Month: November 2006

GO DAVID!

- Vanessa King

suzpic.jpegCanadian Environmentalist, David Suzuki, has a foundation that researches and follows most pressing issues on climate change and anything environment related. I thought it was only fair to give this guy some props for his consistantly amazing work at bringing these kinds of important issues to the public in a way that is understandable and inspires involvement from the community. On the foundation site, you can sign up for a newsletter which sends you frequent (but not too frequent) information on issues involving the Canadian Government and programs that are in effect by David’s crew working toward solutions.

Sound vague? Check it out for yourself! The last newsletter that showed up in my e-mail was addressing The Government of Canada, who failed to deliver a credible and effective climate change action plan at the United Nations climate change conference held in Nairobi, Kenya.

This part really sparked my interest…….

Contact Prime Minister Stephen Harper

By mail (postage-free): House of Commons, Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6;
fax: 613-941-6900; or e-mail: pm@pm.gc.ca

Better Tsunami Detection

- Adam Clare

Detecting tsunamis early can save millions of lives, and the earlier the detection the better. Researchers are wanting to put a new kind of detector that is placed on the ocean floor that will help provide better coverage in the Indian and Pacific oceans.

“They would offer greater coverage of the oceans by filling in large gaps between buoys, allowing scientists to promptly alert officials of undersea earthquakes that could trigger tsunamis and endanger coastal areas, she said.”

Economist Magazine Looks at Green

- Adam Clare 2 Comments

coverThere has been a lot of investment in the field of energy production in the past couple years with a huge increase in the renewable energy sector. The Economist magazine wonders why this is. They openly state that this trend is good for society, but not so good for money.

My copy of the magazine arrived in the mail, and I noticed that the main article is not available on their site, thus no direct link. You may have to take my word that the Economist is unsurprisingly skeptical of renewable energy, apparently British economists are afraid of change. The Economist does provide a different angle than what I’m used to when thinking of renewable energy – the profit motive.

A Free Energy Future?

- Adam Clare 1 Comment

Here’s a documentary that aired in 1995 that looks at the feasibility of free energy. Energy from water is brought up a few times. It is very optimistic about the idea of free energy and I’m hoping that one day we get free energy that doesn’t damage the environment.

Most people scoff at the idea of free energy but it wasn’t that long ago that people scoffed at the thought of using water to power machines (steam trains for example) and oil to power more machines (smog machines for example). That being said there is some questionable science in the vide, but we can dream can’t we?

From the movies description at Google Video:
“In the opening stages Arthur C. Clarke explained how there were four stages in the way scientists react to the development of anything of a revolutionary nature. “Free energy” was now working its way through these four stages of reaction, which were:

a: “It’s nonsense,” b: “It is not important,” c: “I always said it was a good idea,” and d: “I thought of it first.””

Microsoft Has Green Potential, Linux Currently Green

- Adam Clare

Over at the geek-news site Slashdot there recently was a post about how Microsoft can save energy by changing some minor code. Slashdot readers also had a neat discussion regarding power consumption and computers. The community (not surprisingly) concludes that Linux is just as good – if not better – than Windows at conserving energy.

“The author figures that the upgrade would affect 100 million computers and that the power cost savings could hit $7 billion per year. CO2 emissions would be cut by 45 million tons. But what about the impact on computing?”

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