|
|
 Study Finds On-Road Transportation Sector the Greatest Net Contributor to Atmospheric Warming Now and in Mid-Term; Power Sector Takes the Lead by 2050
A new NASA study concludes that cars are the biggest net contributor to climate change:
A new study by led by Nadine Unger at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) that analyzes the net climate impacts of emissions from economic sectors rather than by individual chemical species has found that on-road transportatation is and will be the greatest net contributor to atmospheric warming now and in the near term. The open access paper was published online 3 February in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Cars, buses, and trucks release pollutants and greenhouse gases that promote warming, while emitting few aerosols that counteract it. In contrast, the industrial and power sectors release many of the same gases—with a larger contribution to radiative forcing—but they also emit sulfates and other aerosols that cause cooling by reflecting light and altering clouds……
I found this awesome site for you to check out:
Citrus County Florida Green Building Council
http://www.citrusgreenbuildingcouncil.org/index.php
If your into building green and staying current with green technology please check out this site. 
Here is there mission statment:
To educate government and our community of the advantages of sustainable construction practices, and to promote the use of water conservation measures, lower energy consumption, recycling and waste reduction methods, and the use of renewable resources in the built environment..
Come check it out
Click Here
The Florida Solar Energy Center at the University of Central Florida’s Cocoa campus will administer a $10 million state program to install solar energy systems on 90 public schools.
The SunSmart Schools E-Shelters (Emergency Shelters) program, unveiled this week by Gov. Charlie Crist, is expected to boost Florida’s clean energy sector by providing job opportunities to local installers and vendors. The grant money will come from federal economic stimulus funds.
The solar electric systems, also known as photovoltaic (PV) systems, will provide power during outages, offset electricity costs to the school during normal operations and reduce greenhouse gases.
“Not only will these systems provide a vital energy resource to an emergency shelter,” said Bill Young, the SunSmart technical manager at FSEC, “they will also provide noise-free power with no air pollution or fuel supply issues.”
Nearly 800 schools in Florida are designated as Enhanced Hurricane Protection Area (EHPA) shelters. The selection process will be highly competitive. Schools will be selected based on demographics, emergency shelter needs, partnerships and existing renewable energy education and outreach plans.
“The SunSmart School and E-Shelters program will help protect our environment for future generations,” Crist said. “Educating Floridians and utilizing energy efficient technologies will strengthen our economy by increasing Florida’s energy independence and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.”
Teachers and students alike will benefit from the systems. Energy curriculum workshops for teachers will be provided, and students — as well as the public — will be able to analyze the performance data that will be uploaded to www.energywhiz.com. The program will also provide operation and maintenance workshops for facility managers.
Each participating school will receive a 10-kilowatt solar energy system with a battery back-up — complete with installation. The system will provide enough power for critical energy needs such as lighting, communications and essential medical equipment.
“Our goal is to have PV systems spread throughout the state, ideally at least one SunSmart E-Shelter in every county,” said Susan Schleith, SunSmart program manager.
Those interested in participating in the program should visit www.fsec.ucf.edu/go/sunsmart for more information.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently awarded a Technology Investment Agreement to DuPont for development of a process to convert sugars produced by macroalgae into a next-generation biofuel called isobutanol. Bio Architecture Lab (BAL) will be a subrecipient on the program. Under the award, the DOE will fund $8.8 million and DuPont and BAL will cost share the balance of the total $17.7 million award, forming a joint cost share program between the DOE and DuPont. Butamax™ Advanced Biofuels LLC, a joint venture between DuPont and BP, will be responsible for commercialization of the resulting technology package.
The macroalgae-to-isobutanol project will focus on: improving domestic macroalgae aquaculture; converting macroalgae to bio-available sugars; converting those sugars to isobutanol; and economic and environmental optimization of the production process. More than 60 scientists in Wilmington, Del., and Berkeley, Calif., will work on this research and development program.
“Our capabilities in the field of metabolic engineering and advanced industrial biotechnology techniques make this a natural addition to our existing R&D pipeline,” said John Pierce, vice president – DuPont Applied BioSciences – Technology.
To read the full press release, click here.
By Michael Segell
updated 12:35 p.m. ET, Mon., Jan. 18, 2010
In 1990, the city of La Quinta, CA, proudly opened the doors of its sparkling new middle school. Gayle Cohen, then a sixth-grade teacher, recalls the sense of excitement everyone felt: “We had been in temporary facilities for 2 years, and the change was exhilarating.”
But the glow soon dimmed.
One teacher developed vague symptoms — weakness, dizziness — and didn’t return after the Christmas break. A couple of years later, another developed cancer and died; the teacher who took over his classroom was later diagnosed with throat cancer. More instructors continued to fall ill, and then, in 2003, on her 50th birthday, Cohen received her own bad news: breast cancer.
“That’s when I sat down with another teacher, and we remarked on all the cancers we’d seen,” she says. “We immediately thought of a dozen colleagues who had either gotten sick or passed away.”
By 2005, 16 staffers among the 137 who’d worked at the new school had been diagnosed with 18 cancers, a ratio nearly 3 times the expected number. Nor were the children spared: About a dozen cancers have been detected so far among former students. A couple of them have died.
Prior to undergoing her first chemotherapy treatment, Cohen approached the school principal, who eventually went to district officials for an investigation. A local newspaper article about the possible disease cluster caught the attention of Sam Milham, MD, a widely traveled epidemiologist who has investigated hundreds of environmental and occupational illnesses and published dozens of peer-reviewed papers on his findings. For the past 30 years, he has trained much of his focus on the potential hazards of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) — the radiation that surrounds all electrical appliances and devices, power lines, and home wiring and is emitted by communications devices, including cell phones and radio, TV, and WiFi transmitters.
Read More
|
|
|
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=59e0a6dc-1154-44e3-a0a6-ecc5ff03c41f)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=f110bfb9-201d-4259-92db-f3542191c341)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=07f6a8cc-68db-4907-a52e-510c87b40f9e)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=58eccc06-8f57-4f13-b13a-91aa56a99008)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=3f15188b-d834-4b57-b1ea-8138c0a008c9)
