Sunday, December 20, 2009

Clean Water Project for Three States to Create or Save 600 Jobs, Company Says

Clean Water Project for Three States to Create or Save 600 Jobs, Company Says

A new water treatment plant delivering up to 46.4 million gallons of water per day through 320 miles of new pipes to 300,000 people is being largely underwritten by a $56.5 million Recovery Act grant. The grant, awarded to Lewis & Clark Regional Water System, is for Phase II construction of a new plant near Vermillion, South Dakota. (Phase I, funded by a mix of federal, state, and local monies, will build the underground reservoir necessary for the plant.) The completed plant will provide residents of southeast South Dakota, northwest Iowa, and southwest Minnesota with a needed additional source of clean drinking water.


Foley Company, established in 1913 in Kansas City, Missouri, and employing 250 people, will perform the Phase II work, which is expected to create/save approximately 600 construction-industry jobs over the nearly three-year life of the project, according to Lewis & Clark. The contract with Foley totals $64.1 to $56.5 million from the Recovery Act grant and $7.6 million from community sources in the region served by the Lewis & Clark Regional Water System. The contract was awarded on May 29, 2009 and Phase II is expected to be completed by March 2012.

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Blowin' In The Wind

Blowin' In The Wind

I realize that for many reasons, there is alot of opposition to the proposed windmill farms that will soon take shape on the horizons around the state of Ohio. Some of these are truly valid points that need to be addressed and considered and hopefully a solution will be hammered out to the greater good of all of those involved.

Yet, when I stumble upon an article like this, I see a shameful waste of a natural and renewable resource that is right in front of our eyes each and everyday, though we cannot see it. We do have the abilities and technologies to successfully harness it and contribute a significant amount of energy production for our own use, thereby reducing carbon emissions and reliance upon foreign oil. Does any intelligent, thinking person truly believe that we will never exhaust our supply of fossil fuels?

What type of enviroment will be left for future generations? Personally, in the distant future, I would love to be able to drive for miles and miles with my great-grand children and enjoy the beautiful countryside, fields, flowers, trees, lakes, rivers and streams, and all the creatures that inhabit these lands. A drive through the wastelands relaying memories of "what was" is not my idea of sustaining a better world.

The time is now, gang! Stop with the chatter of "tree-hugger" and "I've thought about reducing my waste or my consumption." Re-train yourself to be more proactive, rather than reactive. Because once it's gone, sadly enough, it's gone! Carry within you the Nike philosophy and "Just Do It!"



http://www.marcgunther.com/2009/12/14/cop15-the-answer-is-blowin-in-the-wind/

REDUCE, RE-USE, RECYCLE!

Loss of species - Maya Lin's 'What Is Missing?' - SFGate

Loss of species - Maya Lin's 'What Is Missing?'



Public art remains the stiffest creative challenge for all involved with it. Consider Maya Lin's "The Listening Cone," the permanent sculptural element of her "What Is Missing?" project, underwritten by the San Francisco Arts Commission and unveiled Thursday at the California Academy of Sciences.


Few will deny the worthiness or urgency of the project's didactic thrust: the quickening pace of species extinction due to habitat destruction and other impacts of global society.

Lin, 49, who became famous overnight for her 1982 Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., chose extinct and vanishing species as her last subject for a memorial project. The years of research she put into it made an environmental activist of her.

 



Un-Chopping A Tree

An eye-opening video in the 'What is Missing' series.
Submitted by Maya Lin at the COP15 Conference, entitled:
'Un-Chopping a Tree'.

Please take a moment to view this in full screen mode.....

http://vimeo.com/8128504

Friday, December 18, 2009

Recovery Act Funding

This is pretty exciting news as we learn that Ohio receives the lion's share of allocated funds per state in this most important area.....

$620 M for Smart Grid Demo & Energy Storage Projects


http://www.energy.gov/news2009/8305.htm

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Ford Develops Wheat Straw Reinforced Plastic; Debuts in 2010 Ford Flex

Yet another innovation in continuing research on useage viability of wheat's abundant waste byproduct. Article points to reduction in petroleum usage and CO2 emissions.


http://http//www.ford.com/about-ford/news-announcements/press-releases/press-releases-detail/pr-ford-teams-up-to-develop-wheat-31391

I'd like to hear comments pertaining to product confidence. Given the company's history and product applications, this should be a real eye-opener.

COP15: Climate Justice, CEO's, Morality & Money, Low-carbon Copenhagen, Planet-saving Technology

Several good blog postings that are more than worth the time it will take to read them. This guy is good! He also is a regular contributor to Fortune 500 magazine.

http://www.marcgunther.com/feed/

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Windpower Outlook 2009

View a compilation of information:

http://http://www.awea.org/pubs/documents/Outlook_2009.pdf

The Real Story: Job Creation and Recovery Act

Some interesting facts and insights into the truth behind all the rumors that these funds are being funneled elsewhere. It's high time to reinvest in our country and it's renewable resources!

http://http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/11-18-09_Job_creation_and_Recovery_Act_funding.html

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Shrinking Glaciers, Rising Oceans: OSU Research Travels to Copenhagen

Shrinking glaciers, rising oceans: OSU research travels to Copenhagen Climate Conference
By: Spencer Hunt
Ellen Mosley-Thompson and her husband, Lonnie Thompson, examine an ice core inside the Byrd Polar Research Center at Ohio State.


 When world leaders meet in Copenhagen for the United Nations Climate Conference this week, some of the data they'll have at their fingertips will have come from a huge freezer on the Ohio State University campus. Inside, at temperatures that hover around 30 below zero, are hundreds of ice cores removed from remote mountain glaciers, some of which are shrinking at an alarming rate. Each cylinder of ice is a record of Earth's climate and can provide the evidence scientists rely on to help establish and illustrate global warming.

Two of the caretakers are OSU climate researchers Lonnie Thompson and Ellen Mosley-Thompson, who directs the Byrd Polar Research Center. Byrd researchers are helping lead efforts to study the effects of climate change on the Arctic and Antarctic. They also have helped tie a steady rise in the world's oceans to vast, melting ice sheets in Greenland and the South Pole.

Shrinking glaciers

The Thompsons are among a group of scientists who discovered that glaciers in the tropics are shrinking and could disappear within decades. They have seen the glaciers recede with their own eyes, but the cause is buried in the ice, where dust, pollen and gases reveal climate conditions over hundreds of thousands of years.

A 2006 paper that the couple published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences tied together decades of data taken from seven glaciers in South America and Asia. They found that the retreat of tropical mountain glaciers is an event that until now hasn't been seen in at least 2,000 years.

Lonnie Thompson said the glaciers are disappearing as the result of increased average global temperatures brought about by the burning of fossil fuels and the clearing of Earth's forests. "It's just phenomenal," he said. "If someone told me back when I started in the 1970s that glaciers would move like this, I would have said they were crazy."

Rising oceans

Water melting from these glaciers and from massive sheets of ice in Greenland and Antarctica also contributes to a rise in Earth's oceans, said C.K. Shum, a professor of geodetic science at the Byrd center. Using more than a century of data recorded by tidal gauges, Shum said the average global sea level has risen between 1.7 millimeters and 1.8 millimeters a year throughout the 20{+t}{+h} century. And satellite data over the past 10 years show a more rapid rise of 3 millimeters to 3.5 millimeters per year. Shum also is a lead author of "Ocean Climate and Sea Level," a chapter in the International Panel on Climate Change's 2007 report, which summarized the state of knowledge on global warming and predicted its consequences.
He found that sea levels could rise 24 inches by the end of the century, which would swamp coastal cities and many small island nations. Such predictions are difficult, Shum said. Part of the problem is that tidal gauges record levels at about only 1 percent of Earth's oceans. Though satellites cover the whole earth, there are only about 10 years of data to work with. "A lot of things are evolving," Shum said.

Polar weather

Researchers also are scrambling to learn more about the effect of warming on polar regions, where annual losses of arctic sea ice have been dramatic.

David Bromwich, a professor of polar meteorology at the Byrd center, will help lead a four-year, multi-university and governmental project that will combine data from NASA satellites and weather stations with research on changes in permafrost, sea ice and polar region rivers. "We need to get a more comprehensive view of what's happening," Bromwich said. "The challenge and the risks are enormous. If all of the ice in Antarctica melted, it would raise the ocean levels by more than 213 feet", Bromwich said.

"You only have to lose a little bit of that ice and it makes quite a lot of difference," he said.

Monday, November 30, 2009

Unexpected Ways to Go Green

An interesting article that I, myself was able to relate to. And by the way, I will be adding as many of these as I can possibly find, so be ready for some good reads! :)

http://http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/world/environment/pkggoinggreen/20091112-orig-cool-ways-go-green/4

An almost prehistoric depiction. Ha! Wind was around before those big guys and will be here long after we have exited this precious planet. Let's try and leave it a little better for the next generation!

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Using Our Resources


Using our resources

After many years of living "the country life", we learned first-hand the importance of regaining some sort of "stewardship" of the land around us. As farming techniques begin to evolve and chemical enhancements to the soils become more and more prevalent so does the urgency for maintaining the fine balancing act between man and earth. One aspect of our immediate concern was a need to reduce our impact on the enviroment by reducing our carbon footprint. Our idea was an obvious one. Our area, The Sandusky Plains, has always been a fantastic source of a free and renewable resource; wind! Our solution was something that we took some time and effort in discovering. After our extensive research, we came upon a product that not only addressed our enviromental concerns but had immediate ROI in the form of a reduction in our electric bills. What a win-win situation!

http://www.altwinds.com/

altwinds@gmail.com