Photo via the New Republic It's a widely held notion that politicians have long been in the pocket of Big Oil. And there's good reason for that perception: oil companies' huge campaign donations, vast lobbying power, and close ties to politicians have ensured that their taxes remain low , that hidden subsidies are around to provide extra funding, and that they receive preferential treatment in US energy policy. But there could be a new, ... View original post here: The Next Big Oil: Big Smart Grid?
So there really isn't anything that deep to this image. It's just a (more or less) life-sized blue whale eye. And on the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society site you can educate yourself/be mesmerized/ waste some time for a while staring at it while the entire life-sized animal scrolls across your browser window. Believe me, it's way cooler than you might think:... Read more from the original source: Ever See a Blue Whale Life-Sized on Your Computer? Now You Can
published May 3, 2011 and has No Comments
Image credit: Peak Moment TV Good Magazine has urged us to share more with our neighbors , and it's the basis behind the whole concept of collaborative consumption . But more and more companies and community initiative are exploring what this kind of sharing looks like in practice. In Portland, many neighborhoods have the luxury... Read the full story ...
Read more...published April 24, 2011 and has No Comments
Photo: flickkerphotos / cc Without the aid of maps, roadsigns, and GPS equipment, many human travelers would have hard time reaching their destinations, but such unassisted journeys are no problem at all for humpback whales. Researchers studying whale migration found that humpbacks are amazingly accurate navigators -- able to travel across hundreds of miles of vast ocean without deviating ...
Read more...published April 24, 2011 and has No Comments
Heated water running through Paris' sewers will be put to use heating a school. Photo: Shadowgate under a Creative Commons license . Paris has been on an alternative energy roll as of late: installing hydropower turbines in the Seine , testing the limits of urban wind power and using solar power to Original post: A Paris School Turns to the ...
Read more...published April 24, 2011 and has No Comments
Image: furlined / CC Sweden recently overturned a 45 year ban on wolf hunting as wolf populations have grown to more than 200 animals, and wolves impinge more frequently on areas occupied by humans. The clash between man and nature has claimed another victim, as two wolves converged on the path of a mother out walking with her c... ...
Read more...published April 21, 2011 and has No Comments
Image credit: Soil Association From Sacramento High School students creating their own CSA to an after-school program based on an urban farm , we've seen plenty of ways that the local food movement is integrating with educational opportunities for school-aged children. But this might be the first time we've seen a full farmers market in a school. organized by ...
Read more...published April 21, 2011 and has No Comments
Image Courtesy of Beckmann N'Thépé The Leningrad, or St Petersburg Zoo, founded in 1865, is the oldest in Russia, and its age is indicative of its condition. Built in a time when zoos were designed to put animals on display rather than as centers of research and learning where the animals are well treated, this zoo suffers from a ...
Read more...published April 20, 2011 and has No Comments
Images via ZenRobotics When it comes to sorting recyclables from trash bound for the landfill, much of the work has to happen by the people throwing away the materials, before waste management comes to pick up trash bins. However, robotics companies are continually working on ways that trash-sorting robots can ensure fewer recyclables head into landfills. ZenRobotics, a Finnish ...
Read more...published April 19, 2011 and has No Comments
Photo: Joi / cc Fish have a lot to worry about these days, what with oil spills, Texas-sized islands of floating plastic debris, and overfishing -- but, according to the latest research, rising ocean temperatures are causing them quite a bit of stress as well. Biologists studying a particularly long-living fish in the Tasman Sea have discovered that, as ...
Read more...published April 19, 2011 and has No Comments
Photo credit: US Army The notion that the Iraq war was really about oil is far beyond speculation -- it floats somewhere in that ambiguous realm between generally accepted and assumed-to-be-fact. So the breaking news that a newly exposed secret memo reveals that national governments actually negotiated with oil companies before invading Iraq should surprise a total of about ...
Read more...published April 18, 2011 and has No Comments
Image: US House Committee on Natural Resources Here on the East Coast, it's evening time, and many of you out there are scrambling to e-file your taxes before the deadline hits in a few hours. And as you wonder if there's any way you can get that refund number to look a bit bigger on TurboTax, keep this in ...
Read more...
This hand operated gramophone is as simple as it gets. Original post: Minimalist Gramophone Makes Playing Music Super Simple
Contrary to previously held notions of how whale songs are shared between neighboring populations, a surprising study finds that whales living the same ocean basin are singing different songs. Read the original post: Study: Humpback Whales Living in Same Ocean ...
