Daily Archives: April 22, 2011

Solar Energy is On

April 22, 2011   Jacob Blanchard   1 Comment

Solar energy, once widely criticized as expensive and inefficient, is catching on with cities across the country thanks to innovative programs and the growing appeal of alternative energy.

Solar Mosaic, the city of Oakland’s “crowdfunding” program, sells solar tiles to residents for $100 each. The city hopes that the program will create a solar array on the roofs of budget-strapped schools, youth centers and churches. These arrays will allow Oakland’s residents to generate energy savings and scale back fossil fuel emissions without having to spend thousands on personal solar arrays.

“There is this huge gap between the population that wants to go solar and the people that actually have,” Billy Parish, president of Solar Mosaic, told SolveClimate News. “We saw an opportunity to connect those dots.”

The project is expected to attract green-collar workers to the city, which struggles from having some of California’s highest crime rates and 17.5% of its population living below the poverty line.

On the other side of the country, Mayor Bloomberg of New York City plans to put the city’s sealed landfills to good use. On Thursday, he announced that he will build solar plants over sealed landfills that could generate power for over 50,000 homes. The construction of solar plants is only part of the city’s PlaNYC project, which includes providing low-cost financing to business owners who conserve energy, planting trees and rooftop gardens and using hybrid vehicles.

“PlaNYC is our agenda for a greener, greater New York that will help guide our city to a better future,” Mayor Bloomberg told the New York Daily News.

Solar energy’s lack of emissions and relative convenience makes it appealing to many cities hoping to save energy, reduce air pollution and attract jobs.

 

This article contains information from Reuters and New York Daily News.
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Is Ethanol the Answer?

April 22, 2011   Jacob Blanchard   No comments

As gas prices climb towards record highs, the controversial corn-based biofuel ethanol is back in the limelight. Advocates have pushed ethanol as a viable alternative to oil-based gasoline since the 70s, and their efforts seem to be paying off. The federal government funds gas stations that offer E85, a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline. The Obama administration hopes to triple the amount of ethanol used in the next decade, from 12.9 billion gallons produced today to 36 billion gallons in 2022.

Still, many are critical of ethanol’s viability as a replacement for gasoline. Ethanol raises problems with everything from day-to-day driving to wide ecological concerns.

Drivers have complained that ethanol, a potent alcohol, damages fuel pumps. John O’Dell, a writer for the auto website Edmunds.com, says that many users need assurance that ethanol is engine-friendly.

O’Dell explains that “alcohol is corrosive to a number of things, including metal and rubber parts. So vehicles have to have fuel systems designed to be hardy enough to handle ethanol, and most everything on the road today is OK to take the current blends.”

Engine safety aside, ethanol critics are also troubled by its inefficiency. In a 2005 study, UC Berkeley scientist Tad Patzek found that up to six times more energy is used to make ethanol than the finished fuel actually contains. The fossil fuel used to farm, ferment, distill and distribute the ethanol almost always outweighs ethanol’s consumable energy.

“Taking grain apart, fermenting it, distilling it and extruding it uses a lot of fossil energy,” Patzek said. “We are grasping at the solution that is by far the least efficient.”

The mass production of ethanol also has ecological consequences. The industrial farming of corn in the United States requires a large amount of nitrogen fertilizer. The introduction of the fertilizer into rivers, lakes and oceans spurs rampant algae growth. These algae blooms result in oxygen-starved “dead zones” that destroy ecosystems. And while ethanol produces less carbon dioxide emissions than fossil fuels, it does release nitrogen oxide, an ingredient in smog.

Hosein Shapouri, an economist for U.S. Department of Agriculture, says that Patzek “doesn’t consider the impact new, more efficient production technologies have had on the ethanol industry.”

Shapouri’s study, published by the USDA in 2004, showed opposite results. He believes that, with today’s innovative energy sources for processing and refinement, ethanol has a positive energy balance, producing 67% more energy than it takes to produce it.

But Cornell University ecology Professor David Pimentel notes that Shapouri’s study does not take into account the energy it takes to irrigate fields and operate farm machinery. The study also failed to address massive-scale farming’s environmental problems.

Scientists like Patzek and Pimentel believe that lawmakers should turn away from ethanol and focus their efforts on improving fuel cells, hybrid electric cars and harnessing solar energy for transport.

 

This article contains content from cnn.com and sfgate.com.
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Amount of sunlight may play a role in postpartum depression

April 22, 2011   Anthony Stuart   2 Comments

Postpartum depression has been researched to try and find links to why this depression occurs.  The depression occurs after a mother has given birth and may not start right after the baby is born.  Some women face postpartum depression up to a year after they give birth.  Researchers have found a link to show the amount of sunlight effects the chance of postpartum depression.

In the fall and winter months there is not as much sunlight as in the spring and summer.  The amount of sunlight allows certain chemicals to go to the brain and may be related to depression.  A study was done in Sweden because there is a larger difference in the amount of sunlight between seasons.  This allows researchers to be more accurate in their findings, and they can use this information to test in other parts of the world.

The study was done on 2,000 women where they would take a questionnaires at 5 days, 6 weeks, and 6 months after giving birth.  Results showed that women who gave birth in the winter months were twice as likely to have postpartum depression.  The link between sunlight and postpartum depression is not 100% proved however this is some valuable information to future researchers and should not be ignored.

Using this information mothers and physicians should be aware of the findings and be more aware of the risk in the winter months.  More patient care and observation should be done for mothers giving birth in these months.  Women who want to become pregnant may want to plan their child’s birth in the spring or summer months to avoid depression.  Future research around the world will be done on this topic to see if their is definitely a link between sunlight and postpartum depression.

Source: American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology

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