The Jaguar XT5 computer, housed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Knoxville, Tenn. and owned by the Department of Energy was just named the fastest computer in the world by the TOP500 list.  It has a performance speed of 1.759 petaflops or quadrillions of calculations per second and that power is being focused on solving the issues of climate change.

The Jaguar is an open science machine for performing peer-reviewed research.  It is being used to create models and simulations for predicting regional climate change, studying enzymes for developing better ethanol and writing algorithms for fast nuclear reactors that would produce less waste.  A billion hours of processor time have been scheduled for 2010 by users like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Argonne National Laboratory and the National Science Foundation.

If you're thinking that the fastest computer in the world should be used for other problems too, don't worry, the Jaguar along with the other supercomputers on the list are also being used for things like nuclear security, developing better medicines and examining the origins of the universe, among other things.

Oak Ridge hosts four of the supercomputers on the list, including Kraken which was number three in the world with a speed of 831 teraflops.  Where the human brain's processing performance ends, these supercomputers pick up, allowing tons of information to be sorted, processed and analyzed.  With all of the challenges facing us in tackling climate change, it's nice to have them on our side.

via AP

 

As reports have indicated for the past several weeks, a binding agreement won't be reached in Copenhagen this December.  Leaders attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation this past weekend met and decided that the Copenhagen conference would be used to come up with an interim "politically" binding agreement and to set a date and time for a legally binding one sometime next year.

The goal of cutting global emissions by 50 percent by 2050 has been scrapped and instead a 2007 goal of reducing energy intensity - emissions per unit of economic output - by 25 percent by 2030 is being restated, but again, it won't be binding.

A big reason for the push back is Congress's inaction on a climate change bill this year.  Without a clear commitment from the U.S. to cut emissions, other countries are hesitant to make any pledges of their own.  In the past few days, members of Congress have said a decision on a climate bill won't happen before the first half of 2010.

For those of us who were keeping our hopes up for a significant agreement to come out of Copenhagen and for a climate bill this year, this news is incredibly disappointing.  One positive thing to hold onto is that the administration seems determined to make some progress even while Congress falters, most notably with the EPA gearing up to regulate greenhouse emissions starting in 2011.

via NY Times

Image via APEC Singapore 2009

 

It's great to see some of the large wind farm projects that were just ideas a couple of years ago become reality. First Wind's Milford Wind Corridor project has just seen the completion of its first phase - 203.5 MW in Millard and Beaver Counties in Utah, the largest renewable energy facility in the state.

The wind farm consists of 97 turbines and will be able power 45,000 homes.  Southern California Public Power Authority is purchasing all of the electricity generated over the next 20 years on behalf of the cities of Los Angeles, Pasadena and Burbank.

Construction on the wind farm began almost exactly a year ago.  Over the next few years, the wind corridor will expand to include four more phases totaling over 1 GW of wind energy capacity.

via Press Release

 

 

The LightSail-1 would run on the pressure of light hitting its four triangular-shaped Mylar sails.  The society sees the project as a way to achieve long space flights with slow, continuous acceleration that eventually leads to high speeds.  The society's executive director imagines flights of many years reaching speeds of 100,000 mph where the craft could leave the solar system in five years instead of 25.

The spacecraft will be composed of three Cubesats, small cubes that contain the electronics and controls modules and the sails.  When the craft hits the target altitude the sails will unfurl to resemble a kite.  The LightSail-1 will "piggyback" on another mission's rocket (the exact one is yet to be determined) and then orbit at an altitude of around 500 miles for a few days to test sunlight as a means of propulsion.

If it's successful, the society plans to launch LightSails 2 and 3 for longer and farther missions.  The 2010 launch will cost almost $2 million and will be privately funded.

via AP

Small-scale wind turbines can't produce the large amounts of power that their giant brothers can, but there's still room for them in the renewable energy landscape.  As an example, cell phone company Core Communications will begin using small vertical-axis wind turbines to power their cell phone towers.

The company will use turbines from Helix Wind that can generate electricity in winds as slow as 10 mph.  The turbines will power the towers and any extra electricity will be sold to the grid, giving Core Communications a new source of revenue as well.

The turbines will be installed on a trial basis on cell phone towers in Southern California for three months starting in early 2010.  If they perform well enough, additional turbines could be rolled out permanently.

via CNET

As a new mom and an ecogeek, I know that choosing a diapering method is a huge issue.  Disposable diapers clog landfills for hundreds of years.  There are alternatives to disposables, of course, but they have their drawbacks.  Cloth diapers require extra water and electricity for laundering and the couple of biodegradable options don't quite perform as well and are hard to find at local supermarkets.  This leads to an overwhelming majority of parents choosing disposables and approximately 27.4 billion diapers making their way to American landfills every year.

Enter one of the more exciting stories I've come across in a while.  Companies Versus Energy and Knowaste are partnering up to build a diaper recycling plant in the UK.  Not only will the diapers collected stay out of landfills, but the plant will actually run on the organic matter contained in them.

The diapers will be shredded, washed, sanitized and separated into organic material and reusable paper pulp and plastic that may find new life as roof tiles, shoe insoles, wallpaper, industrial thickeners or many other potential uses.  The water used in the process will be treated and reused.

The plant will open in May 2010 in Birmingham and is the first of five planned for the UK.  The diapers will be collected from nurseries, nursing homes and hospitals.  My fingers are crossed that the U.S. will follow soon.

via Triple Pundit

Have you ever been driving in rush hour and wished you could just zone out and read a book during your trip instead of stressing about the traffic?  Well, the EU is testing a way to make that possible while cutting fuel consumption at the same time.  The idea is that eight vehicles would travel as one "train," linked by wireless sensors.  It's believed that the system, called Safe Road Trains for the Environment (SARTRE), could cut fuel use by 20 percent for cars traveling in the trains.

Each road train would be controlled by a lead vehicle driven by a professional driver.  All other drivers in the train would be passengers able to take their hands off the wheel and enjoy the ride.  Sensors would collect and send information to the lead vehicle about what was happening around each of the cars.  Cars, buses and trucks would all be able to join a train and could leave at any time.

The SARTRE project will be conducted for three years on test tracks in the UK, Spain and Sweden and eventually on public roads in Spain.  Some specifics will have to be sorted out like how exactly vehicles will join and leave the trains, how the trains will signal to other cars that they're traveling as one and how to ensure a safe organization of vehicles (e.g. not allowing cars to be sandwiched by large trucks).

Ultimately researchers see the road trains being a paid service for drivers.

via BBC

Garmin has revealed screen shots of its new Eco-Route add-on for the Nuvi 1xxx GPS systems with Bluetooth.  The Eco-Route is a cable that plugs into your car's diagnostic communications port and feeds data to your GPS.

Eco-Route reads air, fuel, throttle position and combustion mixture information and then uses that to display performance information for the driver.  Fuel economy data includes not just the gallons used, but the cost of fuel used and the total carbon footprint for the trip.  The add-on includes a driving challenge that scores drivers on braking, speed and acceleration, aiming to make users more efficient drivers.

Drivers can also choose the most fuel efficient route instead of just the usual shortest or fastest options.

All of this sounds great, but there is a big drawback - the price.  The cable will cost $149 for new and old users alike.  If it still sounds appealing, Eco-Route should be available by early next year.

via Autoblog Green

 

 

Consumer and shipping packaging can be incredibly wasteful.  Some companies are downsizing their packaging, but many products sitll come wrapped and boxed in ridiculous amounts of plastic, paper, cardboard - you name it.  One designer has come up with a way to get rid of the waste by wrapping objects in bacteria, creating a biodegradable, custom-fitting shell.  Both gross and exciting!

Mareike Frensmeier just won third place in the Cargo Packs 2020 challenge for his bacteria wrap idea called Bacs.  The packaging is made by covering an object with a culture of the bacterium acetobacter xylinum, then starting a sugar feeding frenzy.  This creates a "fibrous nano-scaled cellulose network" that encases the object and keeps it safe along its journey.

The Bacs system can be manipulated to offer damp, gel-like packaging for food, dry, paper-like packaging or freeze-dried, foam-like packaging for the most fragile objects.  Now, I'm not sure bacteria wrap will ever take off but the idea of a world free of packing peanuts sure is a nice one.

via Treehugger