Non Toxic Vision

It feels like a 100 F in NYC

Walking through NYC these days is a pretty sluggish affair. The occasional pedestrian one encounters on almost empty street corners look puzzled. "For how long?" seems to be on everyones mind. How long is this traitorous heat going to stay?

According to Dr. Jeff Masters of WunderBlog.com: The crest of the extreme heat wave of July 2011 has passed, although temperatures are still going to be dangerously hot in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast today. New York City (Central Park) will reach 100° again, as well as Philadelphia and possibly Washington Dulles. Heat index values could surpass the 110° mark today, and excessive heat warnings are in effect from New York City to South Carolina, as well as a large portion of the Central United States. Yesterday, the heat index soared past 120° in Wilmington, DE (124), Easton, MD (125), Annapolis, MD (120) and Atlantic City, NJ (122), among others. A more complete list of Friday's heat index extremes can be found here.

Numerous records fell yesterday as far north as Maine. There were plenty of daily records to talk about, but here are some of the noteworthy all-time record high temperatures:

• Newark, NJ: 108° (old record was 105° set in 2001)
• Washington Dulles, DC: 105° (old record was 104° on multiple dates)
• Bridgeport, CT: 103° (ties the old record set in 1957)
• Hartford, CT: 103° (old record was 102° set on multiple dates)
• New Haven, CT: 102° (old record was 101° set in 1926)

Stay cool everyone -- and make sure you know where the nearest Cooling Centers are.

ODE wire: The World can be powered by alternative energy in 20 - 40 years

This is a great article published in ODE wire magazine by Louis Bergeron:

The wold can be powered by alternative energy in 20 to 40 years

"...If someone told you there was a way you could save 2.5 million to 3 million lives a year and simultaneously halt global warming, reduce air and water pollution and develop secure, reliable energy sources – nearly all with existing technology and at costs comparable with what we spend on energy today – why wouldn’t you do it?..."

Ode wired states that, according to a new study coauthored by Stanford researcher Mark Z. Jacobson, we could accomplish all that by converting the world to clean, renewable energy sources and forgoing fossil fuels.

Read the full article on Ode wired

Their Moon Shot and Ours by Thomas Friedman

China has at least four game-changing investments going on:

1. building a network of ultramodern airports

2. building a web of high-speed trains connecting major cities

3. bioscience, where Beijing Geonomics Institute ordered 128 DNA sequencers from the US. Giving China the largest number in the world to launch its own stem-cell / genetic engineering industry and

4. proving U$ 15 billion in seed money for the country's leading auto and battery companies to create an electric car industry.

And this is just the beginning. Read more about this great article publisched in Suday Opinion in The New York Times on September 26, 2010.

India wins solar power funding

This article was published in the Financial Times, March 22, 2010:

by Joe Leahy

..."The International Finance Corporation is investing in India's first commercially viable solar power project, giving a vote of confidence to ambitions to develop the technology there. Azure Power Private is India's first megawatt-scale solar power developer, and the IFC is set to invest USD 10 Million. .... India is engaged in a vast expansion of power infrastructure to drive its rapidly growing economy and aid its 1,14bn population, more of half of which do not have access to electricity. The country is seeking to increase its solar power generation capacity from near zero to 20,000 megawatt by 2022. The Azure project sets a precedent in India for connecting to the national grid. .... Connected to the electricity grid the plant supplies power to 20,000 people in 32 villages  in the Amritsar district of Punjab. ..."

The Digital Greenhouse

The Digital Greenhouse is the transmediale.09 salon for strategic artistic,
performative and net-based discourse. Bringing together artists, cultural
activists, hackers and a cosmopolitan array of thinkers and makers the salon
seeks to address the cultural 'raison d'etre' beyond the daily headlines of
climate change rhetoric. How does digital art and culture maneuver across
political and societal boundaries between 'our' North and an emergent, less
'silent' and deep South to create new voices and strong cultural networks? With
the irreversible global transformations we face, the Digital Greenhouse becomes
a training camp for the cultural revolution essential in creating new tools and
methods of agency and dialogue.
All Salon events take place in 'conference room 1' of the House of World
Cultures in Berlin. Admission is 5 euros, reduced 3 euros.

Tickets may be purchased in advance, starting January 15th.

More information go to: http://www.transmediale.de/en/theme-main

M.I.T. Engergy Club

New York Times, Thomas L. Friedman: "The People We Have Been Waiting For"' December 2, 2007:

.....The Energy Club, which was founded in 2004 by a few graduate students discussing energy over beers at a campus bar. Today it has 600-plus members who have put on scores of events focused on building energy expertise among M.I.T. students and faculty, and "fact-based analysis" including a trip to Saudi Arabia. Then he got together with three engeneering undergrads who helped launch the Vehicle Design Summit - a global, open-source, collaborative effort, managed my M.I.T. students, that has 25 college teams around the world, including in India and China, working together to build a plug-in electric hybrid within three years. Each team contributes a different set of parts or designs. These kids are building a hyper-efficient car, which, they hope "will demonstrate a 95 % reduction in embodied energy, materials and toxicity from cradle to cradle to grave" and provide "200 m.p.g. energy equivalency or better." The Linux of cars!

They're not waiting for G.M. More informationon their goal, they explain on their website vds.mit.edu...