Friday 28 August 2009

Population growth at 47-year high

Crowds of people

The UK population grew by 408,000 in 2008 - the biggest increase for almost 50 years, according to the Office for National Statistics.

The total number of people passed 61m for the first time, with changes in birth and death rates now a bigger cause of growth than immigration.

The numbers of people arriving minus those leaving actually fell by 44%.

BBC NEWS | UK | Population growth at 47-year high

Wednesday 26 August 2009

Gracenote: Music Maps

Interactive maps of what people are listening to

Gracenote: Music Maps

Monday 24 August 2009

What is the 2030 Perfect Storm idea?

GRAPH_46241253_population_region_466

As the world's population grows, competition for food, water and energy will increase. Food prices will rise, more people will go hungry, and migrants will flee the worst-affected regions.

PERFECT STORM 2030 On Monday BBC correspondents report on the problems identified by UK chief scientist John Beddington, in his forecast of a "perfect storm" of food, water and energy shortages in 2030. On Tuesday they address the implications, and possible solutions.

BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | What is the 2030 Perfect Storm idea?

Thursday 20 August 2009

BELLA GAIA

BELLA GAIA(TM) (Beautiful Earth) is a 'Living Atlas' journey of our world, expressing the deeply moving beauty of planet Earth as seen through the eyes of astronauts. Created by award winning director and classically trained violinist Kenji Williams, BELLA GAIA(TM) features live performances by Williams and world music artists against a large-screen backdrop of orbiting visualizations of Earth from space.

BELLA GAIA

Shanghai urges 'two-child policy'

 

Chinese child with teddy, flag

China's only children are often spoiled "little emperors"

Officials in Shanghai are urging parents to have a second child, the first time in decades the government has pushed for more babies.

A public information campaign has been launched to highlight exemptions to the country's one-child policy.

Couples who were both only children, which includes most of the city's newly-weds, are allowed a second child.

The move comes as China's most populous city becomes richer and older, with the number of retired residents soaring.

"Shanghai's over-60 population already exceeds three million, or 21.6% of registered residents," said Zhang Meixin, a spokesman for the city's Municipal Population and Family Planning Commission.

BBC NEWS | World | Asia-Pacific | Shanghai urges 'two-child policy'

If you want to go green, buy Spanish strawberries - Green Living, Environment - The Independent

The belief that local is best when it comes to measuring the environmental impact of our food is often wrong, says new research

 

Strawberry fields: Fruit grown in southern Spain contributes fewer greenhouse gases to global warming

Millions of Britons who think they are doing their bit for the environment by choosing home-grown food over produce imported from thousands of miles away could actually be having the reverse effect, according to a startling new report.

The "food miles" philosophy that decrees anything transported over distance is worse for the environment than something closer to home is frequently flawed, according to researchers funded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

If you want to go green, buy Spanish strawberries - Green Living, Environment - The Independent

Outline Maps

 

Outline Maps

Outline Maps

Krakatoa's fiery eruption

Krakatau volcano: Powerful lightning hits the volcano's crater in June 2009

Amateur photographer Marco Fulle's pictures of Krakatoa, between the islands of Java and Sumatra, taken last month, highlight the raw intensity of volcanic eruption

Krakatoa's fiery eruption | World news | guardian.co.uk

In pictures: The world's melting glaciers | Environment | guardian.co.uk

Glaciers-under-treat-Amou-010

Glaciers around the world are retreating at unprecedented rates as temperatures rise due to climate change. Some ice caps, glaciers, sea ice and even an ice shelf have disappeared altogether in this century and many more are retreating so rapidly that they may vanish within a matter of decades

In pictures: The world's melting glaciers | Environment | guardian.co.uk

BBC NEWS | World | Asia-Pacific | Typhoon batters south-east China

merkot map

Typhoon Morakot has struck China's south-east coast, destroying hundreds of houses and flooding farmland.

Almost one million people were evacuated ahead of the storm, which crashed ashore in Fujian province with winds of up to 119km/h (74mph).

BBC NEWS | World | Asia-Pacific | Typhoon batters south-east China

Wednesday 19 August 2009

Barcelona gets new water supply

drought

A desalination plant has opened near Barcelona - said to be the biggest of its type in Europe - to ease chronic water shortages.

A drought last year forced Barcelona to import drinking water by tanker. It was one of Spain's driest years on record.

The new plant at El Prat del Llobregat will provide 24% of the water consumed in the Barcelona area, officials say. It went into operation on Monday.

Two more desalination plants are being built in the Catalonia region.

The new plant near Barcelona will provide 200m litres (44m gallons) of drinking water daily for the city's 4.5 million people.

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Barcelona gets new water supply

If the UK were a village of 100 people... - Features, Health & Families - The Independent

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There are, according to the estimate for this month, 6,790,062,216 people in the world. It's hard enough to say the number, never mind picture those people. You could round it up to a less tongue-twisting 6.8 billion, but does that make such a frightening figure any easier to compute? When you try, do you see faces, or just more brain-frying strings of digits?

The sheer vastness of the data we gather in our attempts to understand the world around us has been challenging statisticians since the earliest censuses. The "size of Wales" approach to number-crunching is popular among headline writers; but is it helpful, for example, to imagine the global population in terms of 75,445 Wembleys, or, indeed, 2,341 Waleses? The numbers are still too big.

It's the same with the news we read and hear each day. What does it mean when we're told that unemployment has risen by 281,000? Is that a huge number? Or just a big one? The stories are about people, but it is often hard to see beyond the figures.

If the UK were a village of 100 people... - Features, Health & Families - The Independent

Blog entry

Top Ten Technologies for an Alternative Energy Future « EE/RE Investing

10. Combined Heat and Power

The muscle car of energy efficiency.  Combined heat and power isn’t sexy… it’s just using the “waste” heat from your powerplant for some useful purpose.  Like cooking your lunch on you car radiator, but using every bit of waste heat you can…  Combined heat and power can use 90% of the power in your fuel source for useful work.  And now you can have it in your home.

9. Solar Chimneys

They’re tall, they’re low-tech, and they’re baseload power.  They don’t pollute, and the fuel is free.  What’s not to like?

8. Molten salt thermal storage

It’s cheaper to store heat than electricity, and molten salts can store a ton of BTu’s very cheaply.  And concentrating solar power can produce a ton of heat… without pollution or fuel.

7. Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs)

More lumens per watt… now that’s energy efficiency. 

6. Vehicle to Grid

Our energy efficient cars can make the electric grid work better.

5 & 4.  Cellulosic Ethanol and Biodiesel from Algae

The two technologies that have real hope of replacing gasoline and diesel as liquid fuel for our cars…  We’ll still need massive efficiency gains and Plug-in-Hybrids to reduce our total fuel use, but even with those, corn ethanol and biodiesel from traditional oil crops just can’t produce enough volume. 

3. Time of Use pricing and Demand Side Management.

Sometimes the best ideas are the simplest.  To make the best use of wind power, we can store power until it is needed, or we can give people incentives to use it when it is available.

Time of use pricing is also a great boon for solar, because solar energy tends to be available near times of peak demand.

Finally, time of use pricing shaves peak demand, which means that we can delay building new fossil fired generation, while renewables get cheaper by the year.

2. Terra Preta

Discovered by aboriginals in Brazil, thousands of years before Columbus, mixing carbon into unproductive soils can make them much more productive… and the carbon stays there for thousands of years.  Using charcoal dust as a fertilizer not only holds the hope of a replacement for fertilizer based on fossil fuels, but it is also an easy way to sequester carbon.

1. Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs

Where else can you get a 1000% payback with little or no risk?

Top Ten Technologies for an Alternative Energy Future « EE/RE Investing

Sunday 9 August 2009

Met Office : Invent - Weather

 Go to Met Office homepage

This offers the chance to zoom in to your chosen area of the country and add a range of weather information. You can add places of interest, or click the map to get a forecast for the week ahead.

Met Office : Invent - Weather

Thursday 6 August 2009

Coastal path will open up 1,000 miles of previously inaccessible land - Telegraph

Land that will be opened up includes the cliff tops south of Berwick-upon-Tweed in the Borders, the crumbling Norfolk coast south of Sheringham, inaccessible land along the Solent and urban areas around Liverpool. The path will also make it possible for ramblers to walk through golf courses, country estates and farms that are currently closed to the public.

map220_1453752f

Coastal path will open up 1,000 miles of previously inaccessible land - Telegraph