Anthropology News, Science News

Australia has adopted a similar environmental approach to Britain offering free insulation to home owners and tenants giving them chance to make a difference to the environment. The Australian Government insulation grant provides Australian people with free loft & ceiling insulation.

In the United Kingdom the government previously offered loft insulation & Cavity wall insulation as part of our environmental initiative. The cavity wall insulation was introduced to houses that were built in the 1920’s, as they were made with the external walls having two layers with a tiny gap ‘cavity’ between them.

The benefits of having this installed in your home were to save energy, which in theory helped reduce the amount of carbon monoxide emissions from the home and in turn keeping the warmth within the home where it is needed most. Carbon monoxide being one of the biggest causes to climate change in the world.

While offering this to the older homes in the country they also provided the free loft insulation grant. This would further reduce the amount of carbon monoxide emissions and would help reduce home owner’s yearly bills. This is the idea that Australia have taken on board.

With the Australian government adopting this program and offering free insulation to the Australian residents, it will help reduce the amount of green house gases that escape our homes. The Australian government are offering a $1200 government insulation rebate for free loft & ceiling insulation to those that are eligible.

Companies like Bradford insulation offer Australians various types of insulation including rock wool, fibre glass batts, eco wool and even a hybrid fibreglass foil insulation.

In the United Kingdom they were insulating the homes to keep the heat in. In Australia the government are providing the insulation grant to achieve the opposite and keep homes cool in the summer and warmer in the winter. With this the residents are saving money on there yearly home gas & electric bills.

It is great to see that the Australian government has adopted the insulation grant as a result they are helping the economy by creating more jobs and reducing carbon monoxide emissions. But after this grant was announced the Australian government did mention an increase in energy bills of up to 40%. If only more countries would adopt this process we would be getting closer to making more of a difference.

First study to look at effect of greenness on inner city children's weight over time

San Diego, October 28, 2008 – Childhood obesity can lead to type 2 diabetes, asthma, hypertension, sleep apnea and emotional distress. Obese children and youth are likely to be obese as adults, experience more cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure and stroke and incur higher healthcare costs. In an article published in the December 2008 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers report that children living in inner city neighborhoods with higher "greenness" experienced lower weight gains compared to those in areas with less green space.

Researchers from the University of Washington, Indiana University-Purdue University and Indiana University School of Medicine followed more than 3800 children, predominantly African-American and poor, aged 3-16 over a two-year period. Using satellite imaging data to measure vegetation coverage, the investigators found that higher greenness was significantly associated with lower body mass index (BMI) changes in those children. In previous studies of adults, residential density tended to predict physical activity levels, with highly urban environments leading to more walking, less driving and lower BMI. The current study did not find this correlation for children.

Children and youth in urban environments may be active in a wider variety of open spaces (e.g., yards, parks, vacant lots) and less likely to constrain activity to streets and sidewalks. Greenness might indicate proximity to parks, playfields or other open spaces that promote either physical activity or increased time spent outdoors in active play.

Writing in the article, Janice F. Bell, PhD, MPH, Assistant Professor in the department of Health Services at the School of Public Health and Community Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, and co-investigators state, "This study's findings align with previous research linking exposure to green landscapes with health improvements. Among adults, greenness is associated with less stress and lower BMI, improved self-reported health and shorter post-operative recovery periods. Among children and youth, the positive health effects of green landscapes include improved cognitive functioning and reduced attention deficit hyperactivity disorder symptoms. Ideally, future research in this area will be multidisciplinary – involving city planners, architects, geographers, psychologists and public health researchers – and will consider the ways children live and play in urban environments."

In a commentary published in the same issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, Nick Wareham, MBBS, PhD, of the Institute of Metabolic Science, Cambridge, England, writes, "Previous research on factors associated with physical activity in children has used mostly cross-sectional designs and few prospective studies have been published. In addition, studies have focused mostly on individual biological or psychological factors, with little emphasis, until recently, on collective determinants such as the physical environment. By focusing on environmental determinants in a longitudinal study in children, the study by Bell et al makes an important contribution to the existing literature."

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-10/ehs-gnm102608.php

Scientists say they have found a workable way of reducing CO2 levels
in the atmosphere by adding lime to seawater. And they think it has the
potential to dramatically reverse CO2 accumulation in the atmosphere,
reports Cath O’Driscoll in SCI’s Chemistry & Industry magazine
published today.

Shell is so impressed with the new approach that it is funding an
investigation into its economic feasibility. ‘We think it’s a promising
idea,’ says Shell’s Gilles Bertherin, a coordinator on the project.
‘There are potentially huge environmental benefits from addressing
climate change – and adding calcium hydroxide to seawater will also
mitigate the effects of ocean acidification, so it should have a
positive impact on the marine environment.’

Adding lime to seawater increases alkalinity, boosting seawater’s
ability to absorb CO2 from air and reducing the tendency to release it
back again.

However, the idea, which has been bandied about for years, was
thought unworkable because of the expense of obtaining lime from
limestone and the amount of CO2 released in the process.

Tim Kruger, a management consultant at London firm Corven is the
brains behind the plan to resurrect the lime process. He argues that it
could be made workable by locating it in regions that have a
combination of low-cost ‘stranded’ energy considered too remote to be
economically viable to exploit – like flared natural gas or solar
energy in deserts – and that are rich in limestone, making it feasible
for calcination to take place on site.

Kruger says: ‘There are many such places – for example, Australia’s
Nullarbor Plain would be a prime location for this process, as it has
10 000km3 of limestone and soaks up roughly 20MJ/m2 of solar
irradiation every day.’

The process of making lime generates CO2, but adding the lime to
seawater absorbs almost twice as much CO2. The overall process is
therefore ‘carbon negative’.

‘This process has the potential to reverse the accumulation of CO2
in the atmosphere. It would be possible to reduce CO2 to pre-industrial
levels,’ Kruger says.

And Professor Klaus Lackner, a researcher in the field from Columbia
University, says: ‘The theoretical CO2 balance is roughly right…it is
certainly worth thinking through carefully.’

The oceans are already the world’s largest carbon sink, absorbing
2bn tonnes of carbon every year. Increasing absorption ability by just
a few percent could dramatically increase CO2 uptake from the
atmosphere.

This project is being developed in an open source manner. To find
out more, please go to www.cquestrate.com, a new website, launched
today.

The May 12 earthquake that rocked Sichuan Province in China was the
first there in recorded history and unexpected in its magnitude. Now a
team of geoscientists is looking at the potential for future
earthquakes due to earthquake-induced changes in stress.

Around the world, earthquakes like the one in China are
associated with triggered aftershocks that are very large. In 1999, a
7.1 earthquake in Duzce, Turkey, followed a 7.4 magnitude earthquake in
Izmit, Turkey. In 2004, an 8.7 magnitude earthquake struck three months
after the Sumatra Andaman earthquake of magnitude 9.2. While analysis
of the Turkish earthquakes was not timely enough to shed light on the
second earthquake there, the researchers believe that information on
the Sumatra Andaman earthquake did illuminate the situation.

For the May 12 earthquake, the researchers performed analysis
of co-seismic stress transfer onto Sichuan basin faults using broad
ranges because at this time, exact values for all the various factors
are unknown. The researchers report in today’s (July 6) advanced online
edition of Nature that "this approach enables rapid mapping of faults with heightened rupture likelihood."

"We
knew that the fault was there and we knew it was active," says Eric
Kirby, associate professor of geosciences at Penn State. "I had done
some previous work in the area, but I do not think anyone would have
anticipated the size of this earthquake."

The May earthquake in Sichuan Provence was 7.9 in magnitude
and collapsed buildings, destroyed villages and killed thousands of
people. The earthquake occurred in the area where the Sichuan basin and
the Longmen Mountains meet. This is on the eastern edge of the Tibetan
Plateau in an area deformed by the collision of the Indian and Asian
tectonic plates. The area is crisscrossed with fault lines.

The researchers, who include Tom Parsons, research
geophysicist, U.S. Geological Survey, Chen Ji, assistant professor of
Earth sciences, University of California-Santa Barbara, and Kirby, used
a model to see how the Sichuan earthquake, which took place on the
Beichuan fault, affected other portions of that fault and others in the
area. They looked at physical characteristics of the faults including
the directions and amounts of movement of the faults – whether and how
much they moved up and down and side to side, and the estimates of the
frictional resistance to motion along the fault.

"The Sichuan earthquake seemed to rupture on the northern
portion of the Beichuan fault," says Kirby. "It does not seem to have
involved the southwestern branch."

According to the model, after the May 12 earthquake, stress
increased on faults running parallel to the Wenchuan-Maowen fault and
the two major faults that are perpendicular and to the north of the
fault. Some smaller faults south of the earthquake zone show a decrease
in stress. However, according to the model, the majority of the faults
in the area are still stressed.

"The occurrence of triggered earthquakes after a major
earthquake can be months, years or decades," says Kirby. "Sumatra seems
to be a really nice example. Also, the historic record in Turkey shows
a series of earthquakes that progress from east to west over 60 years."

The data used in the model consists of ranges rather than
actual measurements because of the difficulty of obtaining information
from that area of China at the moment. The models always use a range of
friction because the movement of the faults changes the friction
sometimes in unknown or unexpected ways.

"The model takes what we think we know about the faults in the
region and asks what was the change to stress associated with the
earthquake," says Kirby. "The model shows where an increase in the
potential for failure may occur, but we do not know the trigger point
for these faults. The analysis does not say there is going to be an
earthquake, just that the potential exists on some of the faults."

Evidence of Violent Eruptions on Gakkel Ridge in the Arctic Defies Assumptions about Seafloor Pressure and Volcanism

A research team led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI)
has uncovered evidence of
explosive volcanic eruptions deep beneath the
ice-covered surface of the Arctic Ocean. Such violent eruptions of
splintered, fragmented rock—known as pyroclastic deposits—were not
thought possible at great ocean depths because of the intense weight
and pressure of water and because of the composition of seafloor magma
and rock.

Researchers found jagged, glassy rock fragments spread out over a 10
square kilometer (4 square mile) area around a series of small volcanic
craters about 4,000 meters (2.5 miles) below the sea surface. The
volcanoes lie along the Gakkel Ridge, a remote and mostly unexplored
section of the mid-ocean ridge system that runs through the Arctic
Ocean.

“These are the first pyroclastic deposits we’ve ever
found in such deep water, at oppressive pressures that inhibit the
formation of steam, and many people thought this was not possible,”
said WHOI geophysicist Rob Reves-Sohn, lead author and chief scientist
for the Arctic Gakkel Vents Expedition (AGAVE) of July 2007. “This
means that a tremendous blast of CO2 was released into the water column
during the explosive eruption.”

The paper, which was co-authored by 22 investigators from nine
institutions in four countries, was published in the June 26 issue of
the journal Nature.

Seafloor volcanoes usually emit lobes and
sheets of lava during an eruption, rather than explosive plumes of gas,
steam, and rock that are ejected from land-based volcanoes. Because of
the hydrostatic pressure of seawater, ocean eruptions are more likely
to resemble those of Kilauea than Mount Saint Helens or Mount Pinatubo.

Making
just the third expedition ever launched to the Gakkel Ridge—and the
first to visually examine the seafloor–researchers used a combination
of survey instruments, cameras, and a seafloor sampling platform to
collect samples of rock and sediment, as well as dozens of hours of
high-definition video. They saw rough shards and bits of basalt
blanketing the seafloor and spread out in all directions from the
volcanic craters they discovered and named Loke, Oden, and Thor.

They
also found deposits on top of relatively new lavas and high-standing
features—such as Duque’s Hill and Jessica’s Hill–indications that the
rock debris had fallen or precipitated out of the water, rather than
being moved as part of a lava flow that erupted from the volcanoes.

Closer
analysis has shown that the some of the tiny fragments are angular bits
of quenched glass known to volcanologists as limu o Pele, or “Pele’s
seaweed.” These fragments are formed when lava is stretched thin around
expanding gas bubbles during an explosion. Reves-Sohn and colleagues
also found larger blocks of rock—known as talus—that could have been
ejected by explosive blasts from the seafloor.

Much of Earth’s
surface is made up of oceanic crust formed by volcanism along seafloor
mid-ocean ridges. These volcanic processes are tied to the rising of
magma from Earth’s mantle and the spreading of Earth’s tectonic plates.
Submerged under several kilometers of cold water, the volcanism of
mid-ocean ridges tends to be relatively subdued compared to land-based
eruptions.

To date, there have been scattered signs of
pyroclastic volcanism in the sea, mostly in shallower water depths.
Samples of sediment and rock collected on other expeditions have hinted
at the possibilities at depths down to 3,000 meters, but the likelihood
of explosive eruptions at greater depths seemed slim.

One
reason is the tremendous pressure exerted by the weight of seawater,
known as hydrostatic pressure. More importantly, it is very difficult
to build up the amount of steam and carbon dioxide gas in the magma
that would be required to explode a mass of rock up into the water
column. (Far less energy is needed to do so in air.) In fact, the
buildup of CO2 in magma in the sea crust would have to be ten times
higher than anyone has ever observed in seafloor samples.

The
findings from the Gakkel Ridge expedition appear to show that deep-sea
pyroclastic eruptions can and do happen. “The circulation and plumbing
of the Gakkel Ridge might be different,” said Reves-Sohn. “There must
be a lot more volatiles in the system than we thought.” The research
team hypothesizes that excess gas may be building up like foam or froth
near the ceiling of the magma chambers beneath the crust, waiting to
pop like champagne beneath a cork.

“Are pyroclastic eruptions
more common than we thought, or is there something special about the
conditions along the Gakkel Ridge?” said Reves-Sohn. “That is our next
question.”

Support for the Arctic Gakkel Vents Expedition and
for vehicle development was provided by the National Science
Foundation’s Office of Polar Programs; the NSF Division of Ocean
Sciences; the Gordon Center for Subsurface Sensing and Imaging Systems,
an NSF Engineering Research Center; the NASA Astrobiology Program; and
the WHOI Deep Ocean Exploration Institute.

The Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution is a private, independent organization in
Falmouth, Mass., dedicated to marine research, engineering, and higher
education. Established in 1930 on a recommendation from the National
Academy of Sciences, its primary mission is to understand the oceans
and their interaction with the Earth as a whole, and to communicate a
basic understanding of the oceans’ role in the changing global
environment.

Pictures of volcanoe eruptions

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