockyards Industrial Park by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). As we reported back in May, the company’s 91,000-square-foot warehouse distribution center...
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As California deals with overcrowding in its state prison system by transferring low-level offenders to county correctional facilities, one municipality has found a way to cut costs without cutting services while also helping the state meet its renewable energy goals. Merced County has recently announced that it has commissioned a 1.4-megawatt (MW) photovoltaic (PV) array to power the...
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“We are looking at a consolidation of the global solar industry,” says Wolfgang Hummel, director of the Center for Solar Research in Berlin. “Having seen a whole range of US companies go under in the last few months, it is now Germany’s turn. And the biggest threat comes from China.” The development seems paradoxical. In 2011, renewable...
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Short answer–because all of the political, technological, and financial focus was on the liquid-metal fast breeder reactor. Later on, due to fears about non-proliferation, the US cancelled plans to commercially reprocess spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium, and the case for the fast breeder reactor was toast. Because there were no fast breeder reactors...
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Long-term growth in international gas demand will provide a market for the anticipated wave of liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports from the U.S., according to a recent report by Barclays Capital. Barclays cited gas demand forecasts by the International Energy Agency, which anticipates growth of 1.7 percent each year until 2035, and ExxonMobil’s most...
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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced Thursday its withdrawal of a decades-old proposal to limit the use of antibiotics in animal feed, a move experts say could have dire implications for public health. Experts warn the common and often unnecessary practice is decreasing the effectiveness of antibiotics in human medicine and increasing the...
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Traditional farming methods could be essential for the survival of species such as vultures. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA Traditional farming methods are crucial for protecting a number of threatened bird species in the developing world, including bustards, cranes, ibises and vultures, a study has found. Livestock grazing and features associated with arable farming – such as hedgerows...
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WorldBank – The number of people living on less than $1.25 (PPP 2005) a day is projected to be 883 million in 2015, compared with 1.4 billion in 2005 and 1.8 billion in 1990. Much of this progress reflects rapid growth in China and India, while many African countries are lagging behind: 17 countries are...
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Brookings Institute have analyzed the poverty and project there could be fewer than 600 million living on less than $1.25 per day in 2015. In 2009, there were World Bank projections that there would be 1 billion living on less than $1.25 per day in 2015 and 800 million in 2020. Therefore, poverty statistics are...
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Independent – The 12 most read are those environment articles published in 2011 that have been visited by the greatest number of separate users to date. The list (click the headlines to read articles in full) 1. Global warning: climate sceptics are winning the battle Father of the green movement,  James Hansen of Nasa, says...
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LAGOS, Nigeria — Oil from an offshore spill has spread roughly 100 nautical miles after a leak occurred while loading a tanker, a Nigerian official said Thursday. Royal Dutch Shell shut down a deep-water oil field off Nigeria’s oil-rich southern delta on Tuesday. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45762693/ns/world_news-world_environment/
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MOSCOW (AP) — The sinking of a floating oil rig that left more than 50 crew dead or missing is intensifying fears that Russian companies searching for oil in remote areas are unprepared for emergencies — and could cause a disastrous spill in the pristine waters of the Arctic. Readmon at:’http://www.chron.com/news/article/Russian-oil-rig-sinking-casts-doubt-on-Arctic-plan-2421720.php
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Ian Cooper –  Here are some predictions for 2012: $2,000 gold, $40 silver, and $150 oil on any Strait of Hormuz disruptions; No recovery for housing; The euro will finally fail; The Dow will test 9,500; Israel will attack Iran; Natural gas will fall to historic lows on the Marcellus Shale finds; The Great...
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The Japanese government and the ruling Democratic Party of Japan plan to reconsider Japan’s pledge to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels. “Achieving the target has become impossible in any way,” a government source said, because the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant has made it...
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Researchers at Aalto University in Finland have developed a new and significantly cheaper method of manufacturing direct alcohol fuel cells (DAFCs) fuel cells by preparing a palladium nanoparticle catalyst using atomic layer deposition (ALD). This ALD method for manufacturing fuel cells requires 60% less catalyst than current methods. http://www.greencarcongress.com/2011/12/dafc-20111222.html
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Nissan is making a case for the safety and strength of the lithium-ion batteries in the Nissan Leaf, while being careful to avoid specifically mentioning a recent controversy over fires in crash-damaged batteries from the Chevy Volt. Around 20 units of the Nissan Leaf were damaged in the March earthquake and tsunami in Japan, a Nissan spokesman...
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Solar Stunner: America is a $1.9 Billion Exporter of Solar Products With a high-profile trade war against the Chinese brewing in the solar market, it’s often forgotten that the U.S. is actually a net exporter of solar products to China and the rest of the world. With 73 cents out of every dollar spent on a...
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The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) voted to approve a rule certifying an amended version of Westinghouse’s AP1000 nuclear reactor design for use in the United States. (Earlier post.) The amended certification, which will be incorporated into the NRC’s regulations, will be valid for 15 years. …US Energy Secretary Steven Chu issued a statement in support of the Nuclear...
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Maryland’s state Board of Public Works has approved a biomass project at an Eastern Shore prison. The project gives Virginia company EcoCorp a 30-year lease of a 4.2-acre site at the Eastern Correctional Institute at an annual rent of $100, writes the Baltimore Sun. EcoCorp will build anaerobic digester that will generate electricity… http://www.environmentalleader.com/2011/12/23/chicken-manure-biodigester-to-power-md-prison-wisconsin-at-work-on-255m-biomass-plant/
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The U.S. geothermal industry will start 2012 with billions in planned investments, according to Leslie Blodgett of the Geothermal Energy Association. Writing for Renewable Energy World, Blodgett says U.S. capacity reached 3,102 MW by early 2011, and up to 5,745 MW is now in development. Some planned projects are hybrids… http://www.environmentalleader.com/2011/12/23/geothermal-industry-plans-5745-mw-billions-in-investments/
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A compound produced from fish oil that appears to target leukemia stem cells could lead to a cure for the disease, according to Penn State researchers. Read at: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111222103112.htm
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A 14-year study in an atoll reef lagoon in Glover’s Reef, Belize has found that fishing closures there produce encouraging increases in populations of predatory fish species. However, such closures have resulted in only minimal increases in herbivorous fish, which feed on the algae that smother corals and inhibit reef recovery. Read at: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111221211229.htm
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Should You Eat More or Less Salt?…the analysis revealed that both high and low sodium intake were linked to heart risks. Compared with those who got 4,000 to 6,000 milligrams of sodium per day, people who consumed more than 7,000 milligrams were more likely to have a heart attack or other heart event. However,...
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rodale.com: Men who smoke around the time they get a woman pregnant are increasing the risk that their child will get cancer years down the line, according to a recent study published in American Journal of Epidemiology. Australian studies looked at nearly 400 children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and another group of children without...
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The Obama administration confirmed this week that a provision in the payroll tax bill requiring a quick decision on the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from western Canada to the Gulf Coast will probably lead to cancellation of the project. But does that mean the $7 billion pipeline project is dead forever? http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/24/us/provision-may-halt-keystone-pipeline-but-oil-is-still-likely-to-flow.html
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Attribution: Nate Beeler, The Washington Examiner
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Ouch… There went the future. Bloomberg: $16 trillion — The “total transaction amounts” for Fed lending included in a July 21, 2011, study by the Government Accountability Office, a non-partisan investigative agency that reports to Congress. The Fed’s Dec. 6 memo said it was inaccurate to describe that amount as the total of its...
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Each Chevy Volt sold thus far may have as much as $250,000 in state and federal dollars in incentives behind it – a total of $3 billion altogether, according to an analysis by James Hohman, assistant director of fiscal policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Read it at: http://www.michigancapitolconfidential.com/16192
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