RenoVous

  China has tested the world's first megawatt-class flying wind turbine, generating enough energy to power an average home for two weeks. Dubbed AWES, it is a large helium-filled airship containing 12 wind turbines.  It utilizes stable wind speeds at an altitude of 6,500 feet. The idea wouldn't be to have one over every house though, but to complement traditional ground-based wind power systems, and potentially for use in off-grid settings. Testing is in early phases, there is much to consider with regards to maintenance and safety, such as the tether's risk to aircraft.

  The Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River. It is the largest hydropower producer in the United States, generating enough electricity to power much of the Pacific Northwest. It is a gravity dam, which resists the force of water pushing against it through sheer mass.  The weight of the dam, acting downwards, counteracts the horizontal force of water. The dam creates a reservoir on the river, named Lake Roosevelt, for FDR was president during construction. From May through September, a laser show is projected onto the dam, called "One River, Many Voices."  It started in 1989 and is one of the largest light shows in the US.

 Go Planet! I saw a post today that said Captain Planet isn't real, but his enemies are.  The assaults on Gaia, Mother Earth. "I urge everyone to treat every day of the year as Earth Day.  Planet Earth is the only home we shall ever know, yet we are relentlessly harming it." - Dr. Jane Goodall The theme for this year is OUR POWER, OUR PLANET, to unite around renewable energy. With all the new homes and apartments being built, I can't help but wonder why solar panels aren't just incorporated in.  It's all insanely expensive anyway.  And having them spread through a community seems a bit safer to birds than entire fields of them. On an individual level, we can all try to do better.  My biggest failure, I think, is to-go boxes.  So that is my Earth Day Action pledge. Site

  Neutrinos are subatomic particles that are very small, neutral, and have almost no mass.  They are called "ghost particles" because they rarely interact with other matter. But recently, a cosmic neutrino plunged into the Mediterranean Sea with an energy that blows all other neutrinos out of the water. With some 220 million billion electron volts, this particle was around 20 times as energetic as the highest seen before. It was seen thanks to the partially built Cubic Kilometre Neutrino Telescope located at the bottom of the sea. The neutrino detectors are three-dimensional arrays of light sensor modules or optical modules distributed over large volumes of the transparent water.  The optical modules register the faint Cherenkov light from charged particles induced by neutrino interactions in the seawater. There's more. The neutrino's interaction with matter spawns charged particles such as muons.  As these careen through the water, that is what the detectors pick up...