SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — Several Midwest utilities, including Sioux Falls-based NorthWestern Energy, are studying the economics of building high-voltage transmission lines to carry wind energy to eastern markets. Pewaukee, Wis.-based American Transmission Co. joined with utilities in Ohio, Illinois, Iowa and South Dakota on a study that will address the need for new transmission lines to carry electricity from renewable power sources. ATC chose Quanta Technology of Raleigh, N.C., to come up with recommendations for transmission development in the Dakotas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan’s upper peninsula. Some of the same utilities backing the Strategic Midwest Area Renewable Transmission Study also have endorsed a plan by Novi, Mich.-based ITC Holdings Corp. to develop a high-voltage power line to move wind energy from the Midwest to homes in Chicago and other cities. The study will be combined with other studies under way by the Midwest Independent Transmission System Operators to help plan for future transmission needs. That group oversees operations of the electrical grid in the region.
Three powerful technology companies have banded together to oppose Google Inc.’s proposed settlement with the Authors Guild and the Assn. of American Publishers over the Internet search giant’s book scanning project. Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. have signed on to a coalition being assembled by the Internet Archive and Gary Reback, a Silicon Valley antitrust lawyer, said Peter Brantley, director of the Internet Archive, a San Francisco nonprofit that is trying to build a free digital library of Internet content. Though the coalition has not been formally announced, several library and journalism associations have already agreed to take part, including the New York Library Assn., the Special Libraries Assn. and the American Society of Journalists and Authors. The group is expected to issue a joint statement next week. The coalition’s members include players who normally would be sitting at opposite sides of the table. Reback, for example, is known for instigating the antitrust efforts against Microsoft. That they have agreed to join forces suggests the magnitude of the concern raised by Google’s book scanning efforts, Brantley said. ‘By having a set of organizations speaking together, we can demonstrate the seriousness which we all confront […]
Life expectancy in the United States rose to an all-time high, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said today. But that’s only half the story. The country is behind about 30 others on this measure. Though the United States has by far the highest level of health care spending per capita in the world, we have one of the lowest life expectancies among developed nations - lower than Italy, Spain and Cuba and just a smidgeon ahead of Chile, Costa Rica and Slovenia, according to the United Nations. China does almost as well as we do. Japan tops the list at 83 years. And in an era where advances in medicine and better understanding of health issues should boost life expectancy significantly, the gains announced today were modest. U.S. life expectancy reached nearly 78 years (77.9) in 2007, the latest year for which data from death certificates has been compiled. That’s up from 77.7 in 2006. Over the past decade, life expectancy has increased 1.4 years. In fact, U.S. life expectancy gains may be pretty much over, as some groups - particularly people in rural locations - are already stagnating or slipping, explains […]
In a modest building on the west side of Salt Lake City, a team of specialists in advanced materials and electrochemistry has produced what could be the single most important breakthrough for clean, alternative energy since Socrates first noted solar heating 2,400 years ago. The prize is the culmination of 10 years of research and testing - a new generation of deep-storage battery that’s small enough, and safe enough, to sit in your basement and power your home. It promises to nudge the world to a paradigm shift as big as the switch from centralized mainframe computers in the 1980s to personal laptops. But this time the mainframe is America’s antiquated electrical grid; and the switch is to personal power stations in millions of individual homes. Former energy secretary Bill Richardson once disparaged the U.S. electrical grid as ‘third world,’ and he was painfully close to the mark. It’s an inefficient, aging relic of a century-old approach to energy and a weak link in national security in an age of terrorism. Taking a load off the grid through electricity production and storage at home would extend the life of the system and avoid the expenditure of […]
NEW YORK — When some readers of Entertainment Weekly open their magazines next month, they will discover characters from US television programmes speaking to them from a wafer-thin video screen built into the page. The marketing experiment – which is being conducted by CBS, the US broadcaster, and Pepsi, the soft drinks maker – recalls the fantasy newspapers of the Harry Potter films and works much like a singing greetings card, with the video starting once a reader turns the appropriate page. The cost of the full-motion video ad was not disclosed, but it will be far more expensive than traditional print ads, according to executives familiar with the technology, developed by a US company called Americhip. The willingness to spend on such a promotion highlights the radical means marketers are employing to reach consumers at a time when a growing number of people are using new technologies such as digital video recorders to avoid ads. ‘It’s part of the future – a way to engage consumers in new and surprising ways, said George Schweitzer, president of CBS marketing group. ‘How do you sample a drink? You give them a taste. In the Harry Potter […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
