* Posts by John Smith 19

16327 publicly visible posts • joined 10 Jun 2009

NEC shows off ultra-thin battery

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Making organic radicals *stable* is the tricky bit.

I didn't think they existed for more than fractions of a *second* at any one time.

Keeping them stable but *useful* is a pretty neat trick and if it sidesteps any specific hard-to-get metals it *could* be said to be a truly green technology (but I'd want to know a *lot* more about the process before using that term given some very nasty catalysts can be found in chemistry).

Note that at least 1 company (Safion) *already* makes a battery in this range *specifically* for credit card sized devices. I'm not sure what it's chemistry is however.

How about a "Summer book reader" printed and loaded with a Summers worth of reading (that only lasts a Summer)?

It's never too early to pervert the high quality engineering achievement to the purposes of banal (but profitable) entertainment.

Thumbs up for the work.

New steganography technique relies on letter shapes

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Disappointed

I'd thought they'd come up with some neat trick to alter the characteristics of individual fonts or instances of font in a PDF file.

If you open a file of *known* format in the relevant reader and your first reaction "this is nonsense" then it's pretty obvious it's a)random file done for the LOLz b)encoded message.

BTW the very first Mission Impossible is about trying to find the key used to separate a message page photographically combined with a random image.

As others have notes that is *proper* steganography.

Met plod will use 1980s software to police Olympics

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FAIL

And it has just occured to the MPS *now* that this *might* be a problem.

Because who knew the Olympics was going to start in a few months?

Oh, everybody?

So even if they *could* get a new system designed and built how could you *test* it vigorously enough to be confident it will work? I'll bet there's a fair bit of data to transfer as well.

On the hardware side I'd guess its a mini computer app (*could* be a Siemens mainframe, which was IIRC what PNC was originally run on) driving what are now dumb terminal emulators running on normal PC's.

I'd go with WTF but as anyone who's seen the Italian Job will know massive sporting events offer massive opportunity for criminal activity. So something tells me the SOR *will* get a workout. We can only hope the FAIL will *not* be epic.

E.ON to flog stake in wind farms to private firms

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Boffin

Offshore is *meant* to be about 7% more efficient

From (IIRC) 26% to 33%.

Of course that still leaves the average 67% of the time a turbine is *not* making anything.

It is *all* about the ROC's (and their presumed re-sale value). #

In a *properly* functioning market as the market gets going then govt *should* ramp down its support and that actually appears to be *happening*.

Note though that is also *exactly* what the UK govt is doing with rail subsidies, and note what has happened to train fares as a result....

Robotics breakthrough blasts crud from that bit behind the lav

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Let's face it that bit around the back of the aveage crapper is pretty nasty

I welcome our new robo-lavie cleaning overlords.

Russia plans manned moon shot by 2030

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Re: Looks like the russians have been suckered again.

"Only then did it dawn on them that *this* is what the US shuttle program was *for*."

Actually that was what SDI was for as Jerry Pournelle used to explain it.

STS was about keeping most of the NASA "ecosystem" in place until the US govt got over it's "temporary" reduced funding levels and returned them to Apollo levels.

That has not happened yet but insiders remain confident that it will real soon now.

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Looks like the russians have been suckered again.

the quote from the actual article

http://rbth.ru/articles/2012/03/16/roscosmos_takes_on_nasa_15096.html

due to "Accounts Chamber Chairman Sergei Stepashin" that "“Indeed, heavy lift launch vehicles are also an indispensable element – no interplanetary spacecraft can be put into orbit without them,” he said.

Suggested they are going to chase the US model. Rocket engineers going back to Werner von Braun have known better.

This is a *very* poor choice and use of budget. The Augustine commission went to some trouble to find out what you a space programme could do with *existing* launchers.

They realized propellent is the biggest *single* lump of mass that has to go to orbit but is the *simplest* to sub-divide *provided* you have a big storage tank in orbit. While big it is light, so it can still sit on on top of an existing launcher.

Russia also has a back catalogue of very high efficiency engines running everything *except*LH2.Proton runs with storables propellant and on orbit refueling exercises have already been carried out with these, although LOX/Kero would be a much better choice given similarly developed engines. On orbit fuel transfer would also give Russia *unique* capabilities which would be "one up" on both the US and China (and India), despite *decades* of NASA saying it would be a really good idea if they developed this capability.

The USSR developed a space shuttle because their engineers looked at the design and concluded it could not be operated for the costs NASA claimed (which was true). Russian politicians concluded it was a conspiracy to do something else and insisted on having one just like it.

They failed to take into account NASA (and the US aerospace industries) fondness for protecting jobs at *almost* any cost (provided it's paid by the taxpayers of course).

In a world where information is supposedly *much* more freely available astute Russian merkin watchers should have realized this a *long* time ago. Never attribute to planning for a surprise military attack what simple (very well funded) political lobbying and political self-interest can do just as well.

Russintards, you are about to be had.

Busty blogger bursts Bulgarian airbag in mud-wrestle blunder

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Boffin

But if the implant technology is good enough....

How would you *know* they were fake?

Just asking.

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Nasty

And yet *epic* at the same time.

Supersonic silent biplane COMING SOON ...ish

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Re: I'm wondering if it's time for a return of the "ring wing"

"Ah yes, the ring wing. It was further developed into the SSZ concept aka the Super Sonic Zeppelin. Fit a shockwave-trapping ring wing around a lighter-than-air dirigible which provides the lift and it can go supersonic without those discomfiting bangy noises. Drag is someone else's problem."

This is hands down one of the maddest things I've ever heard of (although the idea of a nuclear powered dirigible was described in the 1950s and the 2 technologies would be quite a good fit for each other).

However speed has *always* been the Achilles heel of airships. I don't think I've heard of any one hitting better than 80 mph. Very fast for a ship but you've only got cargo plane carrying capacity. LTA eliminates the landing gear problem at a stroke.

But an SSZ would change *everything* putting them back in *real* competition with aircraft.. Sadly the only thing I've seen is the Ben Bova story on the subject.

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I'm wondering if it's time for a return of the "ring wing"

Yes it *really* is a ring around the whole fuselage.

Yes it does generate lift (but I'm still not quite sure how).

It looks mad but had some fairly serious work done on it throughout the 50s and 60s.

In reality a 1/2 circle (which has also been tested) looked a lot more practical, especially when working out where to put the landing gear.

As for swing wings historically this has had a *very* big pucker factor. The military have always had the option to eject and crash if the wings locked in a position that you could not land in.

Modern flight control systems are pretty reliable but I'm guessing for that sort of application it's got to be in instrument landing system levels of reliability. IE *parts of the system fail but it never fails to execute across *all* aircraft (of that type) in operation ever.

This is still pretty tough to achieve.

Clever idea but we'll see if it covers *all* the problems that such an aircraft has to solve, starting with *adequate* lift across the whole speed/altitude envelope.

Thumbs up for effort.

Eddie Murphy heading for worst movie ever glory

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Gerry

I guess you mean the Gus Van Sant movie of 2 guys who go walking in the desert without food or water.

It doesn't sound like much happens and I suspect not a lot does. In right hands this could be a profound mediation on the nature of friendship and sacrifice in adversity.

But personally I think within 5 minutes I'd be wondering "How could you be so f***ing stupid while managing to stay alive."

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I think it's difficult to make a film that stays either good *or* bad over time.

Citizen Kane lost to How Green Was My Valley but how many people have ever *seen* the latter?

Likewise Hudson Hawk's reputation has (slightly) risen over the years. Probably not too popular in the UK but plenty of cinematic in jokes some surprising casting and it did not take itself too seriously. "Breaking it down for the 'hoes back home" is not something I'd ever expect Richard E. Grant to say.

But I wonder what movies have been released and people at the time said "This is s**t" and 2,3,4 or more decades later still say "This is s**t" ?

I'm not talking fast and furious straight-to-DVD stuff. That's a given.

I mean something that actually got to a *cinema* that a recognized studio spent some reasonable cash on but still turned out s**t.

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Re: Yet another opinion …

"In my view, the film Windows (1980, in those halcyon pre-PC days) continues to hold its spot against all competition at the nadir of filmed entertainment. It was nominated for five Razzies in 1981 — Worst Picture, Worst Actress, Worst Supporting Actress, Worst Director, and Worst Screenplay — and inconceivably took home none of them. It was robbed."

On IMDB it looks like some quite promising soft core pron.

I suspect the reality falls *far* below the expectation.

John Smith 19 Gold badge

Silly boy

It's a *troma* film

That's like placing a running chain saw against your leg and suddenly wondering why you're falling over.

You just did it anyway.

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Happy

To be fair

Maybe the graphic novel on which Mystery Men is based is better.

I'll admit their are some neat *bits* but the don't happen nearly often enough. Eddie Izzard's dedication to the idea that "Disco is not dead" has a certain charm and I'd like to have seen more of some of Casanova Frankenstein's partners in crime.

For low rent super heroes trying to sort themselves out I'd go with "The Return of Captain Invincible."

Alan Arkin is Hancock 3 decades before Will Smith. Christopher Lee has a musical number (I'm *fairly* sure it's his only song in 9 decades). What's not to love?

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Re: One word...

A film whose title is a fancy word for depression directed by a director with a reputation for directing depressing films who I think has been diagnosed with depression (well he's Scandinavian and they tend to run to the depressed viewpoint. The glass is *always* half empty).

Was there much doubt this was only going to end one way?

Melancholic.

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Happy

A few suggested rating rules...

Guns +1

Hotties +1

Hotties with guns +3

Obviously stupid physics -2

Clever plot +2

Unsentimental ending +1

Adaptation of a book by the author and/or there 1st time doing so -3

More than 3 writers for the movie.

Members of cast on my s**t list -1 for each member

Members of cast on my good list +1 for each.

Points 1 2 and 3 rescue GI Joe, all the Underworld series, Van Helsing and Doomsday and are essentially the plot of Suck Punch (Who didn't see Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction and think "I wonder what Fox Force Five would have been like?) while 4 stuffs Wanted. 5&6 kept me watching Eden Lake, Hard Candy (while parts of me tried to retract back inside myself) and Lucky Number Sleven. I'd say 7 is what made Stormbreaker such a miss able experiences. JK Rowling keep well away from the script for any Harry Potter movie and I think they all benefited from that.

Authors. Know your place. Learning to write screenplays by writing the first of what you *hope* will be a franchise with 10s (100s?) of $m at stake is *not* a good idea. Really.

The last 2 are very individual. Some performer *always* manage to choose good pieces to do. Others it's more of a mixed bag. Others just seem to guarantee fail. For every Anger Management you get a Don't Mess with the Zohan and a Big Daddy, with a bonus portion of Jack & Jill, for example. Not pretty.

I'm partial to Janeane Garofalo and chortled through Romy & Michelles High School Reunion, The Truth About Cats & Dogs and Copland. And Ben Stiller but *boy* did Mystery Men hurt. Almost *nothing* will make me abandon a film I've put down cash to view but I came close that day.

See how this helps you plan your viewing and happy viewing.

Atmospheric CO2 set to soar - OECD

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Remember the *second* fastest growing plant species

is the hemp plant. And being a weed it's *not* fussy about where or how its grow and expertise in its cultivation is widespread (allegedly).

It can be used to make the core ingredient of something that sounds *almost* impossible (if you know something of how the regular stuff is made)

Hempcrete.

It is *better* than carbon neutral, its carbon negative as a building material.

Imagine all those people displaced by rising water re-housed in new, clean, fireproof hempcrete houses.

Grow the weed, save the planet.

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There's never been a better time

To start developing satellite solar power stations.

Come on folks the future does not have to be a live action version of Soylent Green.

John Smith 19 Gold badge

Re: Several votes for Thorium

"I thought that the original research into thorium reactors in the US was killed because the reactors weren't going to produce anything that could be used to build nuclear weapons. Not saying you're wrong, just that was the impression I had..."

Molten salt reactors were originally developed for the Nuclear Powered Bomber programme.

Their *original* key benefit (along with being pretty compact) was that you could arrange the major Neutron absorber (Xe 135 IIRC) to collect in 1 place and tap it off like bleeding a radiator.

Proponents have (IIRC) stated one of the other fission products is a hard Gamma ray emitter (U240?) making it *very* difficult to built a bomb that won't drench its builders and its surroundings in radiation. In principal anything like a critical mass would be undergoing quite high level fission

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Re: Preconceived agendas, etc.

Good thing that it's not Ammonia that the article is about then, eh? D'uh!

You're either pretty ignorant or naturally combative. I'm kind of leaning towards the latter.

New NASA snap of game developer's electric cart FOUND ON MOON

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but the Mars rovers are *tiny*

Does that not *partly* explain why they've taken 8 years to go 34 Km?

MYSTERY programming language found in Duqu

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Keep in mind the *processor* is Intel, *whatever* the language turns out to be.

It's generating code for an Intel instruction set.

Clock ticking on NASA’s low-cost X-ray stargazer

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Don't worry

There is *no* way to stuff Sam Neil in a fairing the size of a Pegasus XL. It's a *lot* smaller than it appears.

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A 10m truss for a $165m

Is pretty impressive.

This really is *tiny* by NASA probe standards.

Of course it's still got to *get* to space first.

Report: UK falls behind as smart meters rolled out across Europe

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Meh

Interesting reactions.

My simple gut reaction. 11 Up, 1 down.

My more thought out comments. 1 down.

Britards if you want to stop this happening you have to lobby your MP's. Force the security test issue. US meters have been shown to be *wide* open. I mean *no* encryption. Ask them why did a govt department push *so* hard for remote disconnect capability, and more importantly how secure is that. And what is the *actual* bulk price of these meters? Because in the end *you* will be paying for them through your bill.

Ask them why (if they did) support a policy that bankrolls *hundreds* of generators IE Turbines that *might* work as little as 6% of the time? If their track record is *so* patchy what are you (Mr MP) getting energy companies to do about it?

Tell them there *are* alternatives on your island. Scotland had invested in wave and tidal for example. Anaerobic digestion, nuclear, micro hydro, geothermal *can* run 24/7/365.

"Alternative", "Carbon neutral" and "low carbon" do not have to be synonyms for "low efficiency" , "unreliable" and "expensive"

I am not a utopian fantasist but I refuse to believe the world has to be like the *most* depressing elements of several 1970's end of the world TV series rolled into one.

After all if everything else fails we can always put a few politicians on the fire. It would be "carbon neutral"......

John Smith 19 Gold badge
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*Realistically* this is the flipside of the dash for wind + no nukes

With 20-25% of the UK electricity grid nuclear powered and near its end of life (c13-15GW) and the hell for leather run at ramping up wind generation to cut UK carbon emissions from *all* energy usage by 1/3 coupled with a govt department that seems to be *incapable* of dealing with more than one "unconventional" energy source at a time it's not looking good.

BTW Tony Blair's office stated that was *not* a misunderstanding and he did not mean to say "electricity". He wanted a *challenging* target to aim for. And of course the fact he'd be long gone when the s**t hit the fan on what looked to be Gordon Browns watch was just a fringe benefit. Any El Reg readers who have a chance to thank TB for this "generous" gift to the British people might like to do so.

So if your chances of making up the shortfall in time are slim to nothing you're going to have manage *consumption* rather than production. Hence the DECC's interest in remote disconnection (the companies would far rather change your band as they do with card meters, where poor people pay roughly 2x as much for the same unit of electricity).

As for "energy displays" helping users manage their use that was in the trials but is not *mandatory* and how difficult would it be to do that yourself?

Could the UK do better? Definitely. Could it meet *all* that shortfall in time? Who knows. We know there are *lots* of options that are more *reliable* than wind (even PV runs *every* day, but what's it's real *average* power output compared to the number on the rating plate?)

I'll suggest one high tech bone. It's been talked about for *decades* but I've not heard anyone actually do it. It's simply a really *big* superconducting solenoid that acts as a massive (but compact) energy store. Sitting on a fixed site it could be as heavy as necessary to get the job done. Simple geometry, fairly available materials but very big.

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UK Falls behind Europe in smart meter roll out.

Good.

Moore's Law savior EUV faces uncertain future

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Meh

so EUV == X-Ray Projection Lithography. The designation given the wavelength looked odd.

And now I know why. I guess changing the name did not make the technology *any* easier to make work.

I recall Electronics Design articles talking about laser driven metal plasma soft x-ray sources in the 80's. People were saying the load/lock procedures to retain the UHV were a drag on cycle time and the resists exposure times were either *very* long or you needed to put multiple levels on.

I doubt *anyone* thought they would still be *trying* to get it to work about 30 years later.

Anyone still trying with storage rings?

'When you disagreed with Steve Jobs, you lost'

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Flame

"anything left over"

Simple solution.

Farm out the "production & distribution" to A.N>Other company which you just happened to have set up to find "The most cost effective specialists in distribution & production"

Figure out how much you want to trouser.

Ensure they invoice the "charity" for the right amount.

Oppps. "Nothing left over. Very sorry. Costs of the publishing game. Couldn't be helped etc."

Startup slices solar panels using ion gun

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"Kerf loss" is one of the semiconductor industries little secrets.

Spend *shed-loads* of cash on hardware, chemicals and energy to make a raw material with PPB impurity levels.

Throw away 1/3 of it in processing.

BTW while much like the Soitec process SOI is viewed as a *premium* price wafer, whereas these have to be base price (is there a "PV" grade price?) or cheaper with low scrap and low cost. That makes this engineering *tricky*.

Note that by starting with monocrystal PV cell material they get to *leverage* any current or future Silicon work, which is still the bulk semiconductor by a *very* wide margin.

However for *really* big, low cost you'd need to skip *any* conventional slicing.

I picture a system under permanent high vacuum with something like a revolver cylinder inside it. The number of boules corresponding to the number of steps in the slicing process.

boules in -> slices out. No waste.

With modern boules being 300mm in diameter (going to 320mm soon) and 10m long it would be a beast of a machine to make but you would get back most of the kerf loss.

Of course this *all* depends on them working out how to *handle* these thin "floppy" wafers to process them into cells.

Thumbs up on trying to make a niche, high precision process into a bulk mass produced one. I hope they success

'Seas will rise, flood millions of homes' warns Eric Schmidt ecologist

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@ Dan paul

Now that's a proper troll.

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Stop

Note that modern infrastructure makes the developed world *very* vulnerable.

Building a waterproof building is not *that* difficult. It turns out that short concrete posts with slotted concrete panels are quite able to keep water out.

But once the water gets to electricity & *sewerage* systems you've got real trouble.

In short it's a *systems* issue. But if people *want* to keep living at less than 1m above sea level then it's got to be *planned* for. For the extreme cases I quite like the idea of the "floating" house. If services are not disrupted it's simply BAU.

BTW 2 points about NO & Christina. Firstly the levees were described as being built to handle a cat 3 storm, not a cat 5. The old cost/benefit argument. Secondly IIRC the *old* parts of NO recovered fairly quickly. It seems those 18th and 19th century founders built their stuff on the *highest* bits of land, hence the fastest draining.

Having looked at the Nature article this *might* not be a plan of creepy Eric's to bag some decent beachfront property at a knockdown price.

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Re: You quote Grist

A *very* interesting article that actually puts some *numbers* on expectations and seems to be fairly restrained on the limits to accuracy.

I note their comment that its the *local* climate around a glacier that decides weather it's going to melt or not and the IPPC first principles models were not taking some factors into account.

I wonder what could be done to reduce ice melting? I keep thinking of ping pong balls being dropped to float on any open water and reflect sunlight so at night there is more of a chance it will re-freeze.

Many thanks.

Boffins build cyborg snails to generate electricity

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Well sugar is found in lots of plants as well.

And should be extractable *without* conversion to Meth or Ethanol.

May be the start of something big..

Silicon nanowires: The Next Big Thing™ in chip design

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Meh

We've come a *long* way from the self-aligned gate.

<sigh>

As for lattice and edge effects keep in mind that crystal lattice spacings used to be measured in Angstroms or 0.1 nm. So you're looking at a chunk of crystal about 50 atoms wide, which *should* be enough for it to viewed as a *very* small piece of a large crystal, rather than a small group of atoms.

Of course as the thing you need to make gets smaller it might just be simpler to build it *up* 1 atom at a time....

CSIRO: warming up to five degrees by 2070

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Meh

Re: burb

"Perhaps you should read the 2005 paper by J N Carter from Imperial College London."

I have.

it makes some interesting points about curve fitting to historical data to derive a set of model parameters.

While this is a *reasonable* strategy AFAIK most (if not all) climate models actually *simulate* from first principles. How *well* they simulate, in terms of what physics is covered and frankly what is covered by some kind of fudge factor, is another matter.

I'd totally agree GCM's are unreliable and seem to still have a lot of fudge factors rather than proper physics derived elements.

But using Carter does not really cover the same *type* of model.

NASA orders study for all astronauts over vision concerns

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Meh

there *was* a plan to put a kind of cetrifuge on the ISS

But was not viewed as *that* important at the time.

This is a nice little demonstration (once again) that it's not the *known* unknowns that may7 kill you (galactic cosmic rays? Massive coronal mass ejection while en route to Mars) but possibly that the 'nauts might end up too blind to land.

That said a comparison study with some of the Russian and Former Soviet Union 'nauts should be *very* interesting.

108 days? How about Valeri Polyakov at 437 days? He should need a guide dog but does he?

Boffins boost fuel-cell future with 'nanowire forest'

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Re: The "tipping point" will be when New Orleans & Miami are *permanently* under water

"Bet you'll be wishing we had more nuke power stations then!"

You do know that I'm in favor of increasing the use of nuclear power, right?

Greenland melt threshold lower than thought

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Unhappy

I seem to have acquired a down voting tick.

It seems no subject I've posted on has proved too obscure for them to down vote.

Rather than look through every post I've made and down voting perhaps they could just choose one and *reply* to it. They might have a point and I might agree with it.

Given the AC option exists you'd have to be pretty cowardly to not engage at *all*.

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Sorry folks but narrowing the error bands works *both* ways.

So thumbs up for tightening up the models and reducing the uncertainty.

Proper science is about getting to the *truth*, even when the results make life more difficult.

I'll note that Greenland is still 1/20 of the Earths fresh water or about 3.25m if it all goes.

Another reason to keep the champagne for the "We dodged the AGW bullet" party on ice for the time being.

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Boffin

Re: 2,000 years

"If we are still around by that time it really won't matter."

This may come as a surprise but (collectively) the human race *has* been around that long already.

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Trollface

Re: Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

"I've been studying the works of a German social engineer from the mid Twentieth Century - a forward thinking, yet deeply misunderstood vegetarian - who asserted that humankind should isolate genetic markers favourable to its survival and carry only those forward."

And I think you are pulling the leg of some people who have suffered a humor bypass.

But on a more serious note that would certainly be a "hard green" agenda.

Nanocapacitor slab to boost car batteries

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Meh

Capicitors. It's not about energy stored, it's about *rate* of release

That's the *tough* part.

John Smith 19 Gold badge
Boffin

Automotive electronics companies provide *special* kit for stop/start options.

Revised EMU, beefed up starter/alternator, deeper discharging battery. It's a bit more than a switch wired to the clutch and a motion detector.

I believe catalytic converter heaters are SOP on high end cars these days to *avoid* the poisoning and poor efficiency that comes from running them cold, something more common in Europe, where certain pollution control options were outlawed in favor of the cat.

UK.gov claims it's giving doubled cash to SMEs ... now 13%

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Re: Banks

"After a conversation lasting 25 minutes my business bank manager at Lloyds asked me...'so what kind of business are you in then?'"

Oh yes. The myth that you're loyalty will *somehow* be rewarded.

That will only change when banks *fear* customers leaving them.

Speedy 3D printer creates 285µm Formula-1 speedster

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astonishing speed x astonishing resolution

The combination is what makes it astonishing.

The 2 photon absorption chemistry is quit interesting as a way of improving resolution.

The challenges of hot rocks and big data

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4Km is *deep;*

A lot of this sort of stuff has been done around the 3000 ft mark in Texas for tapping heat from played out oil wells.

It's strange that they are not initially focusing on the areas around the big cities.

does the extraction efficiency vary *so* much that the transport losses from 2000 km are outweighed by the increased energy recovery?

Possible I suppose but hard to believe.

A very impressive feat of both IT and engineering if they pull it off.