Archive for the 'World Affairs' Category
August 27th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
The Earth is being heated by the Sun every day. Almost 174,000 Terawatts of energy hits the Earth. One Terawatt is equal to one million megawatts! So the Sun is heating the Earth with 174 billion megawatts of energy! Of this, about 30% is reflected back due to the white reflectivity of the Earth which is known in science as the albedo effect. So the net energy absorbed by the Earth is 122 Terawatts.
If so much energy is being absorbed by the Earth, it should continue to heat up and its temperature must continue to rise constantly. Within days the temp should surpass the maximum that any life could bear. All life would die and the trees whither and char.
But this does not happen. The Earth has its own temperature stability. Why? Because, at night the Earth radiates the heat absorbed during the day into deep space. Of the 122 TW that the Earth absorbs from the Sun, it radiates 121TW back into deep space and the difference is converted into work for moving the air, the clouds and the sea currents and tides. Radiation always takes place between two bodies, the heat going out from the hotter to the cooler body. We can actually feel this cooling effect at night, but the truth is that it is happening all 24 hours. The Earth is constantly cooling by radiating out its energy into deep space. We don’t feel it during day because the effect of the Sun’s radiation is to annul the cooling and go on further to warm the Earth. Over the millions of years the Earth has achieved a balance of its temperature equating the heating by the Sun and the cooling at night.
The sea has a vast reserve of water which is capable of absorbing the heat of the Sun without change in its temperature. Sun’s radiation penetrates a long distance down in the water and the heat is absorbed into a very big mass of water. In places where there are algae or plankton as a mixed layer, its depth makes some difference. Observations of sea surface temperature (SST) where there was ocean mixed layer (OML) at 5 feet below surface showed a day night temperature difference of 1.5 degrees centigrade. But when the OML was 50 feet deep, the temperature difference was only just 0.1 degree!
The Oceans hold 1.3 billion cubic kilometers of water. Physics has given us a way to calculate the rise of temperature of water knowing its mass, specific heat and the amount of heat input. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has reported that the effect of greenhouse gases on global warming is 1.6 watts per sq. meter which works out to a heat input of 800TW on the surface area of 500 Tera sq. meters for the whole planet. This heat input for the whole year without considering the night-time radiation from the sea surface, can only raise the temperature of the sea by ? degree over a period of 111 years! It is therefore impossible for the global warming arising out of the greenhouse gases to warm the sea enough to melt the polar ice caps from underneath.
eMaya the expert on Climate Change, suspects that it is more likely caused by undersea volcanic activity. You can read how she plans to stop global warming in the book ‘eMaya’ at www.trafford.com/08-0434
The author Dilip Dahanukar studied engineering in India and management in the USA. He has rich experience in corporate management and finance. His interest in environment and computer possibilities has resulted in this book ?eMaya?. He spends his weekends in his forest-garden abode in the hills in India.
August 27th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
A Multi-million-dollar undersea pipeline designed to bring water to North Cyprus from Turkey could be up and running by 2012.
As there has been a period of water shortage, President Demetris Christofias, the internationally-recognised Greek Cypriot leader, is presently trying to supply the southern part of the divided island through tankers bringing water from Greece.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said work on the 110km plastic pipeline scheme would start in June 2009.
“The project should be completed at the latest within three years beginning in June next year (2009),” the PM told a news conference in Nicosia alongside Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat. “The (Turkish) government has given the necessary instructions to the environment ministry so the project can be finalised,” he added.
A dam will be created at Alakopur, near Anamur in southern Turkey, to collect water from the Dragon River. This water will then be pumped to a new dam in North Cyprus by converting the reservoir at Gecitkoy, south of Guzelayali.
Selin Ekinci, an engineer from Alsim-Alarko who is working on the project, said water would be transferred to a 10,000m3 storage facility through a 21km pipeline in Turkey.
Mr Ekinci said the water would then be sent along 80km of plastic pipeline submerged 250 metres below the surface of the Mediterranean.
The pipeline will be attached to large weights which are essential to prevent it floating on the surface.
At Guelyali beach, a pumping station will be constructed to send the water to Gecitkoy dam along a 4km pipeline.
Mr Ekinci said, “The pumping station will not have a great impact on the beach where it will be constructed, either environmentally or scenically. It will not be a huge construction.”
The project, which was signed between Turkish Water Works General Directorate and Alsim-Alarko in 2005, will carry 73 million m3 of water from Turkey each year. About 15 million m3 will be used for drinking water after being purified in a facility that will be constructed near Lefkosa.
The remainder will be used to irrigate 7,650 hectares of agricultural land in the Mesaoria plain.
The project aims to meet the drinking and irrigation needs of North Cyprus up to the year 2035, when the population of the TRNC is estimated to grow to about 350,000.
Orhan Aydeniz, chairman of the Association of Forestation and Prevention of Erosion (Kema), said the project to bring water from Turkey was “very good”.
However, he also said that it would take at least four years for the project to be completed, and urged the government to take tough measures in order to protect existing resources.
There should be a limit on the number of wells opened, he urged. Apart from this, meters should be put on wells to limit the amount used. The municipalities should not plant exotic plants which need a lot of water- they should plant local plants which can withstand drought.
In addition, the government should identify those agricultural products that are marketable, and the water should be used on them.
Linda Cartwright is an expert on the property market in North Cyprus, currently writing for Meridies Homes
August 17th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
Climate change and global warming - indeed, how to control them - are becoming more central to politics with every new development. Sustainable energy is the method of our times, and government’s across the globe are under pressure - from each other, from environmental groups, and from individuals - to implement genuine and successful ‘green’ policy.
The E.U is one of the biggest political organisations in the world. It comprises 27 member states and under its banner are close to 500 million people. The GDP that the E.U generates accounts for roughly 30% of the world.
In terms of the world’s environment, then, it is a chief player. What is the European Union doing to combat global warming and climate change? And are they committed to the cause?
The official E.U website has this to say on the matter:
“Sustainable Development stands for meeting the needs of present generations without jeopardizing the ability of futures generations to meet their own needs – in other words, a better quality of life for everyone, now and for generations to come. It offers a vision of progress that integrates immediate and longer-term objectives, local and global action, and regards social, economic and environmental issues as inseparable and interdependent components of human progress.
Sustainable development will not be brought about by policies only: it must be taken up by society at large as a principle guiding the many choices each citizen makes every day, as well as the big political and economic decisions that have. This requires profound changes in thinking, in economic and social structures and in consumption and production patterns.”
What is clear, then, is that the E.U see promotion of the message as central; a sustainable future is only possible with a growing conciousness and willingness on the part of the public to accept and encourage environmental policy and legislation.
If the E.U can get its citizens to accept the challenge, though, what policy can be expected from the organizations governments?
The ‘E.U Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS)’ was established to answer exactly that question. In its own words, the SDS will “gradually change our current unsustainable consumption and production patterns and move towards a better integrated approach to policy-making…[it will] reaffirm the need for global solidarity and recognizes the importance of strengthening our work with partners outside the EU, including those rapidly developing countries which will have a significant impact on global sustainable development.”
So the E.U - acknowledging its role within the world’s sphere - champions the importance of climate change as a global issue, and believes that it should be treated as such. Its method for achieving that aim is to work closely and extensively with the world’s other governmental bodies.
The SDS has 7 key areas of interest:
Climate change and clean energy
Sustainable transport
Sustainable consumption & production
Conservation and management of natural resources
Public Health
Social inclusion, demography and migration
Global poverty and sustainable development challenges
Central, then, is the simultaneous need for a maintenance of current ecosystems - to conserve and manage the continent’s current resources - combined with a development of a sustainable infrastructure for the future; investment in clean fuels, plus solar energy, wind energy and biogas.
Indeed, the E.U - through its 7 SDS points - recognises that environmental issues affect everything in our lives, because we are part of the environment, and so everything we do is affecting it also. As such, the E.U beleives that ‘Changing Behaviour’ is imperative in the fight against climate change:
“A host of cultural, economic, social and psychological factors affect the way we behave, often locking us into unsustainable consumption habits. Even those who say they will buy organic food for environmental reasons and the good of their own health may change their minds if products outstrip their budget.”
The overall challenge, then, for the European Union - along with the rest of the world’s nations - is to educate the next generation on the pitfalls of our own.
That way, the E.U can guarantee that it does not return in the future to the issues that have caused the problem in the first instance.
Chris Woolfrey is the Global Warming expert at EcoSwitch The environmental social network.
August 17th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
In the Autumn of next year, the third ‘Solar Decathlon’ will take place in Washington, D.C.
When it is under way, the experts and spectators alike will see some of the best examples in the world of the relationship between design and solar power.
Comprising 20 teams - each representing universities or colleges - entrants are expected to build a house that is solar powered, and is judged on aesthetics and design.
The official Solar Decathlon website has this to say:
“Teams of college students design a solar house, knowing from the outset that it must be powered entirely by the sun. In a quest to stretch every last watt of electricity that’s generated by the solar panels on their roofs, the students absorb the lesson that energy is a precious commodity. They strive to innovate, using high-tech materials and design elements in ingenious ways. Along the way, the students learn how to raise funds and communicate about team activities. They collect supplies and talk to contractors. They build their solar houses, learning as they go.”
Perhaps the key phrase, then, is that “energy is a precious commodity”. What the Solar Decathlon competition tries to show is that sustainable and renewable energy is not just important, but necessary; with climate change on the rise, and fossil fuels declining, the message from the Solar Decathlon is one of duty, not preference.
Which is not to say that sustainable and renewable energy cannot be attractive and exciting, as the competition also shows.
Indeed the ultimate aim of the competition is to fuse the need for sustainable energy with the luxury of good design:
“The Solar Decathletes — tomorrow’s engineers, architects, researchers, and homeowners — are sharing with us a new vision for living under the sun. These solar homes are powerful, comfortable, and stylish. They are relaxed and elegant, wasting neither space nor energy.
Today’s solar houses connect with nature to take advantage of heat and light from the sun and cooling breezes and shading. But they crank this natural advantage way up by using the newest products and technologies on the market. The Solar Decathlon solar homes combine the best from the past and the present… and deliver the promise of a brighter future.”
So the Solar Decathlon is committed to a growing movement that dispels any beliefs on the incompatibility of good looks and sustainable power.
And - since its launch in 2002 - it has proved that point. With the stipulation that the entrants build the houses with only existing commercially available products, the Solar Decathlon commits to sustainable housing that is commercially viable.
Within a commercially anchored framework, then, the teams are judged in 10 contests throughout the competition.
They can be divided into two groups, detailing technology and everyday use.
Technology:
Architecture, Engineering, Communications, Appliances, Lighting, Hot Water, Energy Balance.
Everyday Use:
Market Viability, Comfort Zone, Getting Around.
So the Solar Decathlon brings public interest to the solar development issue; the same institutions that are developing the most high tech and specialist advances in sustainable energy are expected to use their knowledge for the benefit of public and commercial culture.
As the competition begins again next year, the commercial will once again -quite rightfully - take precedence over the specialist.
Chris Woolfrey is the solar power expert at EcoSwitch The environmental social network.
August 17th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
And if the case of the recent discovery of the body of a 70-year-old man in his apartment in the town of Aix-les-Bains in southeastern France is anything to go by, he had anything but “good neighbours.”
While there’s nothing too unusual perhaps in the report of an elderly person’s death going unnoticed, especially when he or she lives alone, there must be more than a little cause for concern in cases such as this one.
That’s because investigators believe that the man’s body, found mummified in his apartment on the 14th floor of a social housing block of flats last week, had been there for anything up to three years.
Media reports confirm that the man did indeed live alone and had no close family in the region.
But where were the neighbours?
Well one of them - living on the same floor - told reporters that he apparently crossed the 70-year-old on the landing occasionally, and the last time the two had spoken was after his dog had died. That was FOUR years ago.
The caretaker of the building - yes unbelievably there is one - but obviously not taking a great deal “care” of its occupants, noticed just last week that the old man’s letter box was full to overflowing - clearly an astute woman - and alerted the authorities.
The police arrived, forced open the door and discovered the body. The official explanation of death was through “natural causes” and there won’t be any inquiry launched.
Perhaps though there should be one opened on the morality and intellect of the neighbours who you would think might just have noticed that something wasn’t quite right.
One of them, when questioned by reporters said,
“I didn’t know that someone had died in the building. There are 14 floors and people are moving in and out all the time.”
Not surprisingly perhaps, the neighbour - a woman - wanted to remain anonymous.
To put this sad story into context, there are a couple of other elements that need to be included.
A few years ago in Europe - August 2003 to be precise - there was a heat wave across much of the continent. In France alone around 15,000 people, mainly elderly, died as a consequence and there was a public outcry.
There have been subsequent calls each summer (and winter) from the authorities for people to keep a watchful but not-too-obtrusive eye on elderly neigbours.
There was even a half-hearted, but bungled attempt by the government to launch a “day of Solidarity” whereby people would give up one of the public holidays in May and instead work “free” with all money earned being put in a special fund to help the elderly.
Surprise, surprise (given the evidence of this case) the idea didn’t work for one reason or another and was finally shelved this year.
As long ago as 1999, the campaign to promote good neighbourliness was launched here in France. From humble beginnings with just 10,000 participants taking part in 80 buildings dotted around the capital, La F?te des voisins (neighbours day) has grown to more than 5 million people in 600 local authorities throughout the country, according to organisers’ figures for 2007.
And even since 2004 the concept has been exported to many other parts of Europe with Journ?e europ?enne des voisins (European neighbours’ day) in around 150 towns and cities.
Sadly, the idea and the news do not seem to have reached Aix-les-Bains.
Johnny Summerton is a Paris-based broadcaster, writer and journalist specializing in politics, sport and travel. For more on what’s making the headlines here in France, log on to his site at http://www.persiflagefrance.com
August 17th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
It’s a question that has preoccupied many here in France over the past month, and sadly made the headlines far too often. It’s also one to which it’s difficult to provide an answer.
Over the past four weeks there have been three separate incidents of young children or babies - being left alone in locked cars. In two of the cases, the infants died, in the third a passerby was able to intervene, break a window and save the child from probable death.
Yannis
On July 15, two-and-a-half-year-old Yannis died in the town of Pont-de-Ch?ruy near Lyon. The 38-year-old father was reportedly supposed to drop his son off for the day with relatives while he went to work.
Arriving at the car park just a few metres from the pharmacy where he worked, he was the witness of a road traffic accident, and his attention was apparently distracted enough for him to be able to offer the licence number of a vehicle involved, but not to remember that his son was still in the back of his own car.
It was several hours later that a passerby noticed the child alone in the car, and immediately contacted the emergency services. But it was too late for Yannis, who died of dehydration.
The outside temperature that day had been 25 degrees centigrade. Experts estimated that inside the car it had been more than 45 degrees.
Zo?
Just a week later on July 22 in the town of Saint-Marcel in the department of Sa?ne-et-Loire, three-year-old Zo? suffered the same fate.
She died after being left alone in the vehicle at the company car park while her 38-year-old father went to work.
Every morning the father would drive his five-year-old son to the creche and then leave his daughter with a child minder.
For some reason on this particular day he forgot about Zo?.
When he returned to the car in mid afternoon he apparently still didn’t realize that his daughter was in the back and drove to collect his five-year-old son from the creche. It was only when returning to the car with his son that the father realized Zo? was in the back, and he immediately drove to the emergency department. But it was already too late by then.
Third case
On Wednesday there was yet another case, but this time with a happier ending.
A two-and-a-half year old girl was left in a car on the car park of a supermarket in the town of Br?zet, near Clermont-Ferrand, while her mother was doing some last-minute shopping.
She had apparently only been alone for about 20 minutes when a passerby noticed her, broke the window and alerted the emergency services. The child was dashed off to hospital for tests and her mother taken into custody and investigated for putting her daughter’s life in danger. The temperature in the car was again estimated to be about 45 degrees centigrade.
A look at the wheels of French justice in each of these cases reveals some astonishing differences in the way and speed with which they have been handled by the authorities.
The father of Yannis is not being prosecuted for the moment, although the police insist that it doesn’t mean the case is closed and charges could still be brought.
Zo?’s father was immediately investigated for involuntary homicide, and the maximum penalty for that in France is three years imprisonment and a ?45,000 fine.
It’s bad enough reading or hearing reports in the media of animals left in cars, their owners thinking perhaps that leaving the windows open for just a little air would not present any danger.
But as any animal lover will know, and even those who don’t own a pet would probably realize, the temperatures inside a vehicle can rise quickly, even when it’s not high summer. And the outcome is inevitable.
That it could happen once to a child is surely the saddest of news. But on the back of previous reports, for it to happen three times in quick succession!
An explanation
One prominent paediatrician, Jean-Michel Muller, president of the Association of Paediatricians of Nice C?te d’Azur, has tried to come up with some sort of explanation as to how parents could forget. He is quoted in the French press as saying that such things could happen to anybody.
“If you ask those to whom this has happened, they know that children shouldn’t be left alone in the car, but at that particular moment their minds are elsewhere, they have some other problem,” he says.
“It’s not intentional by any means. It’s like knowing that you shouldn’t leave a child alone at the side of a swimming pool but in spite of that it happens.
“When it comes to leaving a child in a car these people have obviously had difficulties, or are preoccupied by other things, had other things to do during several hours and at the last moment forget that there is a child still in the car.”
Whether that would be a convincing argument in a court of law would only become apparent if charges in any of the cases were brought.
But still there remains the question for many people here in France as to how parents could forget?
Johnny Summerton is a Paris-based broadcaster, writer and journalist specializing in politics, sport and travel. For more on what’s making the headlines here in France, log on to his site at http://www.persiflagefrance.com
August 16th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
When former Astronaut Edgar Mitchell recently told the world that he had been briefed on Aliens and UFOs by the U.S. Government, the media reacted by treating his comments with disdain. Their own bias against any acknowledgement that Aliens might be visiting our world and unwillingness to accept the word of a national hero that UFOs are intelligently controlled spacecrafts from another world may have caused them to miss the historical significance of what he said.
Mitchell, a former Navy Officer and Astronaut that walked on the Moon, grew up in Roswell, New Mexico. Over the past several years he has indicated that he was living in the town when the 1947 UFO crash occurred and knew what happened based on conversations with first hand witnesses. He has also said that several other people with intimate knowledge about the UFO crash have taken him into their confidence. Mitchell gave this statement to Robert Collins:
“I grew up in the Roswell area. I was almost 17 and senior in high school when it happened. Family members were ranchers and cattle people. We knew all the ranchers and towns people in the area, including where the UFO impacted. In spite of official denials and threats about talking, the local lore told the story.”
“After my space flight, and being a local boy, people involved, not only the locals, trusted me with their stories, because they were getting older and wanted the truth out, but were afraid to say it publicly; so considered me a trustworthy source to carry their story onward. Been telling it all that way, if anyone bothered to ask my opinion, since the Pentagon incident 11 years ago. Only now, suddenly, it got international media attention.”
The Pentagon incident that Edgar Mitchell is talking about occurred after he requested and received permission to meet with the Intelligence Committee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during April of 1997. Mitchell wanted to brief them on what he knew or had heard about the Roswell UFO Crash. After the briefing, Mitchell says he was told by a Navy Admiral that what he knew about the crash was correct. He recently commented on that meeting:
“ I did take my story to the Pentagon — not NASA, but the Pentagon — and asked for a meeting with the Intelligence Committee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and got it. And told them my story and what I know and eventually had that confirmed by the admiral that I spoke with, that indeed what I was saying was true.”
When a Vice Admiral found out about the Mitchell briefing at the Pentagon, he wanted to attend. The Vice Admiral was refused access and told that he didn’t have a “need to know.” This interesting side story provides proof that the UFO secret is one available only to an elite group of Military Leaders within the U.S. Government. It also lends credence to the idea that the President and most elected officials probably do not have access to one of our nation’s biggest secrets.
When Harry Truman signed the National Security Act in 1947, it allowed for the restriction of certain information from the President and other members of the U.S. Government. The idea was to safeguard national secrets and provide sitting presidents and other elected officials with plausible deniability. I doubt that Truman envisioned a time when members of the government would routinely lie to and deceive those they were constitutionally obligated to serve.
It’s easy for mainstream news company reporters to label Edgar Mitchell as a new age Kool-aide drinker because of his interest in exploring the Mind Sciences from a more eclectic point of view. However, I don’t see them attacking other Astronauts for their beliefs or actions. Many of the original Mercury, Gemini and Apollo Crew Members were notorious drinkers and philanderers. Some Space Shuttle Astronauts flew training missions while drunk, while others have publicly exposed themselves or lobbied for the rights of earthworms. Despite behavior that ranges from criminal to comical, those Astronauts continue to represent NASA on TV and in print interviews.
It’s easy for members of the Press to set themselves up as societal filters set in place to decide what people should be told. It’s harder to accept and report on the kind of truths that are not easily covered in thirty second television news reports or short paragraphs in increasingly abbreviated versions of news publications. As the line from the film City of Angels proclaims, “Some things are true whether you believe them or not.”
For more, visit http://www.ufoguy.com
Author: Bill Knell is a popular paranormal author, speaker and consultant. Author’s Website: UFOguy.com Terms To Use Article: Permission is granted to use this article for free online or in print with inclusion of the author?s url.
August 15th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
After the nuclear power company British Energy announced that it was thinking about takeover approaches earlier this year, and then subsequently held talks and meetings with EDF of France, E.ON and RWE of Germany, and Iberdrola of Spain. It is the French energy power house that has emerged as the only formal bidder for the takeover and is now only days away from clinching the £12 billion deal.
EDF has been one of the leading contenders to buy British Energy since the British Government effectively put the power company up for sale by announcing it wanted to sell its 35% stake in the nuclear operator.
According to the BBC, EDF is now prepared to pay as much as 775p per share, after British Energy released that none of the potential deals took into account the soaring wholesale electricity costs and the prospective role of its sites and the allotted plans that were in development in conjunction to Britain’s nuclear power supply.
Shares in British Energy, which is capable of producing around one-sixth of the UK’s energy needs, rose to almost 6% following the report as the renewed speculation and prospect of an imminent deal excited the investors considerably. British Energy’s eight nuclear power stations are Dungeness B in Kent, Hartlepool, Heysham 1 and 2 in Lancashire, Hinkley Point B in Somerset, Hunterston B in Ayrshire, Sizewell B in Suffolk and Torness in East Lothian. The group, which has around 6,000 staff, also owns a coal-fired power station at Eggborough, East Yorkshire.
EDF executives now hope to be able to announce a deal imminently. Centrica, the British power company, is also involved in some negotiations with EDF, they are seeking to secure a deal that would see it acquire 25% of British Energy.
The decisive takeover price for British Energy is still under last-minute discussions, but could go above the 750p share mark, valuing it at between £11bn and £12bn. That would secure the Government as much as £4bn. However, the net cash has already been marked for the decommission costs that are connected with dismantling nuclear power stations, nearing the end of their lives.
Despite Centrica refusing to comment on its involvement in the deal, it is understood that its executives whom are also working very busily with EDF. The British company’s involvement in the deal would appease critics of the sale of the UK’s only major nuclear operator to a French company.
Since Gordon Brown committed the UK to developing a brand new generation of nuclear power plants, Malcolm Wicks, the Energy minister, has commented that while the Government is not opposed to British Energy being taken over by a foreign buyer, they are alert to the sensitivities of such an issue.
The Government will also have to consider how a deal with the French power house EDF would affect other potential operators in view of a monopolising of nuclear power by the French company, given that British Energy’s existing sites are likely to be the favoured locations for future constructions.
Ryan Whatley is the solar power expert at EcoSwitch The environmental social network.
August 11th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
After the success of Solar One - the world’s first large-scale thermal solar power plant - and its update, Solar Two, Europe has now entered into the race for sustained solar power.
Solar Tres, located West of Ejica in the Andalusia district of Spain, has been modeled on the Solar One and Two projects, which were developed and updated in the Marstow Desert, California, in 1981 and 1995. Like its American predecessor, Solar Tres will produce energy through heliostats: large mirror assemblies that track and reflect the sun’s rays throughout the day. From there, it is bounced onto a central column, named the ‘Solar Power Tower’, which absorbs and stores the energy, to be converted into thermal power.
What marks Solar Tres above its prototypes is that it uses molten salt as its conducting fluid, so that the energy can be stored in molten form and converted at any time. It means that the new European Solar Power Tower can be operational 24 hours a day, allowing for greater energy storage and conversion, and it outstrips its US counterparts, which ran on oils, and so had a lower capacity for storage after conversion.
It also looks to expand on the size of Solar One and Two, with a heliostat field that is three times larger than Solar Two at its optimum. It means that Solar Tres has a potential capacity of 15MW, where Solar One and Two could reach a maximum of 10MW. Not only can it run more efficiently, then - working right round the clock - but its output is greater, allowing for sustainable energy that is produced more quickly and in abundance.
By all intents and purposes, it is a larger and more ambitious project. With the backing of the EU Commission, who have provided 5 million Euro through the EU 5th Frame program, it has the potential to move thermal solar power into the competitive energy markets.
After the relative success of the original US Power Tower Plants, the improvements to Solar Tres mean a bold step towards sustainable energy in the world at large. With a project of this scale, it signals a move from personal sustainability initiatives - the efforts made, from individuals to family units - to a potentially full-fledged commercial representation of universal solar power in the community.
It now means that two of the world’s major political powers - The US, and the EU - are committing themselves to the importance of sustainable energy. Whilst Solar One and Two are now closed, they represent important first examples of what Solar Tres can now make possible.
And that is not to say that the US have abandoned the pursuit; upon the closure of the original Solar One and Two site in 2001, they commenced production of Nevada Solar One, which became operational in 2007, and boasts a maximum production capacity of 75MW. With three major Solar Power Tower Plants built since 1995, moves to a genuine production of solar power are being implemented on both sides of the Atlantic. Sustainable energy is a real possibility. Let’s hope other nations follow suit.
Chris Woolfrey is the solar panels expert at www.EcoSwitch.com The environmental social network EcoSwitch
August 10th, 2008 -- Posted in World Affairs |
Edgar Mitchell was one of the twelve Americans to walk on the surface of the moon. During a recent radio interview on the UK-based Kerrang! Broadcast, he told host Nick Margerrison, “I happen to have been privileged enough to be in on the fact that we’ve been visited on this planet and the UFO phenomena is real.” That statement shocked the host and began an amazing disclosure from a true American hero.
Born in Texas and brought up in New Mexico, he has three earned degrees including a Doctorate of Science degree in Aeronautics and Astronautics from MIT, as well as at least four honorary Doctorate degrees from prestigious universities. Among his many awards are the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the United States Navy Distinguished Service Medal.
Mitchell began his Navy career in 1952 and completed flight training in 1954. During the 1950s, he flew A3 aircraft as part of the Heavy Attack Squadron Two and served as a Research Project Pilot with the Navy’s Air Development Squadron Five. In the early 1960s he was Chief of the Project Management Division of the Navy Field Office for a Manned Orbiting Laboratory. In 1965 he entered the U.S. Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School in preparation for astronaut duties.
In 1966, Edgar Mitchell was chosen for the Astronaut Training Program by NASA. After serving as a member of the astronaut support crew for Apollo 9 and as backup lunar module pilot for Apollo 10, Mitchell, he was assigned as a lunar module pilot. In 1971, U.S. Navy Captain Mitchell was a part of the crew of Apollo 14 along with Admiral Alan Shepard and Colonel Stuart Roosa.
After the Apollo 13 disaster, the world had their eyes on the Apollo 14 Moon Mission. Mitchell maneuvered the lunar module Antares to a perfect landing on the hilly Fra Mauro region of the moon. Mitchell and Shepard deployed from the module, performed a number of experiments and collected over 100 pounds of moon rocks and set a record of staying thirty three hours on the lunar surface. They also hold the record for the longest moon walk on record at nine hours and seventeen minutes.
Nine days after his mission began, Edgar Mitchell made a triumphant return to Earth and helped reestablish the American Public and Government’s faith in NASA. He retired from NASA and the U.S. Navy in 1972. Since that time, Mitchell has been active as an author and speaker on many subjects including space exploration, the nature of consciousness and powers of the mind.
Now seventy-seven years old, the sixth man to walk on the surface of the moon told a stunned radio audience that Aliens from other worlds have contacted humans and that governments have purposely covered up what they have learned about these entities. Mitchell describes the beings as “little people who look strange to us.” He says that the traditional description of creatures with a small body frame, large eyes and over-sized head is accurate.
Speaking about the cover-up, Mitchell told radio host Nick Margerrison, “’It’s been well covered up by all our governments for the last 60 years or so, but slowly it’s leaked out and some of us have been privileged to have been briefed on some of it… I’ve been in military and intelligence circles, who know that beneath the surface of what has been public knowledge, yes - we have been visited. Reading the papers recently, it’s been happening quite a bit.”
Responding to a question about disclosure by Margerrison, Mitchell said, “This is really starting to open up. I think we’re headed for real disclosure and some serious organisations are moving in that direction.” Well, all except for NASA. Despite what Mitchell did for them, a spokesperson for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration responded to his comments by saying, “NASA does not track UFOs.
NASA is not involved in any sort of cover up about alien life on this planet or anywhere in the universe. Dr Mitchell is a great American, but we do not share his opinion on this issue.”
It’s came as no surprise that what other government agencies have described as “the most deception organization in the United State Government” should turn on Mitchell as soon as he tried to tell the truth about UFOs and Aliens. They have repeatedly described Astronaut UFO sightings as cases of mistaken identity saying they were pieces of rockets, ice, dust particles and space junk. If the truth is out there, NASA isn’t going o be the government agency that will tell you about it! For more, visit http://newsletter.ufoguy.com
Bill Knell is a popular paranormal author, speaker and consultant. Author’s Website: UFOguy.com Terms To Use Article: Permission is granted to use this article for free online or in print with inclusion of the author?s url.
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