Direct Action

Power Walking

- Adam Clare

Thanks to a newish invention your walking can now power all sorts of portable devices. There’s been similar devices that have been created but I haven’t mentioned them here in a while. It’s always good to see people turning what we do in something even more productive.

For the past 10 years Dr Max Donelan, from the Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, has been working on ways to harness people power —- how to capture the energy generated when you’re out for a stroll.

He succeeded and his Biomechanical Energy Harvester is featured in today’s edition of the academic journal Science.

True bionic power.

Feed the Birds to Help them Mate

- Adam Clare

Birds make nice music, and the birds that there are the more music that is created. To indirectly produce more music one should then feed birds. A recent released study came to the conclusion that feeding birds over the winter helps them procreate.

Those that were given extra food laid eggs earlier and, although the same number of chicks hatched, on average one more successfully fledged per clutch. Although it was well known that feeding birds during winter increases their survival, this is the first time that the benefits to subsequent breeding have been shown.

Leading the research, Gillian Robb, from Queen’s University School of Biological Sciences said “Our study shows that birds that receive extra food over winter lay their eggs earlier and produce more fledglings.”

Dr Stuart Bearhop from the University of Exeter, who supervised the research, said “We show that extra food provided in winter helps the birds that take it, however, we are still unclear whether it has a knock on effect on other species. Nevertheless, I will certainly be continuing to feed the birds in my garden for the rest of the winter.”

CNN Likes Recycling

- Adam Clare 3 Comments

Recycling is great! CNN has written an article all about the goodness of recycling. Their reporting differs from how The Economist tackled recycling. I’d love to see CNN cover the reduce ‘R’, until then CNN has fun facts like:

Looking at it another way, according to the National Recycling Coalition, the amount of energy saved in one year by Americans recycling their soda cans, plastic containers, newspapers and packaging represented the energy equivalent of:

Enough gasoline to power 11 million passenger cars for a year
A year’s worth of electricity supply for 17.8 million Americans
11 percent of the energy produced by coal-fired power plants in a year
29 percent of nuclear electricity generation in a year

Be an Environmentalist Everyday

- Adam Clare

It’s easy to show that you care about the environment (and by extension the health of those around you).

The Nature Conservancy has compiled a collection of ways that you can be an environmentalist daily.

Remember when “environmentalist” meant…recycling?

It’s not so simple anymore. Being an environmentalist today calls for a whole new level of greener thinking — from what you choose at the grocery store to how you commute to work every day.

The list includes riding a bike, taking the stairs, compost, and keeping bees in line.

Dreaming in Green

- Adam Clare

The Guardan has a well written article that looks at the emergence of academic green thinking in the UK. The article looks at the advancements being made, but does so in a way that ensures we keep our feet on the ground.

Fortunately, he points out, students are starting to take action for themselves, with campaigns including student organisation People and Planet’s Green League Table last summer, which gave universities degrees according to their environmental awareness. The results were surprising. Oxford and LSE both got 2.1s, while York and Glasgow scraped 2.2s: the top three were Leeds Metropolitan, Plymouth and Hertfordshire. “That really shook a few vice-chancellors,” says Patton, smiling. “I imagine that resolutions were made not to come that far down again.”

But the biggest problem is that, in the end, this is not just an issue for universities. This is going to be a problem for all of us. Paul Allen, development director at the Centre for Alternative Technology, is very anxious about the blindness of the academics. “Do they realise that we need to have a huge reskilling for Britain, that in the years ahead we are going to have to learn how to do things very differently? Are they planning courses that are going to re-educate our young people? No. They’re teaching young people in buildings where the lights are on all the time, in buildings where the energy is badly managed, where no one has even thought about approaching green electricity providers.”

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