As we gradually have picked up steam in our pursuit of energy efficiency, we recognize the impact our operating our car or home can have on the wider energy picture. Turns out, we also need to be concerned about the impact of our computer and phone use as well beyond the energy we pull from the outlets in our house to power these devices. Cloud computing, "Googling", and using the data network of our modern phones adds a layer of indirect energy use that continues to increase even as other uses in our lives decrease. It will be interesting to follow this as it develops.
Cell networks are energy hogs
"In a new whitepaper, the CEET estimates that when we use wireless devices to access cloud services, 90 percent of the electrical consumption of that system is eaten up by the network's infrastructure, not the servers or phones.. The data centers themselves use one-tenth that amount of electricity. Worse, cloud services accessed wirelessly will continue to explode, leading to a ballooning electrical load as well. By 2015, they estimate this system could eat up between 32 and 43 million megawatt hours. In 2012, the figure was only 9 million megawatt hours."
A smart "local food" movement recognizes that as we improve transportation energy efficiency, and reduce the environmental impacts of moving things from place to place, the importance of eating what grows near us will come from the idea of growing strong local economies and creating strong regional character. That is not to say that embodied energy will ever be an insignificant issue, but as with every ecological issue, we need to understand all the impacts and benefits to build a wide consensus. When it comes to food, local is a great goal, but healthy, diverse, and socially just growing are still the priority.
Vermont bests nation in local chow
"The ranking was based on several factors: the number of farmers markets in a state; the number of Community Supported Agriculture projects, in which consumers buy shares in a farm's output; and the number of "food hubs," which help farmers with economies of sale by distributing products to consumers and stores."
It is important in our conversation about the impacts of our actions on our neighbors, our country and our planet, that we participate in an active discussion that focuses on sound scientific investigation. Not every weather issue will come from climate change, and not every wacky event comes from our greenhouse gas emissions. For those of us who tire of the war on science, we should recognize that our small contribution to the backlash against it comes from focusing on results instead of process. A good process always leads to a better understanding - and never a "correct result" as some want to suggest. It may turn out that after further study, the freak weather experienced in the lower 48 last summer all occurred as a result of climate change, but we should recognize that it does not lessen the veracity of climate change if it does not cause every issue.
Federal report says don't blame global warming for freak of nature 2012 US drought
"Thursday’s report by dozens of scientists from five different federal agencies looked into why forecasters didn’t see the drought coming. The researchers concluded that it was so unusual and unpredictable that it couldn’t have been forecast.
'This is one of those events that comes along once every couple hundreds of years,” said lead author Martin Hoerling, a research meteorologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “Climate change was not a significant part, if any, of the event.'"
To help that cause of improving the national discussion on science, for the first time in almost 20 years, we have started a national dialogue on how to improve the understanding of science for all students. Educators will now look at science as a process instead of science as a rote memorization subject, while also focusing more on science as a hands-on relationship with our natural world instead of a series of notes in a textbook. I have longed for the day when instead of Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Geology we would take Science I, Science II, Science III, Science IV and learn about the process and overlap among disciplines - much the same way we investigate our language or our history. We live in a multidisciplinary world, and it is high time our science education recognized that. (Side note, it is also about time we understood that young children are the best scientists, and our science education needs to start younger....middle school is a start, but I advocate for even younger.)
New guidelines call for changes in science education
"The guidelines also take a firm stand that children must learn about evolution, the central organizing idea in the biological sciences for more than a century, but one that still provokes a backlash among some religious conservatives.
The guidelines, known as the Next Generation Science Standards, are the first broad national recommendations for science instruction since 1996. They were developed by a consortium of 26 state governments and several groups representing scientists and teachers."
This movement proves more important as we will need more and more of us to participate in the investigation, commercialization, and implementation of ideas that will quickly solve many of the problems associated with rapid development and population increase. We need new materials, and less environmentally damaging ones, to provide the services that lead to our quality of life. We need news processes and technologies to eliminate old, inefficient ways of maintaining our quality of life. Every day, new steps are made toward these goals. If we can get back to a life built on that which we grow instead of that which we extract, we approach the goal of making our lives better while ensuring that we make no one else's life - either now or in the future - worse.
The next world-changing super material is grown, not made
"Cellulose, in its macro form, is one of the most abundant things on the planet. That's what tree bark is made out of. That's the fiber in your bowl of shredded wheat. But like so many other things, cellulose is a different beast at a sub-nanometer scale. Remind you of anything? When nanocellulose is tweaked just right—chained into long polymers or crystalized—it could be put to use in super-light body armor, biofuel, new thin displays, making ridiculously light aerogels, even growing replacement organs for transplants. The stuff has serious potential."
Happy Friday!
No comments:
Post a Comment