California Uses More Gas than China

 

Think about China today; the country with the most people in the world, who’s surface is in the top 5 of the world, and who’s industry is really developing, relying almost entirely on pollutant non-green fuels, which caused an increased and even dangerous degree of pollution. Still, despite the fact that it’s area is just under 100 times smaller, California uses more gas than the entire chinese popullation.

Also, don’t think that this is somehow caused by the fact that China uses little gasoline; this is definitely not the case. Actually, California uses more gas than any other country in the world (except of course for the US as a whole). That includes Germany, Russia, Brazil, any other country.

This stats was published in what is a very interesting report to read, posted by the Energy Commission’s State Alternative Fuels Planl. So it si definitely not going to be easy adapting to a greener alternative. Also, in the past 20 years, the gasoline used in California has increased by one half. But the fact remains that China’s “thirst” for oil increases and will probably continue to increase until they will adopt a sustainable strategy.

So taking into account these considerations, could we possibly believe Al Gore’s speech, where he claims that 10 years from now the US will be living entirely on carbon free sources of energy? This really is an interesting issue, and the results remain to be seen in the following years.

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Gore’s Challenge: 100% Carbon Neutral by 2018

Who isn’t paying attention when Al Gore is talking? The impact he has on people from America and all around the world is just huge, hard to comprehend. He’s probably no saint, but he doesn’t have to be. Due to what he promotes, he managed to promote and help “green” ways of living, giving a big helping hand to the environment and as a consequence, to everybody.But what would a man such as him be without setting goals that seem impossible? Throughout our history, most if not every great leader has made some goals which seemes virtually impossible to achieve. Some failed, some succeded. But without the high standards set, humanity would not be where it is today.

Gore’s challenge is just as amazing: America to produce 100% of it’s power from carbon-free sources in ten years. So, we’re all optimistic (how else could we be?), but this seems just too much. Even if we were to overcome the technological obstacles which separate us from this, people still have to be persuaded to use green sources of energy and transportation. However, in a speech in D.C. Al Gore claims this is how things will happen. As far as I’m concerned, carbon capture and storage will not be possible in 10 years, and that’s by the most optimistic standards. Also, considering how reluctant people are in accepting these sources of energy, at least 10 years will pass until they will get used to the idea and maybe start adopting it in general. Still, he could be right, relying on some huge carbon taxes. Obama praised this speech, and claims that his presidency will take imprtant steps in accomplishing Al Gore’s dream; the main idea of his speech:

“The answer is to end our reliance on carbon-based fuels. When you connect the dots, it turns out that the real solutions to the climate crisis are the very same measures needed to renew our economy and escape the trap of ever-rising energy prices. Even coal has a role to play if the carbon dioxide is captured and safely buried … but clean coal does not exist right now”

4 amazing modern sculptures from around the world

Art is hard to define as a concept and is being understood different as time passes. Sculptors have often been the flag carriers for art around the world. Here’s just a small list of some amazing art works that just stand out, public sculptures that just stand out.

The magic tap

It seems to be taken straight out of photoshop, but it’s as real as you can get. Located in the Aqualand in Cadiz, it seems to be floating and pouring water all day long. It’s not rocket science figuring out how it works; there’s a pipe hidden in the stream of water which is the answer behind it.

La Trobe

A statue of Charles Joseph La Trobe, gifted to the Library by the La Trobe Society, was unveiled in 2006. Located in Melbourne, the sculpture is standing upside down and seems to be a wonder of balance.

The Shark

The Shark has been an attraction for tourists in Oxford for more than 20 years. This house is not different to any other; it was built as a semi-detached house in about 1860 but now attached by a link to a second house to the north.

Computer chip Mona Lisa

It may not seem that great, but this sculpture made just from computer chips is definitely something to be admired whenever you’re in the Asus Headquarters.

Wrongly made, massive mangrove restoration backfires

How many times have you heard about a good idea applied wrongly which backfired and caused more harm than good?? This is exactly the case with one of the world’s most intensive efforts to restore coastal mangrove forests. It is failing as we speak because people planted them in the wrong places. Also, this restoration could harm other coastal habitats in the Philippines.What happened?? Over the past century, about 3 quarters of the mangroves in the Philippines were destroyed, and the others were seriously threatened. The trees which grow in brackish coastal waters on leggy roots are vital for the local ecosystems, as they supply key habitats for fish and shellfish. Their destruction could cause a massive downfall of the local ecosystem, and actually causing it to crash.

So, of course, a restoration was very important. So conservation groups began fanning out across the archipelago 2 decades ago, planting 44,000 hectares with hundreds of millions of mangrove seedlings. But the bad thing is that a big part of those trees was doomed to a quick death,according to biologists Maricar Samson and Rene Rollon of the University of the Philippines in Quezon City. They claim that the planters didn’t understand the biological needs of the mangroves, and placed them in places they just can’t grow.

So why the initiative has to be applauded and respected for the worthiness behind it, we really should recommend more care in taking such actions that could have an amazing impact. To get them going the right way, the two biologists recommend better guidance on where to place the seedlings

Mirror mirror on the wall, who’s the brightest star of all?

Actually, it’s not about the brightest star of all, but the brightest star in our galaxy. It seems there’s a new contender for the title of Milky Way brightest star; it’s near its dusty center, and infrared observations performed by NASA have revealed how bright it is by piercing the dust that surrounds it.

The thing is that measuring brightness is not an exact field and sometimes results vary. This challenger is estimated to shine at the wattage of 3.2 million Suns, while the current record holder, Eta Carinae, has over 4 million Suns. Despite the fact that current calculations show that Eta Carinae will still hold the record, things are not so clear. This was the case when it was the challenger, and the record holder was the Pistol Star.

At the moment, Eta Carinae is the most massive nearby star that can be studied in great detail and it is believed that it will become a supernova in the nearby future (nearby in astrological time). Stars of its type have the mass of “just” 100 times the mass of the Sun, and they produce more than a million times as much light as the Sun, but they are quite rare. Just several are known in the whole galaxy. Scientists have studied it for a long time, because it is believed that GAMMA-RAY bursts produced by the collapse of massive stars may have triggered mass extinctions on Earth. They have been worried that this might be the case for Eta Carinae, but it is currently believed that this will not happen, because its axis is not pointed towards our planet.

Both Eta Carinae and the Peony nebula star (challenger) are evolved blue giants known as “Wolf-Rayet” stars, which have masses of 100 to 200 Suns. Either could self-destruct as a supernova at any moment.
“As we get better measurements, these things change around a bit,” says Michelle Thaller at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, who was not involved in the study. “These are real drivers of a galaxy’s life cycle, when these things go off, they will probably kick off a new generation of stars.”

Scientists discover ‘world’s first bird’, and compare it to another

Archaeopteryx has been the subject of many controversies, but it is now widely considered as the world’s oldest bird; however, reptiles were flying for 50 million years when it appeared, even before the world was roamed by dinosaurs. Now, paleontologists have unveiled an extraordinary prehistoric ‘flying’ reptile which lived 235 million years ago.It’s called kuehneosaurs and it was first unearthed in the Britain by Archaeologists in the 1950s but until now nobody has studied their ability to fly or glide; a team of scientists from the University of Bristol, England conducted a study which led to surprising conclusions. These early flyers used extraordinary extensions of their ribs which used friction with air to form large gliding surfaces on the side of the body. They were up to 70 cm in size, and it was first assumed that they were able to fly, so scientists didn’t even think about studying their ability to glide. The team built lifesized models of the two genera.

They are Kuehneosuchus, which was a glider and had elongate wings and Kuehneosaurus which had much shorter wings which were used in a way similar to parachuting. Scientists are studying the possibility that these two were in fact the male and female of the same species, because in other aspects there is little or no difference. Koen Stein, who worked at this project:

“We didn’t think kuehneosaurs would have been very efficient in the air, but all the work up to now had been speculation, so we decided to build models and test them in the wind tunnel in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Bristol.
“Surprisingly, we found that Kuehneosuchus was aerodynamically very stable. Jumping from a five-metre tree, it could easily have crossed nine metres distance before landing on the ground. The other form, Kuehneosaurus, was more of a parachutist than a glider.”

What’s for sure is that the species lived in the warm late Triassic period from 235 to 200 million years ago, and 80 million years before the largest dinosaurs of the Jurassic period, and 50 million years before the earliest known bird, archaeopteryx, which lived in what is now southern Germany. The rest remains to be found out.

Mystery insect baffles experts at London museum

If you have a bug you want to identify and know everything about, there’s one place which will solve all your problems; the experts at the Natural History Museum in London are proud to say that they can identify species from around the globe, from birds and mammals to insects and snakes. Still, if you were to show them this particular tiny red-and-black bug showed above, they wouldn’t know what to say. What’s even more surprising is that the place you can find it in is the museum’s backyard.The bug has is about as big as a grain of rice, and was first seen in March 2007 on some of the plane trees that grow on the grounds of the 19th century museum, collections manager Max Barclay said Tuesday. Less than 3 months from that, it was the most common bug in the garden.

After that, it started showing up in other British green places, and scientists still haven’t been able to solve this issue. The museum has more than 28 million insect species in its collection but there is none that has the same characteristics as this bug. But Max Barclay, collection manager, is very cautios about calling it a new discovery, especially because the place it was found.

“I don’t expect to find a new species in the gardens of a museum,” he said. “Deep inside a tropical rainforest, yes, but not in central London.” “We waited to see if the insect would survive the British winter,” Barclay said. “It did and it’s thriving, so now we had better figure out what it is.”

High-fructose corn syrup - the mastermind behind obesity?

Whether you want to admit it or now, the world (and most of all America) has a problem with obesity. The fact that people are eating less healthy and working out less is something that can’t be denied even by the most optimistic of us. However, even taking into consideration all those aspects, the numbers seem to be unbelievable. About 1 in 3 Americans is obese, and under 1 in 3 has suitable weight.

What if it’s that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS)? It was introduced in 1970, about the time obesity began to take proportions, and it’s very possible that it has a certain trait that wreaks havoc into your cells, especially fat cells. When it was introduced, it was a huge success, and it took many “client” from sugar; you can check out all those things and many more from HFCSfacts, which was dedicated exclusively to sharing information about it.

What’s surprising is that almost nobody seems to be paying attention to this really important issue. Just taking into consideration all the health issues caused by obesity (not to mention the huge productivity loss) should be enough motivation for several studies to be carried to find out for sure if there is a connection between HFCS and obesity.

“A number of recent studies . . . have convinced me that HFCS does not affect weight gain,” says Barry Popkin of the University of North Carolina, who was an early proponent of the HFCS-obesity hypothesis. “At the same time, there is a new body of research that suggested HFCS might be linked with higher triglyceride levels and other health effects. This research is too preliminary to make any conclusion.”

Cost Effective Solar Energy Devices from MIT to hit Markets in 3 years

The two major problems of green energy are actually developing the technology and making it cost productive. Both of them are yet to be solved, but scientists are making progress everyday to solve those matters.

Now, MIT engineers say they’ve created a new approach to harnessing the sun’s energy that provide windows with a clear view and illuminate rooms at the same time at low costs which promise to make it highly usable. This solar concentrator collects light from the edges, and dye molecules coated on the glass absorb that light, and then re-emits it at a different wave length.

The light is thus trapped and creates energy while allowing light into the room as well, thanks to this new mixture. Marc A Baldo, leader of the work claims that “the focused light increases the electrical power obtained from each solar cell by a factor of over 40″.

This technology will be developed and commercialized by a new company formed by members of the team who created it, and the system has every chance of being available for purchase in less then three years.

The man who farms the sea

Credits

A few miles inland from the Sea of Cortez, cracked earth contrasts with the clear, cloudless sky to create a beautiful yet cruel and unforgiving landscape. Here, resources are scarce and people are even fewer. Still, one man fights agains all these adversities; amid mosquitos, cactus, and an almost unbearable heat Carl Hodges manages to create fluorishing crops.

He is the founding director of the University of Arizona’s highly regarded Environmental Research Lab and his amazing work has attracted quite a few workers, both qualified and not. Hodges spent most of his 71 years figuring out how humans could gather enough resources to live in places where usable water and good soil are almost inexistant.

The crop is salicornia and Hodges and his team have flooded the plots with saltwater from the Sea of Cortez, located nearby. The crop which relies on ocean water has the potential to feed and fuel millions. Flowing from a man made canal, this kind of water is accessible in many places where otherwise, the possibility of a good crop wouldn’t exist. With his trademark had contrasting with his iPhone, Hodges has seen a fantastic opportunity to use salt water and direct it inland and create wealth and healthy food instead of disasters. The atmospheric physicist, far from the crowd and media, seems to have found a key that many have been looking for but failed to find.

Analyzing recent projections of ice melt occurring in the Antarctic and Greenland he calculated that diverting 3 times the water Mississipi has would be just enough to achieve the goals he has set. He wants to channel and use ocean into some artificial rivers to “feed” commercial aquaculture operations, mangrove forests and crops that produce food and fuel. This could mean an increase of millions of acres of productive farmland.

“The only way we can stop [sea-level rise] is if people believe we can,” said Hodges, whose outsize intellect is exceeded only by his self-assurance. “This is the big idea” that humanity has been waiting for, he believes.

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