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Sci/tech
$2 Billion Wind Turbine Order Is Largest Ever
May 16, 2008 09:04 AM - , MetaEfficient
Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens has placed an the largest ever order for wind turbines: he ordered 667 wind turbines from GE, each costing $3 million dollars, making the total order $2 billion. Picken plans to develop the world’s largest wind farm in the panhandle of Texas. The $2 billion order is just one quarter of the total amount he plans to purchase.
Nissan To Build Electric Cars
May 16, 2008 09:02 AM - , Earth 911
Nissan Motor Co. announced Tuesday it will mass produce electric cars within the next five years, according to NPR. Zero-emission electric cars will be available in two years for government fleets in the U.S. and Japan, Nissan Chief Executive Carlos Ghosn told NPR. By 2012, the cars will be in mass production.
An epidemic of extinctions: Decimation of life on earth
May 16, 2008 08:40 AM - http://www.independent.co.uk
The world's species are declining at a rate "unprecedented since the extinction of the dinosaurs", a census of the animal kingdom has revealed. The Living Planet Index out today shows the devastating impact of humanity as biodiversity has plummeted by almost a third in the 35 years to 2005.
NASA study links Earth impacts to human-caused climate change
May 15, 2008 09:21 AM - NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
A new NASA-led study shows human-caused climate change has made an impact on a wide range of Earth's natural systems, including permafrost thawing, plants blooming earlier across Europe, and lakes declining in productivity in Africa. Cynthia Rosenzweig of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Science in New York and scientists at 10 other institutions have linked physical and biological impacts since 1970 with rises in temperatures during that period.
U.S. Using Food Crisis to Boost Bio-Engineered Crops
May 15, 2008 09:04 AM - , Organic Consumers Association
The Bush administration has slipped a controversial ingredient into the $770 million aid package it recently proposed to ease the world food crisis, adding language that would promote the use of genetically modified crops in food-deprived countries. The value of genetically modified, or bio-engineered, food is an intensely disputed issue in the U.S. and in Europe, where many countries have banned foods made from genetically modified organisms, or GMOs.
Fuel cells: distant dream, but burning with promise
May 15, 2008 08:46 AM - Cornell Chronicle Online
Some day, fuel cells may power your car and exhaust only water and perhaps carbon dioxide. More efficient and cleaner than an internal combustion engine, their emissions will be much lower. They may also run your home without the energy loss of power lines, or even power your laptop or cell phone. But not today or even tomorrow.
Nanowires may boost solar cell efficiency, UC San Diego engineers say
May 14, 2008 09:12 AM - University of California - San Diego
University of California, San Diego electrical engineers have created experimental solar cells spiked with nanowires that could lead to highly efficient thin-film solar cells of the future. Indium phosphide (InP) nanowires can serve as electron superhighways that carry electrons kicked loose by photons of light directly to the device’s electron-attracting electrode — and this scenario could boost thin-film solar cell efficiency, according to research recently published in NanoLetters.
Companies preparing to rule 'climate ready' crop market -- report
May 14, 2008 08:46 AM - , The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD)
Some of the world's largest biotechnology companies have filed hundreds of patents on "climate ready" gene-altered crops, hoping to dominate a market expected to emerge as farmers respond to environmental stresses caused by global warming, an advocacy group for subsistence farmers said in a report today. BASF, Monsanto, Bayer, Syngenta, Dupont and biotech partners have filed 532 patent documents around the world for crops genetically altered to adapt to rising temperatures, the ETC Group's report says.
Recipe for energy saving unravelled in migratory birds
May 14, 2008 08:38 AM - Public Library of Science
Pointed wings together with carrying less weight per wing area and avoidance of high winds and atmospheric turbulence save a bird loads of energy during migration. This has been shown for the first time in free-flying wild birds by researchers at Princeton University, the University of Montana, and the German Max Planck Institute for Ornithology. They state in PLoS ONE’s May 14th edition that climate change might have a critical impact on small migrants’ energy budgets if it causes higher winds and atmospheric instability as predicted.
Shrimps see beyond the rainbow
May 14, 2008 08:34 AM - Public Library of Science
A Swiss marine biologist and an Australian quantum physicist have found that a species of shrimp from the Great Barrier Reef, Australia, can see a world invisible to all other animals. Dr Sonja Kleinlogel and Professor Andrew White have shown that mantis shrimp not only have the ability to see colours from the ultraviolet through to the infrared, but have optimal polarisation vision — a first for any animal and a capability that humanity has only achieved in the last decade using fast computer technology. The findings are published in the journal PLoS ONE.