Engine Could Provide Energy for Hybrid Vehicles

September 30, 2008 2:27 PM | | Comments (0)

Engineers are looking at an alternative to hydrogen fuel cells or conventional engines in hybrid vehicles, an efficient design called a free-piston engine. As Technology Review explains, a free-piston engine has no mechanical connection between the piston and the crankshaft, which reduces friction and makes for a more efficient engine. In fact, researchers believe it could be far more efficient in producing electricity than either conventional generators or newer fuel-cell technology.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Energy and Environment, Transportation

Tags: hybrid

Skyscraper Farms Could Save Energy

September 30, 2008 1:00 AM | | Comments (0)

skyscraper and goat.jpg
South African Boer goats chews on tough weeds to clear a steep hillside lot in downtown Los Angeles. In the future, maybe the livestock will be inside the skyscrapers. (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)

 Instead of spending all that energy to plant and plow fields and then truck the produce from the country to the city, why not grow food right in a city, in a glass tower with different floors for different crops and livestock? A Columbia University professor tells Scientific American that such "vertical farming" would bring fresh food to urban dwellers with less fuel expended on shipping, and would allow farmers to heat or cool the environment as needed to grow crops all year round.'


Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com



Continue reading Skyscraper Farms Could Save Energy.

Categories: Energy and Environment, Web Picks

Tags: farming, Scientific American, skycrapers

Auction Sets Carbon Emissions at $3.07 per Ton

September 29, 2008 2:51 PM | | Comments (0)

The country's first auction of emissions permits set the price of releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at $3.07 per ton. The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a consortium of 10 states in the Northeast, held the first U.S. cap-and-trade auction last week and announced the results today, the Associated Press reports. Under the program, companies buy permits to emit a certain amount of greenhouse gases, and if they reduce their emissions they can sell the permits to other companies for a profit.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Energy and Environment, Web Picks

Tags: Associated Press, carbon offsets, greenhouse gases

Bacteria Can Produce Plastic

September 29, 2008 11:15 AM | | Comments (0)

Not all of the fossil fuel we use goes to power our cars or heat our homes: Some is used to make plastic. The Discovery Channel tells us that researchers at Genomatica, a company in San Diego, CA, say they've developed bacteria that make an important ingredient of the plastic that's used in products from Spandex to car bumpers. The company says it can go into production as early as next year, and that its product will be cheaper even if the cost of oil drops as low as $50 a barrel.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Technology, Web Picks

A Different Digital Divide: Age

September 29, 2008 1:00 AM | | Comments (0)

By Mark Stencel, CQ Columnist

The child of a science writer I know once hopped into her mother's lap and took control of the family computer. My friend was amazed to watch her daughter, who was 3 at the time, use the wheel on the mouse to scroll down the screen. "Oh," the science writer said, "that's what that does!"

Perhaps John McCain has felt just that kind of wonderment this year, as his staff and family have taught the 72-year-old Arizona senator how to browse the Web and read his daughter Meghan's campaign blog. The Republican nominee has described himself as a technological "Neanderthal" and computer "illiterate." And now his Democratic opponent has turned those comments into a campaign ad that paints McCain as "out of touch."

Continue reading A Different Digital Divide: Age.

Categories: Technology

Tags: computers, digital divide, Mark Stencel

NASA Reauthorization Passes, Astronauts to Return to the Moon

September 27, 2008 5:40 PM | | Comments (0)

By Kathryn A. Wolfe, CQ Staff

The House cleared a NASA reauthorization Saturday by voice vote, just one month shy of its 50th anniversary. .

The measure would reauthorize the space agency for one year at an authorized funding level of $20.2 billion. The bill embraces the agency's plan to send astronauts back to the moon in preparation for future missions to Mars and would designate $1 billion for accelerate development of a spacecraft to replace the current shuttle fleet.

Continue reading NASA Reauthorization Passes, Astronauts to Return to the Moon.

Categories: Government

Tags: astronauts, Kathryn A. Wolfe, NASA, reauthorization

Digitizing Health Records Still a Challenge

September 27, 2008 10:00 AM | | Comments (0)

Healthcare could be dramatically improved if every doctor a patient ever saw had access to all that patient's health records, which could happen if the records were all digital. But only 15 to 18 percent of U.S. doctors use electronic records, partly because of the upfront costs of going digital. Technology Review talks to Karen Bell, who's in charge of promoting digital records at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, about what the problem is.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Health

Tags: health IT, HHS, Karen Bell, Technology Review

Boeing Begins Jet Biofuel Initiative

September 26, 2008 5:00 PM | | Comments (0)

Aircraft manufacturer Boeing has teamed up with 10 airlines, including Air France, Continental, and Virgin Atlantic, to form a Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group. Flightglobal reports that the group will look for ways to make renewable jet fuel, with the goal of at least partially replacing fossil fuel used in airplanes with biofuel by 2013. Boeing is funding two studies on making jet fuel from algae or the plant jatropha, being done at the Natural Resources Defense Council and Yale.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Energy and Environment, Web Picks

Tags: airplanes, biofuels, Boeing, Flightglobal

Obama Releases Science Funding Plan

September 26, 2008 1:46 PM | | Comments (0)

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has released an 11-page "plan for science and innovation." Nature reports that the plan calls for doubling the funding of the National Institutes of Health over 10 years, and spells out science policies in more specific details than had been released previously.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Government, Web Picks

Tags: funding, Nature, NIH, Obama

Google to Fund "World-Saving" Ideas

September 26, 2008 10:45 AM | | Comments (0)

Google has announced a project to solicit ideas that can have a positive impact on humanity, and to fund those it deems most promising. The project, dubbed 10^100 (10 to the hundredth power), will dole out up to $10 million to the winning idea or ideas. As CNN reports, Google is open to any sort of idea that helps people in some way, from providing food and shelter to promoting clean energy.

Web pick posted by Neil Savage, Xconomy.com

Categories: Web Picks

Tags: CNN, Google

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