Watch the Path of Hurricanes on Google Earth--- Google

The 2011 hurricane season is in full swing, and Google has recently added a nice set of hurricane-related data to Google Earth. Simply make sure that your "Places" layer is enabled, and you'll see icons appear in the water wherever hurricanes and/or tropical storms exist. For example, here is Tropical Storm Don, currently located in the southern part of the Gulf of Mexico.

This new feature in Google Earth is quite solid, as it provides quite a bit of data about each storm, along with historical tracks and future track predictions. However, it's a bit odd that this appears in the "Places" layer; why not somewhere in the "Weather" folder? As they explain in a recent blog entry, Google is trying to make the hurricane data easier to find by leaving it in the main "Places" layer, which is likely turned on for a lot of people. Still, if people dig around trying to find it, I'd expect most will go to the "Weather" layer first.

In past seasons we've seen other great hurricane trackers, such as the one from 'Glooton' that we've used for the past five years or so. However, that tracker is no longer working, and we're having a difficult time finding any decent tools beyond the one now built-in to Google Earth.

Atlantis Launch Photo

The man, who has not made a mistake, probably never did anything new!A E.

Nuclear Technologies to Play an Important Role in Electricity Production Growth with a Low-Carbon Path : R Chidambaram

Nuclear Technologies to Play an Important Role in Electricity Production Growth with a Low-Carbon Path : R Chidambaram
Barc Established Largest Nuclear Desalination Plant in the World Based on Hybrid Technology

The Human Development Index (HDI) is directly dependent on two main parameters: Per Capita Electricity Consumption and Female Literacy. Delivering his keynote address on ‘Energy Technologies, Energy Securities and Climate Change’, Dr R Chidambaram, Principal Scientific Adviser to Government of India and DAE-Homi Bhabha Professor, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, said, “For India to become a ‘developed’ country, the per capita electricity consumption has to increase manifold. Nuclear has to play an important role in this increase as India looks for a low-carbon path for its electricity production growth. India is aiming for an electricity capacity of over a million MW by 2050. Expanded use of nuclear technologies offers immense potential to meet important development needs. In fact, to satisfy energy demands and to mitigate the threat of climate change – two of the 21st century’s greatest challenges – there are major opportunities for expansion of nuclear energy in those countries that choose to have it.” Dr Chidambaram said that there should not be any fear related to nuclear energy. Lessons will be learnt from the recent Fukushima accident and more stringent security measures are being taken in the country and all over the world. Explaining three Stage Indian Nuclear Programme, Dr Chidambaram said, “In the first stage, we have Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWR) which uses natural UO2 fuels and SEU/MOX fuels, the second stage there are Fsat Breeder Reactors(FBRs) which use MOX/MC/ metallic fuel and the third stage uses thorium with TH-U233 closed cycle.
Explaining the Indian Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR-Pu) he said, it is a 300 MWe vertical pressure tube type, boiling light water cooled and heavy water moderated reactor using 233U-Th MOX and Pu-Th MOX fuel. Its Major design objectives are 65% of power from Th. Its several passive features include 3 days grace period, No radiological impact , Passive shutdown system to address insider threat scenarios , Design life of 100 years and coolant channels can be Easily replaceable. This is an innovative Technology demonstrator for the closed thorium fuel cycle.” Closing the nuclear fuel cycle is essential if nuclear is to be a sustainable mitigating technology in the context of the climate change threat. This is in coherence with India’s three-stage nuclear programme, Dr R Chidambaram explained.
Talking about other nuclear options, Dr Chidambaram said Accelerator-driven sub-critical reactor, using the spallation nuclear reaction are there. The second option is Thermonuclear fusion – Magnetic Confinement Fusion (Tokamak) and Inertial Confinement (Laser-Induced) Fusion and the third option is for energy as reactors or for energy amplification and fissile material breeding as hybrids. Referring to Eight Missions outlined in the National Action Plan on Climate Change, he clarified that Nuclear Energy is not in the group of eight missions because the Department of Atomic Energy is itself a Mission – oriented Agency. He disclosed that a new, 9th Mission on Clean Coal (Carbon) Technologies is being considered.
Regarding Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission, he said the target capacity of Grid-connected Solar Power Projects by the year 2022=20,000 MW which will be split equally between Photovoltaic and Concentrated Solar Power (CSP). He said that BARC has established a 6300 m3/day (6.3 MLD) Nuclear Desalination Demonstration Plant using hybrid Multi-Stage Flash-Reverse Osmosis (MSF-RO) technology integrated to existing PHWR at MAPS (Kalpakkam). It is the largest nuclear desalination plant in the world based on hybrid technology.
Research involves generation of new knowledge and Innovation requires adding economic value to knowledge. The border between Applied and Innovation, when developing cutting-edge technologies, becomes fuzzy. Referring to The Prime Minister’s announcement of the present decade as the ‘Decade of Innovation” and the year 2012-13 as the year of Science, Dr Chidambaram said, research and innovation are strengthened by collaboration, particularly between scientists who have mutual respect. Also any international collaboration is sustainable only if it is mutually beneficial. We need connectivity – both physical and electronic. Today’s India seeks international scientific and technological collaboration on an ‘equal partner’ basis e.g. LHC, ITER.

Indian safety response to Fukushima

26 July 2011

India has outlined its plans to bolster plant defence and preparedness to handle events of the scale of the tsunami that engulfed Fukushima Daiichi.
 
The owner and operator of India's 20 nuclear power reactors is Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL). It said that "adequate provisions exist at Indian nuclear power plants to handle station blackout situations and maintain continuous cooling of reactor cores for decay heat removal."

The conclusion came after task forces were dispatched to consider the situation of each of India's four reactor types, based on boiling water, pressurized water with two kinds of containment, and pressurized heavy water.

The report - Safety Evaluation of Indian Nuclear Power Plants Post Fukushima Incident - notes the successful management of incidents of prolonged loss of power supplies at the Narora plant in 1993, a flood at Kakrapara in 1994, and the impact of the Indian Ocean tsunami at Madras in 2004.

Nevertheless, it went on to make several recommendations to boost safety levels and included a roadmap for their implementation, with deadlines ranging from two to 14 months.

Among the main suggestions were installing systems to improve the detection of seismic activity and improve automatic shut down; revising existing emergency operating procedures; re-training workers to deal with such emergencies; and establishing flood-proof enclosures for important electrical power sources.

The capability to top-up coolant water, emergency core cooling systems and used fuel ponds from external sources is to be added in a year-long project. The duration of battery power for instrumentation of basic plant parameters will also be improved.

Over about 14 months, extra sea protection is to be installed at Tarapur and Madras plants. The first step in this project is to determine the size of the required shore protection barriers. At Tarapur, the atmosphere in the containment is to be made inert.

This review is to be thought of as an interim measure, it said, based on the present understanding of the Fukushima event. It will be updated "at a later stage" when Fukushima is understood in finer detail.

Reporting by Raghavendra Verma

for World Nuclear NewsThe man, who has not made a mistake, probably never did anything new! A E.

Spotlight: Germany’s nuclear exit will mean burning more fossil fuels

Spotlight: Germany’s nuclear exit will mean burning more fossil fuels: "

by Jarrett Adams

As Germany begins its trek toward shutting down its nuclear plants by 2022, it has to answer several questions about what effect this will have on the nation’s energy and environmental outlook. Some opponents to nuclear energy have stated that Germany’s plants, which until recently produced 24 percent of its electricity, will be picked up by expanding renewables. But, at least in the short term, much of this shortfall will be met by building new fossil fuel-fired plants.

In a recent piece, Guardian columnist George Monbiot wrote:

Germany’s promise to ditch nuclear power will produce an extra 40 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. In June Angela Merkel announced a possible doubling of the capacity of the coal and gas plants Germany will build in the next 10 years. Already Germany has been burning brown coal, one of the most polluting fuels on earth, to make up the shortfall.

In fact, the German chancellor has called for construction of 20 new fossil plants to replace the 17 nuclear plants until additional renewable capacity is available. According to Der Spiegel, a portion of funds originally directed for investment in renewables “has now been earmarked to subsidize the construction of new coal-fired power plants.”

Part of Germany’s solution will be to replace the electricity supplied by nuclear energy with renewable generation. We applaud the intent to build more renewable generation – AREVA has built six offshore wind turbines off the German coast and, with a production facility in Bremerhaven, working to developing many more. As these renewable sources cannot supply all of the power yet, the German energy demand will have to be supplemented through coal and natural gas. This increased dependence, mostly imported from Russia, has other drawbacks besides producing more greenhouse gas emissions.

Some recent articles have highlighted how Russian industry is positioning to help Germany with its transition away from nuclear energy, including the Voice of Russia. Last week an article plainly titled “Germany to renounce nuclear energy, Gazprom is ready to help,” detailed the new partnership between Gazprom and German utility RWE to build coal and gas fired plants in the country.

Blogger Rod Adams has written an interesting post on the Energy Collective examining Russia’s stake in the German nuclear phaseout.

Other analyses have pointed out that even if Germany meets its objective to phase out nuclear energy, it will not meet the supply the nuclear plants had provided with renewables. According to an insightful post from the Breakthrough Institute:

To fully replace nuclear power with renewable energy, the country would have to scale renewable energy to provide over 42.4% of the country’s projected 2020 electricity demand, a substantial increase from the 17% of electricity demand renewable energy provided in 2010, and far greater than the country’s goal of 35% of electricity demand in 2020. In terms of non-hydro renewables, that’s an increase of 2.6 times today’s levels.

The German people have the right to choose their energy sources, including deciding against nuclear energy. But this is not necessarily the trend. Many other countries understand the constant, low-carbon energy generated by nuclear plants and are moving forward aggressively with new nuclear plants, including China, which now has some 25 plants under construction, and India and the United Kingdom.

"

Ganymede Color Global

Ganymede Color Global, a photo by NASAJPL on Flickr.

Exxon spills Venom in Yellowstone River

Exxon Spoils Yellowstone River bed , Montana , USA

An ExxonMobil pipeline that runs under the Yellowstone River in Montana ruptured Saturday and leaked hundreds of barrels of oil into the waterway, causing a 25-mile plume that fouled the riverbank and forced municipalities and irrigation districts downstream to close intakes.

The break near Billings in south-central Montana led to temporary evacuations of hundreds of residents along a 20-mile stretch. Cleanup crews deployed booms and absorbent material as the plume moved downstream at an estimated 5 to 7 mph.

The river has no dams on its way to its confluence with the Missouri River just across the Montana border inNorth Dakota. It was unclear how far the plume might travel.

"The parties responsible will restore the Yellowstone River," Mont. Gov. Brian Schweitzer said.

ExxonMobil spokeswoman Pam Malek said the pipe leaked an estimated 750 to 1,000 barrels of oil for about a half-hour before it was shut down. Other Exxon officials had estimated up to 42,000 gallons of crude oil escaped.

Duane Winslow, Yellowstone County director of disaster and emergency services, said the plume was dissipating as it moved downstream. "We're just kind of waiting for it to move on down while Exxon is trying to figure out how to corral this monster," Winslow said.

"The timing couldn't be worse," said Steve Knecht, chief of operations for Montana Disaster and Emergency Services, who added that the plume was measured at 25 miles near Pompeys Pillar National Monument. "With the Yellowstone running at flood stage and all the debris, it makes it dang tough to get out there to do anything."

Brent Peters, the fire chief for the city of Laurel about 12 miles west of Billings, said the rupture in the 12-inch diameter pipe occurred late Friday about a mile south of Laurel.

He said about 140 people in the Laurel area were evacuated early Saturday due to concerns about possible explosions and the overpowering fumes. He said they were allowed to return at about 4 a.m. after fumes had decreased.

Winslow said hundreds or residents downstream were told to evacuate in the early morning hours as authorities knocked on doors, but it's unclear how many did.

In a statement, ExxonMobil said it was sending a team to help with cleanup, and that state and federal authorities had been alerted to the spill. The ExxonMobil Pipeline Company "deeply regrets this release," it said.

A 600-foot-long black smear of oil coated Jim Swanson's riverfront property just downstream from where the pipe broke.

"Whosever pipeline it is better be knocking on my door soon and explaining how they're going to clean it up," Swanson said as globules of oil bubbled to the surface. "They say they've got it capped off. I'm not so sure."

Crews were putting out absorbent material along stretches of the river in Billings and near Laurel, but there were no attempts at capturing oil farther out in the river. In some areas oil flowed underneath booms and continued downstream.

The smell of oil permeated the air for miles downstream and through the city of Billings.

"Nobody's been able to lay their eyes on the pipe," Peters said. "Right now, the Yellowstone River is at flood stage. The bank isn't stable enough for anybody to get close."

The cause of the rupture in the pipe carrying crude oil from Belfry, Mont., to the company's refinery in Billings wasn't known. Peters and Malek said speculation involves high water that might have gouged out the river bed and exposed the pipe, which was possibly hit by debris.

"I haven't seen it this high for at least 15 years," Peters said.

Jeb Montgomery of ExxonMobil said the pipe was buried six feet below the riverbed.

The state has received record rainfall in the last month and also has a huge snowpack in the mountains that is melting, which has resulted in widespread flooding in recent weeks.

Three oil refineries are in the Billings area, and Peters said he asked all three to turn off the flow of oil in their pipelines under the river once the leak was reported. He said ExxonMobil and Cenex Harvest Refinery did so, and that Conoco Phillips said its pipe was already shut down.

He said the river where the leak occurred is about 250 yards wide, and that an oil slick appeared to be about 20 feet wide.

"That was the farthest my flashlight would reach," he said.

Laurel, which has about 6,500 residents, is known for a huge Fourth of July fireworks display put on by the fire department. Peters said the town can swell to as many as 50,000 people for the event.

He said the fire department plans to hold the event on Monday.

Exxon carries disrepute of being careless and spilling oil Often.

It’s Disregard towards the nature and carelessness towards operations dates back 1989. The News is Here:

No one anticipated any unusual problems as the Exxon Valdez left the Alyeska Pipeline Terminal at 9:12 p.m., Alaska Standard Time, on March 23,1989. The 987foot ship, second newest in Exxon Shipping Company's 20-tanker fleet, was loaded with 53,094,5 10 gallons (1,264,155 barrels) of North Slope crude oil bound for Long Beach, California. Tankers carrying North Slope crude oil had safely transited Prince William Sound more than 8,700 times in the 12 years since oil began flowing through the trans-Alaska pipeline, with no major disasters and few serious incidents. This experience gave little reason to suspect impending disaster. Yet less than three hours later, the Exxon Valdez grounded at Bligh Reef, rupturing eight of its 11 cargo tanks and spewing some 10.8 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound.

WHY MAN LIES…? HERE is a 500 year old Lie detector …

Niccolò Machiavelli might well have titled his 16^th-century Dell'arte Della Guerra (" The Art of War ") as The Art of Lying, since verbal deception—mainly, how to get away with it—was so central to his political psychology. To say that the exquisitely light-of-tongue are "talented" is, of course, sure to be met with moral outrage. We place a social premium on the ability to ferret out other people’s lies, especially, as we’ve seen just this week in the news, when they may hide brutal and ugly crimes.  

Still, there is something darkly fascinating about those skilled in verbal legerdemain. And at least one team of scientists, led by Dutch psychologist Aldert Vrij , believes that it has identified the precise ingredients of "good liars." These researchers outline the following 18 traits (pdf) that, if ever they were to coalesce in a perfect storm of a single perpetrator, would strain even seasoned interrogators’ lie-detection abilities:  

(1) manipulativeness. "Machiavellians" are pragmatic liars who aren’t fearful or anxious. They are "scheming but not stupid," explain the authors. "In conversations, they tend to dominate, but they also seem relaxed, talented and confident."

(2) acting. Good actors make good liars; receptive audiences encourage confidence.

(3) expressiveness. Animated people create favorable first impressions, making liars seductive and their expressions distracting.

(4) physical attractiveness. Fair or unfair, pretty people are judged as being more honest than unattractive people. 

(5) natural performers. These people can adapt to abrupt changes in the discourse with a convincing spontaneity.

(6) experience. Prior lying helps people manage familiar emotions, such as guilt and fear, which can “leak” behaviorally and tip off observers.

(7) confidence. Like anything else, believing in yourself is half the battle; you’ve got to believe in your ability to deceive others.

(8) emotional camouflage. Liars "mask their stark inclination to show the emotional expressions they truly feel" by feigning the opposite affect.

(9) eloquence. Eloquent speakers confound listeners with word play and buy extra time to ponder a plausible answer by giving long-winded responses.

(10) well-preparedness. This minimizes fabrication on the spot, which is vulnerable to detection. 

(11) unverifiable responding. Concealing information ("I honestly don’t remember") is preferable to a constructed lie because it cannot be disconfirmed.

(12) information frugality. Saying as little as possible in response to pointed questions makes it all the more difficult to confirm or disconfirm details.

(13) original thinking. Even meticulous liars can be thrown by the unexpected, so the ability to give original, convincing, non-scripted responses comes in handy.

(14) rapid thinking. Delays and verbal fillers ("ums" and "ahs") signal deception, so good liars are quick-witted, thinking fast on their feet.

(15) intelligence. Intelligence enables an efficient shouldering of the “cognitive load” imposed by lying, since there are many complex, simultaneously occurring demands associated with monitoring one’s own deceptiveness.

(16) good memory. Interrogators’ ears will prick at inconsistencies. A good memoryallows a liar to remember details without tripping in their own fibs.

(17) truth adherence. Lies that "bend the truth" are generally more convincing, and require less cognitive effort, than those that involve fabricating an entire story.

(18) decoding. The ability to detect suspicion in the listener allows the liar to make the necessary adjustments, borrowing from strategies in the preceding skill set.  

Why give the criminals such helpful advice? The authors anticipated these concerns, clarifying that they hope this knowledge will assist interrogators, rather than those sitting on the other side of the table. Furthermore, "Undoubtedly," they write, "this [work] provides tips that liars could use to make their performance more convincing, but most characteristics we mentioned are inherent, and related to personality." 

In other words, there’s still a certain, inimitable je ne sais quoi to the great deluders. And should you find yourself so burdened with this particular type of genius, perhaps, as Mark Twain offered:

… the wise thing is to train [yourself] to lie thoughtfully,
judiciously; to lie with a good object, and not an evil one; to lie
for others' advantage, and not [y]our own; to lie healingly,
charitably, humanely, not cruelly, hurtfully, maliciously; to lie
gracefully and graciously, not awkwardly and clumsily; to lie firmly,
frankly, squarely, with head erect, not haltingly, tortuously, with
pusillanimous mien, as being ashamed of [y]our high calling.

Comet Hartley 2 Gets a Visitor

Comet Hartley 2 Gets a Visitor, a photo by NASAJPL on Flickr.

The Comet Hartly

Cassini Spacecraft Captures Images

 

 

These false-color images chronicle a day in the life of a huge storm in Saturn's northern mid-latitudes.

PASADENA, Calif. – Scientists analyzing data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft now have the first-ever, up-close details of a Saturn storm that is eight times the surface area of Earth.

On Dec. 5, 2010, Cassini first detected the storm that has been raging ever since. It appears approximately 35 degrees north latitude of Saturn. Pictures from Cassini's imaging cameras show the storm wrapping around the entire planet covering approximately 2 billion square miles (4 billion square kilometers).

The storm is about 500 times larger than the biggest storm previously seen by Cassini during several months from 2009 to 2010. Scientists studied the sounds of the new storm's lightning strikes and analyzed images taken between December 2010 and February 2011. Data from Cassini's radio and plasma wave science instrument showed the lightning flash rate as much as 10 times more frequent than during other storms monitored since Cassini's arrival to Saturn in 2004. The data appear in a paper published this week in the journal Nature.

A composite near-true-color view of the storm.

"Cassini shows us that Saturn is bipolar," said Andrew Ingersoll, an author of the study and a Cassini imaging team member at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif. "Saturn is not like Earth and Jupiter, where storms are fairly frequent. Weather on Saturn appears to hum along placidly for years and then erupt violently. I'm excited we saw weather so spectacular on our watch."

At its most intense, the storm generated more than 10 lightning flashes per second. Even with millisecond resolution, the spacecraft's radio and plasma wave instrument had difficulty separating individual signals during the most intense period. Scientists created a sound file from data obtained on March 15 at a slightly lower intensity period.

Cassini has detected 10 lightning storms on Saturn since the spacecraft entered the planet's orbit and its southern hemisphere was experiencing summer, with full solar illumination not shadowed by the rings. Those storms rolled through an area in the southern hemisphere dubbed "Storm Alley." But the sun's illumination on the hemispheres flipped around August 2009, when the northern hemisphere began experiencing spring.

Cassini captured these sounds of lightning strikes at Saturn on March 15, 2011. Click on the image for listening options.

"This storm is thrilling because it shows how shifting seasons and solar illumination can dramatically stir up the weather on Saturn," said Georg Fischer, the paper's lead author and a radio and plasma wave science team member at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Graz. "We have been observing storms on Saturn for almost seven years, so tracking a storm so different from the others has put us at the edge of our seats."

The storm's results are the first activities of a new "Saturn Storm Watch" campaign. During this effort, Cassini looks at likely storm locations on Saturn in between its scheduled observations. On the same day that the radio and plasma wave instrument detected the first lightning, Cassini's cameras happened to be pointed at the right location as part of the campaign and captured an image of a small, bright cloud. Because analysis on that image was not completed immediately, Fischer sent out a notice to the worldwide amateur astronomy community to collect more images. A flood of amateur images helped scientists track the storm as it grew rapidly, wrapping around the planet by late January 2011.

The new details about this storm complement atmospheric disturbances described recently by scientists using Cassini's composite infrared spectrometer and the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope. The storm is the biggest observed by spacecraft orbiting or flying by Saturn. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captured images in 1990 of an equally large storm.

Amateur astronomers helped scientists track the growth of the largest, most intense lightning storm on Saturn seen by NASA's Cassini and Voyager spacecraft. This image was obtained by Christopher Go, of Cebu, the Philippines on Dec. 13, 2010. Image credit: C. Go

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena manages the mission for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The radio and plasma wave science team is based at the University of Iowa, Iowa City, where the instrument was built. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena.

http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/news/newsreleases/newsrelease20110706/

Rare-earth elements : Sea Route ?

The world's insatiable demand for the rare-earth elements needed to make almost all technological gadgets could one day be partially met by sea-floor mining, hints an assessment of the Pacific Ocean's resources. But accessing the treasure trove of key elements on the ocean floor will be very expensive and potentially harmful to sea-floor ecology.

In Nature Geoscience this week¹, Yasuhiro Kato, a geosystem engineer at the University of Tokyo, and his colleagues catalogue some hotspots of rare-earth accumulation on the bed of the Pacific. They estimate that a 1-square-kilometre area around the site that has the highest concentration of the elements in its mud holds a cache equivalent to one-fifth of current annual demand — about the same yield as a small mine on land.

In Nature Geoscience this week¹, Yasuhiro Kato, a geosystem engineer at the University of Tokyo, and his colleagues catalogue some hotspots of rare-earth accumulation on the bed of the Pacific. They estimate that a 1-square-kilometre area around the site that has the highest concentration of the elements in its mud holds a cache equivalent to one-fifth of current annual demand — about the same yield as a small mine on land.

The rare-earth elements — metals such as lanthanum and neodymium — are used to make strong magnets, which help to drive the motors in everything from laptops to electric cars and washing machines. Demand for rare earths has leapt from 30,000 tonnes in the 1980s to about 120,000 tonnes in 2010 — higher than the world's current annual production of about 112,000 tonnes. Despite the name, rare earths aren't geologically scarce. But China, which currently produces some 97% of world supply, has put stringent caps on the amount available for export. This has led to big price jumps and the depletion of national stockpiles elsewhere in recent years. New mines are now being developed around the world, for example in California, Canada, and Australia.

Wet wealth

It has long been known th

Rare Earth Mineral Deposits

at the ocean might provide a wealth of rare earths. Sea-floor hydrothermal vents pump out rare-earth elements dissolved in their hot fluids. And these elements and others accumulate in potato-sized lumps, called manganese nodules, on the sea floor. The elements also build up in sea-floor mud; but only a few spot measures of this source of rare-earth elements have previously been made.

Kato and his colleagues set out to perform a widespread assessment of this possible resource. They looked at 2,000 samples of sediments taken from 78 sites around the Pacific, and found rare-earth concentrations as high as 0.2% of the mud in the eastern South Pacific, and 0.1% near Hawaii. That might not sound like much, but those concentrations are as high as or higher than those at one clay mine currently in operation in China, they point out. And the deposits are particularly rich in heavy rare-earth elements — the rarer and more expensive metals.

Some of the deposits are more than 70 metres thick. The authors estimate that an area of 1 square kilometre around a hotspot near Hawaii could hold 25,000 tonnes of rare earths. Overall, they say, the ocean floor might hold more than the 110 million tonnes of rare earths estimated to be buried on land.

Kato : "I'm a geoscientist, not an economist,"         He notes & says that he doesn't know resource is commercially viable..?

Privatised in Profit, now Socialising Losses Why Insure ?

Japan officials draw up Tepco breakup plan: report http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE7620AU20110703

EMC2: Wireless network HARMS GPS ?

EMC2: Wireless network HARMS GPS ?: "The m SymbolPriceChange GRMN 33.03+0.98 T 31.41+0.15 TRMB 39.64+1.11 {“s” : “grmn,t,trmb”,”k” : “a00,a50,b00,b60,c10,g00,h00,l10,p20,t10,v00..."

The man, who has not made a mistake, probably never did anything new!A E.

Wireless network HARMS GPS ?

The mSymbolPriceChangeGRMN33.03+0.98T31.41+0.15TRMB39.64+1.11{“s” : “grmn,t,trmb”,”k” : “a00,a50,b00,b60,c10,g00,h00,l10,p20,t10,v00″,”o” : “”,”j” : “”}

WASHINGTON (AP) — New test results show that a proposed nationwide wireless broadband network would produce significant interference with GPS systems used for everything from aviation to high-precision timing networks to consumer navigation devices. Changes to the proposal could reduce interference, but wouldn’t eliminate it.
The findings, based on extensive equipment tests conducted in Las Vegas, increase pressure on the Federal Communications Commission to block a Virginia company called LightSquared from launching the network, which is designed to compete with super-fast systems being rolled out by ATT and Verizon Wireless.
Although the FCC in January gave LightSquared approval to build the system, the agency said it would not let the company turn on the network until GPS interference problems are resolved. The agency required LightSquared, GPS equipment makers and GPS users to establish a working group to study the matter.
That group filed its report with the commission on Thursday, with the two sides offering different interpretations of the test results.
LightSquared insisted that the interference problems are fixable.
But GPS equipment makers, and companies and government agencies that rely on GPS technology, warn that the planned network would jam their systems because LightSquared would use airwaves close to those already set aside for GPS.
They say that sensitive satellite receivers — designed to pick up relatively weak signals coming from space — could be overwhelmed when LightSquared starts sending high-powered signals from as many as 40,000 transmitters on the ground. GPS signals, they say, will suffer the way a radio station can get drowned out by a stronger broadcast in a nearby channel.
“The FCC needs to consider other options for the LightSquared signals where they do not run up against the laws of physics,” said Charles Trimble, co-founder of Trimble Navigation Ltd., which makes GPS systems.
With the working group report complete, the FCC will now seek public comments. The FCC said it will review the report, adding that it has “a long-standing record of resolving interference disputes.”
The working group’s report follows the release of federal test results that also found significant interference with GPS systems used by a broad cross-section of government agencies, including the Coast Guard, the Federal Aviation Administration and NASA.
Faced with growing GPS industry resistance, LightSquared last week proposed to launch its network using a different slice of airwaves located farther away from GPS frequencies. It also proposed to transmit signals at lower power levels to ensure that its network would not interfere with most nearby GPS systems.
Most of the testing conducted by the working group was based on the company’s original plan to use airwaves next to the GPS band.
The working group said that plan would produce significant, across-the-board interference. Among the findings:
– GPS systems used for aviation would be unavailable over entire regions of the country at normal aircraft altitudes.
– GPS receivers built into cellular devices could experience interference at significant distances from LightSquared’s base stations — resulting in delayed or inaccurate location readings.
– Space-based GPS receivers used in NASA science missions could be disrupted.
Although the working group conducted only limited testing based on LightSquared’s proposal to use different airwaves, it said the change could reduce problems for some GPS receivers, including those used in aircraft navigation and cellphones.