UAE Residents wake up to lightning and rain on Sunday morning

UAE residents woke up to overcast skies, lightning and slight rain on Sunday morning. The roads are wet and motorists are warned to drive carefully.

 

The weather is expected to be partly cloudy in general today, with the cloud cover increasing over the islands and some northern and eastern areas.

According to the National Center for Meteorology and Seismology (NCMS), the amount of clouds will increase over scattered areas, with a chance of rain. A slight fall in temperatures is also expected over some areas .

Winds will be moderate in general, fresh at times. However, it may kick up dust in some internal areas.

Sea will be moderate becoming rough gradually by night .

Meanwhile, the maximum temperature in some internal areas will hit 44 degree C, with a minimum of 23 degree C.

Humidity is also expected to touch 95 per cent in coastal areas.

 Rain in forecast for the next couple of days in the emirates.

National Conference on E-Waste Sustainability: Call for Papers

ORGANISER(S):

Bhaskaracharya College of Applied Sciences in joint collaboration with GIZ-IGEP (Indo-German Environment Partnership)

THEME: E-Waste Sustainability: Needs And Solutions For Its Management

WHEN: 7-8 March, 2013

WHERE: Bhaskaracharya College of Applied Sciences (University of Delhi), Sector 2, Phase 1, Dwarka, New Delhi

CALL FOR PAPERS:

Abstract can be submitted through email by 15th February, 2013 at ewasteconf2013@gmail.com . Abstracts are limited to one page of text (12 point in font type Times Roman, MS Word) and a second, optional page with up to four figures.

Accepted papers will have to submit camera ready print by 1 March, 2013.

Themes For Paper Submission

Based on the 4R principles of recycle, refurbish, re-use and reduce the Conference attempts to discuss and cover the following themes by inviting paper presentation by research scholars and panel discussions:

1.  Implementation of E-waste policy/Regulation

2. Initiatives of Government in reducing E-Waste

3. Integrating E-Waste and Green Design in curriculum

4. Needs for Technological Development and Recycling of E-waste

5. Recovery and reuse of Metals/Plastics/Glass from E-waste

6. Role of EPR in Sustaining E-waste Management

7. Role of informal recycling in E-waste Management

8. E-waste as pollutant on the ecosystem and humans

9. Shift in Design Methodologies (Green Design and Demanufacturing)

10. RoHS compliance and Green Production

11. Potential of re-use of EEE in terms of economic, social aspect

SEE Registration Details here

 

Source Link: http://confewaste2013.tk/

Plantbook Laptop Concept

A highly futuristic concept of a laptop that bases it’s charging system in the same water-soaking abilities of the bamboo by the designers Seunggi Baek and Hyerim Kim. The Plantbook system uses an external water tank, hence the Plantbook continuously absorbs water when soaking it in water and generates electrolysis using power stored in a solar heat plate installed on the top. In this process, it is operated using hydrogen as energy source and discharges oxygen. If you put it into a water bottle while you don’t use the laptop, it automatically charges a battery and discharges oxygen.

30 Cool High Tech #Gadgets you will love for your home

Gadgets are becoming a part of our everyday life and like the mobile phone (one of the first gadgets) we are starting to be addicted, depending on them for our daily actions. As technology advances, so do these gadgets that we are fond of and we are amazed by the new concepts created by young and ambitious designers. These innovations appear from a necessity of solving the problems that old products have and besides new and improved functions, they also come with a beautiful design.

Transparent TV

The transparent tv designed by Michael Friebe is a marvelous piece of technology that combines conventional LCD and the latest TOLED display technology. This allows to create non-transparent / solid moving pictures with rich color reproduction and full contrast range from solid black to pristine white.

Floor Plan Light switch

Have you ever had a problem with forgetting which light switch stands for what light? Taewon Hwang came with the great idea of creating a master light switch with a simple design that shows you what lights you are turning on or off.

The AURA Lamp

Looking almost alien like, the AURA lamp lights up a room with a certain texture and that is because it’s a woven lamp hand made in France.

Dimensional Wall Panels

People aren’t familiar with 3D wall panels. I don’t know why, cause they surely bring a nice feel to a room, with their interesting shapes that create a beautiful arrangement of light and shadows. They can also be put in shops, restaurants, offices and because of their different that usual look they transmit a nice futuristic look.

The RIMA lamp

The RIMA lamp is one like no other because of its interesting feature that allows you to control the light via four controller rings that you can slide. This beautiful lamp created by Matthias Pinkert has a processor which controls the heat, intensity, angle of the beam and color.

Sony Eclipse

This Sony Eclipse concept created by Hoang M Nguyen and Anh Nguyen is a media player that uses photovoltaic cells situated on its backside to draw in solar power. With this player you have a slight change of seeing the battery low warning very very rare.

Pouring Light Lamp

A strange but interesting lamp that will surely be sold really fast if it would be put in stores is this one created by Yeongwoo Kim. The lamp uses LED lights that are situated in the bucket and with the help of phosphorescence in the “water” it lights in a marvelous way.

Door Handle With Self-sterilization System

Senzo Nightlight

It’s really annoying during the night when you wake up and not find the light switch. The solution is provided by Soledad Clavell and Marcos Madia who created this wonderful nightlight that lights up the room when touching it.

 

 

Electrolux Fireplace

This fireplace created by Camillo Vanacore for Electrolux looks almost magical because of its transformation from off to on, from an opaque ceramic column to a transparent one.

 

Eco Cleaner

Without using regular dish detergents, the Eco Cleaner makes the plates bright and fresh using ultrasonic waves to ionize food particles on the dishes, converting the food into reusable compost for plants. Less waste and more nutrients for plants are a good idea for the future and a solution for enriching the soil. Of course, we’re talking about the soil for the plants that you keep in your apartment.

Document Extractor – Combi Monitor

Saving space on the desk has always been a problem for some and to solve this issue Byeong Min Choe has come up with a marvelous idea of combining a printer and a monitor.

On Switch

Minimalistic and elegant. That’s how you define this light switch created by Burakov Denis.

Green Smart Glass

The Green Smart Glass has an interesting technology that harnesses the heat energy from the hot beverage and stores it to be used later.

 

iQ Alarm clock

Instead of the snooze button which you unwillingly press in the morning, this alarm clock has questions that need your lucidity to solve them. This way, you will surely get up fast in the morning.

Change It! Wall

This wall has been passed around on the internet for some time and has become a neat attraction. It’s not LED or anything digital, it’s actually made of turning triangles with different colors on them, white, black and a rainbow color. It is limited at these three options for now, but I’m sure we’ll see in the future various patterns and images.

Orbital Washing Machine

Washing clothes has never been so easy. With the incorporated basket you can load and unload the clothes in the washing machine as easy as 1, 2, 3. This isn’t the only innovative feature. The spherical drum is moving on two axes washing your clothes better than the old washing machines that use only one axe.

Bediator

Having a warm bed underneath you is a cool thing, especially if you’re in a place where winters are incredibly cold. Now I don’t know how much weight this bed radiator-bed supports but if it can take two medium people it is awesome.

LED Ceiling

This is an interesting concept created by Seo Dong-Hun that allows you to create on the ceiling the light shapes you want. Literally, you can paint the ceiling with light. Imagine the artworks that would result from some people’s imagination.

LULA Lung Lamp

LULA is a product that collects data and indicates the air quality in your room. If it’s connected to the internet, it can process the data and tell you the health issues that you are facing in that situation and how you can avoid having problems caused by the quality of air.

WAT Lamp

The WAT lamp has the interesting ability to generate light if you fuel it with water. Yeah, it sounds outrageously futuristic, but the system is actually not that strange. The water combines with a hydroelectric battery to generate an electrochemical reaction that lights it up.

Miranda

This surface tile is not for everyone but it is fun for sure, having the ability to morph the way you want it and create shapes and basic drawings on it. More info can be found on Giles Miller’s site.

WAVE Ultra Sonic Wine Ager And Refrigerator

Ever wanted to age your wine so that it will be of a higher quality? Now you can, it’s not only a movie idea. Designer Mika Yamamoto has created this device that does this incredible thing. The Wave uses magnetic cooling system that is based on the magnetocaloric effect, which is the ability of some materials to heat up when magnetized and cool when removed from the magnetic field. It reduces carbon emissions and increases energy efficiency. It can possibly cut energy consumption by 40%. It also reduces the cost of electricity.

The Wave Dish Washer

This dishwasher beautifully designed by Guilherme Parolin makes the action of washing dishes a piece of cake thanks to its user friendly control panel.

Swan Umbrella Dryer

Drying up a wet umbrella has always been a problem. Till Noh Seon Mi designed the Swan Umbrella Dryer, of course.

 

1limit Faucet

Unlike the +- water faucet which only tells you how much you consume and doesn’t technically help you to reduce your costs, the 1litre limited faucet helps you to consume only the water that you need.

iChef+ Oven

From what I’ve seen on the market, the ovens are not user friendly at all, having changed over the years only at an aesthetic level without modifying the process in which you actually cook the meal. The iChef Oven has an innovative and powerful computer behind it’s technology and I believe it can be considered a milestone in its niche.

The Book Light

This product with integrated LEDs in a plastic body is an interesting product for the people who read a lot and need a discreet light over their pages. Don’t worry about the light being to powerful, cause you can adjust it as you please.

The Tulip Bath/Shower

In a small bathroom there’s always a problem with space and the Tulip Bath/Shower designed by Piotr Pyrtek provides the solution. Saving space is not its only feature, having a number of characteristics that qualifies it as a luxury item, like underwater jets or massage programs.

Unique Eco-Sculptures from an Indian Design Student

 

The Eco-Lamp

Satish Behera is a design student in India who has been exploring the ancient craft of paper maché as an ecological design material.  His style is so unique, his designs so impressionable that they are hard to forget.  His has created a style that is very professional and objects that are very desirable. (Pics)

 Using nothing more than newspaper, glue and varnish, Behera’s medium winds around and around itself as it becomes both base and cover, while Behera molds each strip into an elegant cultural work of function and art.  Each work has a patina of its own created by the blend of varnish, glue, and paper ink, adding even more distinctiveness to Behera’s style.

 

Eco-Ganesha is a modern, ecological sculpture of an ancient Hindu god, a god who, legend has it, has an elephant head.  It is exquisitely formed with rich detail that’s astounding when you consider the designer’s medium.

Eco-Ganesha

The Eco- Lamp or the Paper Table Lamp was a challenge for Behara who writes that the unusual form resulted from his placement of the lamp’s center of gravity.  Though Behara uses every strip of newspaper he acquires in his exploration, he acknowledges that he had to use “alien” products like wire, a bulb and the bulb holder.  This is a functioning lamp with a 60 watt bulb.

Wanting to design something more interesting than a box for a speaker, Behara created the Eco-Speakers to look like large snail shells/  Again, you see his meticulous craftsmanship.

Eco-Speaker

Of course, these works were simply explorations Mr. Behara undertook as part of his design coursework, but they’re awfully interesting and I should think marketable as well!

Portion of global GDP contributed by river basins set to more than double by 2050.

  Economic output of the world’s ten most populous river basins will exceed that of the US, Japanese and German economies combined by 2050 – but only if water scarcity is addressed

Almost 8% of global GDP could be generated in China‘s Yangtze River basin by 2050,

but only if water shortages are dealt with.

Photograph: STR/AFP/Getty Images

The world‘s ten most populous river basins will account for almost a quarter of global GDP by 2050, according to research by Frontier Economics laid out in a new study commissioned by HSBC.

The portion of global economic output provided by these regions is projected to more than double between 2010 and 2050, with almost 8% of global GDP to be generated along China’s Yangtze River by mid-century.

In 2010 roughly one dollar in ten of global economic output came from one of the ten river basins shown below, but in 2050 this figure is predicted to be 24.7%.

Source: figures from HSBC and Frontier Economics

Publication of the report coincides with the launch of the HSBC Water Programme, a $100m, five year partnership with WWF, WaterAid and Earthwatch aimed at combatting water risks in river basins and raising awareness of broader global water issues.

The launch of the Water Programme is covered in greater detail on our environment blog here, including the following quote from Barbara Frost, CEO of WaterAid:

This partnership will result in 1.1 million people gaining access to safe water and 1.9 million to improved hygiene and sanitation in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Nigeria and Ghana.

Most of the rivers in question are located in emerging economies – the Nile in Egypt, the Ganges in India, the Niger in West Africa – and such surges in economic activity could lift millions out of poverty, but these projections will only be realised if management of these regions’ water supplies is improved significantly.

An OECD model of water usage in 2050 shows that the largest increases in consumption are expected to come among the ‘BRIICS’ group of nations – Brazil, Russia, India, Indonesia, China and South Africa.

Total water consumption across BRIICS nations is projected to increase by 78% between 2000 and 2050, from 1,827 to 3,263 cubic kilometres, whereas the corresponding global figure will rise by a more modest 53%.

According to the UN’s latest World Water Development Report, water supplies in several of the ten basins featuring in the Frontier Economics report are being over-exploited. The map below shows water scarcity across the globe, with the darkest regions representing areas where water use exceeds minimum recharge levels.

Global patterns of water exploitation, coloured according to water stress indicator (WSI). Click for larger image. Illustration: United Nations Environment Programme

The Frontier Economics study shows that water use in seven of the ten river basins will be at unsustainable levels (30% or more of natural run-off being consumed) by 2050 if resource management does not improve.

Global distribution of different indicators of water scarcity. Click for larger image including description of categories. Illustration: UNESCO

Also included in the report are calculation of the benefits that would arise from meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) targets for water, and from going one step further to achieve universal access to water.

Several Latin American and Central African countries could see annual GDP increases of 5% or more if MDG targets are met, with the economic boost rising to as much as 15% with universal access.

Even China, already a major economic power, could see an annual increase in GDP of almost 1% if its entire population had access to clean water and sanitation.

Source: figures from HSBC and Frontier Economics

According to Frontier Economics’ calculations, the investments required to achieve such levels of water access could be paid off in as few as fifteen months.

A cost-benefit analysis of implementing the changes required to achieve these targets shows projected returns ratios vary considerable by region.

Assuming a 35 year lifetime for the impacts of initial investments, every dollar spent on achieving universal access in Sub-Saharan Africa would yield $2.50, compared to a return of over $16 per dollar spent on equivalent work in Latin America.

Data summary

Economic output from top ten river basins

River	Population in 2010 (millions)	Population in 2010 (% of global)	Basin GDP in 2010 (US$bn)	Basin GDP in 2010 (% of global)	Basin GDP in 2050 (US$bn)	Basin GDP in 2050 (% of global)
Source: Frontier Economics, HSBC
Ganges	528	0.08	690	0.01	5776	0.03
Yangtze (Chang Jiang)	407	0.06	1796	0.03	14810	0.08
Indus	254	0.04	281	0	1522	0.01
Nile	207	0.03	304	0	3035	0.02
Huang He (Yellow River)	170	0.02	751	0.01	6187	0.03
Huai He	103	0.02	457	0.01	3766	0.02
Niger	100	0.01	105	0	753	0
Hai	96	0.01	426	0.01	3511	0.02
Krishna	89	0.01	126	0	1052	0.01
Danube	81	0.01	1305	0.02	6432	0.03
Total	2036	0.3	6240	0.1	46844	0.25

 

Download the data

• DATA: download the full spreadsheet

Ozone hole second smallest in 20 years

Bringing great reprive to scientists monitoring ozone hole over the Antarctic, the the average area covered by the hole this year is smallest in the last 20 years. 

 

The ozone hole reached its maximum size Sep 22, covering 8.2 million square miles (21.2 million sq km), or the area of the US, Canada and Mexico combined, according to data from NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellites.

 

The average size of the 2012 ozone hole was 6.9 million sq miles (17.9 million square km). The Sep 6, 2000 ozone hole was the largest on record at 11.5 million square miles (29.9 million sq km). 

 

Ozone layer acts as Earth’s natural shield against ultraviolet radiation, which can cause skin cancer. The ozone hole phenomenon began making a yearly appearance in the early 1980s. 

 

“The ozone hole mainly is caused by chlorine from human-produced chemicals, and these chlorine levels are still sizable in the Antarctic stratosphere,” said atmospheric scientist Paul Newman of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre in Greenbelt, according to a NASA statement. 

 

“Natural fluctuations in weather patterns resulted in warmer stratospheric temperatures this year. These temperatures led to a smaller ozone hole,” added Newman. 

 

The Antarctic ozone layer likely will not return to its early 1980s state until about 2065, Newman said. The lengthy recovery is because of the long lifetimes of ozone-depleting substances in the atmosphere. 

 

Overall atmospheric ozone no longer is declining as concentrations of ozone-depleting substances decrease. The decrease is the result of an international agreement regulating the production of certain chemicals.

India’s Polluted Rivers Threaten Millions of Lives

River is not just a source of life in India; it represents faith and belief of the many million Indians who pray and preach the river for its mystical essence. But now the major rivers in India are threatening lives of millions of people who depend on the water from these rivers for sustenance. A team of 11 environmental activists cycled through the Gangetic plains covering about 1,800km in 27 days and have discovered that the devout rivers of these plains are turning into ‘sewage’ and becoming increasingly life threatening. The team members crossed 24 rivers while cycling through north Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, reached the capital and then cycled to their final stop at Dehra Dun.

Dr. Anil P Joshi is the team head of the environmental team from the Dehra Dun-based environmental NGO, HESCO. He is also a Padma Shri-awardee. On the current situations of these rivers, he said, “Not one river was fit to bathe in. The water at many places resembled sewage water. Among the most polluted rivers we came across was the Yamuna in western UP, Varuna and Gandak,” as reported by TNN.
Dr. Joshi further informed, “The growing pollution of rivers is a stark sign of wider ecological imbalance in the region.”

The aim of the survey done on the journey or ‘yatra’ by the environmental team was to increase awareness on the need to keep a track of India’s natural resources. The team is insisting the government to introduce an annual green measure entitled the ‘’gross environmental product’ or GEP. Joshi claims, “Like the GDP for the economy, the GEP would monitor the health of India’s natural assets, showing whether these were being overexploited or not,” as reported by TNN.

The activists were not just concerned about the condition of rivers they were even bothered about the disappearing forests on their yatra.  In the states they travelled they noticed that most of them had the forest area below India’s set target of 33 percent like in Bengal it showed 14.64 percent, Delhi 11.94 percent, Bihar 7.23 percent and UP 3.61 percent.
Joshi said, “Forests are vanishing in these states. And even the ones that survive are grade C forests, consisting of bushes rather than broad-leaved trees,” as reported by TNN.

The team visiting through 31 districts held 300 meetings and spread the message to about 10,000 people to preserve the quality of rivers. They also noted the falling water table, degradation of agricultural lands in various districts and polluted underground water.

Joshi informed “We will compile a report of our observations, which will be sent to the Prime Minister’s Office and to all chief ministers.”
Similarly the holy waters of Beas River in Manali, Himachal Pradesh are gradually turning into sewage, dustbin and also a corpse dump yard for the inhabitants and the visitors. The river bank is covered with tonnes of garbage and the sewage lines of most houses open directly into the water stream.

Nanak Chand Sharma, an elderly person from Kullu said, “Beas was not so polluted 20 years back. Construction of hundreds of hotels, increasing population, plastic packaging and indifferent attitude of the government are responsible for the unimpeded destruction of holy Beas,” as informed by Suresh Sharma for TNN.

The river is also used by the ranchers to dispose their dead animals. This practice has highly contaminated the water. Hari Prasad Singh, a resident in Patlikuhal village said, “People are throwing cattle carcasses into the river while some bury the dead animals by the riverside. These people think that there are floods in the river every year which will sweep away all the dirt and bodies,” as reported by TNN.

The ignorant villagers are disposing wastes, dead bodies and animals in the river, even then very little is done by the government to stop the ongoing contamination of the river. Even with such drastic circumstances there are no signboards installed in the district anywhere warning not to pollute the river, informed another resident.

These practices in the small towns and cities in India has caused enough damage to the natural resources that it is at a point where it has become a huge challenge to salvage it. The rivers in the country have been given such importance but now these rivers require a lot of attention to be cleaned and be turned innocuous for the people in the country.

World #Nuclear Electricity Generation Down 5 Percent Since 2006

World nuclear electricity-generating capacity has been essentially flat since 2007 and is likely to fall as plants retire faster than new ones are built. In fact, the actual electricity generated at nuclear power plants fell 5 percent between 2006 and 2011.

In 2011, following Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, 13 nuclear reactors in Japan, Germany, and the United Kingdom were permanently taken offline. Seven new reactors, three of them in China, were connected to the grid. The net result was a two percent reduction in world nuclear capacity to 369,000 megawatts by the end of 2011. In 2012, the world has added a net 3,000 megawatts of nuclear capacity, with new additions in South Korea and Canada partly offset by more U.K. shutdowns.

© Earth Policy Institute

The United States, with 104 nuclear reactors generating some 19 percent of the country’s electricity, leads the world in nuclear generating capacity. France is a distant second in installed capacity, but its 58 reactors meet more than three quarters of the country’s electricity demand. (President François Hollande has pledged to reduce this dependence to 50 percent by 2025.)

© Earth Policy Institute

China, Russia, South Korea, and India account for 48 of the 64 nuclear reactors the International Atomic Energy Agency lists as under construction worldwide. Although these 64 reactors add up to some 62,000 megawatts of potential new capacity, fewer than one in four has a projected date for connecting to the electrical grid. Some reactors have been listed as “under construction” for over two decades.

© Earth Policy Institute

Plagued by cost overruns, construction delays, and a dearth of private investment interest, the world’s nuclear reactor fleet is aging quickly as new reactor connections struggle to keep up with retirements. The average age of nuclear reactors operating today is 27 years; the 142 reactors that have already retired were just 23 years old on average when they closed. Many nuclear reactors have been granted operating extensions, usually for 20 years, beyond their typical design lifetime of 40 years. But since Fukushima, where the four retired reactors averaged 37 years in operation, this option has become less attractive.

© Earth Policy Institute

In contrast to the decline in nuclear power, electricity generation from the wind and the sun has grown 27 percent and 62 percent, respectively, per year since 2006. Four German states now get close to half of their electricity from wind. By 2015, China plans to increase its current estimated 60,000 megawatts of grid-connected wind power capacity to 100,000 megawatts. More solar photovoltaic capacity was added in the European Union in 2011 than any other source of electricity generation. The list of exciting developments in renewable energy goes on. As this story unfolds, it is becoming increasingly clear that we can design an energy economy that is at once low-carbon and low-risk.

By J. Matthew Roney

 

Meet The 14-Year-Old Girl Who Developed A Low-Cost Water Purification System

Deepika Kurup just won $25,000 for a device that uses the power of the sun to kill bacteria in water.

The next generation of scientists is already hard at work solving our biggest problems. Take Deepika Kurup, a 14-year-old high school student from Nashua, New Hampshire. After seeing children in India drinking dirty water from a stagnant pool, she decided, in her words, “to find a solution to the global water crisis.” And then she actually made some progress towards that goal, developing a solar-powered water purification system.

Kurup’s low-cost invention just won her $25,000 in The Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge–a high-stakes science competition for students in 5th to 8th grade (Kurup entered the competition before she was in high school). This was her second time entering; in 7th grade, she took first place in her state.

This time around, Kurup spent three months toiling away at the project, foregoing vacations and summer camp to leaf through PhD papers about water purification methods. She spoke with her mentor at 3M every day. And she tested the purification system independently in her backyard with contaminated water taken from the Nashua wastewater treatment facility. She ultimately came up with a system that exposes titanium oxide and zinc oxide to sunlight, creating a chemical reaction that generates hydroxyl radicals, which in turn can kill harmful bacteria.

Kurup used her system for one set of testing; the other was a control. She counted bacteria before and after purification (with 3M petrifilms), and discovered that water which had gone through her composite–which costs about half a cent per gram–had significantly fewer coliform units and E.Coli colonies in a matter of hours.

14-Year-old is America’s Top Young Scientist: Her Solar-Powered Jug Purifies

Unlike today’s popular water purification methods–using UV lamps that require electricity or chemicals that give water a nasty smell and taste–Kurup’s method can run off-grid, generating fresh-tasting water. She has competition from innovative water filtration systems like LifeStraw, of course, but this isn’t the last we’ll see of Kurup’s inventions.

The high school freshman hopes to work with Discovery and 3M on developing the water filtration project. She’s also interested in speaking with other companies that could help with funding. “My next step is applying for a patent,” she says. “I want to start a nonprofit organization to deploy my innovation.”

After graduation, Kurup wants to become a neurologist. But first, more science competitions. “Science is really my passion,” she says.