alcohol - by pavel constantin, romania

by dave granlund, politicalcartoons.com

The White House has announced that it will be installing solar panels on its roof, following last month’s attempt by global warming activists to deliver panels to the Oval Office. The “solar panels — which will be installed by spring 2011 — will heat water and supply some of the first family’s electricity.”
Former president Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the executive mansion in 1979, but Ronald Reagan took them down. The Obama White House last month politely rebuffed an activist who showed up with a Carter-era panel.
Energy Secretary Steven Chu said that the new project “reflects President Obama’s strong commitment to US leadership in solar energy and the jobs it will create here at home.” President Barack Obama has pledged to help build a new green economy, but Congress has balked at mandatory cuts in carbon emissions. A study this year found that China has overtaken the United States in green investment.
The Interior Department, which supervises most of the United States’ 650 million acres (263 million hectares) of public land, said it approved solar projects in southern California’s deserts by units of companies Tessera and Chevron.

New America Foundation, James K. Galbraith (University of Texas) - The illusion of stimulus was that the economy would “return to normal” with a little “fiscal boost.” The reality is that having exhausted (however imperfectly) the 1940s agenda of middle-class housing, the 1950s highways agenda, the 1960s health-care agenda and the 1990s information-technology bubble, the economy needs a new strategic direction. The clear and pressing priorities are energy and climate change. To address these challenges is a grand task, requiring decades of research, careful planning and many investments, if we are to pass on a livable planet and a decent living standard. Institutionally it will require new lending agencies to assure that the funds needed are available over the long term. And the work can provide jobs for millions, for many years.

by angel boligan, cagle cartoons, el universal, mexico city

Twee Golfstaten, Saoedi-Arabië en de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten, hebben het gebruik van de blackberry verboden. Zelf ben ik er niet zo op tegen dat regeringen in staat zijn electronische communicatie te bekijken. Als er maar goede parlementaire controle op is, uiteraard. Het is een middel om terrroristische aanslagen te voorkomen.
In Amerika, dat heel goed bevriend is met de twee dictatoriaal bestuurde Golfstaten, gaan stemmen op om hetzelfde te doen.
Glenn Greenwald is er wel fel op tegen. Hij vindt niet dat de staat gegevens over individuen mag verzamelen als ze niet onder de verdenking van een misdrijf staan. Eens was dat het kenmerk van de Amerikaanse democratie. Toen kwam George W. Bush.

Top-level Homeland Security official in the Bush administration Richard Falkenrath said that in the U.S. “among law enforcement investigators and intelligence officers the Emirates’ decision met with approval, admiration and perhaps even a touch of envy.”

The Bush administration’s war on privacy is continued by Obama

In early August, two dictatorial (and U.S.-allied) Gulf states — Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — announced a ban on the use of Blackberries because, as the BBC put it, “[b]oth nations are unhappy that they are unable to monitor such communications via the handsets.” Those two governments demand the power to intercept and monitor every single form of communication. No human interaction may take place beyond their prying ears. Since Blackberry communication data are sent directly to servers in Canada and the company which operates Blackberry — Research in Motion — refused to turn the data over to those governments, “authorities [] decided to ban Blackberry services rather than continue to allow an uncontrolled and unmonitored flow of electronic information within their borders.” That’s the core mindset of the Omnipotent Surveillance State: above all else, what is strictly prohibited is the ability of citizens to communicate in private; we can’t have any “uncontrolled and unmonitored flow of electronic information.”
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foto gelkhinge - eisenwichser, westerbroekstermadepolder bij groningen

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Laat ik nu altijd gedacht hebben dat de in Amerika nog altijd veel gebruikte Dutch oven een echte oven was. Nee dus. Een Dutch oven is een pan. Een stevige ijzeren pan op pootjes weliswaar maar een pan. In dit verhaal legt een jager uit wat je er allemaal mee kunt doen.

Dutch oven is the workhorse of camp cooking

NewarkAdvocate - So, one of my best friends on such outings was a Dutch oven, something used again and again in deer camps. A Dutch oven, for the uninitiated, isn’t an oven at all but a heavy iron pot with a wire handle and a tight-fitting lid. It’s a jack of all trades, good for making soup or baking biscuits or whatever, and if you’re planning to spend time in a rustic camp this fall and plan to do some cooking, such an oven can be a lifesaver.
If you’re planning to hunt too, dig a hole outside, add wood and let it burn down to hot coals, then place the Dutch oven and contents in the hole, cover with more coals, add dirt above the top coals and let it sit for long hours. You’ll want to try this at home a time or two to make sure you’ve got the time, water, etc. right, but this meal will cook itself and be ready when you return.

NYTimes - While the United States of America maintained its role as the world’s leading supplier of weapons, the value of its arms trade sharply declined in 2009. This was in contrast to 2008, when the U. S. increased the value of its weapons sales.
The global economic recession significantly pushed down purchases of weapons last year to the lowest level since 2005, a new government study has found. The report to Congress concluded that the value of worldwide arms deals in 2009 was $57.5 billion, a drop of 8.5 percent from 2008. Last year the U.S. signed arms deals worth $22.6 billion, 39 percent of the world market, down from $38.1 billion in 2008.
whole story here

Vandaag kwam een oudere vrouw onze garage binnengelopen.
‘Wat is er aan de hand’, vroeg ik. Ze begon me haar levensverhaal te vertellen en het duurde even voordat ik tussenbeide kon komen.
‘Met de auto bedoel ik’.
Ze zei dat haar auto buiten stond, een Volkswagen. Hij maakte een raar geluid en reed vreemd. Uiteindelijk vond ik haar auto: een Fiat met een lekke band.

Dirk Koens

The Wall Street Journal schrijft een pagina vol over Dutch Design, ’establishing that design could be both thoughtful and delightful’. En dat Rotterdam de onofficiële design hoofdstad van Nederland is. Wie had dat ooit kunnen denken van die havenarbeiders?
Voor het hele verhaal hier, wel brood meenemen voor onderweg. Een stukje op drasties.

kiki van eijk - love!

Rotterdam, the sprawling home to Europe’s largest port, is the country’s unofficial design capital. Drawn here by low rent, available workspace, and each other, designers began arriving in the early 1990s. Now, they toil away in enormous harborside warehouses, or along the industrial canals of nearby Schiedam just over the city line. A victim of German bombs in the first year of World War II, Rotterdam became an architecture laboratory in the years after the war, and a spirit of communal experimentation continues to set Rotterdam designers apart.
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by peray, thailand

A dreamy university town in the Netherlands has become a major center for Iranian activists abroad. More than a thousand Iranian students, mostly fresh arrivals from Iran’s best universities, are studying at the Delft University of Technology. And in the evening’s they meet in cafes that line the city’s canals to discuss the future of their country.

The Washington Post - The worldfamous university of Delft hosts one of the largest communities of visiting Iranian scholars in Europe, and many are involved with the Iranian opposition.
For many, Delft’s Iranian student community represents the emergence of a new breed of Iranian opposition activists abroad that is more individual, shuns ideology and promotes debate over conflict. Many here say they want an Iran that is connected to the world, but they also support nationalist causes such as Iran’s right to nuclear energy.
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UPDATE, september 3rd, 2010 at 9:44: Het is geen boorplatform maar een productieplatform. Dat is een stuk minder gevaarlijk. Alles is onder controle. Er zou ook geen olie lekken.

Er is weer een boorplatform in de Golf van Mexico geexplodeerd. Er zijn geen doden gevallen, wel lekt er olie. Aangezien het platform in ondiep water staat, zou een eventueel lek snel gedicht kunnen worden. Wat wel mooit uitkomt, is dat deze week net grootscheeps actie wordt gevoerd door Big Oil tegen het moratorium op boren naar olie in de Golf van Mexico.

Gas and oil drilling platform exploded 80 miles off the coast of Louisiana

Oh great… So maybe this wasn’t the best week for Big Oil to organize protests of the drilling moratorium after all.

An offshore oil platform exploded and was burning Thursday in the Gulf of Mexico about 80 miles south of Vermilion Bay, with some workers reported in the water.
The explosion aboard the platform, owned by Mariner Energy, occurred west of the site of the April offshore rig blast that caused the massive BP oil spill.
The Coast Guard said no one was killed in the explosion, which was reported by a commercial helicopter flying over the site around 9 a.m. CDT.
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Kijk dat is nu vooruitgang. In Delft hebben ze een bacterie ontdekt die betonrot kan voorkomen.

Bacteria can make sick concrete better

DELFT, Netherlands - Concrete can heal its own hairline fractures — as living bone does — if bacteria are added to the concrete during mixing,
Cracks in concrete makes buildings vulnerable, allowing water and aggressive chemicals in, says Henk Jonkers of Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.
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Deze vraag is afkomstig van Tegelloods.nl en wel de afdeling:
Antwoorden op de meest gestelde vragen en algemene informatie over tegels.

Volgende week behandelen we de eveneens vaak gestelde vraag: Kan ik wandtegels ook als vloertegels gebruiken?
Maar vandaag dus: Kan ik vloertegels ook als wandtegels gebruiken?

a) Nee, tenzij u echt met de rug tegen de muur staat.
b) In principe wel, maar houd wel rekening met gewicht en zuigkracht van de tegel.
c) Nee, ook al gaat u eerst naar het kastje.

Nog even en het is al weer september mensen. De winter komt er aan.

The Atlantic - While trolling the Internet this writer on clean energy came across this experiment in headgear. We have little information about what’s going on other than what’s provided in the Netherlands Nationaal Archief’s bibliographic record. It indicates that we’re looking at “Plastic face protection from snowstorms. Canada, Montreal, 1939.”
In Dutch, these things have a name: Plastic sneeuwstormbeschermer.

Het verveelt ze nooit, de buitenlanders, Nederlanders en water. U weet, waar dan ook in de wereld een probleem is met water kom je Nederlanders tegen. Dit gaat over het boek van Maarten Asscher uit 2009, H2Olland. Het is nu vertaald in het Duits: “H2Olland. Wie die Niederländer das Meer besiegten.”

Alle mensen zijn nat, maar Nederlanders zijn het natst. Niet alleen bestaan wij – zoals iedereen – voor meer dan 70 procent uit water, wij wonen bovendien in een land dat voor een vijfde deel uit water bestaat en waar ook nog eens jaarlijks gemiddeld zo’n 80 centimeter regen valt. Kan het natter?

Nicht umsonst nannte man früher das Leitungswasser liebevoll Gemeindepils

OE1.ORF - In einem Land, das zu einem Fünftel aus Wasser besteht, im Durchschnitt 80 cm Regen im Jahr zu erwarten hat und auch noch am Meer liegt, verwundert es kaum, dass die Bevölkerung eine ganz besondere Beziehung zum nassen Element aufgebaut hat.

Als Fötus besteht der Mensch zu circa 95 Prozent aus Wasser. Nach der Geburt geht der Anteil zwar zurück, aber es sind noch immer mehr als 70 Prozent. Alle Menschen sind also wässrig, doch die Niederländer sind wässriger als andere Menschen.
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Thanks to the deadlocked United States Senate, the Deutsche Bank will not be looking to invest in alternative energy in the US but China and Europe. There policymakers are looking to the future, which the U.S. does not. The new Congressional state aid package is being funded, partly, by slashing $1.5 billion from renewable energy programs, which is like a hungry man buying fish by selling his fishing rod. This is how they do it in Portugal. Nearly 45 percent of the electricity in Portugal’s grid will come from renewable sources this year.

Alternative energy investment prospects have shriveled in the United States after the U.S. Senate was unable to break a deadlock over tackling global warming, a Deutsche Bank official said.
“You just throw your hands up and say … we’re going to take our money elsewhere,” said Kevin Parker in an interview with Reuters.
Parker, who is global head of the Frankfurt-based bank’s Deutsche Asset Management Division, oversees nearly $700 billion in funds that devote $6 billion to $7 billion to climate change products.
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Is space exploration and colonization a real option? No, according to science-fiction writer Charlie Stross. He is totally pessimistic as can be read in this very well written post. And we’re not talking about distant star systems like Alpha Centauri or Epsilon Eridani but about our own solar system. Mars, the Moon, moons around other planets, forget it, says this expert on manned spacetravel. Till there is a human being invented who can thrive in an airless, inhospitable environment we can forget even colonising the most nearby and earthlike planet Mars.

Colonize the Gobi desert, colonise the North Atlantic in winter - then get back to me about the rest of the solar system!

I write Science fiction for a living.
Possibly because of this, folks seem to think I ought to be an enthusiastic proponent of space exploration and space colonization. Space exploration? Yep, that’s a fair cop — I’m all in favour of advancing the scientific enterprise. But actual space colonisation is another matter entirely, and those of a sensitive (or optimistic) disposition might want to stop reading right now … [read on] (more…)

by arend van dam

De eerste storting van BP is binnen. Er is drie miljard dollar op de rekening van een Claims Fund van de Verenigde Staten gestort. Uiteindelijk moet daar twintig miljard dollar op terecht komen dat zal worden uitgedeeld aan slachtoffers van de olievervuiling in de Golf van Mexico. Goed nieuws allemaal dus want het gat lijkt ook definitef gedicht. Over de schade die is aangericht verschillen de meningen. Het lijkt er op dat de schade aan het ecosysteem aanzienlijk is maar niet zo erg als eerder voor mogelijk gehouden.

Republican Joe Barton won’t be happy about this

DailyKos - Two months after agreeing to fund a $20 billion account for the economic damage done from its oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, BP has deposited the first installment into the escrow fund.

Washington (CNN) — The Justice Department announced Monday that the details have been completed for establishing a $20 billion escrow account that BP has promised to fund. The money will pay for claims to those who suffered from the effects of the Gulf oil spill. [read on] (more…)

Yesterday, government scientists released their official estimate of the total amount of oil that leaked from BP’s deepwater disaster: 4.9 million barrels, or 206 million gallons. Of that total, they estimated that about half had either been either contained, evaporated, or dissolved, that 24% had dispersed into tiny droplets in the ocean, and that 26% had either come ashore, been buried in sand, or remained in the Gulf as tar balls.
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