New Voice

There are reams of words. Whole spillages of words delivered into the ether of the internet acknowledging the fear of humanity at our capacity to wreak lasting damage on our society. Just read the pages of the climate project or the climate count down. Whole earthquakes of tiny words. Such is the embrace of the people and the fear. Bill Bryson, in his revelatory work of simple genius – A Short History of Nearly Everything – discusses at length the shocking power of the earth to unleash damage on the surface of the planet. In fact it incorporates a number of chapters. There is as seriousness to that power. I think that it is always present, and can never be fundamentally shifted. Utilised, though, is another thing entirely. (continue reading…)

You might recall from a while back my look at some of the new technologies being introduced to tackle the global issue of climate change. Maintaining that focus I thought I would comment on the continued expansion of biofuels, of which so many potential sources have be found that it would take a veritable ocean of web space to begin to mumble around the fringes of this tumultuous field.  Needless to say, one specific element has piqued my interest.  A number of years ago (the eighties, a shockingly interesting time for novel scientific endeavour with sadly many of the original ideas produced petering out by the end of the decade), some scientists noted that algae (an awful looking autotroph, most of us would know them as seaweed) was a possible candidate for renewable energy given its photosynthetic machinery, and its tough and resilient nature.  How they could operate it as an energy source was derived from the fact that algae produces oil, during its processes, which, not being fossilized, is clean of carbon. But, as was the way of the period, this theorizing failed to gain enough credence and by the end of the decade with little material investment the energy source failed to acquire backing.  As time passed and the requirement for alternative energies became notably stronger and all potential biofuel sources received further attention, it seems that algae was viewed as too difficult, and expensive, to develop. Until some far-reaching science was manufactured that changed its potential. (continue reading…)

Nuclear proliferation is the hottest of topics, and as I discussed a few weeks ago, the foundation is now available for a comprehensive treaty to begin to deal with this thorny issue. The international community (at least those seeking stable society) can commit to the deceleration of nuclear production and manufacture a way forward for a world still cognisant of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The United States is at the very centre of any progress that can be made, not least because they control the vast majority of active nuclear warheads, but also given they are thus far the only nation to have made use of the weaponry: the Soviet Union’s feint in 1962 being an alarming follow up. (continue reading…)

Weeks have passed since the discovery of the fossil Ida was made public; and the world has moved with the media scramble for her justification as the missing link in primate evolutionary history. Countless pages have be addressed with supposition regarding the relevance of the link and the possibilities that it is a fundamental confirmation of evolution; a question I would consistently consider, if I did not already feel that evolution does not require any further confirmation. But having said that, science is continuously strengthened by discovery, and is thus open to any amendments that can be made by novel scientific endeavour. (continue reading…)

The shockwaves from the North Korean nuclear weapon test have begun to recede, yet the issue of a response likely fills the halls of global power. What to do when a rogue state chimes an international warning bell and effectively draws a shot across the proverbial bow of the United States? Surely the answer is in nuclear disarmament. (continue reading…)

At the risk of stating the obvious – Ireland is an island. Sat flush in the north Atlantic this country exists in a swirl of oceanic force which pummels our shores and floods our rivers. With our island’s isolated status comes the fog of miserable low pressured weather patterns, which haunt our winters and, often, our summers. This low pressure coincides with the constant drift of warm water from the Gulf Stream to impact on our island in exponential showerings of bursting wind and wave. (continue reading…)

To my mind, Biomass has long been hailed as a standard bearer for the renewable energy world. Allowing the comprehensive destruction of dead materials with an output made up of distributable energy, its use in our high-energy-demand world is both logical and consistent – and indeed comprehensive. Though not specifically a carbon free scheme (roughly one half of the burnt matter contains carbon) it sits well as a renewable energy source. Its problems, as is irritatingly the case with so many renewables, lies in the amount of energy needed to complete the manufacturing process: in the case of Biomass – far too much to warrant significant use. Be that as it may, in a world floundering in the impact of too much carbon, technology is needed to find alternatives to the burning of fossil fuels, and hopefully, to burn a source clean and free of pollutants. A goal I feel is vitally important over the next twenty years. (continue reading…)

Seated at my desk in the cold of an Irish May. My thoughts forever dwell on our mercurial weather. I am the average soul in that fashion, blunderingly confused by the masses of wintry air, falling endlessly at my window. It makes no difference what time it is; nor what window I peer through, for that matter. Always the rain. Living in Ireland brings that gloomy weather system as often and assuredly as it issues tall pints resting on a bar top, or clasping hands pinching a morning breakfast roll. Recent years have proved even more waterful: the summers of 2007 and 2008 were a period of record rainfall. Whole months whispered by in a cloudy haze, scatterings of tight sunshine piercing mournful days for bare minutes at a time. Thus is the sprawling weather of the new globe. (continue reading…)