25th December 2010.
Taliban maraud on Afghan-Pakistan border. Hundreds of militants attack military outposts on Pakistan-Afghan border: image telegraph.co.uk
The meaning of Christmas?
December 25, 2010Honda takes to the air
December 24, 2010Honda Motor Co. says the first FAA-conforming version of the small business jet it has been working on for years made its first flight. The plane, called the HondaJet, flew from the company’s Honda Aircraft Co. operation at Piedmont Triad International Airport in Greensboro, N.C.
HondaJet first flight:image Honda Motor Co.
While an earlier version called a proof-of-concept aircraft has logged more than 500 hours of flight testing, flying the version built to Federal Aviation Administration rules is what really counts toward bringing the plane to market. Honda’s project is part of a renewed and growing intersection between automobiles and aviation that is occurring around personal- and business-transport. Honda touts the same qualities for the plane, such as “dynamic performance” and efficiency, as it does for its cars. The company has said it is essentially applying lessons learned in auto manufacturing to the aircraft business
HondaJet First Conforming Flight: image Honda Motor Co.
Honda says it will build five FAA-conforming jets for testing before ramping up production in 2012. The company says it has more than 100 orders for the light business jets, which have a top speed around 483 mph and a ceiling of 43,000 feet. Honda plans to deliver the first one in the third quarter of 2012.
HondaJet interior
First flight video is at http://hondajet.honda.com/
Using cerium oxide to mimic absorption of solar energy by plants
December 24, 2010
Science 24 December 2010: Vol. 330 no. 6012 pp. 1797-1801 DOI: 10.1126/science.1197834
High-Flux Solar-Driven Thermochemical Dissociation of CO2 and H2O Using Nonstoichiometric Ceria by William C. Chueh, Christoph Falter, Mandy Abbott, Danien Scipio, Philipp Furler, Sossina M. Haile, and Aldo Steinfeld
In the prototype, sunlight heats a ceria cylinder which breaks down water or carbon dioxide
Abstract:
Because solar energy is available in large excess relative to current rates of energy consumption, effective conversion of this renewable yet intermittent resource into a transportable and dispatchable chemical fuel may ensure the goal of a sustainable energy future. However, low conversion efficiencies, particularly with CO2 reduction, as well as utilization of precious materials have limited the practical generation of solar fuels. By using a solar cavity-receiver reactor, we combined the oxygen uptake and release capacity of cerium oxide and facile catalysis at elevated temperatures to thermochemically dissociate CO2 and H2O, yielding CO and H2, respectively. Stable and rapid generation of fuel was demonstrated over 500 cycles. Solar-to-fuel efficiencies of 0.7 to 0.8% were achieved and shown to be largely limited by the system scale and design rather than by chemistry.
A prototype solar device has been unveiled which mimics plant life, turning the Sun’s energy into fuel. The machine uses the Sun’s rays and a metal oxide called ceria to break down carbon dioxide or water into fuels which can be stored and transported.
Conventional photovoltaic panels must use the electricity they generate in situ, and cannot deliver power at night. Details are published in the journal Science. The prototype, which was devised by researchers in the US and Switzerland, uses a quartz window and cavity to concentrate sunlight into a cylinder lined with cerium oxide, also known as ceria.
Ceria has a natural propensity to exhale oxygen as it heats up and inhale it as it cools down.
If as in the prototype, carbon dioxide and/or water are pumped into the vessel, the ceria will rapidly strip the oxygen from them as it cools, creating hydrogen and/or carbon monoxide. Hydrogen produced could be used to fuel hydrogen fuel cells in cars, for example, while a combination of hydrogen and carbon monoxide can be used to create “syngas” for fuel. It is this harnessing of ceria’s properties in the solar reactor which represents the major breakthrough, say the inventors of the device. They also say the metal is readily available, being the most abundant of the “rare-earth” metals. Methane can be produced using the same machine, they say.
The prototype is grossly inefficient, the fuel created harnessing only between 0.7% and 0.8% of the solar energy taken into the vessel. Most of the energy is lost through heat loss through the reactor’s wall or through the re-radiation of sunlight back through the device’s aperture.
But the researchers are confident that efficiency rates of up to 19% can be achieved through better insulation and smaller apertures. Such efficiency rates, they say, could make for a viable commercial device.
“The chemistry of the material is really well suited to this process,” says Professor Sossina Haile of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). “This is the first demonstration of doing the full shebang, running it under (light) photons in a reactor.”
It has been suggested that the device mimics plants, which also use carbon dioxide, water and sunlight to create energy as part of the process of photosynthesis. But Professor Haile thinks the analogy is over-simplistic. “Yes, the reactor takes in sunlight, we take in carbon dioxide and water and we produce a chemical compound, so in the most generic sense there are these similarities, but I think that’s pretty much where the analogy ends.”
While cerium is quite abundant in the earth’s crust it is one of the “rare earths” and current production is dominated by China. Cerium oxide, which is used to finish semiconductors and obtained from the rare earth element cerium, rose in price from $ 4.70 per kg on April 20 to 36 U.S. dollars a kilo on Tuesday, October 19. An increase of 665 percent.
Temperature rose 10°C today but we will still have a cold white Christmas
December 24, 2010We had -22°C last night but tonight on Christmas Eve the temperature has risen to -12°C.
But the snow is thick on the ground and the views are spectacular. A little more snow is expected on Christmas Day and temperatures will then fall back to the -22°C level leading up to the New Year.
A Merry Christmas to one and all!
Rome embassy bombs set by “eco-terrorists”
December 23, 2010Anarchists are suspected of having launched parcel bomb attacks on the Swiss and Chilean embassies in Rome.
Swiss Embassy Rome: image flickr.com
The first explosion, which occurred at midday (11amGMT) seriously injured a caretaker at the Swiss embassy. The second, which occurred at around 3pm (2pm GMT), was at the Chilean embassy, also injuring one person. The Rome prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation on suspicion of “an attack with terrorist aims,” ANSA news agency reported
One of the investigators said that one of the main lines of inquiry was on “anarchist circles of the eco-terrorist movement.”
The parcel bomb delivered to the Swiss embassy in Rome exploded in the hands of a mail worker who opened the package. “A device hidden inside a package exploded in the embassy. at midday (1100 GMT),” the Swiss embassy said in a statement. “The postal worker’s hands were injured and he was immediately taken to hospital,” it added. The embassy said there had been no claim of responsibility. The injured man is a 53-year-old Swiss national and he risks the amputation of one or both his hands but his life is not in danger.
US: Polar bears are “threatened” but not “endangered”
December 23, 2010
Polar Bear (Sow And Cub), Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska: Image via Wikipedia
In spite of a great deal of PR from alarmist and global warming lobbies in the past week, the US has decided not to change the status of polar bears from “threatened” to “endangered”.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service told a U.S. District Court judge Wednesday that the threatened designation will not change because polar bears were not considered to be in danger of extinction at the time of the listing in 2008.
“The Service explained how its biologists had concluded in 2008 that the polar bear was not facing sudden and catastrophic threats [and] was still a widespread species that had not been restricted to a critically small range or critically low numbers,” the agency said in a statement.
Kassie Siegel, director of the Climate Law Institute at the Center for Biological Diversity, called the administration’s decision “a huge disappointment.” Arctic ice, the bears’ hunting ground, is melting and bears are starving to death, she said.
“It’s a wasted opportunity to do the right thing,” Siegel said. “The government’s own studies show about an 80 percent chance of extinction of two-thirds of the world’s polar bears in the next 40 years.”
Some enironmentalists heads are exploding right about now. This pretty well slams the door on the polar bears threatened by global warming meme. Now we know why there was a flurry of questionable press releases this past week like these:
Polar bears no longer on ‘thin ice’: researchers say polar bears could face brighter future: “a combination of greenhouse gas mitigation and control of adverse human activities in the Arctic can lead to a more promising future for polar bear populations and their sea ice habitat“
Polar bears: On thin ice? Extinction can be averted, scientists say
Cutting greenhouse gases now is the keyPolar bears still on thin ice, but cutting greenhouse gases now can avert extinction
Polar bears not endangered, US confirms
Is the Landscheidt minimum a precursor for a grand minimum?
December 23, 2010It took 500 years with reducing solar activity to get from the Medieval maximum to the the grand Maunder minimum. The Dalton minimum came a little over a 100 years later as solar activity was increasing to its modern maximum in the years preceding Solar Cycle 22 (c. 1890 – 1990). Now with the Landscheidt minimum seemingly well established, SC 23 and the current SC 24 show a clear trend of declining solar activity. SC’s 22, 23 and 24 are remarkably similar to SC’s 3, 4 and 5. The Dalton minimum coincided with SC’s 5 and 6.
It is reasonable to assume that climatic conditions over the next 20 – 30 years will resemble those prevailing between 1790 and 1820. But SC24 has a way to go yet and it could be that solar activity for SC24 and 25 will be even lower than during the Dalton minimum and perhaps closer to the Spörer minimum but perhaps not as deep as the Maunder minimum.
But in either case the solar activity to come following the Modern maximum may well resemble the 500 years of decline in solar activity which followed the Medieval maximum.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalton_Minimum
Solar activity events recorded in radiocarbon. Present period is on left. Values since 1950 not shown: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maunder_Minimum
The Maunder minimum in a 400 year history of sunspot numbers: Wikipedia
http://sc25.com/index.php?id=268&linkbox=true&position=10
The excellent historical weather chronology covering 1800 years put together by James A Marusek shows that the period between 1790 and 1820 was characterised not only by colder weather but also by violent fluctuations of seasonal weather. An extract of the chronology during the Dalton minimum is here: (weather chronology Dalton).
I give little credence to AGW Alarmism and the doom-saying regarding the effects of carbon dioxide. Environmentalism which was (and still is) highly admirable when concerned with the improvement of local conditions went off the rails when it went “global” and came to be dominated by the overweening arrogance of ignoring the sun and the presumption of super-computers and inadequate computer models. Rather I am persuaded about the dominance of solar influences on the chaotic system which is our climate.
Whether or not a grand solar minimum is on its way, we are in for a decade of two of reduced activity and a cooling trend during this Landscheidt minimum.
Piers Corbyn forecasts a 3rd solar-influenced wave of snow in UK
December 23, 2010
A THIRD period of “Solar Climate Change” on the UK will take place from Christmas Day to the End of December, this comes right after the first & second periods correctly predicted by WeatherAction.com & Piers Corbyn
The forecast made in November says….Snow deluges and blizzards in most of England and Wales, heaviest in East parts. Snow showers in Scotland. Sleet/rain and less cold in far West Ireland.
This “triple hit” of “Solar Climate Change” announced to WeatherAction.com users in November, means that the UK will go on to complete the “worst ever” December for High street retailers and business with the lack of essential public service due to road/rail/airport closures and again bring the country to it’s knees, and with “road salt” running out fast this “third” wave will take it’s toll on the “holiday” work force.
This is likely to add to one of the worst if not THE worst period of disruption in the UK to have been seen in modern times.
I will repeat what was said on the previous statement as this will still apply….
There are potential “life threatening” conditions that will be underestimated by the media (inc. Met Office).
With the aid of this forecast we hope to give some advance warning to those of you who are already suffering hardship and warn you of a very real risk of further and even bigger snow storms and blizzard conditions set for Scotland & England and Eastern Europe.
Please spread news of this forecast to all of those who are vulnerable and try to ensure that food supplies are sufficient to cope with this impending crisis.
Arman Jaffer – a successor to Tendulkar?
December 23, 2010
Arman Jaffer: image Mumbai Mirror
Arman Jaffer etched his name in the record books by scoring an incredible 498 runs against IES Raje Shivaji in the Giles Shield. The youngster, who plays for Rizvi Springfield, helped his team reach 800 for eight in the process but yesterday was all about him as he became the holder of the highest individual score in Mumbai schools cricket. The ease with which the 13-year-old batted revealed an instinct that cannot be coached. Perhaps the fact that he is former India opener Wasim Jaffer’s nephew has started to show. The Rizvi batsman broke his teammate Sarfaraz Khan’s record of 439 runs which was recorded in last year’s Harris Shield.
Sachin Tendulkar started his phenomenal Test career at the age of 16, so Arman has another 3 years to emulate his hero and get into the Indian Test team.
High corruption at the Commonwealth games spawns tales of conspiracies
December 22, 2010Today came the startling news that two inmates serving life sentences at Delhi’s notorious Tihar jail claim that the jail authorities gave them weapons to kill 2 of the 3 members of the Commonwealth Games Organising Committee currently being held at the jail on corruption charges.
Tihar Jail
Two inmates serving life sentences at Tihar Jail have claimed that the prison authorities gave them weapons to murder two former senior officials of the Commonwealth Games (CWG) lodged in the prison with them. In an application to chief metropolitan magistrate (CMM) Vinod Yadav, Amit and Nishant who are facing trial in a murder case, have said, “The jail authorities inside jail number 4 and ward number 11 approached us with weapons on December 20, 2010, and asked us to murder the two Commonwealth Games officials lodged in the jail with us.” On personally meeting the judge, the inmates identified the officials as TS Darbari and Sanjay Mahendroo, who are lodged in Tihar following corruption charges.
Their application stated, “The jail officials threatened us with dire consequences if we do not comply with their orders. We are also receiving threats to our life inside the jail premises.” Amit’s mother Munni Devi has also filed an application in the magistrate’s court claiming her son and Pawan were being threatened inside the jail.
The application also claimed that a Delhi police official, who had come to the prison on Monday, recovered the knife from their cell. But they have not identified the officer before the magistrate. “The country-made pistol that was given to us was displaced by the jail authorities. We seek the court’s help to protect us from this ongoing exploitation at Tihar,” the application read.
Following this, the judge has directed the station house officer of the Hari Nagar police station to file a report in the incident and investigate the claims of the Tihar inmates.
Sunil Gupta, PRO of Tihar Jail, told Hindustan Times, “These are hardcore criminals lodged in high security jail. No weapon was recovered from the jail premises and their application is a farce. There was no conspiracy.”
Speculation now is that:
- The lifers made up the story merely to create a distraction from their own murder trial, or
- Other officials in fear of new confessions have placed a contract on the lives of the officials being held, or
- Politicians who fear being implicated in the mesh of corruption surrounding the games have placed the contract, or
- the officials under arrest have themselves arranged for the “confession” to develop a sympathy factor before they come to trial.
Tihar Jail is itself notorious for the mal-treatment of many prisoners and for the comfortable living conditions for inmates with money and clout. So the allegation that Tihar jail officials were involved in something like this is not – in itself- so incredible!!
There will be many more twists and turns in this corruption scandal.
