By Mike Robbins
Hydrogen -- Star Gas, Everywhere, Yet Unseen. Sunlight is its Child.
(Haiku by Stephen Wetlesen)
January 30, 2015
A commonly used pesticide
may alter the development of
the brain’s dopamine system
-- responsible for emotional
expression and cognitive
function – and increase the
risk of attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder in
children, according to a new
Rutgers study.
In deciding to skip the
Unity March in Paris for a
football game but cut short
his trip to India to go to
Saudi Arabia, President
Obama chose tyranny over
freedom.
Both the ESA’s Sentinel-1A
and CryoSat satellites have
detected a significant
degree of ice loss in the
Austfonna ice cap, located
on Norway’s Nordaustlandet
island in the Svalbard
archipelago. Parts of the
ice cap have thinned by as
much as 50 m (164 ft) since
2012 – around a sixth of its
total thickness, and the
speed of the outer glacier
has increased to 3.8 km (2.4
miles) per year.
A $6 billion sticking point
could create headaches for
the U.S.-Cuba talks.
Though concerns over human
rights, press freedoms and
U.S. fugitives living free
on the island have dominated
debate over the Obama
administration's
negotiations on restoring
diplomatic ties, the Castro
regime also still owes
Americans that eye-popping
sum.
Though gas prices are the
lowest they've been since
2009, Swiecki said that "now
folks do have money, they're
voting with their wallet and
the vehicles they're
choosing are larger and less
fuel efficient."
The past decade has
witnessed significant
developments in policies for
renewable energy, which are
driving its growth globally.
In fact, new analysis from
Frost & Sullivan forecasts
the global installed
capacity of renewable energy
to more than double from
1,566 gigawatts (GW) in 2012
to 3,203 GW in 2025.
The president is revered by
environmental groups for
taking steps to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions
that come from burning
fossil fuels, such as
signing higher
fuel-efficiency standards
for cars and protecting more
land and water than any
other president. But when he
discusses the recovering
economy, Obama often touts
the fact that the United
States now produces the most
oil and natural gas in the
world and the benefits that
has yielded, such as $2 per
gallon gasoline.
Monsanto’s Roundup. It’s
been around since 1974. But
it wasn’t until the late
1990s that the use of
Monsanto’s flagship poison
surged. That’s when the
company came up with the
idea to genetically engineer
seeds to grow food crops,
like corn, soy, alfalfa,
sugar beets and canola, that
could tolerate high doses of
the poison.
This allowed farmers to
spray entire fields of
crops, killing everything in
sight—except Monsanto’s
genetically engineered
crops.
For almost 5 years, the
FDA has been attacking
Daniel Smith of Spokane
Washington for selling a
mineral supplement that
purifies water and has been
used in places like Africa
by the Red Cross to prevent
Malaria. The product is
called MMS (Miracle Mineral
Solution), and the active
ingredient is sodium
chlorite, a common mineral
that is even used in some
municipalities in the U.S.
to purify water instead of
chlorine.
Daniel Smith will face a
trial in less than 30 days,
the culmination of close to
5 years of legal battles,
that could result in him
spending 37 years in prison
if convicted.
Why?
Because the FDA has not
approved his product for
health claims.
Has the product killed
anyone? No.
Do FDA approved products
kill anyone? Yes.
Germany is to open a
first auction of land for
solar power installations
from next month as it seeks
to bring renewable energy
into the wholesale power
market, away from a costly
era of subsidies.
The cabinet on Wednesday
agreed rules for a pilot
project to auction open
spaces for the deployment of
1.2 gigawatts (GW) of
installed photovoltaic
capacity over the next three
years.
Greece's new radical left
government has shot the
first salvo in what is
expected to be a tough clash
with fellow eurozone
countries over budget cuts
that Athens says are choking
the life out of its economy.
The government of Prime
Minister Alexis Tsipras said
Wednesday it would ignore
key budget commitments and
reforms previous
administrations had promised
in exchange for rescue loans
from fellow eurozone
countries.
A team of scientists led by
UC Irvine has shown that you
can unboil an egg,
or at least egg whites ...
but it isn't easy. Far more
than a breakfast table
trick, the feat is designed
to demonstrate a new
technique for recovering
valuable molecular proteins
quickly and cheaply that
could have important
biochemical applications.
The installed capacity of
the global thermal energy
storage market is expected
to reach 6,070 MW by 2020,
up from 2938 MW in 2013.
That is according to new
findings from Transparency
Market Research (TMR).
The strike came amid rising
frontier tension 10 days
after an Israeli air strike
in Syria killed an Iranian
general and several Lebanese
Hezbollah guerrillas.
An individual’s view of
health determinants is
directly correlated to their
sources and how they process
information. Regardless of
its accuracy, when something
is repeated a sufficient
number of times, people will
start to believe it. The
cancer and sunscreen
industries have made it
their mission to convince
the world that sunlight is a
primary cause of skin
cancer, when it fact it has
been shown to prevent it. In
fact, considerable evidence
shows that blocking the
sun’s rays from reaching our
skin with, for example
sunscreen, significantly
decreases our uptake of
vitamin D levels, leading to
higher mortality, critical
illness, mental health
disorders and cancer itself.
Clashing energy interests on
the Japanese island of
Kyushu have prompted Japans
government to clamp down on
solar power development
nationwide. While the
government calls it a
necessary revision to assure
grid stability amidst
rapidly rising levels of
intermittent solar energy,
critics see a pro-nuclear
agenda at work—one that
could stunt Japans renewable
energy potential.
Kansas City Power & Light
(KCP&L) said it will stop
burning coal at six units in
three of its coal-fired
power plants.
Dr. Bruce D. Perry, M.D.,
Phd., recently stated that
attention-deficit
hyperactivity disorder is
not a “real”
disease, and that too many
children are being given
potentially dangerous drugs
in the name of treating it.
In an interview with the
Observer, he stated that the
symptoms of ADHD are so
wide-ranging and varied that
all children and adults
exhibit at least a few at
one point or another.
The department said 79 of
those cases are in
California and 10 of those
cases involve Bay Area
residents. Fifty-two cases
can be linked directly to
measles exposure
at Disneyland.
Until now, it has been
generally accepted that a
meteor constitutes a time
capsule – a relic of the
early creation of the solar
system that has fallen to
Earth, allowing us to delve
into the distant past by
looking at the composition
of the essentially unchanged
material that formed the
basis of planetary
formation. However, a new
study carried out by
researchers from MIT and
Purdue University seeks to
challenge the established
belief, asserting that
rather than representing the
kernel of planetary
creation, that they are
instead a by-product of the
violent and often
cataclysmic process.
For more than 50 years,
global production of plastic
has continued to rise. Some
299 million tons of plastics
were produced in 2013,
representing a 4 percent
increase over 2012. Recovery
and recycling, however,
remain insufficient, and
millions of tons of plastics
end up in landfills and
oceans each year, writes
Gaelle Gourmelon,
Communications and Marketing
Manager at the Worldwatch
Institute, in the
Institute’s latest Vital
Signs Online article
The Obama administration
estimates that up to 29
percent of U.S. taxpayers
could have to take the law
known as Obamacare into
account as they complete
their 2014 income tax
returns, officials said on
Wednesday.
Two to 4 percent are
expected to pay a penalty
for failing to obtain health
coverage last year under
President Barack Obama's
Affordable Care Act,
according to official
estimates.
Obamacare, the VA scandal,
the IRS scandal--these are
just a few examples of what
happens when we give
government huge power
without oversight.
It's about to happen
again--the Obama
Administration is fighting
for a government takeover of
the Internet and the Federal
Communications Commission is
going to vote on it February
26th...
You may not have noticed,
but the Earth had a close
shave on Monday as an
asteroid with its own moon
made a cosmic near miss. As
it passed within 3.1 times
the distance from the Earth
to the Moon, NASA's
230-foot-wide (70-meter)
Deep Space Network (DSN)
captured radar images of
asteroid 2004 BL86 and its
tiny satellite.
In 2012, pollution – in the
form of contaminated soil,
water, and both indoor and
outdoor air – was
responsible for 8.4 million
deaths in developing
countries, finds Pollution:
The Silent Killer of
Millions in Poor Countries.
That’s almost three times
more deaths than those
caused by malaria, HIV/AIDS
and tuberculosis combined:
Malaria claimed 600,000
lives in 2012, HIV/AIDS
caused 1.5 million deaths
and tuberculosis killed
900,000 individuals.
Last year, scientists from
the University of Chicago
found that a probiotic
therapy using a common gut
bacteria prevented
sensitization to peanut
allergens – in mice. Now
researchers at the Murdoch
Childrens Research Institute
in Melbourne, Australia,
have shown that a similar
probiotic treatment, this
time involving
Lactobacillus rhamnosus,
has a similar effect, but
this time in children.
"A complete and thorough
audit of the Fed will
finally allow the American
people to know exactly how
their money is being spent
by Washington," Paul said in
a statement announcing the
legislation Tuesday. "The
Fed's currently operates
under a cloak of secrecy and
it has gone on for too long.
The American people have a
right to know what the
Federal Reserve is doing
with our nation's money
supply."
"We had to learn that wind
energy development was the
means to an end, and once
things leveled out we are
still much better off than
when we began."
M2 event observed.
Solar
Activity Forecast: Solar
activity is expected to be
low with a chance for
M-class flares and a slight
chance for an X-class flare
on days one, two, and three
(30 Jan, 31 Jan, 01 Feb).
The geomagnetic field is
expected to be at quiet to
minor storm levels on days
one and two (30 Jan, 31 Jan)
and quiet to active levels
on day three (01 Feb).
Protons greater than 10 Mev
have a slight chance of
crossing threshold on days
two and three (31 Jan, 01
Feb).
A new study shows that more
than half the people in some
developing countries could
become newly at risk for
malnutrition if
crop-pollinating animals —
like bees — continue to
decline.
-
Intermittent fasting,
which focuses on
restricting your eating
to a small time window,
can have a beneficial
effect on a wide array
of biological functions
and systems
-
Time-restricted eating
can both prevent and
reverse obesity and
related metabolic
dysfunction
-
Mice restricted to
eating within an eight-,
nine-, or 12-hour window
remained thin and
healthy, even when
cheating on weekends,
and/or eating a
high-sugar diet
-
Chloride levels
increased substantially
in 84 percent of US
urban streams tested,
largely as a result of
de-icing activity on
roadways
-
Elevated chloride levels
may inhibit plant
growth, impair
reproduction in marine
life and reduce the
diversity of organisms
in streams
-
Moose, elk, and birds
may also be harmed by
salt on roadways, and
even soil health is
adversely impacted
An incredible image,
released Wednesday by the
European Space Agency,
depicts a faint nebula —
cometary globule CG4 —
located about 1300
light-years away from Earth
in the constellation of
Puppis.
The Keystone bill’s
three-week gallop included
votes on more than 40
amendments, but the bill
still lacks the support in
both the Senate and the
House to override a
presidential veto.
The Supreme Court has
decided to hear an important
property rights case
involving raisin farmers who
aren’t allowed to keep and
sell their own crop. Every
year, their raisins are
seized by a Depression-era
bureaucratic organization
called the Raisin
Administrative Committee, as
Damon Root noted yesterday
(January 16, 2015).
The question for 2015 is not
IF the booming solar PV will
grow but just how much more
marketshare it can gain.
The show aims to
"educate and entertain
viewers, empower Indigenous
peoples, and bridge culture
gaps," and the premiere
episode (below) takes on an
issue that touches all these
concepts, just in time for
the Super Bowl: the
controversy over the name
and mascot of the NFL's
Washington Redskins...
While I have no interest
in parsing President Obama’s
performance here, his strong
statement on climate change
is worth noting for water
and wastewater
professionals. “No
challenge" poses a greater
threat to future generations
than climate change,” he
said. It was perhaps the
most quotable moment of the
night, and an emboldened
stance on what is considered
a controversial topic. But
is it really
controversial?
Let’s say it’s partially
controversial. There’s a
near-universal consensus,
even among politicians, that
the earth is warming. The
Senate recently voted 98-1
in favor of an amendment
stating that “climate change
is real and is not a hoax.”
Research from universities,
regulators and industry
experts increasingly
demonstrates that the Dan
River is in good condition
one year after a coal ash
spill at the Dan River Steam
Station . ..
Since the spill, Duke Energy
has conducted a major
operation, under the
direction of the U.S. EPA ,
to excavate and monitor coal
ash in the river.
A new Duke University-led
study finds that most
climate models likely
underestimate the degree of
decade-to-decade variability
occurring in mean surface
temperatures as Earth’s
atmosphere warms. The models
also provide inconsistent
explanations of why this
variability occurs in the
first place...
“The inconsistencies we
found among the models are a
reality check showing we may
not know as much as we
thought we did,” said lead
author Patrick T. Brown, a
Ph.D. student in climatology
at Duke’s Nicholas School of
the Environment.
When the New England
Patriots and the Seattle
Seahawks face on Sunday, it
will also showcase new
technology as the first
Superbowl game played under
LED lighting. According to
the makers, the new
high-performance LED stadium
lights built by Cree and
Ephesus Lighting will
provide better lighting for
less energy.
Researchers at the Stanford
University School of
Medicine have developed a
new procedure to increase
the length of human
telomeres. This increases
the number of times cells
are able to divide,
essentially making the cells
many years younger. This not
only has useful applications
for laboratory work, but may
point the way to treating
various age-related
disorders – or even muscular
dystrophy.
What started out looking
like the ultimate challenge
between brains and brawn
turned out to be a day to
forget for one party, and a
day recorded in the record
books for the other.
There is solar, and there is
solar. Centralized solar
generation — large fields of
solar panels feeding
electricity into the grid —
must be distinguished from
distributed generation, that
is, photovoltaics on
rooftops. At the public
policy level, the
distinction between the two
options matters, but this,
unfortunately, receives
insufficient attention.
Saudi Arabia on Tuesday
beheaded two more of its
citizens and a Pakistani,
continuing the strictest
punishment under new King
Salman.
Does it seem like the buzz
over transportation is all
electric, all the time? If
not, it soon could be, as
the sale of four-wheel
electric drive and
electric-assisted commercial
vehicles is expected to jump
tenfold and innovation in
engine-powered two-wheeled
transportation is also
accelerating.
US crude exports rose
126,000 b/d to a record
502,000 b/d in November, US
Energy Information
Administration data showed
Thursday.
The prior
record high of 455,000 b/d
was set in March of 1957.
EIA data goes back to 1920.
This time last year, EIA
data shows, US exports were
just 253,000 b/d.
In a statement, officials at
the Pilgrim nuclear power
plant in Plymouth said it
stopped operating in
accordance with procedure
after distribution lines
that send power from the
plant to the electric grid
became inoperable because of
the weather.
-
The flu vaccine has been
found to be largely
ineffective this season.
-
There has been a measles
outbreak tied to
Disneyland in California
in which many vaccinated
people have nonetheless
contracted the illness.
Health authorities had
previously declared
measles eradicated from
the U.S.
-
There was a fast-moving
outbreak of mumps cases
among pro hockey
players, many of whom
had been vaccinated.
In light of nuclear
negotiations with Iran, the
general conflagration in the
Middle East, Russia’s march
and a whole host of other
chaotic situations
worldwide, recently we sat
down with an expert on
national security, foreign
policy and in particular
nuclear proliferation, John
Wohlstetter, to discuss the
gravest threats to the
American homeland.
January 27, 2015
Greek left-wing leader
Alexis Tsipras was sworn in
on Monday as the prime
minister of a new hardline,
anti-bailout government
determined to face down
international lenders and
end nearly five years of
tough economic measures.
Anadarko Petroleum Corp.
today paid a record $5.15
billion settlement to the
U.S. government and others –
the largest environmental
enforcement recovery payment
ever obtained in a lawsuit
by the Department of
Justice.
As a result, more than
$4.4 billion will be
distributed to fund
environmental cleanups and
to settle environmental
claims across the country
Snow-covered icebergs
dominate the scene near the
shore of the Antarctic
Peninsula, the northernmost
part of the icy south polar
region. Between the sun, the
water and icy peaks, the
beauty can be quite
literally blinding.
“Everything is reflective
and everything’s
white,” recalls
filmmaker Alex Cornell,...
Satellite images have
revealed that a remote
Arctic ice cap has thinned
by more than 50 metres since
2012 – about one sixth of
its original thickness – and
that it is now flowing 25
times faster.
Australia faced a rise in
temperature of potentially
more than 5 degrees celsius
(41 degrees fahrenheit) by
the end of the century, an
increase that would outpace
global warming worldwide,
the country's national
science agency said on
Tuesday.
In its most comprehensive
analysis yet of the impacts
of climate change, the
Commonwealth Scientific and
Industrial Research
Organization (CSIRO) painted
a worst-case scenario of a
rise of up to 5.1 degrees
celsius by 2090 if there are
no actions taken to cut
greenhouse emissions.
The Baker Hughes rotary rig
count fell 43 this week to
1,633 total oil and gas rigs
working on land and offshore
for the week ending Friday
-- the lowest the count has
been since August 2010.
Of the total US rig
count, 1,579 rigs -- nearly
97% -- are working on land
or inland waters, the lowest
number since July 2010 and
also down 43 from a week
ago, the oil services
company said Friday in its
weekly data.
It's time for American
citizens to start using
their brains and turn around
the country's fortunes,
especially when it comes to
immigration, education and
jobs, retired Maryland
neurosurgeon and potential
presidential candidate Ben
Carson told the Iowa Freedom
Foundation Saturday.
“Today, I bring a
simple message from the
tribes of the 21st Century:
We must tear down barriers
to growth, simplify
regulations that are
limiting opportunities, and
acknowledge that tribes have
the capability as
governments to oversee our
own affairs,” said
Cladoosby.
-
Excessive amounts of
sugar in your diet has
toxic effects, and
processed fructose is
far worse, from a
metabolic standpoint,
than refined sugar
-
Female mice fed a diet
that contained 25
percent of calories from
corn syrup had nearly
twice the death rate
compared to those fed a
diet in which 25 percent
of calories came from
table sugar
-
Mice fed corn syrup also
had 26 percent fewer
offspring than their
sugar-fed counterparts
For centuries, shamans and
healers have been using
psychedelics in sacramental
rituals in the belief that
the substances have healing
qualities and can lead to
meaningful spiritual
experiences. It turns out
contemporary science may
back these ancient claims.
The Center for Disease
Control released a study on
January 6 about U.S. deaths
from alcohol poisoning based
on two years of death
certificate data, 2010 to
2012. It contains some
expected results and some
not so expected.
The result that most
surprised the CDC was that
the majority of people who
poison themselves with
alcohol are not teenagers.
Of the six people per day
who died from excessive
alcohol, only 5.1 percent
were between the ages of 15
and 24. Those under lawful
drinking age (21) were only
2 percent.
On March 4, the Supreme
Court will hear oral
arguments in King v.
Burwell. Obamacare’s plain
text says that its
taxpayer-funded subsidies
can only be paid out through
state-based exchanges, yet
the Obama administration has
been paying out through
federal exchanges as well.
If the Supreme Court rules
in King that Obama has been
distributing subsidies in
violation of Obamacare’s
written text—that he has
been paying them out
illegally—millions of
Americans across the 36
states with federal
exchanges will lose their
subsidies and, in most
cases, their health
insurance. The case should
be decided shortly before
July 4, and the way in which
Republicans prepare for the
ruling will go a long way
toward showing how genuine
their commitment to
repealing and replacing
Obamacare is.
While the whole world is
aware of the many human
fatalities from the Ebola
epidemic in Western Africa,
you may not realize that the
disease has claimed hundreds
of thousands of other
victims in the area.
Unfortunately, Ebola is
simultaneously working its
way through gorilla and
chimpanzee populations with
no sign of stopping. In the
past 25 years, Ebola has
wiped out 33% of all apes,
reports the Daily Beast.
The harvesting of wood to
meet the heating and cooking
demands for billions of
people worldwide has less of
an impact on global forest
loss and carbon dioxide
(CO2) emissions than
previously believed,
according to a new Yale-led
study.
An unknown signal
emitting from space was
detected by astronomers live
for the first time ever,
scientists announced in a
journal this month.
The radio burst was
detected on May 15, 2014 by
astronomers in Australia but
just reported in the Monthly
Notices of the Royal
Astronomical Society, Fox
News reported.
The U.S. Golden Field Office
has announced that it
expects to award a
discretionary cooperative
agreement grant to
accelerate adoption of
hydrogen and fuel cell
technologies with specific
interest in mobile hydrogen
refuelers, fuel cell powered
range extenders for light
duty hybrid electric
vehicles and a Communities
of Excellence topic
featuring hydrogen and fuel
cell technologies.
"Somewhere far away from
us, people have no
understanding that their
demand for cheap
electricity, air
conditioning and lights 24
hours a day have contributed
to the imbalance of this
very delicate place." —
Nicole Horseherder, Navajo,
Black Mesa
- Comments
were made by professor
of meteorology, Richard
Lindzen
- 'Instead of
saying, oh, we were
wrong, they get more
fanatical,' he said
- He says 70%
of the Earth is ocean,
and measuring its
temperature tricky
- He has
previously blasted the
IPCC for blaming humans
for a global warming
trend - and then
glossing over the
warming slowdown
Harvard University has
quietly become one of the
biggest grape growers in
California's
drought-stricken Paso Robles
wine region, securing water
well drilling permits to
feed its vineyards days
before lawmakers banned new
pumping, according to
records reviewed by Reuters.
-
Agriculture uses the
majority, 70 percent, of
the world’s fresh water
supply
-
Large-scale factory
farms not only deplete
aquifers of valuable
drinking water, they
also pollute what little
water remains
-
Modern agriculture is
also responsible for the
destruction of topsoil.
If current rates of
degradation continue,
all of the topsoil
around the world will be
gone in 60 years
After more than three years
of oil prices at between
$100 and $110 per barrel,
prices collapsed by nearly
50 percent in late 2014
after OPEC refused to cut
production. Combined with
modest oil demand growth
since 2010, restored
production in countries like
Libya and Iraq and the huge
increase of U.S. light tight
oil production, OPEC's
decision has contributed to
a massive supply/demand
imbalance and the resulting
price drop, according to
Ernst & Young.
Freedom Partners, the
political operation run by
the Koch brothers, has
budgeted $889 million for
its political activities in
the 2016 election, donors
were told at the group's
meeting in California over
the weekend.
Kurdish fighters backed by
intense U.S.-led airstrikes
pushed the Islamic State
group entirely out of a key
Syrian town on Monday,
marking a major defeat for
the extremists whose hopes
for an easy victory when
they pushed into Kobani last
year dissolved into a
bloody, costly and
months-long siege.
The Florida Public Service
Commission (PSC) has been
attracting attention in the
past few months. But it is
probably attention
commissioners would rather
not have. A Florida Senate
bill has been introduced to
limit the perceived
influence utilities have on
commission decisions, along
with other
commission-related
provisions.
As debate intensifies
over oil and gas drilling,
most states with frackable
reserves are already
fracking—or making moves to
do so in the near future.
That translates to 22
states, from California to
Texas, Michigan to West
Virginia, currently
employing this
high-intensity form of
energy extraction, and five
others may soon follow.
With a major solar plant on
the way and the possibility
of another, Buffalo, New
York is emerging as a solar
manufacturing powerhouse.
Pallid sturgeon come from a
genetic line that has lived
on this planet for tens of
millions of years; yet it
has been decades since
anyone has documented any of
the enormous fish
successfully producing young
that survive to adulthood in
the upper Missouri River
basin.
In a long-term field study,
U.S. Geological Survey
(USGS) and Virginia Tech
scientists have found that
changes in geochemistry from
the natural breakdown of
petroleum hydrocarbons
underground can promote the
chemical release
(mobilization) of naturally
occurring arsenic into
groundwater.i This
geochemical change can
result in potentially
significant arsenic
groundwater contamination.
President Obama continued
his war on private and
nonprofit colleges this week
with his State of the Union
proposal to end the tax free
status of withdrawals from
529 college funds. As a
result, were his bill to
pass, taxpayers would face
full taxation when they take
their money out to pay for
their children's' college.
President's decree calls for
'science-based decision
making' as the Arctic warms
twice as rapidly as rest of
U.S.
“Alaska’s National Wildlife
Refuge is an incredible
place – pristine,
undisturbed,” said President
Obama in a YouTube video
announcing his
administration’s plan to
protect core areas of the
refuge, including its
Coastal Plain, as
Wilderness, the highest
level of protection
available to public lands.
When will the federal
government start connecting
the dots? Between a toxic,
industrial agriculture
system and the decline not
only of public health, but
of our planet’s health?
Not yet, apparently.
M1 event observed.
Solar
activity is expected to be
low with a chance for
M-class flares on days one,
two, and three (27 Jan, 28
Jan, 29 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at unsettled
to active levels on day one
(27 Jan), quiet to unsettled
levels on day two (28 Jan)
and unsettled levels on day
three (29 Jan).
-
Evidence clearly shows
that refined sugar is a
primary factor causing
not just obesity, but
also chronic yet
preventable disease
-
In one clinical trial,
test subjects who
consumed high fructose
corn syrup (HFCS)
developed higher risk
factors for
cardiovascular disease
in just two weeks
-
On average, sugar makes
up 15 percent of total
calories consumed.
Overloading your liver
with more sugar than it
can safely metabolize
leads to chronic
metabolic disease
Poor safety, defects may
have added risks to pipeline
that spilled up to 40,000
gallons of oil into the
Yellowstone River.
Extreme "La Nina" weather
events that cool the Pacific
Ocean and can disrupt
weather worldwide will
paradoxically happen almost
twice as often in a warming
world, an international team
of scientists said on
Monday.
When you eat refined
processed sugars, they
trigger production of your
brain’s natural opioids — a
key ingredient in the
addiction process. Your
brain essentially becomes
addicted to stimulating the
release of its own opioids
as it would to morphine or
heroin.
Much of how we understand
the way our universe is
built hangs on
constants—physical
measurements that describe,
for example, the charge and
mass of the electron. These
quantities are the
foundation for basic
theoretical equations, and
they don’t change. Except,
scientists just found out
that the most famous
constant, the speed of
light, isn’t quite as
constant as we thought.
I've learned that even when
I have pains, I don't have
to be one. Age 82
The UAE will continue to
push ahead with its planned
oil sector projects despite
lower crude oil prices,
energy minister Suhail
al-Mazrouei said Monday.
"Because of what is
happening in terms of
commodity prices, people say
companies should rethink
what they are investing in.
I disagree. I think
investment in infrastructure
and upgrading infrastructure
has to continue,"
al-Mazrouei said at a
conference in Abu Dhabi.
Whistleblowing site
WikiLeaks on Monday accused
Google of handing over the
emails and electronic data
of its senior staff to the
US authorities without
providing notification until
almost three years later.
Google was apparently acting
in response to warrants
issued by the US Department
of Justice, which is
investigating WikiLeaks for
publishing hundreds of
thousands of classified
military and diplomatic
files.
January 23, 2015
Most people expect the
power to be there when they
flip the switch, and they
probably don't want to pay
much for it.
But the reality is
consumers may be unaware of
factors that affect the cost
of electricity, a retiring
industry veteran said.
As nations face problems
ranging from pollution to
scarcity, the politics of
water resources have become
complicated—but that is
nothing new.
The Pacific Institute, a
think tank, has created a
5,000-year timeline of water
conflicts, including
religious accounts. It shows
that water politics have
been messy since the
beginning.
Algerian Prime Minister
Abdelmalek Sellal said late
Wednesday he expects the oil
price to fall further,
adding that Algeria is now
in a state of economic
"crisis."
Bakery owner Marjorie Silva
stands for a photo inside
her own Azucar Bakery, in
Denver. Silva is facing a
discrimination complaint
with Colorado’s Civil Rights
Division because she refused
to write hateful words about
gays on a cake for a
customer.
The boss of oil giant BP Bob
Dudley has said that oil
prices could remain low for
up to three years. He added
that could send UK petrol
prices below £1 per litre.
Wind farms are popping up
all over the world with the
lure of cleaner electric
generation and a lessened
dependency on fossil fuels.
Renewable energy, including
solar, hydroelectric,
geothermal, and biomass, is
all the rage in the race to
combat climate change. So,
why is wind so often
contested amongst the
general population?
Rising threats from
climate change and nuclear
arsenals prompted the
scientists who maintain the
Doomsday Clock, a symbolic
countdown to global
catastrophe, to move it two
minutes closer to midnight
on Thursday, its first shift
in three years.
The Doomsday Clock,
devised by the Chicago-based
Bulletin of the Atomic
Scientists, now stands at
three minutes to midnight,
or doomsday.
Drone vendors got special
exhibition space just for
them at this year's Consumer
Electronics Show, a
testament to the public's
growing interest in the new
product category and its
awareness about pending
regulations to both allow
and control in the use of
unmanned aircraft in U.S.
skies.
The first batch of an
experimental vaccine against
Ebola is on its way to
Liberia.
The shipment will be the
first potentially
preventative medicine to
reach one of the hardest hit
countries.
But experts say that,
with Ebola cases falling, it
may be difficult to
establish whether the jab
offers any protection
against the virus.
An inclusive plan for energy
subsidy reform is to be
implemented within five
years and includes
protecting the poor, said
Egyptian President
Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi at the
World Future Energy Summit
(WEFS) in Abu Dhabi on
Monday. The president
travelled to the United Arab
Emirates on Sunday for a
two-day trip to attend the
summit and meet UAE
officials.
A U.S. federal court has
ruled for the first time
that manure from livestock
facilities can be regulated
as solid waste, a decision
hailed by environmentalists
as opening the door to
potential legal challenges
against facilities across
the country.
The energy industry has
earnestly been trying to
come up with ways to recruit
and train skilled employees
to replace the many who are
now retiring or nearing
retirement age. Recognizing
an opportunity to provide
well-paying jobs, many
academic institutions are
doing their best to answer
the call. Jefferson
Community College (JCC) in
Watertown, New York is one
of those institutions.
Climate change threatens
the genetic diversity of the
world's food supply, and
saving crops and animals at
risk will be crucial for
preserving yields and
adapting to wild weather
patterns, a U.N. policy
paper said on Monday.
Certain wild crops -
varieties not often
cultivated by today's
farmers - could prove more
resilient to a warming
planet than some popular
crop breeds, the U.N. Food
and Agriculture Organisation
(FAO) said.
But these wild strains
are among those most
threatened by climate
change.
For
many electric vehicle (EV)
drivers, it’s only a matter
of time before this idea
pops up: Why don’t I install
PV modules so I can run my
car on sunshine?
Our
research suggests that
approximately one in three
EV owners has a home
grid-tied PV system.
Hawaiian Electric Co. is
expected to file a proposal
Tuesday with the state
Public Utilities Commission
to cut nearly in half the
net energy metering
reimbursements offered to
customers with rooftop
photovoltaic systems.
Steve Klein is an advocate
for wind and solar power,
but as chief executive of
Snohomish County Public
Utility District he also has
plenty of experience with
their drawbacks.
On December 17, an
indigenous Peruvian woman
and her family, after
suffering violent beatings
and threats, won a lawsuit
filed against her by a
multinational mining
corporation that tried to
force her off her land,
claiming the family had
"invaded" the territory the
company wanted for an open
pit gold mine.
Boston's aging pipeline
network leaks about $90
million worth of natural gas
each year, marking a
sizeable financial loss and
a threat to the environment,
according to a study
released on Thursday by
Harvard researchers.
"The Bushehr Nuclear
Power Plant is different
from the power plants of
other countries since this
power plant is the symbol of
a nation's resistance,"
Rouhani said.
"The construction of this
power plant and making it
operational showed the world
that should a nation have a
will to attain a goal, it
would take steps in that
direction, stand up for its
rights and attain its goal."
The Permanent Representative
of Japan to the IAEA,
Ambassador Mitsuru Kitano
signed and delivered the
instrument of acceptance to
IAEA Director General Yukiya
Amano on 15 January 2015.
Canadian company behind the
Keystone pipeline files
eminent domain proceedings
against 90 Nebraska
landowners
Last year was Earth's
hottest on record in new
evidence that people are
disrupting the climate by
burning fossil fuels that
release greenhouse gases
into the air, two U.S.
government agencies said on
Friday.
Low oil prices combined with
continuing low interest
rates in wealthy countries
represent an ideal
opportunity for investments
in low-carbon infrastructure
while making it easier to
cut fossil fuel subsidies
and introduce a tax on
carbon in an effort to slow
climate change. That is
according to members of the
Global Commission on the
Economy and Climate who
spoke at the recent World
Economic Forum.
For firms installing
solar-power systems on homes
and businesses in Montana,
the market is limited -- but
a coalition of odd political
bedfellows at the 2015
Legislature wants to expand
it.
Rescuers are working
diligently to save birds who
are being killed by a
“mysterious goo” that has
appeared in the San
Francisco Bay, while
officials remain perplexed
about what the substance is
and where it came from.
Since affected birds
began turning up in distress
on shores last Friday, the
International Bird Rescue
(IBR) has taken in more than
300 birds covered by the
unknown substance at its San
Francisco Bay center located
in Fairfield, while wildlife
officials estimate that at
least another 200 have been
found dead
Diminishing financial
returns for utilities have
put at risk the ability of
the electricity sector in
OECD markets to raise the
estimated $7.6 trillion in
investments needed by 2040
to meet energy policy
objectives, according to a
new report from the World
Economic Forum.
This investment is needed
to simultaneously
decarbonize the sector while
maintaining energy security.
About 20 percent of the
world's fishing catch is
taken illegally by poachers,
experts estimate, but a new
satellite tracking system
launched on Wednesday aims
to crack down on the
industrial-scale theft known
as "pirate fishing."
The media broadly praised
President Obama's sixth
State of the Union address
last night as a "confident"
and "ambitious" speech. But
even his traditional allies
in the press could not
ignore the fact that it was
a confident speech
completely disconnected from
the real world.
Two new reports from the
Energy Department's National
Renewable Energy Laboratory
(NREL) examine the economic
options customers face when
deciding how to finance
commercial or residential
solar energy systems. NREL
analysts found that
businesses that use low-cost
financing to purchase a
photovoltaic (PV) system and
homeowners who use
solar-specific loans can
save up to 30 percent
compared with consumers who
lease a PV system through a
conventional third-party
owner.
NYMEX March crude settled
$1.47 lower at $46.31/b
Thursday after US Energy
Information Administration
data showed a
10.1-million-barrel increase
last week in US commercial
crude stocks.
A
weaker euro pushed ICE March
Brent 51 cents lower at
$48.52/b.
The U.S. may not have “risen
from recession” quite as
rousingly as President
Barack Obama suggested in
his State of the Union
speech Tuesday night. Seven
years after that severe
downturn began, household
income hasn’t recovered and
healthy job growth is
complicated by the poor
quality, and pay, of many of
those jobs.
Oil prices rose on the
news of the death of Saudi
Arabia’s King Abdullah
Thursday, but the king’s
death is not expected to
change the course of oil
prices over the next several
months.
The price of U.S. crude
was up $1.07, or 2.3
percent, to $47.38 a barrel
in after-hours trading.
Brent crude, an
international benchmark, was
up 1 percent to $49 a
barrel.
Water reuse, one of the
most promising hopes for
combatting scarcity, is
running up against a major
problem: There just isn't
enough of it.
When Caltrans, the
California agency
responsible for highways,
tried to reduce the amount
of water it used for roadway
landscaping, water reuse was
a key element of the
plan. But the challenge has
been finding a sufficient
amount of recycled water for
its projects,..
M1 event observed.
Solar activity is expected
to be low with a chance for
M-class flares on days one,
two, and three (23 Jan, 24
Jan, 25 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at unsettled
to active levels on days one
and two (23 Jan, 24 Jan) and
unsettled to minor storm
levels on day three (25
Jan).
Humanity should use
planetary resources with
care
Can the world continue
expanding its use of
renewable resources at an
increasing rate? Most likely
not. Using a data set of
over 25 resources
researchers at the Helmholtz
Centre for Environmental
Research (UFZ), Yale
University and Michigan
State University demonstrate
that several key resources
have recently passed, at
around the same time, their
"peak-rate year" -- the
maximum increase year.
‘Meltdown’ in GOP amid fears
that Republican-controlled
Congress’s pro-life
priorities risk alienating
millennial women
he long-awaited study,
"Connectivity of Streams and
Wetlands to Downstream
Waters," released today by
the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), provides the
scientific underpinning for
the proposed Clean Water
Protection Rule (CWPR), or
'Waters of the U.S.' rule,
which is due to be finalized
by the Agency this spring.
Senators squared off with
the Obama administration
Wednesday about whether new
sanctions would scuttle
nuclear talks with Iran as
House Speaker John Boehner
invited Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
to address Congress about
threats from Tehran.
It does not take long to
find a news story about the
growth spurt solar power is
enjoying, driven as it is by
the increasing popularity of
rooftop solar and other
installations, as well as
overall expectations among
consumers and regulators for
more renewable, sustainable
energy. A jobs census report
from The Solar Foundation
(TSF) confirms that the
industry employed 173,807
Americans in 2014, an
increase in excess of more
than 31,000 jobs over last
year.
Solar panels imported from
China and Taiwan harm
manufacturers, a U.S. trade
panel ruled, a decision that
will trigger tariffs on the
renewable-energy components.
..
The ITC panel decides only
if U.S. makers are being
harmed by the imported
products. The Commerce
Department had already set
subsidy rates as high as
49.79 percent on imports
from China, and dumping
rates that averaged 52.13
percent for most importers
for China.
SolarWorld, the largest U.S.
solar manufacturer for
nearly 40 years, commended
the U.S. International Trade
Commission for its votes
this morning determining
that imports of solar
products from China and
Taiwan are injuring U.S.
manufacturers. Today’s votes
were the final steps in the
company’s second set of
trade cases and SolarWorld’s
tenth consecutive victory in
those cases. The commission
voted 5-0 with regard to
China and 4-1 with regard to
Taiwan.
Sitting around the
fireplace with a hot
beverage is as good a place
as any to tell stories.
Hydraulic fracturing
functions as a double-edged
sword: It permits the
extraction of oil and
natural gas in an
unconventional reservoir
with low permeability but
also carries significant
environmental risk.
A drone loaded with
packages containing
methamphetamine after it
crashed into a
supermarket parking lot
in Tijuana, Mexico. (AP
Photo/Secretaria de
Seguridad Pública
Municipal de Tijuana)
A drug-toting drone has
crashed into a supermarket
parking lot in Mexico, a
couple of miles from the
U.S. border.
Turkey's current natural
gas and electricity prices
are the cheapest among the
28 EU countries and are at
the same levels as in 2008,
Turkey's Energy and Natural
Resources Minister
said Tuesday...
Yildiz explained that as a
ministry they have given
priority to renewable
resources to decrease
natural gas imports. The
country aims to add 110
thousands megawatts to its
power capacity by 2023 and
targets to meet 30 percent
of its power from renewable
resources.
US nuclear power plants in
2014 had an average capacity
factor of 91.8%, the highest
level ever recorded, after a
series of extended repair
outages ended and plants
shortened the time reactors
shut for refueling, the
Nuclear Energy Institute
said Thursday.
Today’s $490 million
release, the third such
payment of this amount since
Dec. 10, was agreed to by
the Obama administration
under the parameters of
another extension in
negotiations over Tehran’s
contested nuclear program
that was inked in November.
20-year
balance useful life with
proper maintenance
As the Earth warms and
glaciers all over the world
begin to melt, researchers
and public policy experts
have focused largely on how
all of that extra water will
contribute to sea level
rise.
But another impact
lurking in that inevitable
scenario is carbon.
More specifically, what
happens to all of the
organic carbon found in
those glaciers when they
melt?
Yemen's President resigned
Thursday night shortly after
his prime minister and the
Cabinet stepped down:
seismic changes in the
country's political scene
that come just one day after
the government and Houthi
rebels struck a tentative
peace deal meant to end days
of turmoil.
January 20, 2015
-
In the past three flu
seasons, the CDC rated
the flu vaccine’s
overall effectiveness
between 47 and 62
percent; some experts
have measured it at 0 to
7 percent
-
When children get a flu
shot every year, it can
interfere with healthy
immune responses and
make them more likely to
get influenza in certain
flu seasons
-
If you got a flu shot
this year, it does not
protect you from the
most common influenza A
subtype making people
sick
Have you visited your doctor
lately? Imagine if there was
no choice but to be examined
by candlelight, or worse,
with no light at all - the
doctor might have missed
something. That's the
scenario for 1 billion
people around the world
whose health clinics lack
electricity.
A stormier
Arctic could fast-track the
greenhouse gas into the
atmosphere, potentially
accelerating global warming.
"Significant quantities of
methane are escaping the
East Siberian Shelf as a
result of the degradation of
submarine permafrost," says
Natalia Shakhova of the
University of Alaska in
Fairbanks. She and her team
collected data – at a great
cost – to show that vast
areas are releasing plumes
of methane gas, which is
escaping into the
atmosphere.
BP Plc will face a
maximum fine of $13.7
billion under the Clean
Water Act for its Gulf of
Mexico oil spill, several
billion less than feared,
after a judge found on
Thursday the size of the
spill was smaller than the
U.S. government claimed.
The ruling by federal
magistrate Carl Barbier put
the size of the worst
offshore spill in U.S.
history in 2010 at 3.19
million barrels.
Complacency...
“The tragedy of life is
often not in our failure,
but rather in our
complacency; not in our
doing too much, but rather
in our doing too little; not
in our living above our
ability, but rather in our
living below our
capacities.”
The year 2014 ranks as
Earth’s warmest since record
keeping began in 1880,
according to two separate
analyses by scientists with
two U.S. agencies – the
National Aeronautics and
Space Administration, NASA,
and National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration,
NOAA.
The 10 warmest years on
record, with the exception
of 1998, have now occurred
since 2000.
Astronomers happened upon
“fast radio burst” phenomena
in 2007 while reviewing data
from the Parkes Radio
Telescope. There was only
one problem: they were only
able to see the newly
discovered occurrences long
after they had occurred.
-
About 75 percent of
Americans have
flame-retardant
chemicals in their
bodies
-
Flame retardants also
contaminate the world’s
oceans, and when fish
eat plastic contaminated
with flame retardants
they show signs of
endocrine disruption and
tumor formation
Like a thousand other
farmers across the US, Kirk
Bair is a farmer looking for
ways to grow food
economically and with as
little labor as possible –
but what are the
moral implications of
planting food you are aware
is toxic, and selling it to
your friends and neighbors?
Is Bair in the right for
planting GMO seed, even if
conventional seed is hard to
come by?
The CRA allows for Congress
to review and disapprove
rules submitted by federal
agencies before they go into
effect. However, in order to
disapprove a rule, Congress
has to pass a joint
resolution in both the House
and Senate.
Just as in Soviet
days, state television
does not report facts,
it conceals them. The
official picture is
dominated by the war in
Ukraine (fuelled by
America), Ukraine’s
economic collapse
(ignored by America),
and Russia’s
achievements in sport,
ballet and other spheres
(envied by America).
Most Russian media are
largely willing to toe the
line drawn by the Russian
government (with one major,
persecuted exception), but
Russian economic woes are
plentiful and serious.
That’s why I was intrigued
by a
recent study in the
journal Psychological
Science on the voice of
authority. Scientists wanted
to hear if people’s voices
change in predictable ways
when they are put into
positions of power. Plus,
they wondered if listeners
could detect those changes.
-
Avocados are an
excellent source of
heart-healthy
monounsaturated fat that
is easily burned for
energy, while being low
in fructose. They also
provide close to 20
essential nutrients,
including high levels of
potassium
-
Research shows that
avocados can help
improve lipid profiles,
and can lower LDL
cholesterol twice as
effectively as a diet of
equal fat ratio without
the inclusion of avocado
-
Healthy fats, both from
avocado and other
sources, are also vital
for optimal brain
function, and for the
prevention of
degenerative brain
disorders like
Alzheimer’s
In the midst of the
California rainy season,
scientists are embarking on
a field campaign designed to
improve the understanding of
the natural and human-caused
phenomena that determine
when and how the state gets
its precipitation. They will
do so by studying
atmospheric rivers,
meteorological events that
include the famous rainmaker
known as the Pineapple
Express.
Michigan Governor Rick
Snyder is setting his energy
stall out early in the
state's two-year legislative
session, saying he wants to
look into weaning the state
off coal-fired generation.
Currently, Michigan
sources about 50% of its
power from coal-fired
plants, but Snyder told the
Michigan Conservative Energy
Forum Thursday that "now is
the time to look at a
long-term transition away
from coal."
A recent Department of
Justice report announced
that as a percentage of the
population, Natives are more
likely than any other race
to be shot by police. The
Kanosh Band of Paiutes are
calling for attention to the
October 2012 shooting of
Corey Kanosh, a 35-year-old
Paiute man, who was shot by
Millard County Deputy Dale
Josse. Kanosh was the
unarmed passenger in a car
...
Monsanto sells soybean seeds
coated in neonicotinoids (a
class of pesticides directly
linked to the mass die-off
of honeybees) under pretense
of helping farmers increase
their yields.
But
according to the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), pre-treating
soybean seeds with neonics
doesn’t deliver on that
promise. And now, new
evidence suggests that not
only do pretreated soybean
seeds not provide any
benefit to farmers, they may
actually cause a decrease
in crop yields.
The Obama Administration
today announced a new goal
to cut methane emissions
from the oil and gas sector
by 40 to 45 percent from
2012 levels by 2025, and a
set of actions to put the
United States on a path to
achieve this goal.
OPEC's decision not to cut
output was driven by Saudi
Arabia, with support from
Kuwait, the UAE and Qatar.
It has not been universally
popular and has been heavily
criticized by Venezuela and
Iran in particular.
State police and Garland
County officers were
apparently looking for a
“miracle” supplement that
claims to help treat cancer
and other illnesses. The
product is not illegal and
can be purchased online, but
the FDA has warned of
serious health concerns
regarding the product.
As I explained recently in
One More ‘Free Lunch’ in
Energy, it always takes more
energy to split water into
hydrogen and oxygen than you
can get back from burning
the hydrogen. But such a
scheme might make sense in
some instances if the
electricity is cheap, or if
the hydrogen is desperately
needed. At times renewable
energy installations may
produce more power than a
home can use or than the
grid can absorb, and it
could be directed into
electrolysis of water to
produce hydrogen for later
consumption. In this way,
the hydrogen is acting like
an energy storage device —
which could then be used to
produce power even when the
sun isn’t shining.
C1 event observed.
Solar activity is expected
to be very low with a chance
for a C-class flares on days
one, two, and three (20 Jan,
21 Jan, 22 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at quiet
levels on days one, two, and
three (20 Jan, 21 Jan, 22
Jan).
Rolls-Royce is introducing
an MTU Onsite Energy
generator set (genset) based
on the new 12, 16 and
18-cylinder versions of the
Series 2000 engine.
Maybe we won't suck up all
of Earth's resources and
destroy our planet just yet.
Scientists say that they
have created solar jet fuel
using just sunlight, water
and carbon dioxide for the
very first time. That's
basically creating fuel from
thin air.
There’s no Stevia in The
Truvia Sweetener, Only Tiny
Amounts of Rebaudioside A.
Truvia barely contains
any
components of the stevia
plant, and certainly none of
the health benefits.
Stevia leaves contain two
sweet compounds, stevioside
and rebaudioside A.
A new study from the
University of Exeter has
found that viruses carried
by commercial bees can jump
to wild pollinator
populations with potentially
devastating effects. The
researchers are calling for
new measures to be
introduced that will prevent
the introduction of diseased
pollinators into natural
environments.
January 16, 2015
The more I learn about the
food system, the more
passion grows inside me to
change it. What I am about
to share with you will have
you gasping for air – it’s
so downright appalling.
There’s a sorry state of
affairs regarding the
approval of new food
ingredients in this country,
and there is a BIG
misconception that the FDA
diligently reviews and
approves them all.
The Wild Wisdom of Weeds is
the first book on foraging
and edible weeds to focus on
13 plants found all over the
world, each representing an
essential food source as
well as extensive medical
pharmacy and first-aid kit.
Bonaire (pop. 14,500), a
small island off the coast
of Venezuela, is famous for
its beautiful marine reefs,
which are visited by 70,000
tourists every year. What
many of the tourists don’t
realize is that the majority
of the electricity powering
their needs comes from
renewable energy. Yet for
the residents of Bonaire,
the switch from
fossil-fueled to renewable
energy systems has made a
world of difference.
The Obama Administration is
committed to taking
responsible steps to address
climate change and help
ensure a cleaner, more
stable environment for
future generations. As part
of that effort, today, the
Administration is announcing
a new goal to cut methane
emissions from the oil and
gas sector by 40 – 45
percent from 2012 levels by
2025, and a set of actions
to put the U.S. on a path to
achieve this ambitious goal.
Afghan President Ashraf
Ghani has unveiled his unity
cabinet more than three
months after he was sworn
in.
The names of 25 ministers
were read out at a ceremony
in Kabul presided over by Mr
Ghani and government chief
executive Abdullah Abdullah.
The announcement comes
after tortuous negotiations
between the two former
rivals who agreed to work
together following disputed
elections last year.
The cabinet still needs
to be approved by
parliament.
An ammunition manufacturer
in Bradenton, Florida, will
collect more than $15
million from the U.S.
government after a judge
ruled the defense department
infringed on one of the
company’s patents.
While Japan may have added a
tremendous amount of solar
power to its grid in 2014,
it has done so over the
strenuous objections of the
country's electric
utilities. A recently
released estimate said the
country added eight
gigawatts of photovoltaic
solar last year, largely
because of its feed-in
tariff (FIT), which requires
utilities to buy electricity
from renewable energy
producers.
The armed good Samaritan
reportedly opened fire at
one of the suspects when he
attempted to run, striking
glass windows. He was able
to hold the other man at
gunpoint until police
arrived.
Attitude...
“The
greatest discovery of
any generation is that
human beings can alter
their lives by altering
the attitudes of their
minds.”
― Albert Schweitzer
President Obama’s
spokespersons at the White
House and State Department
outdid themselves this week
exemplifying the
administration’s dangerous
self-deception about the
threats we face.
Cameroonian Minister Issa
Tchiroma Bakary says
Cameroon soldier killed,
four wounded in fight in
which 143 militants from
extremist Muslim group Boko
Haram died
One day rainwater systems
will be a standard feature
of building construction
just like indoor plumbing.
It begins with relearning
what is necessary and
normal. We no longer allow
buildings without indoor
plumbing and in the future
it will be the same for
rainwater systems.
With very few oil and gas
resources of their own,
Caribbean islands rely
heavily on imported fuel for
electricity generation,
forcing residents and
businesses to pay some of
the highest energy costs in
the world, which fluctuate
greatly with the global
price of oil
A CIA internal watchdog has
cleared agency officers of
improperly accessing the
computers of members of the
US Senate intelligence
committee.
It said CIA officers
acted reasonably in
searching computers after
concerns they contained
classified material.
The finding contradicts
allegations from lawmakers
and an admission from the
agency's own inspector
general.
Overall cargo tonnage was up
by 19.55 percent, to
11,653,430 tons from last
year's 9,748,078 tons, and
Joe Cappel, the port
authority's vice president
of business development,
noted that all cargo
categories posted increases.
Contrary to what some in the
biotech industry and the
media claim, genetic
engineering of plants is
not the same thing as
selective breeding, or
hybridization. Genetic
modification involves
inserting foreign genetic
material (DNA) into an
organism. Selective breeding
does not.
The Pew Charitable Trusts
and Cogent Reports have
recognized CPS Energy, the
largest municipally owned
electric and gas utility in
the country, for its
leadership in renewable
energy development and
serving as a "customer
champion," respectively.
“We need to pass fundamental
tax reform making our tax
code simpler, flatter,
fairer,” he said Monday at
Heritage Action’s 2015
conservative policy
summit. ”And I’ll tell you,
the single most important
tax reform, we should
abolish the IRS.
Dozens of House Democrats
on Wednesday voted against a
legislative proposal aimed
at ensuring that illegal
immigrants convicted of
domestic violence, sexual
abuse or child abuse are a
priority for deportation.
The vote suggests that
immigration-related issues
trump other traditional
Democratic priorities, such
as efforts to protect people
from sex or violence-related
crimes, especially against
women.
Although the Chinese
government is aiming to
produce 3 million m3/day of
water from desalination by
2020, this could come at a
heavy environmental price,
according to the World
Resources Institute (WRI).
There are all kinds of
“brain-training” programs
out there that promise to
help you stay smart even as
you age. The problem is that
there’s little evidence that
they work — but a lot of
evidence that they are a
waste of money.
President Abdel Fattah al
Sisi recently called on
Muslim clerics to eschew
intolerant teachings as a
counterweight to extremism.
But Egypt's show of
solidarity with Charlie
Hebdo is offset by a new
decree on press freedom.
Scientists at the Energy
Department's National
Renewable Energy Laboratory
(NREL) have developed an
enzyme that could change the
economics of biofuel
conversion by converting
biomass to sugars up to 14
times faster and much
cheaper than competing
catalysts in enzyme
cocktails today.
This enzyme is called
CelA, a cellulase from
the bacterium
Caldicellulosiruptor
bescii, and the
fact that it's from a
bacterium, and not a
fungus, is just one
reason why it is such a
potential game-changer.
Similar to previous
years, in 2013, most of the
toxic chemical waste managed
at industrial facilities in
the U.S. was not released
into the environment,
according to the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency's (EPA) annual Toxics
Release Inventory (TRI)
report. The report,
published today, shows that
approximately 22 billion
pounds— or 84 percent— of
the 26 billion pounds of
toxic chemical waste were
instead managed through the
use of preferred practices
such as recycling.
Ohio officials are pushing
back against a federal plan
that critics say would
contribute to pollution and
algae growth in Lake Erie.
"The Buffalo office of the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
needs to be brought to heel
by federal and state
authorities for continuing
to press ahead with its
inane plans to dump toxic
Cleveland harbor and
Cuyahoga River dredge
directly into Lake Erie,"
the editorial said.
The highly anticipated solar
rebate offered by Florida
Power and Light (FPL) was
opened for application this
morning. After a "sneak"
opening of a minute or so
around the 8:23 mark, the
rebate portal was officially
live at 8:30 AM. Residential
solar rebate funds were all
claimed or allocated within
the first 30 seconds.
Business solar rebates
followed suit and were
completely claimed in the
next 3 minutes.
The owner of the Vermont
Yankee nuclear power plant
says the fuel has been
removed from the reactor and
placed in the spent fuel
pool.
Germany's offshore wind
capacity more than doubled
last year as investors warm
up to the technology,
helping Europe's largest
economy in its ambitious
push into renewable power.
Clean energy investment rose
for the first time in three
years in 2014, overcoming a
slump in oil prices that
unsettled the outlook for
the industry.
New
funds for wind, solar,
biofuels and other
low-carbon energy
technologies gained 16
percent to $310 billion
last year,
A chemical oceanographer at
the University of Rhode
Island who measured organic
pollutants in the air and
water around Lake Erie and
Lake Ontario has found that
airborne emissions are no
longer the primary cause of
the lakes’ contamination.
Instead, most of the lakes’
chemical pollutants come
from sources on land or in
rivers.
Grey Cloud, an
enrolled member of the Crow
Creek Sioux tribe and a
Native American activist who
sang an honor song for the
41 Senators who voted
against the Keystone XL
Pipeline, had his final
court hearing January 12
regarding his case where he
was charged with disruption
of Congress and disorderly
conduct for his actions
But when Pistorious
miraculously woke up, he
claimed that he was “aware
of everything” while trapped
in a vegetative state — even
his mother’s horrific
comment.
Using high-speed cameras,
the researchers observed
that when a raindrop hits a
porous surface, it traps
tiny air bubbles at the
point of contact. As in a
glass of champagne, the
bubbles then shoot upward,
ultimately bursting from the
drop in a fizz of aerosols.
Human activity has pushed
the planet across four of
nine environmental
boundaries, sending the
world towards a "danger
zone", according to a study
published on Thursday in the
journal Science.
Climate change,
biodiversity loss, changes
in land use, and altered
biogeochemical cycles due in
part to fertilizer use have
fundamentally changed how
the planet functions, the
study said.
These changes destabilize
complex interactions between
people, oceans, land and the
atmosphere, said the paper
"Planetary Boundaries:
Guiding human development on
a changing planet" by 18
leading international
researchers.
The international importance
of reducing greenhouse gas
emissions with the use of
clean diesel technology was
highlighted by U.S.
Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton during a special
event hosted by the Climate
and Clean Air Coalition in
Stockholm...
...a system of tubes that
makes consumption of one’s
own urine sensible. What the
handy gadget will do is take
a bunch of pee and convert
roughly 80 percent of it
back into potable water,"
according to the
Examiner.
The other 20 percent is
broken down to hydrogen and
nitrogen byproducts from the
urine. It is stored in fuel
cells, although about half
of it is lost in the process
The United States can
increase the use of
renewable energy in its
energy portfolio from 7.5
percent in 2010 to 27
percent by 2030. That is
according to research from
the International Renewable
Energy Agency (IRENA), who
also says the U.S. can
increase its use of
renewable energy in power
generation from 14 percent
to almost 50 percent by 2030
-- making the United States
the largest renewable energy
user second only to China.
Japan's Cabinet approved the
country's largest ever
defense budget on Wednesday,
including plans to buy
surveillance aircraft,
drones and F-35 fighter jets
to help counter China's
rising assertiveness in the
region.
Boulder suffered a setback
in its municipalization push
Wednesday when a judge
rejected the city's appeal
of a Colorado Public
Utilities Commission ruling
that the city should first
present its plans to that
body before filing for
condemnation of Xcel
Energy's local assets.
A judge has ruled that a
florist who came under fire
after refusing to provide
flowers for a gay couple’s
wedding can be personally
sued and held liable by the
Washington state attorney
general’s office.
As the largest single
chunk of melting snow and
ice in the world, the
massive ice sheet that
covers about 80 percent of
Greenland is recognized as
the biggest potential
contributor to rising sea
levels due to glacial
meltwater.
Until now, however,
scientists’ attention has
mostly focused on the ice
sheet’s aquamarine lakes —
bodies of meltwater that
tend to abruptly drain — and
on monster chunks of ice
that slide into the ocean to
become icebergs.
Astronomers probing the
mystery of where the Earth's
water came from have
eliminated a leading
hypothesis: that water came
to Earth as a result of a
comet.
"Over the past few
months, the European Space
Agency's Rosetta space probe
closely examined the type of
comet that some scientists
theorized could have brought
water to our planet 4
billion years ago. It found
water, but the wrong
kind,"..
The acceleration in global
sea level from the 20th
century to the last two
decades has been
significantly larger than
scientists previously
thought, according to a new
Harvard study...
"Scientists now believe that
most of the world's ice
sheets and mountain glaciers
are melting in response to
rising temperatures." Hay
added. "Melting ice sheets
cause global mean sea level
to rise. Understanding this
contribution is critical in
a warming world."
"Unlined open-air
wastewater pits brimming
with the toxic leftovers of
fracking and other types of
oil and gas development are
threatening California's air
and water quality," Inside
Climate News reported,
citing the study.
The study authors said
they began the report after
researchers had become sick
when they visited wastewater
pits in California's Central
Valley, the news report
said. Clean Water Action and
Earthworks issued the study.
Traditional options for
managing wastewater
treatment use 68 GWh of
energy annually in the
United States alone and up
to two percent of all
electric power goes toward
managing wastewater,
according to Lux Research,
but a new generation of
technology is offering new
solutions.
Xcel Energy media
relations specialist Tom
Hoen helped arrange a recent
tour of the Prairie Island
nuclear plant, which is in
the midst of a $1 billion
upgrade.
Yet when it came time to
pass through the plant's
security gates, Xcel
security guards refused to
grant Hoen access He'd
forgotten to submit his own
name for a background check.
When Ron Johnson looks east,
the twin towers of the
Prairie Island nuclear plant
dominate the skyline. It's a
constant reminder of a
looming threat to his
people.
The Obama Administration
today announced a new goal
to cut methane emissions
from the oil and gas sector
by 40 to 45 percent from
2012 levels by 2025, and a
set of actions to put the
United States on a path to
achieve this goal.
Covanta’s Delaware Valley
energy-from-waste facility
in Chester, Pennsylvania,
has saved 1.3 million
gallons a day (MGD) from
local water supplies by
installing GE’s advanced
RePAK water reuse technology
in the power plant’s cooling
tower. GE honored Covanta
with the Return on
Environment (ROE) award to
recognize the company for
its noteworthy reductions in
water usage.
Public Service Company of
New Mexico has told state
regulators that its original
cost estimates for a plan to
replace power at the
coal-fired San Juan
Generating Station have
increased by more than $1
billion in the last year,
due to corrections in
calculation errors. Those
costs will be passed along
to the company's
half-million customers
through rate payments.
Some polar bear clusters
have slowly moved to islands
north of Canada's mainland
that are retaining the
Arctic ice for longer,
according to a new
scientific study that
predicts the migration,
linked to climate change,
would continue.
More than 100 coal-fired
power plants nationwide
either plan to shut down or
already closed their doors
in 2014, as the market
responds to stricter
environmental regulations,
cheap natural gas and
lackluster electricity
demand growth, according to
a survey done by the Energy
Information Administration .
Over the past two decades,
natural disasters and deadly
diseases have wreaked havoc
around the world, causing
millions of deaths,
disrupting the lives of
billions of people, and
leading to trillions of
dollars in economic damages
and losses. While we cannot
prevent global tragedies
from occurring, what we can
do is to provide resources
to assist in the recovery,
healing, and empowering of
people, especially those
most vulnerable and helpless
living in rural communities
in developing countries.
The government has also set
an interim target of
achieving 50 per cent of its
electricity demand from
renewable power by 2015.
The country seems to be well
under way. During the first
six months of 2014,
renewables generated 32 per
cent more electricity than
any other single source.
C3 event observed. Solar
activity is expected to be
low with a chance for
M-class flares on days one,
two, and three (16 Jan, 17
Jan, 18 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at quiet to
unsettled levels on days one
and two (16 Jan, 17 Jan) and
quiet to active levels on
day three (18 Jan).
More than thirty Senate
Democrats on Monday voted
against the idea of starting
work on a bill to approve
the Keystone oil pipeline,
even though no Democrats at
all objected when a similar
vote came up in November,
when considering the bill
was seen as a way to keep
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.)
in the Senate.
A highly-touted concept
to build small, portable
nuclear power reactors that
could be moved on a railroad
car or truck has made little
progress in recent years,
especially at Savannah River
Site.
Often cited as the future
of nuclear energy, the
development of small modular
reactors has faced funding
challenges and competing
energy sources -- mainly
falling natural gas prices
that jilted the nuclear
industry's comeback --
leaving some questioning if
the mini-reactors will ever
be viable.
People who owe old debts
to the Social Security
Administration are getting a
reprieve this tax season:
The federal government won't
be seizing their tax
refunds.
Social Security
Commissioner Carolyn Colvin
suspended a debt collection
program last spring in which
thousands of people had tax
refunds seized to recoup
overpayments that happened
more than a decade ago.
Members of Congress
complained that some people
were being forced to repay
benefits they received
decades ago as children.
Vermont and a coalition of
47 global investors are
challenging the ExxonMobil
Corporation to adopt
quantitative goals for
reducing total greenhouse
gas emissions from its
products and operations.
While viewing the videos,
the temperature of the
volunteers' hands was
monitored and revealed their
hands became significantly
colder when viewing the cold
water videos, indicating a
"temperature contagion" was
taking place. However, no
change was recorded when
viewing the warm water
videos.
It's that time of year:
Utilities in frosty regions
have kicked off the season
of "let-run" notices.
Utilities send out
notices urging customers to
let a trickle of water run
from the faucet in order to
prevent pipes from freezing.
As reported by CEO Elon
Musk, Tesla Motors will
employ several improvements
that are predicted to
achieve a 40-50% improvement
on range between the
original Roadster and the
new Roadster 3.0 ...
The Obama administration
today announced its landmark
climate change initiative –
the first-ever protection
against carbon emissions
from existing power plants.
Carbon emissions, or
greenhouse gases, cause
climate change and are
already costing Texans
millions of dollars in
damage from drought,
wildfires and extreme heat.
The new standards, which
will reduce carbon emissions
by 30 percent by 2030, will
clean up power plants that
generate most of Texas's
carbon pollution. They will
allow states to give power
plants broad options for
offsetting their emissions
by investing in solar, wind
and other renewable energy
sources
One of the most visible
trends at CES, mostly driven
by IoT momentum, is the
proliferation of appliances
and systems equipped with
image sensors. This Big
Brother fad doesn’t exactly
make you feel warm and
fuzzy, but I found a
camera-embedded fridge that
tickled my foodie fancy
The "$65 billion inverter
market by 2020 will be
driven by multiple
applications,"..The inverter
market will be driven by
three factors:
electrification trends in
transportation, the need for
power conversion
optimization for CO2
emission reduction, and the
development of clean
electricity sources. Such
strong and sustainable
drivers will make the
inverter market grow.
Researchers at Michigan
State University (MSU) have
developed a technology which
uses transparent, uncoloured
plastic, which can be placed
over windows to produce
electricity from sunlight.
The new technology is called
a transparent luminescent
solar contractor and absorbs
specific non-visible
wavelengths.
Until now, technologies
that tried to produce solar
power using windows or other
transparent surfaces had
several disadvantages. They
mainly used solar cells
placed around luminescent
materials and production of
electricity was low with a
maximum efficiency of about
7 %
U.S.
solar companies boosted
their employee rolls by 22
percent last year, and now
employ 86 percent more
workers than they did in
2010, driven by rising
demand in the world’s
third-largest market.
Almost
174,000 people are
working in the U.S. solar industry,
compared with 143,000 in
2013 and 93,500 in
2010...
Islamic terrorist-training
camps have been operating in
the United States for 30
years and pose a "very
dangerous" threat, says
Martin Mawyer, president of
the Christian Action
Network.
"Between 2001 and 2011,
water bills grew the fastest
as a percentage of income
for the poorest customers.
Water expenses grew faster
than all other utility bills
for low-income Americans
except electricity. At the
same time, though, the
take-home pay for low-income
Americans has fallen, when
adjusting for inflation,
Curtis noted," the report
said.
n Japan, solar photovoltaic
(PV) technology has been a
center of attention ever
since the nation’s
government launched a very
rich feed-in tariff (FIT)
program. Although they are
not getting the spotlight,
there are also several
unique biomass projects in
Japan, which fully utilize
locally-available resources
such as noodles and oranges,
without directly competing
with consumable food
production.
The drastic drop in the
price of crude has left its
mark on the oil and gas
industry in several ways,
including project
curtailment, layoffs in the
industry and their
suppliers, and more. Some
industry observers are
predicting that will mean a
rush on cheap oil at the
expense of clean energy.
But the longer low oil
prices continue, that is not
a likely outcome, many
analysts are saying...
January 13, 2015
Two of the biggest obstacles
to the widespread adoption
of electric vehicles (EVs)
have been their
prohibitively high prices
and limited ranges.
Chevrolet's new Bolt EV
concept seeks to tackle both
of these factors. It is
designed to go 200 miles
(322 km) per charge and cost
from US$30,000.
The trashy litter in
Baltimore area streams and
the city’s harbor must be
removed under new pollution
limits set by federal and
state regulators, the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency announced Tuesday.
Senator Barbara Boxer, a
California Democrat, said
Thursday that she will not
seek reelection after her
fourth term in the U.S.
Senate concludes in 2016.
Southeastern Brazil is
getting some rainfall a year
after a record drought
started, but not enough to
eliminate worries about
electricity rationing,
drinking-water shortages or
another season of damaged
export crops, meteorologists
said.
California Governor Jerry
Brown proposed spending $59
billion to fix crumbling
roads and raising the
state’s renewable energy
mandate to 50 percent.
Sworn
in today for an
unprecedented fourth
term, the 76-year-old
Democrat said he would
proceed with a $68
billion California
high-speed-rail line, on
which he is expected
break ground tomorrow.
For fisherman Sammar Dablo,
it was as if "the seawater
stole our homes" when land
erosion forced his village
to relocate further inland
on Pakistan's south coast.
So Bill Kristol tried to get
to the bottom of it,
tweeting: “I figured
President Obama must have
been awfully busy not to go
to Paris today. So I checked
out his schedule…”
The three-word entry reads,
“No public schedule.”
Americans are deeply worried
that the a “catastrophic
terrorist attack” by Islamic
militants, like the one
Wednesday on a Paris
magazine staff, will happen
in the United States,
according to a new poll.
According to the survey
from national pollster
McLaughlin & Associates,
74.2 percent of likely
voters said they fear
terrorists affiliated with
the Islamic State will
strike U.S. targets if they
aren’t stopped. The poll was
provided to Secrets.
The “warming hiatus” that
has occurred over the last
15 years has been caused in
part by small volcanic
eruptions.
Scientists have long
known that volcanoes cool
the atmosphere because of
the sulfur dioxide that is
expelled during eruptions.
Droplets of sulfuric acid
that form when the gas
combines with oxygen in the
upper atmosphere can persist
for many months, reflecting
sunlight away from Earth and
lowering temperatures at the
surface and in the lower
atmosphere.
As we continue
installing thousands
of rooftop solar power
systems on homes across the
United States, we continue
to gain a deeper
understanding of what
motivates people to pull the
trigger and go solar.
While the
decreasing cost of solar is
the all-important
driver, the incentive to
install a solar array at
home comes from a wide
variety of needs and
desires. These
motivations are closely
related to generational
trends.
Former Soviet leader
Mikhail Gorbachev warned
that tensions between Russia
and European powers over the
Ukraine crisis could result
in a major conflict or even
nuclear war, in an interview
in a German news magazine on
Saturday.
"A war of this kind would
unavoidably lead to a
nuclear war," the 1990 Nobel
Peace Prize winner told Der
Spiegel.
The greatest
concentrations of the
world's soil carbon have
been pinpointed by
researchers - and much of it
is a dangerously flammable
addition to climate change
concerns.
An international
scientific survey of peat
bogs has calculated that
they contain more carbon
than all the world's
forests, heaths and
grasslands together - and
perhaps as much as the
planet's atmosphere.
The hacking of South Korea's
nuclear operator means the
country's second-oldest
reactor may be shut
permanently due to safety
concerns, said several
nuclear watchdog
commissioners, raising the
risk that other aging
reactors may also be closed.
-
Vitamin K2 is necessary
to prevent arterial
calcification, which it
does by activating
Matrix Gla protein (MGP)
-
If you fail to consume
adequate amounts of
vitamin K1 and K2, you
will radically increase
your risk of heart
disease and stroke
-
People who consume the
greatest amounts of K2
have the lowest risk of
cardiovascular disease,
cardiovascular
calcification, and the
lowest chance of dying
from cardiovascular
disease
“We
could try freedom for a
while,” Paul said on Fox
News Monday night. “We had
it for a long time. That’s
where you sell something and
I agree to buy it because I
like it. That’s how we
operate in most of the rest
of the marketplace, other
than healthcare.”
All of the chamber's 54
Republicans and nine
Democrats are expected to
support the legislation,
which needs a two-thirds
majority to override a veto.
“But we're going to the
floor with an open amendment
process, trying to foster
more bipartisanship,” Hoeven
said.
What's the most
controversial topic at the
grocery store these days?
It's GMOs.
Should
you consume them? Are they
okay in moderation? Should
you strictly avoid them at
all times? And if so, how on
earth can you manage to
navigate the store without
stepping into a genetically
modified landmine? And if
you really want to challenge
yourself, how can you do
that on a budget?
-
Mold on hard foods (hard
cheese, firm vegetables)
can be cut off (with an
inch around it), and the
food safely consumed
-
Mold on soft foods
(bread, fruit, and soft
cheese and vegetables)
has likely permeated
through the food, so it
should be discarded
-
While some mold is
harmless, others can
cause allergies,
respiratory problems, or
may produce
cancer-causing
substances called
mycotoxins
A massacre occurs at a
satirical French
publication, Charlie Hebdo.
Its sin had been satirizing
the Prophet Mohammed.
The shooters yelled,
"Allahu Akbar" (Allah is the
greatest) and, "We have
avenged the Prophet
Mohammed."
What could the attack
mean?
It may have taken a while
for the impact to catch up,
but extremely low oil prices
are taking their toll not
only on oil companies but on
some of their suppliers.
what the organic label
really means and what the
standards are for labeling.
Here are the benefits of
eating organic:
- Organic food
contains more
antioxidant value.
- You ingest fewer
pesticides.
- In animals, you are
exposed to fewer
antibiotics.
- You can more easily
avoid GMOs.
- Easier on the
environment.
Just over a decade ago,
this sleepy farming
community on the fringe of
North Dakota's Bakken shale
formation hosted the state's
first horizontal oil well to
be hydraulically fractured,
or fracked, helping set in
motion an economic
revolution that shook the
world.
Today, Divide County may
be another vanguard for the
state, this time ominous, as
the first to feel the full
effect of a collapse in
prices that has lopped more
than 50 percent off the
price of oil since the
summer.
With the price of
gasoline having declined
from nearly $4.00 two years
ago to an average of $2.20
nationwide today, most
Americans are undoubtedly
thrilled not to be paying
unnecessarily high prices at
the pump.
President Obama wants
them to know that they
shouldn't get used to it.
His reasons are as
predictable as they are
incorrect.
North American oil and
gas IPO activity continued
to rise in 2014 as master
limited partnerships (MLP)
accounted for nearly half of
the overall deals during the
year. As of early December,
24 North American oil and
gas IPOs had raised $13.371
million during 2014 -- a 14
percent increase in volume
and a 26 percent increase in
value compared to 2013. This
is according to data from
Ernst & Young (EY).
M5 event observed.
Solar Activity Forecast:
Solar activity is expected
to be low with a chance for
M-class flares and a slight
chance for an X-class flare
on day one (14 Jan) and
expected to be low with a
chance for M-class flares on
days two and three (15 Jan,
16 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at quiet
levels on day one (14 Jan),
quiet to active levels on
day two (15 Jan) and quiet
to unsettled levels on day
three (16 Jan).
The immutable laws that
govern our universe – such
as those that reign over the
observable world in
classical mechanics and
those that rule the atomic
physics world – are at the
core of all of our
scientific principles. They
not only provide consistent,
repeatable, and accurate
rules that allow
calculations and experiments
to be tested or verified,
they also help us make sense
of the workings of the
cosmos. MIT researchers
claim to have discovered a
new universal law for
superconductors that, if
proved accurate, would bring
the physics of
superconductors in line with
other universal laws and
advance the likes of
superconducting circuits for
quantum and super low-power
computing.
"This act of terror will be
followed by other acts of
terror because we do not
have in place now, and are
unlikely anytime to put in
place, policies up to the
task of dealing with the
scourge of terrorism, which
appears in many countries,
in many forms," Perle said
Friday on Newsmax's "The
Steve Malzberg Show."
"Somehow the governments
of the world don't seem to
have a clue about how to
deal with it."..
Due to its huge potential in
applications ranging from
cheaper vaccinations to
energy-storing car panels,
there's plenty of excitement
surrounding the emergence of
nanotechnology. But a team
of scientists are urging
caution, with a study
conducted at the
Technion-Israel Institute of
Technology suggesting that
exposure to silicon-based
nanoparticles may play a
role in the development of
cardiovascular disease.
Prioritizing energy
efficiency, renewable
energy, and imports of
Canadian hydroelectricity
would reduce Massachusetts's
exposure to wintertime price
spikes that result from the
state's growing dependence
on natural gas for heating
and electricity generation.
That is according to a new
analysis conducted by
Synapse Energy for Acadia
Center, a non-profit,
research and advocacy
organization with a
self-described commitment to
advancing the clean energy
future.
French law enforcement
officers have been told to
erase their social media
presence and carry weapons
around the clock since
terrorist sleeper cells have
been activated over the last
24 hours in the country, CNN
reported, citing a French
police source who attended a
briefing Saturday.
In
June, the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA)
proposed a rule to restrict
the amount of carbon dioxide
released from power plants.
The rule calls for reducing
carbon 30 percent by 2030
over 2005 levels. Many have
praised the aggressive
proposal, while others are
less favorable.
Regardless, this goal
will have an effect on
the energy landscape,..
Transitions...
“Times of transition are
strenuous, but I love them.
They are an opportunity to
purge, rethink priorities,
and be intentional about new
habits. We can make our new
normal any way we want.” ―
Kristin Armstrong
There was a wave in favor of
the Republicans in 1980 and
again in 1994. There was a
wave in favor of the
Democrats in 2006 and again
in 2008. There was a wave
for the Republicans in 2010.
There was a stalemate in
2012. Now there is a
Republican wave in 2014.
Looked at one way, these
waves appear more like
tides, ebbing and flowing.
In 2008, SolarMax hit its
peak, claiming the title of
fifth largest inverter
supplier in the world. Last
week, Swiss parent company
of SolarMax, Sputnik
Engineering, declared
bankruptcy, leaving many
portfolio owners and service
providers confused and
without support. As
unfortunate as the case may
be; it likely will not be
the last we witness. The
well-known example of Satcon
(which filed for bankruptcy
in 2012) has shown the
significant impact of an
event like this on the
market, but the question
remains: how do we deal with
this?
President BarackObama did
not attend Sunday’s massive
march in Paris to honor the
victims of last week’s
terror attacks, and the
White House is not
explaining his absence.
ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft has
found the water vapour from
its target comet to be
significantly different to
that found on Earth. The
discovery fuels the debate
on the origin of our
planet’s oceans...
One of the leading
hypotheses on Earth’s
formation is that it was so
hot when it formed 4.6
billion years ago that any
original water content
should have boiled off. But,
today, two thirds of the
surface is covered in water,
so where did it come from?
While Native Nations are far
from being monolithic, there
is one thing that forced
assimilation cannot take
from us, as Natives; our
coevolved connection to
nature. We all know that
there is a settler
colonialist darkness
hovering like a vulture, set
out to divide us for one
purpose; to take. From
creating blood quantum rules
and silencing strong Indian
voices to intellectual
property theft, the chipping
away of our identity and
everything that makes us who
we are is, by design, to
take our lands and
resources. Here is why I
believe Climate Change can
be one catalyst in uniting
Tribal Nations of Turtle
Island.
With temperatures
plunging again, the wind
industry's trade group said
last year's "polar vortex"
was tempered for consumers
by the availability of wind
energy.
The American Wind Energy
Association said its
analysis shows electricity
consumers saved $1 billion
when utilities shifted to
wind power as natural gas
spot prices escalated during
a cold snap in January 2014
.
A new federal executive
order expands the list of
illnesses for which you
could be detained, isolated,
and treated against your
will if you are entering the
US or traveling between
states—even if you are
completely healthy. Some
states have similar or worse
laws that would even allow
entry into your home.
January 9, 2015
Commissioner Alfredo
Castillo said the
confrontations in Apatzingan
began Tuesday morning when
federal forces moved in to
take control of city hall,
which had been held for days
by civilians whose demands
and identities were unclear.
Politico, citing sources
familiar with the decision,
reported that Boehner will
strip Florida Reps. Daniel
Webster and Richard Nugent
of their prestigious spots
on the House Rules
Committee. Webster ran
against Boehner for speaker
and was supported by Nugent.
On Allied Van Lines’
report, Texas had a net gain
of nearly 2,000 families,
taking the top spot for
incoming movers — for the
10th year in a row.
The least attractive
states: Illinois, Michigan,
New York, New Jersey and
Pennsylvania.
It’s a national flight
from “cold, expensive
states,”
This report summarizes the
fraudulent claims of the
genetic engineering
companies that produce the
world's GMO crops. It also
summarizes the numerous
studies by independent
scientists, which reveal the
alarming toxicity of these
crops and the herbicides and
pesticides used to grow
them.
During the swearing in of
two new Arizona Corporation
Commission (ACC) members
this week, outgoing Chairman
Bob Stump encapsulated the
less than warm and fuzzy
relationship between
regulators and the rooftop
solar industry with some
pointed remarks.
UN Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon confirmed Tuesday
that Palestine would be
joining the International
Criminal Court on April 1.
The International
Criminal Court late Monday
announced that it had
received documents from the
Palestinians indicating they
were moving toward going
after Israelis for alleged
war crimes on two separate
tracks.
Glenn Beck was at his wits
end with politicians on
Tuesday after his friend
Rep. Chris Stewart of Utah
(R) voted to re-elect John
Boehner as speaker of the
House. When Beck heard that
Sen. Bob Corker of
Tennessee, who is also a
Republican, recently
suggested raising the
federal gas tax now that oil
prices have fallen, he
couldn’t take it anymore.
A Belgian man serving a life
sentence for rape and murder
will not be allowed to have
doctors end his life as he
has requested, the justice
minister says.
Energy storage requirements
come in two basic forms:
short-term storage where
components in powered
electrical circuits store
energy in electrostatic or
electromagnetic form and
longer term storage for a
redundant energy source.
The California Independent
System Operator (ISO), the
California Public Utilities
Commission (CPUC) and the
California Energy Commission
(CEC) unveiled a
comprehensive roadmap to
assess the current market
environment and regulatory
policies for connecting new
energy storage technology to
the state's power grid.
Last year, Rice scientists
announced that they had
discovered a "green" carbon
capture material for
wellhead sequestration and
predicted that an even
better compound was on the
horizon -- one that could be
cheaply and easily made from
asphalt of all things.
Unconventional oil and gas
(UOG) operations combine
directional drilling and
hydraulic fracturing, or
“fracking,” to release
natural gas from underground
rock. Recent discussions
have centered on potential
air and water pollution from
chemicals used in these
processes and how it affects
the more than 15 million
Americans living within one
mile of UOG operations.
A new preliminary decision
from the US Department of
Commerce suggests that
tariff rates on Chinese
solar cells may be halved,
after an investigation found
that Chinese companies were
not dumping products in the
US at rates previously
stated.
Colorado regulators
significantly increased
fines for oil and gas
companies that fail to
comply with the state's
safety and environmental
rules for oil and gas
resources. The fines,
previously set at $1,000 per
day, were raised to $15,000
per day and the existing
$10,000 cap on those
penalties was lifted.
Courage...
“You
will never do anything
in this world without
courage. It is the
greatest quality of the
mind next to honor.”
― Aristotle
Experts say the desalination
industry, long seen as a
promising solution to water
scarcity if it were not so
expensive and
energy-intensive, is ripe
for innovation and
technological upgrades.
EU sanctions against Russia
over the crisis in Ukraine
are cutting both ways:
hurting Russia as well as
pinching some big European
companies. But economic
relief isn't likely any time
soon, diplomats and analysts
say, since EU divisions make
the sanctions tough to
overturn.
For decades, prosperity
was built with bricks in the
Colon community of Lee
County. The best clays were
found nearby, and several
plants used to operate
there.
Those heady days are
gone, the brick post office
by the railroad tracks since
abandoned, and the once
dominant Sanford Brick and
Tile Co., which produced
roughly 800,000 bricks a
day, no longer stands.
Environmental groups are
trying to force federal
regulators to respond to a
demand that they stop
letting state officials in
Kentucky and West Virginia
enforce federal clean-water
rules.
Several groups argue the
two states have done a bad
job enforcing the rules
related to surface coal
mining, resulting in
widespread degradation of
waterways.
Projections by leading
climate scientists of rising
sea levels, heatwaves,
floods and droughts linked
to global warming are likely
to oblige millions of people
to move out of harm's way,
with some never able to
return.
A 2013 report from the
Bureau of Labor Statistics
(BLS) found 3.4 million
green jobs in the United
States at the end of 2011.
This is the latest data
available from BLS, due to
the elimination of its Green
Careers program.
...The program encourages
economic investment while
reducing phosphorus
pollution to local waterways
in order to meet water
quality goals for the
Chesapeake Bay. It is
expected similar programs
will be established around
the nation to provide new
revenue sources for
agricultural producers while
reducing soil erosion and
runoff.
Here are four reasons
why the pipeline might never
be built.
Four:
Politics. Three: Climate
change. Two: The opposition
remains firm. And the
most important reason: The
price of oil.
Depending on the utility
pundit, energy storage could
be the next frontier in
electricity. This is because
utility infrastructure is
built to accommodate the
highest energy usage of the
year, typically the hottest
day of the summer. That
means an investment in
infrastructure to
accommodate, for a brief
period, energy usage that
can be as much as three
times what it is on average.
Americans are speaking with
their wallets like never
before in order to voice our
true collective opinion of
how corporations and Big
Food are working with our
food. One critical
example of how we are
demanding change can be seen
where the sale of non-GMO
Project Verified foods have
more than doubled since
2013.
Gov. Jerry Brown's proposal
this week to significantly
boost the amount of energy
California derives from
renewable sources could
reinvigorate the state's
utility-scale solar and wind
industries, as well as
launch another land rush in
the Mojave Desert.
With plans underway to build
one of the state's largest
natural gas power plants in
Jessup, a group is forming
to oppose what they see as a
threat to air quality and
quality of life in the
Lackawanna Valley.
Valued at some $322.5
million over 20 years, the
deal provides an average
levelized rate of 6.3 cents
per kilowatt hour for Idaho
Power Company .
And here we are again. You
might recognize this place.
We’ve been here frequently
over the past, say, 1,500
years or so. It’s the place
where the whole world stands
in dumbfounded shock after
witnessing unspeakable
brutality at the hands of
Islamists. Maybe we should
stop being so surprised.
Conflict in the Middle East,
and the rise of Islamic
State, helped drive a spike
in attacks. Researchers also
noted a sharp increase in
incidents in Nigeria and
Afghanistan.
Lake Erie just can’t catch a
break. The lake has
experienced harmful algal
blooms and severe
oxygen-depleted “dead zones”
for years, but now a team of
researchers led by
Carnegie’s Anna Michalak and
Yuntao Zhou has shown that
the widespread drought in
2012 was associated with the
largest dead zone since at
least the mid-1980s.
“As we continue confronting
the worst drought in
California history, it is
essential that we sustain
our efforts to implement
water resiliency projects
for the future. Together
with other Bay Area cities
and agencies, we’re working
to ensure that we save every
drop of water in order to
protect our region during
times of drought or an
earthquake,” said San
Francisco Mayor Edwin M.
Lee.
Leadership...
“A
leader is best when
people barely know he
exists, when his work is
done, his aim fulfilled,
they will say: we did it
ourselves.”
― Lao Tzu
The image, from M16, the
Eagle Nebula, was quickly
dubbed “The Pillars of
Creation.”
The former Virginia governor
was sentenced Tuesday to two
years in prison, followed by
two years of probation,
after being convicted of
multiple counts of public
corruption. The sentence was
significantly less than what
prosecutors had requested
and what most observers had
expected, and the
Republican’s supporters were
visibly shocked and
delighted.
Scientists analyzing data
from NASA’s Kepler satellite
have boosted the tally of
known or suspected planets
beyond our solar system to
more than 4000, they
reported here today at a
meeting of the American
Astronomical Society. ..
“We’ve significantly
increased the list of
verified small planets in
the habitable zone,” says
Douglas Caldwell of the SETI
Institute in Mountain View,
California.
"With the U.S. solar energy
industry coming off a
record-shattering year, next
week's 'Shout Out For Solar'
Day is the perfect time for
Americans to voice their
support for increased
development of solar
resources nationwide," said
Rhone Resch , SEIA president
and CEO. "In a short period
of time, solar has become a
true American success story,
benefitting both the U.S.
economy and our environment,
and we need to be shouting
that news from every
rooftop."
Duke Energy and other
utilities operating in North
Carolina objected to what
they described as
overpayments they are
required to make to
renewable energy developers,
including solar, and took
their case to the state's
utilities commission.
Regulators, however, did not
see it that way and refused
to authorize any changes to
the payments or how they are
calculated.
The Environmental Protection
Agency’s long-awaited rule
on disposal of toxic ash
from coal-burning power
plants falls far short of
what’s needed to protect the
public and our waterways
from the millions of tons of
dangerous sludge that is
produced annually, the
Natural Resources Defense
Council said recently
A nuclear power plant on the
shores of Lake Michigan in
the western Michigan town of
Bridgman was leaking oil for
about two months from
October to December of last
year, but plant officials
assert the oil has since
dissipated and not caused
any harm to the lake.
The Paraguayan government
agreed Tuesday to meet with
former workers who have
nailed themselves to wooden
crosses over a wage dispute,
an increasingly common form
of protest in Paraguay that
has been condemned by the
Roman Catholic Church but
has often been successful.
PNM Resources, an electric
utility company, has
announced that its New
Mexico utility has filed a
request with the New Mexico
Public Regulation Commission
for an increase in electric
rates of $107.4 million,
which if approved would
become effective January 1,
2016.
Bioreactors may be a good
way to address farm run-off
and tame the high nitrate
content in environmental
waters, but that does not
mean farmers will
necessarily want to pay for
them.
The historic correlation
between the price of oil and
the demand for renewable
energy has been increasingly
weakened in today's global
markets, write the experts
from the Environmental
Defense Fund in an article
published by Forbes.com .
Like apples and oranges, we
use oil and renewables to
make completely different
types of juice: oil
primarily to produce
transportation fuels, and
renewables primarily to
generate electricity.
With Republicans assuming
full control of Congress on
Tuesday after victories in
the November elections, they
have put Keystone at the
center of their agenda and
plan weeks of debate.
They believe that the
public spotlight on Keystone
will pressure President
Barack Obama to eventually
approve the project.
Too much sugar can make you
fat. But it also makes you
sick. That’s the latest word
from a team of scientists at
the University of
California-San Francisco
that reviewed more than
8,000 scientific papers on
sugar and found there is a
strong link between the
consumption of sweets and
chronic diseases.
Illinois governmental
agencies Wednesday issued
reports proposing ways to
prop up Exelon's ailing
nuclear power plants.
The agencies suggested
Chicago -based Exelon's
financially struggling
nuclear plants could be kept
open by favoring Exelon
because it creates
electricity without
producing greenhouse gases.
The policy would punish
competitors who use
carbon-based fuels that
produce carbon dioxide.
Fracking has once again
been shown to cause
earthquakes, according to a
study released by the
Seismological Society of
America on January 5.
A rare “felt” earthquake
in Ohio in March 2014 was
definitely caused by
practices associated with
hydraulic fracturing, the
gas-and-oil extraction
method that entails
injecting highly pressurized
water infused with chemicals
to loosen the oil and gas
trapped between shale
layers, said researchers at
Miami University in Ohio.
When dams are built they
have an impact not only on
the flow of water in the
river, but also on the
people who live downstream
and on the surrounding
ecosystems. By placing data
from close to 6,500 existing
large dams on a highly
precise map of the world’s
rivers, an international
team led by McGill
University researchers has
created a new method to
estimate the global impacts
of dams on river flow and
fragmentation.
How many times have you
heard the argument that
the ingredients in our food
are safe to eat, simply
because they are “Approved”
by the FDA. I’ve heard this
statement many times in the
media recently, and I’m sure
you have, too. I wasn’t
going to let the opportunity
slide to tell you what I
really think when someone
says that an ingredient
has been rubber stamped by
the FDA and is automatically
safe to eat.
During December 2014,
positive sea surface
temperature (SST) anomalies
decreased across the central
and east-central equatorial
Pacific
The rise of solar power
allows a further
democratizing of the
electricity system, and
these charts illustrate how
2014 was a banner year for
solar, but
particularly distributed
solar power.
Toyota is serious about
hydrogen fuel cell
technology. It's so serious
that it's not only welcoming
competition, it's helping
it. At this year's Consumer
Electronics Show, the
automaker announced that it
will open more than 5,500
fuel cell patents and
provide royalty-free
licenses to other automakers
and entities.
Exelon Corp. , the
biggest U.S. owner of
nuclear reactors, needs to
almost double power prices
to keep a New York plant
running in a move that
promises to show just how
far regulators will go to
keep uneconomic plants
operating.
After recording losses
that exceeded $100 million
from 2011 to 2013, Exelon
will need to charge about 83
percent more ..
Tennessee Valley Authority
plans to move ahead with
plans to develop an Oak
Ridge site for a small
modular reactor (SMR).
Ric Perez, TVA senior
vice president for shared
services expressed his hope
for Babcock & Wilcox to
complete their reactor
design despite cutbacks in
the project, and for a small
nuclear reactor to be
installed at the Clinch
River site in Oak Ridge,
according to a report by
Times Free Press.
On a cold and rainy Friday
afternoon, Steven Dring is
tending his baby carrots in
a somewhat unusual setting.
The green shoots are in a
try of volcanic glass
crystals under LED lights -
and the tray is in a tunnel
33 meters underneath a busy
London street.
Sales of plug-in electric
cars in the U.S. for 2014
improved from a year ago,
even as crude oil prices
plunged to historic lows,
according to reports.
Premature nuclear plant
retirements are slowly
eroding U.S. nuclear
capacity and reducing a
major source of carbon free
electricity, according to
Fitch Ratings.
Even though 31 percent of
Americans believe solar
energy will make a major
contribution to meeting the
nation's energy needs within
the next two to five years,
a full 57 percent don't see
this as reality for at least
another 15 to 20 years. That
is according to a Harris
Interactive Poll of 2,205
U.S. adults surveyed online
recently.
The US Senate Energy and
Commerce Committee on
Thursday passed a bill to
approve Transcanada's
contentious Keystone XL
pipeline, the first step in
what looks to be a lengthy
legislative process that is
proceeding under a veto
threat from President Barack
Obama.
A new analysis suggests that
large-scale wave energy
systems developed in the
Pacific Northwest should be
comparatively steady,
dependable and able to be
integrated into the overall
energy grid at lower costs
than some other forms of
alternative energy,
including wind power.
-
When you lose weight,
you exhale 84 percent of
the lost fat in the form
of carbon dioxide. The
remaining 16 percent is
excreted as water via
bodily fluids
-
By substituting one hour
of sedentary lounging
with one hour of
moderate exercise—to
increase your
respiratory rate—your
metabolic rate is
increased sevenfold
-
If you are insulin or
leptin resistant, as
long as you keep eating
fructose and grains,
you're programming your
body to create and store
fat
A third of oil reserves,
half of gas reserves and
over 80% of current coal
reserves globally should
remain in the ground and not
be used before 2050 if
global warming is to stay
below the 2°C target agreed
by policy makers, according
to new research by the UCL
Institute for Sustainable
Resources.
The White House does not
feel pressure to loosen
restrictions on U.S. oil
exports further and views
debate over the issue as
resolved for now, John
Podesta, a top aide to
President Barack Obama, told
Reuters in an interview.
Energy sources and related
commodities have driven
national security issues
ever since the modern
nation-state was born with
the Peace of Westphalia. Oak
made Spain and England’s
stout sailing ships. Water
energy and wind drove mills
and moved water. Wood and
coal moved steamships. Then
came the almost magical
commodity of oil, packed
with energy. World War II
brought us the wonder and
terror of nuclear energy.
Today, America buys much
less foreign oil for the
first time in decades,
largely due to fracking and
other technological
advances. Wind and solar
energy are growing by leaps
and bounds. How fundamental
are these changes in the
world’s energy markets and
what is their likely effect
on our national security
interests?
The market for modern SMWTs
has existed for 30 years,
though growth has been tied
to state and federal
incentives in the United
Kingdom, Italy, and the
United States. The sector
has recently matured, with
growing numbers of
manufacturers located around
the world and expanding
dealer networks, and
momentum is building around
the lease model that has
enabled the distributed
solar PV market to expand
rapidly in the United
States.
January 6, 2015
-
Antibiotic resistance
has turned into a
worldwide health threat
of massive proportions
-
Two million American
adults and children are
infected with
antibiotic-resistant
bacteria each year;
23,000 die as a direct
result
-
Methicillin resistant
Staphylococcus aureus
(MRSA) kills more
Americans each year than
the combined total of
emphysema, HIV/AIDS,
Parkinson’s disease, and
homicide
-
Solutions include
improved infection
prevention, more
responsible use of
antibiotics in human
medicine, limiting use
of antibiotics in
agriculture, and finding
innovative approaches to
treat infections
...many major oil companies
are significantly hedged
against falling oil prices,
essentially betting that
prices will stay low — and
those hedges are shielding
American companies from the
potentially disastrous
implications of oil’s 50
percent drop.
Astronomers initially
discovered an object
orbiting the black hole at
the center of the Milky Way
in 2011. At the time, they
thought it was nothing more
than a gas cloud that would
disappear over time. Four
years later, it’s still
there.
Car purchases revved up in
2014 at a pace not seen
since the start of the Great
Recession. The recovery is
not just good news for the
auto industry, but also a
sign that Americans are
starting to loosen their
pursestrings.
Chinese coal mining firm,
Lu'an Group, said it has
built the world's largest
facility to generate power
from methane gas emitted
during coal mining, as the
country looks to reduce
poisonous gas emissions that
contribute largely to
pollution.
The official Xinhua news
agency reported that Lu'an
Group built the facility,
which is capable of
utilising 99% of methane gas
discharged from the Gaohe
Coal Mine in north China's
Shanxi Province . The
company would soon start
operating the generator with
a capacity of 30 megawatts.
According to the Hartford
Courant, Cassandra believes
chemotherapy can cause her
as much or more damage as
the cancer at this point.
Hodgkin's lymphoma is a
cancer of the lymphatic
system. As it progresses, it
compromises the body's
ability to fight infection.
“She knows the long-term
effects of having chemo,
what it does to your organs,
what it does to your body.
She may not be able to have
children after this because
it affects everything in
your body. It not only kills
cancer, it kills everything
in your body,” Cassandra’s
mother, Jackie Fortin, said
in a video published on the
Hartford Courant’s website.
Cassandra was taken into
temporary custody by DCF in
November, and her mother was
ordered to cooperate with
medical care administered
under the agency’s
supervision, after the
hospital reported her to the
agency.
-
A typical family using
the Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance
Program (SNAP), the
official name for food
stamps, will have about
$3.37 per person, per
day, with which to buy
food
-
People on tight budgets
tend to opt for the
cheapest, most filling
foods, such as white
bread, factory-farmed
ground beef, and ramen
noodles, which are
detrimental to your
health
-
New research found the
difference between
buying food for the most
healthy diet pattern or
the least healthy diet
pattern came out to
about $1.50 per day
-
Bone broth, fermented
vegetables, and sprouts
are examples of
inexpensive foods that
are phenomenal for your
health
-
Growing your own
vegetables can also save
you considerable money
on produce; 53
money-saving tips for
buying organic are also
included
“We have analytical
instruments that can see
things in astronomically
small numbers, but are we
looking for the right
things?” ..
“Are we looking in the
right way?”
Snyder expressed concern
about the many chemicals
that are present throughout
the water cycle, and how so
few of them are regulated.
He also cited flaws in
current laboratory testing
methods and the “glacial”
pace of the federal
rulemaking system as
obstacles to safer drinking
water.
Encouragement...
“How
would your life be
different if... You
walked away from gossip
and verbal defamation?
Let today be the day...
You speak only the good
you know of other people
and encourage others to
do the same.”
― Steve Maraboli
A by-product of coal
fired electric production is
a product known as fly ash.
Recently the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency released a report on
containment of fly ash and
classified it in the same
disposal category as
household trash...
In October, the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) made a
preliminary determination to
regulate strontium in the
nation's drinking water.
This decision is being made
under the Safe Drinking
Water Act (SDWA), which
calls for the creation of a
"contaminant candidates
list" (a CCL) for regulation
every five years (we are
currently on CCL3). The
latest batch of chemicals
off CCL3 for which
preliminary regulatory
determinations were made
identified strontium as the
only chemical that
potentially requires
regulation.
The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA), the
U.S. Department of Justice
and the state of Arkansas
announced that the city of
Fort Smith, Ark. will
upgrade its sewer collection
and treatment system over
the next 12 years to
reduce discharges
of raw sewage and other
pollutants into local
waterways
Communities that have
passed laws banning or
delaying hydraulic
fracturing -- fracking --
have found oil and gas
companies to be very tough
opponents. In at least some
instances, municipalities
that passed no-fracking
ordinances are being sued.
Simply put, the bans are
the result of fears about
possible health hazards and
environmental damage. Oil
and gas companies, however,
generally maintain that
states -- not communities --
have the legal authority to
establish rules for their
industry. And states are
feeling the heat too.
Fukushima rice passed
Japan's radiation checks for
the first time since the
2011 nuclear disaster that
prompted international alarm
over the region's produce, a
prefectural official said.
...researchers have
discovered another period,
some 55m years ago, when
massive volcanic eruptions
pumped so much carbon into
the atmosphere that the
planet warmed at what
geologists would think of as
breakneck speed.
The good news is that
most plants and animals
survived the warm spell. The
planet has experienced
several mass extinctions -
and this wasn't one of them.
According to the Wall Street
Journal, many of the subsidy
recipients could be in for
an unpleasant surprise.
Millions of them will be
getting smaller tax refunds
than they had expected or
finding out that they owe
the IRS because the
subsidies they received to
offset their Obamacare
premiums turned out to be
too generous.
-
With a few healthy
ingredient
substitutions, you can
prepare delicious,
nutritious, guilt-free
baked goods in your own
kitchen
-
Five top baking secrets
are revealed—and they
include butter and
chocolate
-
Those who use their
cell phones the most
are twice as likely
to develop lethal
brain cancer
(glioma) compared to
those whose exposure
is minimal
-
Those who have used
either a cell phone
or cordless house
phone for more than
25 years have triple
the risk of glioma,
compared to those
who have used them
for less than one
year
While Republicans will be
taking the helm of both
houses for the first time
since the 109th Congress,
there will actually be very
little change in the overall
religious make-up of the
House and Senate.
...the building is a major
milestone in South Africa's
struggle to ease its
dependence on fossil fuels.
It runs on hydrogen, an
infinitely renewable fuel
that, when used to generate
power, produces no emissions
apart from water and heat.
“You’ve got a quarter of a
million people dead now in
Syria. You’ve got the
largest number of murders
and deaths in Iraq this past
year, 2014, since 2006-7.
And it’s getting worse,
because the Islamic State is
literally beheading people,
crucifying people,
slaughtering people, selling
little girls into sexual
slavery. It’s a horrific
situation. And yet I’m
concerned, Shannon — and one
of the reasons I wrote the
book — about complacency.
The new year finds Latin
American oil producing
nations strapped for cash at
a time when a cache of
important new finds require
significant capital outlays
for development. Production
declines in recent years
have taken a bite out of the
region's revenues, making
matters worse.
One of Congress' most
prominent foreign policy
voices has expressed alarm
that Iran is moving towards
becoming a military nuclear
power like its longtime ally
North Korea.
Montgomery claims in his
lawsuit that officials
violated his constitutional
rights during the ordeal. He
also accuses the hospital of
violating his privacy by
giving his medical records
to state police.
-
Enjoy the goodness of
fried chicken without
the guilt with this
healthy recipe – it uses
100 percent organic,
free-range chicken and
eggs that were allowed
to forage freely
outdoors, so it’s
superior in vitamin and
mineral content
Remember: never burn or
char your meats. Any
time you cook meat at
high temperature –
whether frying,
broiling, or grilling –
nasty carcinogenic
chemicals called
polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons (PAHs) and
heterocyclic amines
(HCAs) are formed
-
Marinating or dry
rubbing your meat using
natural ingredients can
help reduce the
formation of toxic
carcinogens
-
Use coconut oil when
frying chicken, as it
can withstand higher
temperatures without
being damaged like many
other oils
According to Freddie
Mac's weekly mortgage rate
survey of more than one
hundred banks, 30-year
mortgage rates averaged
3.87% last week, marking the
seventh straight week of
sub-4 percent rates. The
15-year fixed rate mortgage
rate averaged 3.15%.
Conventional mortgage
interest rates remain near
20-month lows, boosting
buyer purchasing power and
putting millions of U.S.
homeowners "in the money" to
refinance.
Meanwhile, VA and FHA
mortgage rates are even
lower.
New Mexico regulators
began taking testimony
Monday on a plan that calls
for shutting down part of an
aging coal-fired power plant
that provides electricity to
more than 2 million people
in the Southwest.
The plan would curb
haze-causing pollution at
the San Juan Generating
Station, but some
environmentalists argue it
doesn't do enough to wean
the state's largest utility
off fossil fuels.
There isn’t just one smoking
gun anymore pointing at GMO
toxicology. There is now an
entire arsenal of scientific
research proving that
genetically modified
organisms adversely affect
the body. In yet
another new study conducted
by Egyptian researchers,
rats given GM soy were found
to have deadly amounts of
toxicity in their kidneys,
liver, testes, sperm, blood
and even DNA.
The selloff in global oil
markets showed little signs
of slowing in the new year,
with prices down as much as
6 percent on Monday, the
lowest since spring 2009, as
fears deepened a supply glut
that has vexed the market
for six months would
continue.
U.S crude crashed below
$50 a barrel while benchmark
Brent tumbled under $53
after data showed Russian
oil output at post-Soviet
era highs and Iraqi oil
exports near 35-year peaks.
California may get the
spotlight for its renewable
energy and related mandates,
alternative energy jobs and
other achievements, but
other states are making
their mark too. Pennsylvania
has become a clean energy
leader, according to a
report from The Pew
Charitable Trusts.
Aviation emissions are a
major clause of climate
change, writes Valerie Brown
- yet they remain
unregulated. The gap between
the best and worst
performing airlines
demonstrates ample
opportunities for
improvement - but is the
political will there to
impose effective regulation?
The performance gap
suggests the industry could
reduce GHG emissions
significantly if the least
efficient airlines would
emulate the most efficient.
M1 event observed, C7 event
observed. Solar
activity is expected to be
low with a chance for
M-class flares and a slight
chance for an X-class flare
on days one, two, and three
(05 Jan, 06 Jan, 07 Jan).
The geomagnetic field is
expected to be at unsettled
to active levels on day one
(05 Jan) and quiet to
unsettled levels on days two
and three (06 Jan, 07 Jan).
Protons greater than 10 Mev
have a slight chance of
crossing threshold on days
two and three (06 Jan, 07
Jan).
A concerning new study
published in the
Brazilian Journal of
Microbiology titled,
“Influence of glyphosate
in planktonic and biofilm
growth of Pseudomonas
aeruginosa,“
indicates that the world’s
most widely used herbicide
Roundup (glyphosate) may be
contributing to the enhanced
growth of the pathogenic
bacteria P. aeruginosa
in our environment.
When it comes to DUI
checkpoints, 2013 and 2014
were both years of
belligerent Constitutional
confrontations.
Could 2015 be the year
those confrontations cool
off — thanks to plastic bags
hanging out of car windows?
"Most of the gains are due
to traditional breeding or
improvement of other
agricultural practices."
Even in the US,
non-GMO crops have shown
better yield improvements
than GM crops, according to
research conducted by the US
Department of Agriculture
and the University of
Wisconsin.
An oil tanker and a bulk
carrier collided off
Singapore on Friday, causing
a crude oil spill, the
Maritime and Port Authority
(MPA) said...estimated that
4,500 tonnes (33,000
barrels) of Madura crude oil
had been spilled from the
tanker, it added.
As of January 1, 2015
single-hull oil tankers are
no longer allowed in U.S.
waters.
The Oil Pollution Act of
1990, passed after the
disastrous 1989 Exxon Valdez
oil spill in Prince William
Sound, Alaska, required that
all new tankers and
tank-barges be built with
double hulls to prevent
similar oil spills.
Republican Louie Gohmert
of Texas says voters made
clear in the November
election that they want
change. Republicans unseated
Democrats as the majority
party in the Senate and
increased their advantage in
the House.
Boehner still is expected
to win despite opposition
from some Republicans who
refused to back the Ohio
lawmaker in 2013.
When it comes to skin
infections, a healthy and
robust immune response may
depend greatly upon what
lies beneath. In a new paper
published in the January 2,
2015 issue of Science,
researchers at the
University of California,
San Diego School of Medicine
report the surprising
discovery that fat cells
below the skin help protect
us from bacteria.
Trina Solar Limited (NYSE:
TSL) ("Trina Solar" or the
"Company"), a global leader
in photovoltaic (PV)
modules, solutions and
services, today announced
that its State Key
Laboratory of PV Science and
Technology has set a new
world record for power
output from a high
efficiency multi-crystalline
silicon PV module.
One unit of Ukraine's
Zaporozhiya nuclear power
plant, the largest in
Europe, has been taken
offline because of generator
problems.
State
nuclear power company
Energoatom says the unit was
disconnected from the
electricity net early Sunday
to prevent internal damage
to the generator. It did not
give further details, but
said radiation in the area
is within acceptable limits.
-
By invitation of the
President of Sierra
Leone, Dr. Robert Rowen
and his team went there
to teach health care
workers how to treat
Ebola using ozone
-
Without explanation, the
Minister of Health
forbade ozone therapy to
be used on any of the
Ebola patients, although
many doctors were taught
how to administer the
treatment
-
A White House petition
has been created, urging
the Obama administration
to stop America’s
testing of viruses in
Africa, and to use free
ozone to combat Ebola
Although the daily spot
price of uranium fell
through almost all of
December, a price increase
is likely in the first
quarter as demand is
projected to rise, market
sources said Wednesday.
Price reporting company
TradeTech on December 1 put
the daily U3O8 spot price at
$39.10/lb. By Tuesday it had
fallen to $35.65/lb. And
Tuesday's price was 10 cents
lower that Monday's,
TradeTech said.
“Beauty's only skin
deep.
Everybody has ugly
days.
We're all made of the
same stuff underneath.
Acting right is
better than looking right.
Realize what makes
you special beyond looks.
Evil can look pretty
on the outside.” -Shannon
Delany
Currently, around 90 per
cent of all freshwater is
used by agriculture (70 per
cent) and industry (20 per
cent), leaving just 10 per
cent for domestic use.
However, as the
population grows and more
people move to a
western-style diet, water
extraction is estimated to
increase by over 50 per cent
to 6,900 billion m3 per
year.
January 2, 2015
The Federal Reserve is the
central banker of the United
States of America and the
group has a dual charter.
The first charter of "the
Fed" is to foster maximum
employment within the U.S.
economy. The second charter
is to seek price stability.
China plans tougher
pollution limits and heavier
penalties in a revision of
its air pollution law,
state-run news agency Xinhua
said, as the government
battles to reduce smog that
takes hundreds of thousands
of lives each year.
The Standing Committee of
the National People's
Congress is this week
considering a draft that
would impose fines of up to
1 million yuan ($160,000) or
even shut down factories
that exceed emission limits,
Xinhua reported late Monday.
-
In February, a study by
the US Centers for
Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC)
declared that obesity
rates among two- to
five-year olds declined
by 43 percent between
2003 and 2012
-
A new study, looking at
the same data but
starting in 1999, shows
a very different
picture. Over the past
14 years, severe obesity
among children has
actually increased
-
As of 2011, just over 17
percent of American
children between the
ages of two and 19 were
obese. Nearly six
percent of youths meet
criteria for class 2
obesity (BMI of 35)
-
The American diet is
primarily to blame for
our expanding waist
lines and declining
health. It contains the
same “nutritional
balance” used for
decades to purposefully
fatten up livestock
-
Dietary factors that
have probably done the
greatest amount of
damage include trans
fats, high fructose corn
syrup, artificial
sweeteners,
growth-promoting drugs
in food animals, and
agricultural chemicals
“If men are good, you don’t
need government; if men are
evil or ambivalent, you
don’t dare have one.”
—
Robert LeFevre, libertarian
businessman
The unanimous decision by
a three-judge panel of the
San Francisco-based U.S. 9th
Circuit Court of Appeals
upheld a 2009 opinion by the
National Marine Fisheries
Service to force the
cutbacks in water use, which
have been in effect since
then.
The decision, which comes
as California faces a
crippling drought that is
entering its fourth year,
represents a blow to
agriculture in the state's
fertile Central Valley.
Crude futures settled at
five-year lows Monday, as
the market brushed aside
continued fires at Libya's
largest oil terminal, as
persistent oversupply
concerns led the oil complex
lower.
NYMEX February
crude closed down $1.12 at
$53.61/b. ICE February Brent
settled $1.57 lower at
$57.88/b.
This past year was
filled with stories that
pushed
government-to-government and
tribal sovereignty forward
for Indian country. The year
was filled with ups and
downs across Turtle Island
as well, with a handful of
stories that made headlines
and should not be forgotten
moving into 2015. Below are
eight topics to watch as
2015 nears
A renewed battle over the
Keystone XL tar sands
pipeline is shaping up for
the new year in North
America.
The Republicans, who
favor the Alberta-Gulf Coast
pipeline because of the jobs
and energy security they say
it will create, will have a
majority in both houses of
Congress for the first time
since TransCanada Corp.
filed an application for the
pipeline six years ago.
Germany's renewable power
output has reached a new
record in 2014, contributing
more than a quarter to the
nation's electricity demand
and output and topping the
power mix for the first time
ever, energy industry
association BDEW said
Monday.
State regulators in less
than two weeks are to begin
deliberating a proposal that
calls for shutting down part
of an aging coal-fired power
plant in northwestern New
Mexico that serves more than
2 million customers in the
Southwest.
But one environmental
group, New Energy Economy,
is calling for Public
Regulation Commissioners Pat
Lyons and Karen Montoya to
recuse themselves from the
deliberations.
Laurence H. Tribe, professor
of constitutional law at
Harvard University and
former mentor to Barack
Obama, said in an article
last week that the EPA’s
Clean Power Plan is
unconstitutional.
Incense burns four times
more particulate matter than
cigarette smoke
Even though incense is
commonly used for religious
and ritual purposes in some
of the most populated
nations in the world, few
studies have ever examined
incense burning as a
potential health threat.
Investigators have found a
link between long-term
incense use and increased
cardiovascular mortality.
Just about any smoke is
harmful to our lungs if it’s
inhaled. Incense burns four
times more particulate
matter than cigarette smoke.
The bad news from Lima
this week is that our
Movement is not yet large
enough, or powerful enough,
to force the billionaires
and multinational
corporations who run the
world to change their ways.
As thousands of us chant and
march in the streets, the
politicians and corporate
elite meeting across town at
COP 20, the official UN
Climate Summit, are still
arguing over who’s to blame
and who will pay the bill.
Meanwhile back in the
U.S., the corrupt and
fossilized Congress has been
completely hijacked by
know-nothing politicians who
deny there’s a climate
crisis at all.
The minimum wage will
rise in 21 states in 2015,
putting it above the federal
pay floor in more than half
the USA and highlighting the
impact of a national
movement to boost the
earnings of low-paid
workers.
The increases will lift
the hourly wages of 2.4
million workers by up to $1
to an average of $8 and a
high of $9.15, according to
the Economic Policy
Institute. The federal
hourly minimum is $7.25.
The presidential race was
thrown into turmoil before
the tribe's Nov. 4 general
election when candidate
Chris Deschene was
disqualified due to a ruling
that he wasn't fluent in the
Navajo language.
Many individuals are aware
that biotech has developed a
seed monopoly largely by
patenting genetically
modified organisms, but not
everyone realizes that
Monsanto tried to patent a
tomato that had no biotech
traits. Now, the European
Patent Office (EPO), with
help from an international
coalition, No Patents on
Seeds!, has revoked
Monsanto’s fraudulent patent
and claim to tomatoes that
are naturally resistant to a
fungal disease called
botrytis.
Innovation in the solar
industry continues --
seemingly at an accelerated
pace. At Solar Power
International in October a
plethora of new solar
products and services have
been introduced, all
striving to reduce total
installation costs. I'm
confident this trend will
continue as R&D efforts by
both large and small
companies bear fruit. As
long as supply shortages and
tariffs don't disrupt our
cost structure, these
innovations will lead to
lower installed costs in
2015 and beyond.
New Year...
“I
hope that in this year to
come, you make mistakes.
Because if you are making
mistakes, then you are
making new things, trying
new things, learning,
living, pushing yourself,
changing yourself, changing
your world. You're doing
things you've never done
before, and more
importantly, you're doing
something.”
― Neil Gaiman
As of early next year, New
York State will be
permanently off-limits to
hydraulic fracturing, or
fracking, for oil and gas.
The decision follows the
release Wednesday of a
long-awaited Department of
Health report that details
adverse health and
environmental effects from
exposure to the process.
The latest volume of a Yucca
Mountain report states that
the U.S. Department of
Energy has not yet purchased
the property where the
repository could potentially
sit, while DOE officials
maintain that Yucca is not a
"workable solution."
President Barack Obama has a
resolution for the New Year
and the
Republican-controlled
Congress convening next week
in Washington: Cooperate
more and use executive
actions less.
Obama
has already used some quite
extensive executive actions,
including a decree on
immigration reform, reports
The Wall Street Journal, but
he still has some top agenda
items left to achieve during
his last two years in
office.
C1 event observed.
Solar activity is expected
to be low with a chance for
M-class flares on days one,
two, and three (03 Jan, 04
Jan, 05 Jan). The
geomagnetic field is
expected to be at unsettled
to active levels on days one
and three (03 Jan, 05 Jan)
and quiet to active levels
on day two (04 Jan).
Prime Minister
Arseniy Yatsenyuk of
Ukraine announced
Tuesday that his nation
has reached a deal on
nuclear fuel deliveries
with Westinghouse to
reduce dependence on
Russian supplies.
Russia's Foreign
Ministry deplored the
move as a "dangerous
experiment that
threatens safety and
health of the Ukrainian
citizens and peoples of
Europe." It said nuclear
fuel produced by the
U.S. company doesn't
quite fit Soviet-built
nuclear reactors that
Ukraine has.
After my anger cooled
from reading about the “Top
Eight Religious Destinations
in the World,” I got to
thinking of the places I
have seen in my own country
that I am willing to claim
in public are “religious
destinations” worthy of
traveling to see.
The futility of naming
just eight is obvious, but
in naming eight I hope to
show that it made no sense
to ignore half of the world
in making the original list.
In no particular order, here
are my nominations from the
United States:
If you can build low-income
housing to standards for
passive energy use, your
chances of winning tax
credits from the
Pennsylvania Housing Finance
Agency just got better.
This is a significant
finding, it could not only
extend the life of humans
but also be able to delay
symptoms that are correlated
with aging.
Humanity is continually
progressing in its
understanding of science and
technology. Everyday, new
breakthroughs are made that
have the potential to change
the way we live.
Widespread militia violence
has plunged Libya into chaos
less than four years after a
NATO-backed uprising toppled
and killed longtime dictator
Moammar Gadhafi.
Texas is not Kentucky .
Or West Virginia . That's
clear to everyone.
But there's conflict over
what these distinctions mean
when it comes to President
Barack Obama's plan to
sharply reduce
climate-altering pollution
from coal-fired power
plants, the nation's leading
source of carbon dioxide
emissions.
All three states burn a
lot of coal, but Texas says
it shouldn't be forced to
make deeper emissions cuts
than Kentucky and West
Virginia . The reason: It's
already moving toward more
climate-friendly electricity
through the use of natural
gas and wind, while the
other two states remain
devoted to coal.
America is making emigration
more difficult and
expensive. Last year, for
example, the cost of
renouncing U.S. citizenship
rose by over 400% from $450
to $2,350. Those who take
the far more common step of
simply and quietly leaving
still remain vulnerable to a
massive tax system that
reaches into foreign lands.
At the same time, expats are
becoming financial pariahs
who find it awkward to
support themselves because
basic services, like a
foreign bank account, are
difficult to obtain.
Today, we embark on a new
year and a fresh start in
our continued journey toward
a healthier, happier life.
But before we leave 2014
behind, let's revisit the
top 10 articles of the past
year, based on page views.
The resolution failed to win
the nine-vote majority
required for approval, the
Associated Press reports.
Eight countries voted in
favor of the resolution,
while two opposed (U.S. and
Australia), and five
abstained.
It may be too soon to assess
the total impact of falling
global crude oil prices on
the US oil patch, but the
lower price will likely slow
the recent fast pace of
pipeline buildouts and focus
attention on regions where
the production plays are
most economic.
Many
oil industry analysts expect
to see a slowdown in new
midstream projects as
production begins to wane,
which is expected by the
middle of 2015 as drilling
slows and many of the hedges
producers put in place to
manage price risk expire.
The USA's 43 year old
Vermont Yankee nuclear power
station has stopped
generating electricity as
the state moves toward a
cleaner and safer energy
future...
It commenced commercial
operations in 1972 and at
one point generated 71.8% of
all electricity generated
within Vermont .
Current Vermont Governor
Peter Shumlin is happy to
see the end of nuclear
energy in his state.
The company is indicted with
charges of violating waste
disposal regulations, which
has impacted streams,
wetlands, soils, surface
water and groundwater around
the company's Porter Street
shale oil well pad in
Franklin Township, Greene
County, Pennsylvania, the
DEP said in a statement.
The Wakati
increases the length
of time that fruit
and veg can be
stored without
refrigeration
For farmers in
developing countries
without refrigerators, a
great deal of produce -
and therefore profit -
can be lost through
spoilage. A new device
seeks to tackle this
problem by increasing
the short-term storage
time for fruit and veg.
The Wakati stores
produce in a sterilized
microclimate.
Speaker Boehner and Senator
McConnell are not the only
ones on Capital Hill who
have voiced opposition to
the idea of climate change.
Due to the beliefs of those
in power, and the stalemate
that they have caused over
climate change policy, it is
time for people to look
elsewhere for an actual plan
to combat and mitigate
climate change.