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Sitting in traffic triggers more heart attacks than eating, alcohol, cocaine, and sex
Running your car in an enclosed garage is one way to kill yourself — so why do it outside?Photo: Simone RamellaSomeday our descendants will get around solely by hover-monorail and electric car, and it will blow their cybernetically-enhanced minds that there ever lived a race backward enough to huff automobile exhaust for an hour a […]
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Bill Nye the Science Guy says not having high-speed rail in the U.S. is embarrassing
Did you grow up smarter because you watched Bill Nye the Science Guy blowing things up on TV? Well, he’s got some choice words of wisdom for politicians who are blocking high-speed rail in the United States. “If I may, you should be embarrassed … as a U.S. citizen, not to have high-speed rail,” […]
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Wind production in Gansu, China
As of the end of 2009, according to the China Renewable Energy Industries Association, more than 10,000 utility-scale wind turbines had been installed nationwide. And in 2010, according to figures released last month by the China Industry Energy Conservation and Clean Production Association, China spent approximately $US 45.55 billion on 378 big wind power projects, […]
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Solar production in Gansu, China
In 2009, China launched a program to build the nation’s first big solar power projects, which produced two 10-MW photovoltaic power installations in Dunhuang, at Gansu’s far northern end. More than a dozen other solar energy projects -- totaling 280 MW -- will be completed this year.
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Coal is China's Largest industrial water consumer
China’s coal mining, processing, and electrical generating industries consumed over 112 billion cubic meters (30 trillion gallons) of water annually, which is nearly 20 percent of all national water consumption, according to the China Ministry of Water Resources.
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Coal is China’s Largest industrial water consumer
China’s coal mining, processing, and electrical generating industries consumed over 112 billion cubic meters (30 trillion gallons) of water annually, which is nearly 20 percent of all national water consumption, according to the China Ministry of Water Resources.
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New wind and solar sectors won’t solve China’s water scarcity
JIUQUAN, China — Business for wind and solar energy components has been so brisk in Gansu Province — a bone-bleaching sweep of gusty desert and sun-washed mountains in China’s northern region — that the New Energy Equipment Manufacturing Industry base, which employs 20,000 people, is a 24/7 operation. Just two years old, the expansive industrial […]
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Check out Helsinki’s underground shadow city
Itakeskus underground swimming complexPhoto: Lewis Martin From the country that brought you the world’s spookiest children’s series, please meet the underground city. Helsinki, Finland’s capital, has decided to defeat sprawl by building down instead of out. Incised into the city’s bedrock are a swimming pool, a shopping area, a church, a hockey rink, and a […]
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They just don’t build virtual cities like they used to
In the NYC Panorama, the Empire State building is only 13cm tallPhoto: John Pavlus The Panorama of the City of New York is one of a kind: Built under Robert Moses himself for the 1964 World’s Fair, its 9,335 square feet encompass “every single building constructed before 1992 in all five boroughs,” or 895,000 individual […]
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Maybe no one cares about climate change because we’re wired for extinction
Will we follow the Irish elk’s strange evolutionary path toward extinction?This piece was written by George Black. In my unending (and thus far, I have to confess, largely fruitless) attempts to figure out why Americans aren’t more alarmed about climate change, one of the more intriguing ideas I’ve heard recently was put to me by […]
