Month: June 2013

Mongolia Builds Their First Wind Farm

- Adam Clare 1 Comment

Via Treehugger

Mongolia is entering the sustainable energy market and the country aims to export renewable energy to its neighbours. It’s great to see countries that are not as well-off as others build the needed infrastructure for a sustainable future.

Mongolia is so windy and has such harsh winters, in fact, that the turbines at Salkhit were built specifically to be “Mongolia-proof” so they could survive the strong winds and winter freeze. Each blade is ~120 feet and the tower and blade combined are 384 ft. However, because Mongolia’s roads are still so bad, the turbines had to be transported directly over the steppe! It took three months for the pieces to arrive from China, where they were manufactured.
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This project is still just one of what will need to be many wind and solar power projects in order for Mongolia to realize its vision of becoming a net exporter of energy to neighbors in China and Russia. Every journey has a beginning, and it was great to see Mongolia taking this important first step.

Read more at TreeHugger

Via Spacing

Organic Farming is Better than Factory Farming for Carbon Capture

- Adam Clare

It turns out that not only is eating organic food better for you than processed foods, growing organic food is better for everyone. Organic farms (and likely home gardens) are better at capturing and retaining carbon than farms that are focused on mass production.

Last year, researchers reexamined all 74 studies that had looked at organic farming and carbon capture. After crunching the numbers from the results of these studies they concluded that, lo and behold, organic farms are carbon sponges.
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Recently, a team of scientists decided to compare the microbes in organic and conventional plots (plus one “low intensity” field that was somewhere between organic and conventional) at the W.K. Kellogg Biological Station in Michigan. They noticed that there was a much lower diversity of microbes in the conventionally farmed plot [PDF]. Perhaps the more complex community is better at exchanging the carbon among themselves, rather than releasing it to the atmosphere.

Read more at Grist.

Band of the Month: The Cautioneers

- Greg

Hello Friday! We made it!

As the NXNE music festival has been invoking joyous, creative revelry inside AND outside of venues throughout downtown Toronto over the last three days, we’re now in the thick of it and I’m excited for the second featured Band in the last week.

Today’s band is The Cautioneers.

Combining harmonious, reverb-doused vocal melodies over softly percussive keys, and smooth synthesizer behind ethereal and driven guitar hooks, this Toronto six piece takes melodic pop to a dark and dreamy level.

The Cautioneers are being featured in three NXNE showcases this week. Be sure to catch at least one of them, including tonight, June 14, at The Boat at 1am. They are also closing off Saturday night at 3am @ Rancho Relaxo and playing a stripped down set @ Of A Kind on Sunday afternoon.

Now get out there and give your ears a treat!

Band of the Month by Greg O’Toole

Bees are Great for Honey and Sleep

- Adam Clare

Bees are wonderful little beings that spread pollen to places that need it and, as a bonus they create delicious honey. It turns out that a spoonful of honey can help you sleep!

Suffering from yet another poor night’s sleep? Then how about trying some local beekeeper’s honey for a rejuvenating sleep!

Here’s why: Researchers found that a teaspoon or two of honey before bed ensures a restorative sleep. A human liver stores about eight hours of glycogen – an important brain food. If you eat supper at 7 p.m., by about 3 a.m. your brain releases a stress hormone called cortisol. Cortisol scavenges the body, melts muscle tissue and converts it into glycogen to feed the brain. When released, cortisol causes the heart to beat faster and raises glucose insulin levels in the blood.

Read more here.

USA Raises ‘Carbon Price’

- Adam Clare

Climate change is happening and it’s costing a lot of money to deal with. More floods, tornados, hurricanes, and other natural events are happening with greater frequency thanks to planetary temperature increase. The reason the planet’s temperature is increasing is thanks to the way previous generations have dealt with waste.

One such waste product comes in the form of exhaust from cars and other air pollution from various sources. This much is obvious, but very few countries have acted on this issue (in fact, Canada has gone out it’s way to stop action). In the USA, the Obama administration has quietly passed a new law that raises the cost of releasing pollutants into the air in the hopes it will help slow more climate change.

Buried in a little-noticed rule on microwave ovens is a change in the U.S. government’s accounting for carbon emissions that could have wide-ranging implications for everything from power plants to the Keystone XL pipeline.

The increase of the so-called social cost of carbon, to $38 a metric ton in 2015 from $23.80, adjusts the calculation the government uses to weigh costs and benefits of proposed regulations. The figure is meant to approximate losses from global warming such as flood damage and diminished crops.

Read more at Bloomberg.

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