The vast expansion of wind and solar power planned by the Obama administration and congressional leaders is fraught with challenges for the nation’s aged electricity network, grid monitors with the North American Electric Reliability Corp. say. But a NERC report released today does not call for a slowdown in deployment of renewable energy. Officials expressed confidence that technology solutions will arrive in time. ‘I am extremely confident we will be successful,’ said Mark Lauby, a NERC director of reliability assessments who briefed reporters yesterday. If there is a limiting factor in renewable power growth, it will be the inability to add enough transmission lines to accommodate new wind, solar and other renewable generation resources, he said. The NERC report is a response to policy proposals now before Congress. Non-hydro renewable power now supplies less than 2 percent of the nation’s electricity. A Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee bill would require utilities to deliver 20 percent of their power from renewable sources by 2021, starting with a 4 percent target in 2012. The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s version starts at 6 percent in 2012 and climbs to 25 percent in 2025. A portion of the […]
Some are clearly just gangsters. But others are trying to stop illegal dumping and trawling Who imagined that in 2009, the world’s governments would be declaring a new War on Pirates? As you read this, the British Royal Navy – backed by the ships of more than two dozen nations, from the US to China – is sailing into Somalian waters to take on men we still picture as parrot-on-the-shoulder pantomime villains. They will soon be fighting Somalian ships and even chasing the pirates onto land, into one of the most broken countries on earth. But behind the arrr-me-hearties oddness of this tale, there is an untold scandal. The people our governments are labelling as ‘one of the great menaces of our times’ have an extraordinary story to tell – and some justice on their side. Pirates have never been quite who we think they are. In the ‘golden age of piracy’ – from 1650 to 1730 – the idea of the pirate as the senseless, savage Bluebeard that lingers today was created by the British government in a great propaganda heave. Many ordinary people believed it was false: pirates were often saved from the gallows by supportive […]
President Barack Obama said he wants to move past ‘a dark and painful chapter by exposing Bush administration legal memos that authorized harsh tactics in the interrogation of suspected terrorists. The U.S. Justice Department released four memos yesterday – – with some material blacked out — that show the agency’s lawyers approved the Central Intelligence Agency’s use of such techniques as sleep deprivation, slapping, nudity and waterboarding to simulate drowning. The Obama administration ruled out prosecuting government interrogators who relied on the memos in questioning suspects. ‘We have been through a dark and painful chapter in our history, Obama said in a statement. ‘Nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past. Obama said making the documents public won’t jeopardize national security. In one of the memos, lawyers approved putting a high- ranking al-Qaeda suspect in a cramped box and telling him an insect in the box could sting him. The idea was discarded, the memos say, ‘for reasons unrelated to any concern it might be unlawful. Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement that intelligence officials who relied on the Justice Department’s legal advice won’t be prosecuted […]
Abstract: We have discovered distinctive red/gray chips in all the samples we have studied of the dust produced by the destruction of the World Trade Center. Examination of four of these samples, collected from separate sites, is reported in this paper. These red/gray chips show marked similarities in all four samples. One sample was collected by a Manhattan resident about ten minutes after the collapse of the second WTC Tower, two the next day, and a fourth about a week later. The properties of these chips were analyzed using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray energy dispersive spectroscopy (XEDS), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The red material contains grains approximately 100 nm across which are largely iron oxide, while aluminum is contained in tiny plate-like structures. Separation of components using methyl ethyl ketone demonstrated that elemental aluminum is present. The iron oxide and aluminum are intimately mixed in the red material. When ignited in a DSC device the chips exhibit large but narrow exotherms occurring at approximately 430 °C, far below the normal ignition temperature for conventional thermite. Numerous iron-rich spheres are clearly observed in the residue following the ignition of these peculiar red/gray chips. The red portion […]
Some vegetable cooking methods may be better than others when it comes to maintaining beneficial antioxidant levels, according to a new study in the Journal of Food Science, published by the Institute of Food Technologists. Results showed that, depending on the vegetable, cooking on a flat metal surface with no oil (griddling) and microwave cooking maintained the highest antioxidant levels. Fruits and vegetables are considered to be the major contributors of nutritional antioxidants, which may prevent cancer and other diseases. Because of their high antioxidant levels and low-calorie content, consumers are encouraged to eat several servings of fruits and vegetables daily. Researchers at the University of Murcia and the University of Complutense in Spain examined how various cooking methods affected antioxidant activity by analyzing six cooking methods with 20 vegetables. The six cooking methods were boiling, pressure-cooking, baking, microwaving, griddling and frying. Their findings showed the following: ¢ The highest antioxidant loss was observed in cauliflower after boiling and microwaving, peas after boiling, and zucchini after boiling and frying. ¢ Green beans, beets, and garlic were found to keep their antioxidant levels after most cooking treatments. ¢ The vegetables that increased their antioxidant levels after all cooking […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
