Friday, December 23rd, 2016
Kim Willsher, - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: This article about the launching of a French solar road has one major problem: it is factually inaccurate. This stretch of road in Normany is not the first solar road in the world, as any regular SR reader knows (see SR archives). However, that is irrelevant to what I see as the important point and why I am running this piece. What it shows me is that solar roadways, bikeways, and sidewalks are catching on in the developed world in many countries and parallel the rise in the number of EV vehicles. By 2030, just 14 years from now, in Europe and Asia we will see a very different transportation infrastructure. The U.S., as things stand now, will be years behind.
A test phase will evaluate whether the solar panel road can provide enough energy to power street lighting.
Credit: Christophe Petit Tesson/EPA
France has opened what it claims to be the world’s first solar panel road, in a Normandy village.
A 1km (0.6-mile) route in the small village of Tourouvre-au-Perche covered with 2,800 sq m of electricity-generating panels, was inaugurated on Thursday by the ecology minister, Ségolène Royal.
It cost €5m (£4.2m) to construct and will be used by about 2,000 motorists a day during a two-year test period to establish if it can generate enough energy to power street lighting in the village of 3,400 residents.
In 2014, a solar-powered cycle path opened in Krommenie in the Netherlands and, despite teething problems, has generated 3,000kWh of energy – enough to power an average family home for a year. The cost of building the cycle path, however, could have paid for 520,000kWh.
Before the solar-powered road – called Wattway – was opened […]
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Thursday, December 22nd, 2016
Mario Vasquez, - truthout
Stephan: One of the trends shaping our future is consolidation. Six corporations own most of the media is one. But nowhere is it clearer than with Amazon, as this report spells out. I admit it I use Amazon frequently. We live in a rural area, getting to a store like Costco, is a a project. Amazon is in my office, as it is in yours. It fulfills a need, although we buy many things from other sites. But Amazon is the new Sears.
If you read in the diaries, and daybooks of men and women, beginning in the late 19th century they are filled with tales of the Sears catalogue. All over America people ordered from their Sears catalogue, then in some rural farms put it in the privy, both as reading material and toilet paper. It was a ubiquitous totem object.
It seems to me the question is is not that Amazon commands such a large market share, but that it be regulated and the culture demand that it conduct its affairs while fostering wellbeing. This is one reason why unions are important. But it takes everyone: Wellbeing is a collective intention made up of many acts.
Amazon Books, for now the online retailer’s sole physical bookstore, at the University Village mall in Seattle, March 9, 2016.
Credit: Michael Hanson / The New York Times
Amazon.com is ubiquitous: It seems to reach into all the corners of our lives, selling everything from toiletries to furniture. Yet, beyond the “A to Z” selections offered on Amazon exists the reality that workers, consumers and their communities are suffering from the retailer’s stranglehold on the American economy, researchers at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) say in a study released in late November. Not only does Amazon possess an increasingly dominant share of the retail market — with one of every two dollars spent online going to the company — but it is increasingly expanding into other low-road money-making schemes, at the expense of public coffers. Amazon’s grip on the US economy should be worrisome for anyone seeking an egalitarian and fair society.
“A to Z”? The M Is for Monopoly
As ILSR puts it, when considering Amazon, imagine “if Walmart owned most of our malls and […]
3 Comments
Thursday, December 22nd, 2016
Stephan: Some good news. The numbers have just come out on the prevalence of EVs in the U.S. and once again it is clear that the transition out of the carbon energy era is going faster than anyone anticipated or could model. This is the 8 Laws in action, people voting with their pocketbooks for a vehicle power source that promotes wellbeing.
And look at where this is taking place, which states are adopting EVs and those which are not. The distribution is very skewed.
Note also that there is little correlation between gas prices and EVs sales. That says to me that people are making this decision not because of gas prices but as a positive act to improve wellbeing. This is a change in consciousness.
Credit: Ron Antonelli/Bloomberg
Electric vehicle sales in the U.S. are higher than they’ve ever been, according to a report published by ChargePoint, which operates more than 31,000 electric vehicle chargers in the U.S.
Between November 2015 and November 2016, more than 130,000 plug-in hybrid or battery-powered EVs were sold, bringing the total number of EVs on the road in the U.S. and Canada to close to 535,000. In the U.S. alone, 542,000 EVs have been sold to date. (emphasis added)
Put in context, that’s more than seven times the 73,000 EVs that were sold in the U.S. in 2012. That’s not just concentrated in places like California. While California is still in the lead as the state with the most EVs, Utah is the fastest growing and saw a 60 percent increase in EV registrations.
The Tesla Model S topped the chart with the most vehicles sold between January and November 2016. In the second spot was Chevy Volt with more than 21,000 vehicles, followed by the Tesla Model […]
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Thursday, December 22nd, 2016
Mary Brophy Marcus, - CBS News
Stephan: I think one is well advised, particularly if one lives in a high sunshine area, to visit a dermatologist once a year and let them look you over. Here's why.
The av
erage American’s chances of developing the most serious form of skin cancer have been steadily rising over the last seven years — and more Americans are dying from the disease.
New data from 2016 shows one in 54 people will be diagnosed with invasive melanoma, compared with one in 58 in 2009, according to researchers who investigated melanoma incidence rates and deaths.
“We wanted to provide an update on the incidence and lifetime risk of developing melanoma so doctors can incorporate it into their daily practices. For internists, it might make them more likely to do a full body scan or to recommend a patient to a dermatologist,” study co-author Dr. Alex Glazer, with the National Society for Cutaneous Medicine in New York, told CBS News.
The lifetime risk for in situ melanoma — which involves only the top layers of skin but can become invasive — has risen even more rapidly, from one in 78 people in 2009 to one in 58 today.
The odds of developing either type of melanoma, in situ or invasive, over a lifetime is shockingly high: one in 28 people will eventually be diagnosed.
The study, […]
1 Comment
Thursday, December 22nd, 2016
Michele Gorman , - Newsweek
Stephan: There is no question, where gun laws are stricter there is less gun death. Here's the data. Once again wellness oriented Blue value governance leads the way.
For the sixth time since 2010, California has the strongest gun laws of all 50 states, according to the most recent annual scorecard released by the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
The center, which tracks every state’s gun legislation, published its scorecard on December 16, just days from the end of a year that saw the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history—the June 12 Pulse nightclub attack in Orlando, Florida, that claimed 49 victims. And although they often aren’t publicized widely, shootings take place in neighborhoods and communities across the country on a daily basis.
Grading the States
Seven states received “A”-range grades, while 25 states earned F’s for weak gun laws in 2016. The center assigned the 18 other states scores ranging from B-plus to D-minus. Each year, legal experts within the organization evaluate every state’s gun laws, assign grades and compare those rankings with its most recent gun death rate. The team bases its analysis on various policy solutions, ranging from the gun-violence prevention order that allows a judge to temporarily suspend individuals’ access to guns if they are viewed as posing a significant danger to public safety to […]
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