What happens at the Colorado River conference in Las Vegas stays at the Colorado River conference in Las Vegas — because nothing really happened. A multistate effort to lock in long-term plans for conserving vital shared water from the struggling Colorado River remains stalled as a report by the reported by the Los Angeles Times notes: […]
Via Fox13, a report on a potential idea that would see Colorado River water swapped for desalination plant funding: An unusual idea floated by the president of the Utah State Senate to get more shares of Colorado River water is intriguing California water officials. In an interview with FOX 13 News in May, Senate President […]
Via the Las Vegas Review Journal, a report on the negotiations aiming to stabilize the Colorado River: Two bitterly divided coalitions of Colorado River states took shots at one another Thursday at a Las Vegas conference, indicating that a unified front on how to update expiring operating guidelines is not in the basin’s near future. […]
Via Bloomberg, a report on Saudi Arabia’s plans to build an AI powerhouse: Entity would build on kingdom’s efforts to emerge as AI hub PIF, Google AI partnership may serve as model for project Saudi Arabia is planning a new artificial intelligence project with backing of as much as $100 billion as it seeks to […]
Via the Wall Street Journal a look at Russia’s plans to merge its oil giants into a mega producer which would be the world’s second-biggest crude producer, after Saudi Arabia’s Aramco, pumping almost three times the output of Exxon Mobil: Moscow is working on a plan to merge its biggest oil companies into a single […]
Kazakhstan once harbored grand plans for a high-speed rail network. The Diplomat examines why – while its neighbors have pushed ahead with such projects – HSR fallen out of favor in Astana: High-speed train travel can be a challenging prospect for any nation. To achieve speeds of 250 kilometers per hour, high-speed rail (HSR) requires […]
Via Carbon Copy, a look at how pricing energy for groundwater extraction could promote more efficient use of both water and energy, arrest groundwater depletion, and make irrigation more sustainable: As Azerbaijan hosts the Conference of the Parties (COP29), it is worth noting that this water-scarce nation heavily depends on water inflow from upstream countries […]
Via Yale e360, a look at how an unprecedented drought has lowered reservoirs in hydropower-dependent Zambia, leading to economically crippling blackouts and spurring a push for solar. With multiple utility-scale arrays now in the works, the nation is betting on solar to increase its power capacity by a third. “When the lights are off, people […]
Via Eco News, a look at Switzerland’s use of floating solar: Countries around the world are striving to establish a strong foothold in the energy sector. This goal could be achieved through a diverse portfolio of projects focused on generating energy from renewable sources like solar and wind. In this context, Switzerland has sparked global […]
Via Volts, an interesting interview examining how residential solar is becoming residential solar + storage + VPP: Hello everyone, this is Volts for November 13, 2024. “Residential solar is becoming residential solar + storage + VPP.” I’m your host, David Roberts. Last month, I was in Brooklyn for the third annual DERvos conference celebrating distributed […]
Via MIT Technology Review, an article on efforts to connect the U.S.’s grids: Michael Skelly hasn’t learned to take no for an answer. For much of the last 15 years, the Houston-based energy entrepreneur has worked to develop long-haul transmission lines to carry wind power across the Great Plains, Midwest, and Southwest, delivering clean electricity […]
Via High Country News, a look at how engineering for flood resilience can address storms heightened by climate change. The living roof of the H2 Hotel in Healdsburg, California, both cools the building and mitigates rainwater runoff.John D. Ivanko/Alamy Stock Photo In early February, meteorologists warned Southern Californians that a supercharged storm was headed their way, […]
Via The Diplomat, a look at how Uzbek farmers are paying a heavy price in the name of privatization: A new report on land grabbing and urban forced evictions, published by a network of independent Uzbek civil rights activists in collaboration with the University of Ulster and Uzbek Forum for Human Rights, exposes the vulnerability of farmers […]
Via GRAIN, a report on the impact that the AfCFTA may have on land grabbing in Africa: In late 2023, a group of experts and government leaders met in Addis Ababa to discuss land policy in Africa in light of the African Continental Free Trade (AfCFTA) agreement.[1] This agreement – from which State Parties expect nothing […]
Via Global Voices, a look at China’s investment in Tajik agriculture: Even though Tajikistan is considered an agricultural country, only six percent of its territory is arable land, the rest is mountainous. Despite this, agriculture provides 20 percent of the country’s GDP and over 45 percent of the country’s employment. Tajikistan is one of the world’s top exporters of raw cotton. In 2022, […]
Via the Wall Street Journal, a report on Electronic Arts’ use of new tech to scan photos for its videogame after securing players’ likeness rights for the first time A character artist works on the new ‘EA Sports College Football 25.’ PHOTO: EA SPORTS It has been over a decade since Electronic Arts released a college football videogame. To […]
Via MIT’s Technology Review, a report on how how AI-powered NPCs that don’t need a script could make games—and other worlds—deeply immersiv First, a confession. I only got into playing video games a little over a year ago (I know, I know). A Christmas gift of an Xbox Series S “for the kids” dragged me—pretty easily, […]
Via Sports Business Journal, a look at how Gym Class VR is building on its popularity with the addition of NBA logos and venues: The mid-range jumper may be a lost art in the NBA game, but I sank one from just inside the free-throw line at the TD Garden, as the PA announcer called out the basket. […]
Via Grist, a report on the math behind putting solar on your roof, which indicates that waiting until you need to re-roof is usually the best course of action: Not too long ago, Bryan and Summer Stubblefield wanted to outfit their California home with solar panels. They were considering an electric vehicle, and powering it with the sun […]
Via Zawya, a report on Dubai Airport’s plans to launch the world’s largest airport solar panel installation: Dubai Airports announced a landmark collaboration with Etihad Clean Energy Development Company, a wholly-owned subsidiary of DEWA, to launch the world’s largest rooftop solar panel installation project at an airport. The announcement was made in the presence of […]
Via Anthropocene Magazine, a report on a new study finds that rooftop agriculture yields greater economic benefits, whereas rooftop solar wins on greenhouse gas emissions: A carefully calibrated combination of rooftop gardens and solar panels could meet 15% of a city’s vegetable needs and provide 5% of its electricity on average, according to a new China-wide […]
Via Forbes, a look at how Markel’s Chief executive Thomas Gayner has quietly turned insurer Markel into a mini-conglomerate. Meet Richmond’s answer to the Oracle of Omaha: Thomas Gayner gets a kick out of telling the story. It was 1983. He had just graduated from the University of Virginia with a plan to return home to Salem, […]
Via The Economist, a look at a firm which many consider as technology’s Berkshire Hathaway: For older startups these are tough times. The weak recent stockmarket debuts of Arm, a British chipmaker, Instacart, a grocery-delivery group, and Klaviyo, a software firm, have dampened enthusiasm for initial public offerings. Venture capital (vc) has dried up. Data […]
Via Bloomberg, interesting commentary on how many – such as crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried couldn’t survive the comparison – but others who actually invest somewhat like the Berkshire Hathaway chairman fare better: A couple of months ago, crypto billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried was peering out from the cover of Fortune magazine above the words “The Next Warren Buffett?” Now he’s at […]
Via Wired, a report on how the internet of things turned every device in your house into a smart something. Now it’s coming for nature—to track forest fires and tree health or to listen out for threatened animals. You are in a lush forest. Sunlight filters through the bright green canopy, casting dappled shadows on the […]
Via BBC, a look at how conservationists are turning to AI in their battle to save red squirrels: An artificial intelligence (AI) tool which has been trained to tell the difference between grey and red squirrels could be “an absolute game changer”, conservationists say. The system, called Squirrel Agent, has been trained on thousands of […]
Via Wired, a report on Swarovski Optik’s new AX Visio binoculars which use image-recognition algorithms and GPS data to discern the species of whatever bird you point them at. And they work anywhere in the world. Photo-Illustration: Ali Cherkis; Getty Images The Austrian company Swarovski Optik has been innovating in long-range optical instruments for 75 years. […]