Environment Forum
Global environmental challenges
Federal purse reopens for solar science
The U.S. Department of Energy announced this week $60 million in funding for scientists to develop “revolutionary research” to lower the cost of solar power systems.
The DOE SunShot Initiative is baiting researchers to increase efficiency of commercial solar power (CSP) systems and lower costs to six cents per kilowatt hour by the end of the decade.
The initiative is being called a “sign of the times for the sector“, and comes amidst accusations the government is squandering taxpayer money on businesses doomed to fail, best exemplified by recently bankrupt solar heavyweight Solyndra.
The DOE says the SunShot CSP grant is meant to look beyond short-term innovation and explore transformative concepts with the “potential to break through performance barriers like efficiency and temperature limitations,” the DOE announced. It wants scientists to think big.
With billions invested in multiple CSP plants throughout the southwestern states, improving CSP generation to the point where it can once again compete with cheaper solar photovoltaic panels appears to be an important priority for the DOE, writes Energy Matters.
Steve Jurvetson on clean tech innovation that will change the world
(This article by Felicity Carus first appeared on Clean Energy Connection and has been edited for length. Any opinions expressed are her own.)
What venture capitalists really think and what they say aren’t always the same thing.
Steve Jurvetson, from Draper Fisher Jurvetson, last week gave his overview of disruptive innovation in clean tech at the Always On Going Green conference in San Francisco.
The man who famously invested $300,000 for a 30 percent stake in Hotmail and made $250 million for his VC firm when Microsoft bought the company two years later says there is an “explosion of possibilities” of synthetic genetics in clean tech.
In August, one of Jurvetson’s portfolio companies, Genomatica, filed an S-1 form with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company uses computerized biotechnology modeling to design high-volume chemicals from renewable sources such as cellulosic biomass.
DFJ joined a consortium of investors including VantagePoint in raising $84 million to finance Genomatica. Tate & Lyle and Mitsubishi are among its partners.
In saying the cleantech portfolio is modest, perhaps you missed the portfolio slide near the beginning. And that’s just from our Menlo Park office. Globally, the DFJ Network has over 85 clean tech investments, perhaps more than any other venture firm on Earth.
My blog post from the conference: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/6 195573431/
Special report: Ten years of oil spills
The Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and subsequent oil leak this summer captured urgent intellectual efforts of leading scientists around the world.
Though it was the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry, it was not the first oil spill nor will it be the last.
To date, scientific studies and published reports on the topic number in the hundreds of thousands. After two months of sorting these reports, Thomson Reuters’ Science Watch is releasing their findings in an extensive Special Topic report with the most influential research on oil spills, from remediation (including dispersants) to bioindicators. Citation data from January 2000 to June 2010 was approached from various angles, and trends and anomalies emerge handily.
Science Watch also launched an interactive map that snapshots key research at over 10 global spill sites, including photos. Another section published graphs that detail key findings of scientific reviews.
Longterm effects of BP’s Macondo blowout and spill that sent close to 5 million barrels of crude oil into the Atlantic ocean this summer are yet to be known. Perhaps the hard scientific research of the past can help researchers probe the questions to alleviate any potential damage in the future.
Genetically engineered fish, anyone?
Would you eat a genetically modified fish? What about pork from a pig with mouse genes? Beef from cattle with genes spliced to resist “mad cow” disease?
These are questions Americans may soon have to answer for themselves if the U.S. health regulators allow the sale of a genetically engineered salmon. The company that makes it, Aqua Bounty Technologies Inc <ABTX.L>, expects an agency decision by year’s end.
The biotech says its Atlantic salmon grows nearly twice as fast as normal salmon and could help Americans get more locally farmed fish. That could cut down on U.S. imports of roughly $1.4 billion a year in Atlantic salmon from other countries such as Chile while also easing pressure on wild Atlantic salmon in the nation’s Northeast.
But environmentalists and consumer advocates are concerned about what could happen if such altered fish were to escape or be released in rivers or off-shore salmon farms. They also worry about the health effects of eating such modified fish.
The Food and Drug Administration takes up the issue starting Sept. 19 as part of a three-day public hearing on whether to allow the genetically altered salmon on the U.S. market.
For more on the salmon situation, click here. For other genetically engineered food animals that aren’t far behind, click here.
Photo credit: Reuters/Victor Ruiz Caballero (Workers process farmed salmon at a plant in Chile. The fish shown in the photo are not genetically modified.)
Scottish scientists brew up whisky biofuel
Scientists in Scotland have unveiled a new biofuel made from whisky byproducts that they say can power ordinary cars more efficiently than ethanol.
A research team from Edinburgh’s Napier University spent two years creating the biofuel butanol that can be used in gas tanks either as a stand-alone fuel or blended with petrol or diesel, they announced Tuesday. It is derived from distillation byproducts pot ale (liquid from copper stills) and draff (the spent grains).
Is this the answer for critics of corn-based, energy-intensive ethanol?
“While some energy companies are growing crops specifically to generate biofuel, we are investigating excess materials such as whisky by-products to develop them,” Professor Martin Tangey, director of Napier’s Biofuel Research Center told the Financial Times.
“This is a more environmentally sustainable option and potentially offers new revenue on the back of one of Scotland’s biggest industries.”
Global exports of Scotch whisky rose to a record $4.85 billion last year, and accounts for about a quarter of all food and drink exports from the UK.
A very brief look into corn based ethanol reveals more problems than solutions. Using something that has been a waste product up until this point is the direction that the world needs to explore.
Kudos to the Scotts & their Scotch!
Introducing 100 innovations
One man alone does not make a movement. But can he influence one?
There are no limits is the attitude espoused by PhD, MBA, entrepreneur, eco-designer, and visionary Gunter Pauli (above), who is now pouring his life’s work into a project to spark a new way of doing business, ergo a new economy.
He calls it the Blue Economy, because it’s not enough to be green and good to the environment. Blue creates a competitive and sustainable society and blue thrives on innovation. Blue is better than green, he asserts.
The 54-year-old founder and former CEO and president of Ecover is releasing the English and Korean editions of his book The Blue Economy at the Business for the Environment B4E Global Summit in Seoul today, Earth Day. It is to be published in 14 languages.
Pauli, who is fluent in seven languages, is addressing a crowd of business professionals, industry players and academics to promote his latest undertaking: “10 Years, 100 Innovations, 100 Million Jobs”. The project explores business opportunities that have evolved from mimicking technologies already found in nature with the goal of inspiring entrepreneurs.
Every week for two years, his foundation the Zero Emissions Research Institute of the United Nations University in Tokyo, will be publishing an essay and video about one of the innovations. He is touring the world meeting with government representatives and industry groups to engage in discussions about what their unique challenges are and what solutions may be proposed in the innovations identified by the ZERI foundation.
How does he feel about accelerating fusion power research?
from Tales from the Trail:
Boycott Copenhagen, Palin urges Obama
If Sarah Palin had her way, President Barack Obama would be staying away from this month's global climate change talks in Copenhagen and "sending a message that the United States will not be a party to fraudulent scientific practices."
The summit will hear from scientists like those from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, where recently revealed e-mails showed information that raised questions about climate change was suppressed, writes Palin.
"Without trustworthy science and with so much at stake, Americans should be wary about what comes out of this politicized conference. The president should boycott Copenhagen," she wrote in an op-ed in the Washington Post.
"He plans to fly in at the climax of the conference in hopes of sealing a 'deal.' Whatever deal he gets, it will be no deal for the American people," said the 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate.
The biggest U.N. climate talks in history are aimed at working out a new pact to curb global warming, replacing the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Obama said last week the United States will aim to reduce its carbon emissions by around 17 percent by 2020, from 2005 levels.
Meeting Obama's stated targets will require cap and trade legislation that would result in job losses and higher energy costs, wrote Palin.
I don’t believe that ex-governor Palin gives two whits about the environment in Alaska or anywhere. The wolves are not decimating the large prey. It is THEIR natural prey. The hunters including Ms. Palin want us to believe that. All monies that are donated to Defenders 80% of the money donated is used for fighting in court to relist many endangered species not just wolves. It is our job to maintain the balance not to slaughter certain animals because they naturally control the large prey population. Which left uncontrolled decimates the forest leaving once fertile ground for growth of Aspen, certain species of conifers, etc. barren. They eat all the vegetation leaving destruction in thier wake if they become to over populated. The hunters of Alaska and Idaho and Montana, along with some of, not all, the ranchers want you to believe the wolves are responsible for all attacks on livestock when in fact they are resoponsible for less than half. They only turn to eating livestock when they are needing food because their natural prey is overhunted, or run out by developements, etc. Defenders of wildlife and the U.S. government compensate the ranchers for livestock lost to wolf attacks. Sometimes when the attack was made by wolves at all but rather coyotes or bear or a cougar. There are many natural predators. The numbers of the wolves are not solid enough for them to be being hunted yet. They need a few more years. Or we are going to have no wolves at all. I would like to know that my grandson when he is older will be able to go out into the wilds and see a wolf for himself oneday if he chooses to and is lucky enough to. They do not generally like humans. Will steer clear of us. Unless we don’t contain our foodstores properly when camping or hunting in the woods. The same as a bear. No one is screaming to “Kill all the bears” I don’t want that. That is not what I am saying. The wolf is a necessary part of our eco system to say they are not is to say God made a mistake. To say they hunt for sport or pleasure is a lie. They hunt for food. They cannot go to the market and purchase food as we humans can, they must hunt for survival, man hunts primarily for sport, keeping and eating the meat is a bonus.
m.
Fishing for information
The research vessel Professor Khromov is just a few kms off the easternmost point of Siberia, and U.S. technologist Kevin Taylor is struggling to reel in an orange buoy that had been deep beneath the Bering Strait for nearly a year.
The first time he tries, the ship veers too far away from the prize and must make a slow, wide turn for another pass. The second time, Taylor’s hook is not quite ready and the float bobs again into the Khromov’s wake. This takes practice, even in calm waters.
A main task of the RUSALCA expedition, a joint-U.S.-Russian scientific effort taking place in August and September, is to retrieve data-gathering moorings that were dropped 50 meters to the bottom during stormy weather last October, and to leave new ones.
It takes technological and navigational know how and, it soon becomes clear, the lassoing skills of a cowboy.
Attached to moorings are instruments that gather data on temperature, currents, salinity and other things tied to RUSALCA’s study of the impact of climate change on the region. Some of the new ones are even equipped with an instrument that listens for whales. They are held to the bottom by weights fashioned from train wheels.
Three are in Russian waters and five are on the U.S. side of the strait.
When the ship gets close to a mooring location the technical team tries to get a signal from the equipment to determine the exact location. If the unit is in the spot where it was dropped — that is, ice did not move it -– then the team sends an electronic pulse to open a mechanism that detaches the anchor, allowing the floats and instruments to float to the surface.
# “a single barnacle has been known to foul up# the release mechanism”Described in two words: bad design.
from FaithWorld:
Do animals have moral codes? Well, up to a point…
"We believe that there isn't a moral gap between humans and other animals, and that saying things like 'the behavior patterns that wolves or chimpanzees display are merely building blocks for human morality' doesn't really get us anywhere. At some point, differences in degree aren't meaningful differences at all and each species is capable of 'the real thing.' Good biology leads to this conclusion. Morality is an evolved trait and 'they' (other animals) have it just like we have it."
That's a pretty bold statement. If a book declares that in its introduction, it better have to have some strong arguments to back it up. A convincing argument could influence how we view our own morality and its origins, how we understand animal cognition and even how we relate to animals themselves.
Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals, a new book by Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce, presents a persuasive case for some animals being much more intelligent than generally believed. The authors show how these animals have emotions, exhibit empathy, mourn for their dead and seem to have a sense of justice. They draw interesting parallels to similar human behaviour that many people think stems from our moral codes and/or religious beliefs rather than some evolutionary process. All this is fascinating and their argument for open-mindedness about recognising animals' real capabilities is strong.
The stories they base their thesis on are intriguing. They talk about an elephant with a leg injury whose fellow elephants in her herd slowed down for her and even fed her. They tell how dogs can agree for a session of rough play that's not supposed to hurt and those that overstep the bounds, by for example by biting too hard, get frozen out of the group. Caged rats taught to push a level for food won't do it when that prompts the scientists to give a rat in the next cage an electric shock. Vampire bats share the blood they collect with bats that can't go out to hunt for their daily dose. Some sort of behavioural code is clearly working here, just as a behavioural code is at work when humans do similar things.
But the authors overreach when they say this shows that animals have morality. The problem is with their limited definition:
"We define morality as a suite of interrelated other-regarding behaviours that cultivate and regulate complex interactions within social groups. These behaviours relate to well-being and harm, and norms of right and wrong attach to many of them. Morality is an essentially social phenomenon, arising in the interactions between and among individual animals, and it exists as a tangle of threads that holds together a complicated and shifting tapestry of social relationships. Morality in this way acts as social glue."
Jason, communication is not the same as language. A baby can communicate its discomfort by crying long before it can express the same feeling by language. Animals can communicate some things — for example, a dog that wants to go for a walk may bark at its owner and then walk to the door. But that’s not language either. Some animals communicate with each other in different ways, but they don’t seem to have the characteristics of language such as grammar. What they communicate is not nonsense. When chimps in the jungle issue a distinctive call to others to warn them that a predator is near, that’s vital information. But it’s stretching the meaning of the word language to call that communication language.
Possessing language skills is not limited to the languages you know. There are tests of language aptitude based on artifical languages with invented words. The test aims at finding out how well the person being tested figures out the underlying grammar of the artifical language and answers questions about sentences written in it. Some experiments have shown some higher apes may grasp some basic concepts of grammar like subject, verb and object. This is interesting and worth recognising, but it is still rudimentary. Stating that does not mean that animals don’t share certain characteristics with humans. It says that animals share these characteristics with humans only to a limited extent.
from FaithWorld:
White U.S. evangelicals most skeptical on climate change
Among U.S. religious groups, white evangelical Protestants are the least likely to believe that human activities are contributing to climate change, according to a new survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. You can see the numbers, based on a broader 2008 poll, here.
Overall the Pew Forum found that a plurality, or 47 percent, of the adult U.S. population accepts that there is solid evidence that the earth is warming because of human activities. Most scientists have reached the conclusion that the planet's climate is changing because of human-induced factors, notably the emissions from burning of the fossil fuels that drive the global economy.
Among religious groups Pew found that those who said they were unaffiliated with any faith tradition were the most likely to accept that humanity was warming the planet, with 58 percent of them taking that view.
Among white mainline Protestants the figure was 48 percent, it was 39 percent for black Protestants and 34 percent for white evangelical Protestants, a key base for the Republican Party whose leaders have often cast doubt on the link between emissions and climate change.
Former U.S. president George W. Bush pulled America out of the Kyoto treaty to curb emissions -- a move hailed at the time by his Republican base -- while President Barack Obama , a Democrat, has made climate a key policy priority.
Many evangelical Christians put their faith completely in the Bible which they see as the revealed word of God and so they also question other widely accepted scientific views such as evolution. Some have even suggested that climate change may be a sign that the biblical end times are drawing near.
Unfortunately, the ignorant are always saved by the wise, who don’t want to be devastated with them, allowing them to forever claim that there never was an issue. One is tempted to sterilize them, stick them in a cave with a flint knife and a bear skin and say, “Have a nice life.” Doubly so when they willfully accept calamity, calling it armageddon. Let the consequences they reap strike them and leave us out of it! Ah, then there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth! As to global warming, let’s see some proof that it isn’t happening. So long as there’s a reasonable basis for concern, we must act.
its a great thing happening because the fuels are going to die one day and then we are totally dependent on the solar energy. It should happen in whole globe that all countries should think of the future now because we are living good life so we should do things which make the life of our coming generations quite smooth.
Kevin
BD manager
http://www.textloansnocreditcheck.co.uk/